Happy Halloween! Have any fun or scary plans tonight? Halloween isn’t really my thing. Once I got too old to go trick or treating, it just lost its appeal. Also, I’m not really into being scared.
Do you know what is scary?
How badly I failed this month with my spending and my goals!
Let’s review.
October Goals:
- Go out to restaurants only once a week FAIL. I was good the first two weeks, then my mom came for a visit and it all went down hill from there.
- Practice Spanish, Portuguese and French on Duolingo.com 5x per week. FAIL. Same reason as above. I also realized studying three languages at the same time isn’t a good idea?
- Finish one book. Success! I read a co-workers book (how cool is that?!) and I’m in the middle of two others. I’m all over the place.
- Write a guest post Success! Check it out
- Confirm three more people for my Dear Debt Letters project Success! I’ve published two letters this month by Girl Meets Debt and Erin! I confirmed two others as well. Are you interested in participating?
- Finish recording a song with my partner (he’s a musician, I sing) FAIL. My boyfriend got a sudden increase in work and we have opposite schedules.
But I did do a little better with my….
Goals for the rest of the year:
- Make my first $1 from my blog – possibly! I’m going to give this freelance writing thing a go and have someone interested. I’ll let you know how it works out. Have you seen my Hire me page? Trying to hustle and pay those loans, you know.
- Grow Dear Debt Letter project – in progress. I am going to start spamming Craigslist looking for many different voices and perspectives for this series.
- Side hustle enough so that I can continue paying $1,500 per month towards debt Success + Fail. I worked three out of the 4 weekends this month. But I overspent and “only” dropped $1200 towards my debt.
- Learn how to drive stick shift FAIL – opposite schedules
My spending was just awful this month. Between my birthday, my mom visiting and me feeling celebratory, I just had a little too much fun. The worst of it is, Ryan and I recently wanted to go out. Knowing that we had already been bad, we decided to go somewhere with a coupon during happy hour. AND WE STILL MAGICALLY SPENT $50!!!
I couldn’t believe it. I left there thinking, how is this even possible? It was my bad, because it was a “small plates” restaurant. Don’t go to a small plates restaurant if your ass is hungry! Lesson learned. That was just so stupid. Look at the prices and don’t pretend that you don’t care!
Anyway, enough with the bad, on to the good!
- I paid off $1,200 in debt, which leaves me with $45,668.46 in student loans. $8,290.84 of which is my undergrad loan, and $37,377.62 is my graduate loan. I am really eager to get under 40k! I’m hoping early 2014 I will see that, if not earlier if my income significantly increases.
- Erin’s Dear Debt letter was featured in The Globe and Mail. I got an instant surge of traffic that made me think something was wrong with my site.
- I started the Bloggers Helping Bloggers program as a mentee. My mentor is Lazy Man and Money and he’s a pretty cool cat. I am excited to learn and grow as a blogger.
- Freelance writing – writing my first post this week and we’ll see how it goes. I’m really excited about getting started on this.
- Today I received an email from a writer at Woman’s World magazine who found my article on How to Become a Brand Ambassador. She wanted to ask me a few questions and said she will use the info in an article. I’ll probably get two sentences of action, but it’s still cool. The publishing world is nuts, so it will most likely be printed in January.
- I worked three out of four weekends. One for my real job, one as a brand ambassador, and I worked two Halloween parties last weekend; one on my birthday and then one on Saturday. I am NOT working this weekend. My sweetie is taking me on a belated birthday surprise adventure and I can’t wait.
So yeah, this month’s spending was hella scary, but lots of good things happened as well. I am reining it in, and focusing on making things happen, making myself happy and living a full, frugal, fantastic adventure-filled life.
How was your month?
- Talking About Money and Mental Health - September 12, 2022
- Dear Debt, We’re Better Apart - June 27, 2022
- Announcing The Mental Health and Wealth Summit - May 4, 2021
24 comments
I find that I spend more at tapas restaurants than anywhere else. The small plates run $8/9 a piece and you need at least 3 to make a meal. I love to sample, but it’s not always a great financial option.
I really hope you get some responses on craigslist for dear debt letters. I think it’d be fun to get the varied perspectives.
Ugh, never again with the tapas! I really hope to get some responses from CL about the project. Feeling inspired for the new month!
“Don’t go to a small plates restaurant if your ass is hungry!” – LOL!! I for sure have learned the value of pre-eating/pre-drinking, especially when it comes to social gatherings and saving money. You had a crazy productive month, and sounds like you’ll have an equally productive rest of the year! Best wishes with your goal – going to check out Duolingo, if we hopefully make the South American honeymoon happen, I need to get crackin’ with practicing Spanish!
Haha glad you found that funny. The bill was so not funny! Definitely use Duolingo to practicar espanol! I recommend going to Buenos Aires and Rio for honeymoon!
Yaaaaaaaayyyyy I’m so excited for you about the freelance gig M! 😀 I’m hoping to get under the $40k mark by end of this year too but that’s gonna be a challenge with Christmas around the corner. Either way, I think you and I are killing those pesky student loans 🙂
You are so close, I know you’ll do it! You are my motivation, girl.
I hear ya on the crazy spending! However, you did awesome by paying $1200 on your debts! Keep up the great work! 🙂
Thanks, Morgaine!
This is a great roundup of your goals. I think you will definitely make your first dollar blogging, probably a lot more if you stick with it. I didn’t make a dime my first seven months, but I stuck with and before you know it I’m making enough to fund two writers a week! I’m definitely not making a TON of money, but it’s been a nice little side income comparable to working a part-time job. It’s great you got that surge of traffic, too. I remember when a big blog mentioned me in their roundup and there was this big spike one day. It’s amazing how much a mention on the right site can give you an immediate surge of traffic.
Hey if you can hire people, you are doing good! Congrats. You are an inspiration. It is really amazing how one nice mention can do wonders for your traffic. The key is to try and sustain it, which has been hard.
Despite the fails, I think you had a pretty kick ass month! Lots of hustling and getting featured in print? I say it’s a win 🙂
Have a wonderful November!
Yes! And a big part of that win was your letter, my dear!
A little splurge isn’t that bad if you still managed to pay $1200 to your debt! 🙂 great job!! Love your blog!
That’s how I feel….if I’m spending so much on debt, some of my splurges are ok. But I need to be really careful with that line of thinking to stay focused!
While there were fails, there were successes too so that should inspire you to keep at it. You are doing a great job. Besides, if I was in your shoes and my mom visited, I wouldn’t mind failing at that particular goal. Anyway, here’s wishing you all the best in achieving more success with the rest of your goals.
Thanks so much, Jen! I am inspired to do better this month for sure.
I always spend more when I got to small plate restaurants, unless I’m not that hungry…which is like never. I’m with you on the spending this past month. With fincon, buying my trip to iceland, and freelance work being slow I need to be a hermit for the next couple months. That’s great you saw a surge in traffic and the fact that your article got noticed. You’ll find those writing gigs in no time! Good luck this month!
Paying off $1200 towards your student loans is awesome! Keep up the good work 🙂
I’d say still being able to put $1,200 toward debt is a big win! I hope you have fun on your birthday surprise adventure. Learning one language can be difficult – I don’t think I could do three! I tried learning Spanish with Duolingo but I kind of lost interest after a week. I need to revisit that. Awesome job getting a freelancing gig! Driving stick shift isn’t too horrible – my dad taught me a while ago and I never really used it as his car was the only manual we had.
Thanks for commenting E.M. and for the encouragement. I am very excited about progressing further and learning new things.
You are doing great. At least you know what have you done well and in what you need to work on. I also overspent last month. My mother-in-law was visiting us. Hope next month will be good.
Thanks for stopping by, Jon! Visits are hard, but worth it.
I am so happy for you, M! $45k in student loan debt does not sound fun at all, it hurts to read these numbers, and I really hope that freelance writing will help you get rid of that debt much faster! You can do it! With your determination you’ll be debt free in no time, I just know it! Best of luck writing your first freelance article and well done on throwing $1200 towards your debt, that’s great!
That’s the hope. I want to build my side hustles up, so I can eliminate those pesky loans asap.