Saving: Feast before the famine

In a culture that thrives on immediate gratification, how is a girl living in a material world supposed to forgo that dress that would be so perfect for the girls' night out next weekend or pass up a great deal for a weekend in Vegas?

This is the plight of so many. While we have compassion for those without, it is hard to give up on the endless pleasures and sparkly doo-dads available for us right this minute. Yet give them up I must. Like I said in an earlier post, saving time is going to begin shortly. I will be trying a $30/week challenge in November (excluding Christmas gifts, rent, gas, car insurance, phone bill, and utilities). This will mean any and all meals as well as anything I simply want will have to be taken out of that $30 per week.

In 2012, I will be saving up to have $5000 put aside by the end of the year. Don't ask me how this will take place. Perhaps I'm mad to even think I'd be capable of it, but I have very little in savings (under $1000), and I am growing older. I want to have a retirement, and I want to be able to take care of any emergencies that may come up.

For the rest of this month, though, I am without rules. Today I found a pair of black boots at DSW for around $100 that I absolutely needed to have. The fact is, a huge portion of my wardrobe requires black boots. I'm not sure how it got this way, but I've been unable to wear quite a few pieces for a while. I made use of my $5 DSW voucher, but as I am writing this, it pains me to admit that I had forgotten that I still had a little money left on a gift card that I didn't use. Fooey.

I do not intend to use up the rest of this paycheck and a bit of the next one before November begins, but I am realizing that there are quite a few things that I need and want that cannot be covered by a mere $30/week.

This is going to be an agonizing journey to building up a savings. Please bear with me through my upcoming whininess, my rants, and perhaps my incomprehensible ramblings that I'm sure will occur due to lack of Starbucks.

Your material girl,

~K