Note: I will pick the winners from the August challenge this weekend.
Grow Your Fund is a daily post that gives you a chance to win prizes by checking in on all the various challenges you are participating in. You can choose to participate in one, two or even all of the challenges giving you even more opportunities to Grow Your Fund!
The Challenges
No Dining Out: The concept is simple, lower your family’s dining out bill and add the money you save to your fund.
Minniemizing for the Mouse: Get in shape for your trip to Disney by walking at least 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week. The average person walks 8 or more miles a day at Disney World. Your feet will thank you!
Not going to Disney? Don’t worry. You can participate too. Just commit to working out at least 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week!
Budget Challenge: Can your family stay on budget this month for groceries, entertainment, dining, etc? Do you think you could even challenge yourself not to spend a dime 5 days this month? Be sure to report on your spending vs your budget every day. The goal is to be able to add the extra money saved at the end of the month to your fund!
*If you haven’t set a budget yet, you might want to check out this post.
Decluttering Challenge: Is your stuff starting to overtake your house? Do you feel like your kids room is full of too much junk and not enough fun? If so, I challenge you to find a new home for just 25 items a day for the next 30 days. This could be 25 articles of clothing, 25 books you no longer read, 25 toys your kids ignore. Have a box for items to donations, a box for items to sell and throw the rest away! At the end of the challenge, have a yard sale and add the earnings to your fund!
The prizes
At the end of each month, I will pick FOUR winners who will each receive $25 to add to their fund. Look for the winners to be announced on the 3rd of each month.
How to enter
Leave a comment with the title of the challenges it is for. You can participate in one, two, three or even all four challenges. There will be one winner per challenge, and winners can win multiple times! It’s all done by using Random.org, so if your number comes up and you are eligible, you win! In order to be eligible to win, you must actively participate in the challenge for at least FIVE calendar days.
Click below for even more details on each challenge…
No Dining
- Take a look at your current dining out budget. How much did you spend last month going out to eat? That is money that could have gone into your fund instead! Try cutting your out to eat costs this month and adding the difference to your fund.
- Set a weekly dining out budget, if you resist going out to eat, add that amount to your fund instead.
- If you were seriously about to go out to eat (like had your coat on and was going out the door or pulled into the drive thru and then pulled back out), add the amount you would have spent to your fund.
- Going out to eat and using a coupon or paying with a gift card? You could add that amount to your fund too. For example… if you had a $25 gift card to Cracker Barrel and you used it, you could take $25 cash out of your budget and add it to the fund. Or if you used a $10 coupon, you could take $10 cash out of the budget and add it to the fund.
- You must challenge yourself. Try to spend less than you spend now. If you don’t go out to eat at all, challenge yourself to try new meals this month. As long as you are challenging yourself when it comes to your family’s eating habits, you can participate!
- You are allowed 1 freebie meal that you don’t have to count or report back to us about. Please report on everything else though so we can encourage and support one another!
- Free meals do not count against you. This is a challenge to spend less money going out to eat than you usually spend. If someone else is paying for the meal or you have a coupon to make it free, great!
- At the end of the month, you will need to comment on the very last post to be entered to win. I will choose the winner from that post and verify that you have commented on at least 5 days worth of posts. The comments must of occurred on 5 DIFFERENT days. Meaning if on the 30th, you commented on that post and then went back and commented on 4 days worth of posts, you would be disqualified. You must comment on 5 different posts on 5 different days.
Minniemizing for the Mouse
- I need to get fit for the mouse. My feet hurt so bad from all that walking and for once I’d love to experience Disney without being in pain. We are going in November, so I am hoping to make a big lifestyle change between now and then. I can’t do it alone and so I need the help from all of you!
- Check in each day and report on your progress. The goal is to exercise for at least 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week. For those of us going to Disney, walking for those 20 minutes is a great way to not only get in shape, but prepare our feet.
- It really doesn’t matter what you do as long as you are moving!
- At the end of the month, you will need to comment on the very last post to be entered to win. I will choose the winner from that post and verify that you have commented on at least 5 days worth of posts. The comments must of occurred on 5 DIFFERENT days. Meaning if on the 30th, you commented on that post and then went back and commented on 4 days worth of posts, you would be disqualified. You must comment on 5 different posts on 5 different days.
Budget Challenge
- Everyone needs a budget. Budgets will help you to be in control of your money without your money being in control of you. You dictate where your money goes and how it is spent.
- Don’t have a budget? I’ve written a few articles that should help you set one… How to Set a Budget and How to Set a Grocery Budget. You’ll find even more helpful advice under Getting Started Couponing and Your Fund.
- Each day, check in and let us know how much you spent the day before and if you stayed under budget or not. We aren’t here to critique your budget (unless you ask!), but we are here to support you in staying on track!
- Also feel free to include bargain brags. Did you find a great deal or do something creative to save money, be sure to share it with all of us!
- At the end of the month, you will need to comment on the very last post to be entered to win. I will choose the winner from that post and verify that you have commented on at least 5 days worth of posts. The comments must of occurred on 5 DIFFERENT days. Meaning if on the 30th, you commented on that post and then went back and commented on 4 days worth of posts, you would be disqualified. You must comment on 5 different posts on 5 different days.
Decluttering Challenge
- It doesn’t take long for the stuff to start taking over your home. The kids rooms start overflowing with broken, neglected and just plain weird no idea where they came from toys. Your stockpile starts to spread from the kitchen, to the hall, to your bathtub. You start finding that the home for more and more items is the middle of your living room floor. Etc!
- It can be overwhelming to take on the task of decluttering your home, but the end rewards are so worth the effort. To make the process easy, I challenge you to find just 25 items every day to find a new home for. Get a box labeled donations, one labeled to sell, and one for trash. Go through 25 items a day and either put it in one of the 3 boxes or find a new permanent place for it.
- At the end of 30 days, you will have an organized home and you can have a yard sale to add more money to your fund!
- Be sure to post every day that you have gone through your 25 items and found a new home for them. Don’t just put them back where they don’t belong.
- At the end of the month, you will need to comment on the very last post to be entered to win. I will choose the winner from that post and verify that you have commented on at least 5 days worth of posts. The comments must of occurred on 5 DIFFERENT days. Meaning if on the 30th, you commented on that post and then went back and commented on 4 days worth of posts, you would be disqualified. You must comment on 5 different posts on 5 different days.
Good luck!
Crystal says
I have been following your site for a couple months…Lots of great info….My goal was to start the challenge for the first time this September, not really sure why I didn’t start sooner, but better late than never. We are challenging ourselves to pay off our debt first and my 11 yr old son needs braces that cost 5k.
Dinning out: splurged for Dairy Queen, spent 12 bucks on 3 blizzards, yikes, desided we are going to buy a blinder and try to make our own.
Exercise: helped my son walk our 3 little daschaunds
Budget: we came up with a plan and wrote it all out in a spiral notebook, we are going to track our expensives for everyday.
Decluttering: started going through the closet lastnight and have a small pile of “stuff” to put on craigslist tonight.
Renee says
no dining out…doing well so far for September :) We had leftovers tonight.
budget…no money spent in September so far!
decluttering…nothing so far but planning a garage sale in September…my garage is full!
minniemiing…shooting for 5 pounds in September!
Cathie says
Minnimize: walked 25 minutes tonight
No Dining Out: packed breakfast and lunch for me today. we ate a variety of leftovers tonight.
Declutter: Cleaned under the bathroom sink. Moved open bottles up front and full ones to the back. Now I can see what I have.
Kymm says
No dining- had leftover ribs and sweet potato fries.
Budget- just picked up more babysitting gigs for sept.I keep telling myself- this gig will pay for dinner at arist point this gig will pay for that…
Declutter- threw out old mail and paid bills.
Minimize- must get on it! Need to start power walking the neighborhood. We are a month and a half away from d- day!
Hillary Wallace says
No Dining Out: stayed in all day, enjoyed some leftovers and some cereal (preggo craving!)
Minniemizing: cleaned my kiddo’s room and organized more baby stuff. Doesn’t sound like much, but it was a lot for me (sore back and big belly!)
Decluttering: I am *so* proud of myself (and my kiddo) for yesterday’s decluttering!! We went through all of his toys and took out anything under aged (put into a box for baby #2 when he’s a little bigger!), organized all his toys into distinct tubs/boxes, set up his train track set so he can actually play with it, and threw out anything that was broken/trash! His room looks amazing!!
Budget: didn’t go out, didn’t spend…good day :-)
Melanie says
Minniemize – did 2.5 miles on the treadmill, plus some upper arm exercises and push ups.
No Dining out – we’re having leftovers tonight.
Budget – spent $0 today.
Declutter – organized my coupon binder. :o)
RK says
We already don’t eat out, and I don’t think we will have a real budget for another couple of months. So I will focus on the Minniemizing and Decluttering challenges this month. In this post, I will set goals for the month.
Minnie: Get to my current goal weight of 122. I have not been this low since I was pregnant, so it will be nice to see that number again after so long. This will require losing about 3 pounds, so it shouldn’t be too hard, but I’m trying to keep my goals very attainable for now. I will report on both eating and exercise progress during the month. I plan to exercise three times a week and control my eating better.
Declutter: I really need to work on this. 25 items a day is just too much for me, though, as I currently work full-time (but not next month, yay!). So my goal will be much less ambitious … I will put 5 things away in their place every night, PLUS at least as many things as I have introduced into the house. (For example, if I buy three things, I must put away three things (preferably those three) plus five more.) The idea is to gain 5 on my clutter every night. Let’s see how it goes!
Jennifer says
Budget – save money with coupons!
Dining – no eating out.
Minniemize – I’ve lost 2 lbs since Monday!
Beth Anne says
No Eating Out – We have been eating all our meals at home with food from our stockpile. We are also going to Orlando for labor day weekend and are going to be bringing food with us so we don’t have to eat out as much and save money on the outrageous park prices!
Minimizing – I went swimming and played tennis this morning
Budget – I’m hoping that my sister and i find jobs in September and we can get my mom on track for Budgeting our money better.
Holly M says
This is my first time starting this monthly challenge! :)
NDO – Cooked in last night for dinner. Thought about taking the kids out for lunch before children’s museum, but had leftovers instead! Dinner will be cooked tonight, too.
Minimizing – I went for a 30 minute walk yesterday, and will do Wii fit today for at least 20 minutes.
Decluttering – this afternoon, I am planning on organizing my homeschool room. Lots of decluttering in there today!
Budget – Starting a monthly budget today! My husband is in school, so last month saw a lot of expenses for school related stuff (veterinary school is so not cheap!). This month should be so much better.
Can’t wait to see how we are at the end of this month! :)
Mindy says
Minimizing-did 45 minutes of shoulders and arms weight training and am almost done with my 30 minutes on the elliptical as we speak!
Budget-I don’t plan on spending any money today, but my hubby is golfing 18 holes today. Hopefully the friend who invited him will be paying though :)
Amy W says
No dining out:
No dining out yesterday! Leftover pizza for lunch, and I made chicken caesar wraps for supper after a REALLY long meeting. They turned out pretty good! :)
Minniemizing:
Stayed under calorie budget yesterday.
Decluttering:
Our comforter had started coming apart along several seams (it was really expensive and we got it 2 years ago!!!), so I fixed all of that. It decluttered my to-do-list if nothing else :) Also did one load of laundry.
Budget:
Went a little over in August. Here’s hoping we do well in September! :)
Sharon says
NDO: No dining out today! On the menu for tonight is Moroccan Chicken Pie (it’s a new recipe – but hubby sounded willing to try!)
MM: Walked a mile this morning
B: Have to find $300 somewhere to pay all the “extra” this month – but starting to take piano students, so that should help!
DC: Planning a garage sale in a month, so LOTS of this going on! I’ve finally purged all the 2t’s out of my daughter’s wardrobe since she is very convincingly wearing a 3t now.
lisa says
I am subscribing, i am taking on your challange, i will post later today on how today went. we pend way too much on out to eat and its time to crack down. Thanks for the challange!!
lisa says
I forgot, we are having a rummage sale next week end so i will be decluttering for the rummage also.
Beth says
No dining out- had dinner at home-elk steak and noodles but did pay for two of the four kids to have lunch at school
Decluttering- gave a bunch of magazines to a friend.
Vickie Jones says
Budget – Doing good 1/2 way to payday, working on other ways to cut
Minimize – Need to get a pedimoter and see how far I’m walking each day with school, I say it’s 2-3 miles, DH says it’s less then 2, Did some just dance last night and my arms about died!
Heather H says
No dining out for us, I even made yummy bread!
Jennifer says
NDO-havent dined out in about 2.5 weeks…..doing our last minute saving for our Disney trip on MONDAY!!! YAY!!!!
minnemizing-totally taking advantage of this WONDERFUL weather….out walking around the neighborhood with my daughter, and running around and playing ike fools in the backyard!!!!
Declulttering-I cleaned out our magazine piles…..and I got rid of a BUNCH of mags……mostly my hubby……it felt sooo good to get them gone!!!
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
How exciting!!
CJ says
No dining- No eating out for us. I laid out ribeyes, for out on the grill tonight with bakd potatoes and Salad (we are leaving for Branson tomorrow and I am trying not to dirty many dishes).
Minniemize- Walking everyday, and portion control. I think I am going to have to give up soda again for a little while.
Budget- Haven’t been spending any extra, since we are taking advantage of the long weekend and going to Branson.
Alison says
No Dining Out – Made several bigger meals at home and took the leftovers for lunch. These were also meals the kids loved and sent leftovers in their lunches instead of “boring” sandwiches.
Minniemizing for the Mouse: Picked pears one day. Spent two days canning the pears plus tomatoes. Constant activity to get it all done!
Budget Challenge – This week was with the kids. There is something that they both want. Priced the items. Working on chores and how we need to save to be able to purchase the item.
Decluttering Challenge – Cleaned off the dining room table with a goal NOT to let papers be placed there again.
Julie H says
No Dining Out – Hubby and I went out to Smashburger for dinner while Miss was at Awana. It’s nice to have an hour kid-free, without paying for a sitter. We don’t get sitters often so having any time off is really nice.
Budget – No household money spent yesterday
Decluttering – Went through some mail and shredded/recycled.
Katie says
I am very excited to get back on board this month. It was kind of a free for all this summer and now we need to get back on track.
No dining-I am going to use my freebie right out of the gate, tonight is a fundraiser for my little girls school. I did get online and got a coupon for a free appetizer though. We eat out quite a bit so my goal is to cut down and stay within our grocery/food budget of $100 a week.
Minniemizing for the mouse- I have 22 more pounds to lose before I book our spring break vacation. I have lost 8 so far. I am walking 5 miles a day and biking 9 (5 days a week). School just started for me and my little girl starts soccer and ballet next week so I have to work on staying on track with this. I am determined to do it though.
Budget Challenge- We set up a budget for the month (for the first time since May) and are saving every receipt (my hubby thinks this is annoying) to make sure we stay on track. We don’t usually have money left over from the budget as it is pretty structured and tight, so the goal is just to stick to it and grow our savings. I have Disney almost paid for anyway with all the great tips from this site.
De-cluttering challenge- We are having a yard sale next weekend (was supposed to be this weekend but I didn’t get it in the paper in time, I figured it would be worth it to wait). I have done really well with de-cluttering, but have more work to do. We are also clearing out 2 grandparents houses (one of which was a family home with over 100 years worth of stuff in it, we are living here now so we are ready for a good clearing out). Today I started pulling out some clothes from my kiddos closet/dresser she started out the summer at one size but finally moved up, she has been this size for a couple of years so we had lots of shorts, shirts, and dresses to pull out. This along with the shoes that she has outgrown equaled 35 items!! Easy and painless so far!
Good luck everyone!!
Angela N says
No dining – Made some hamburger helper last night. I just needed to use it up and vow never to buy it again!
Declutter – Finished sorting boys clothes last night for consignment and garage sale. Priced other stuff for garage sale.
Budget – So excited that I sold my second item on ebay but, this time I actually got paid whereas last time the person never paid. The item I sold was free to me so it was pure profit:). Excited to see what the new month brings.
Tamara says
No Dining out: Hubby came home yesterday and wanted to eat out, no talking him out of it. So we shared a meal and the kids shared a meal with drink $27.00 total. I was not happy about the money spent but another month starts today!
Minnimizing: Did not do anything toward this goal yesterday
Budgeting: Have high hopes for the new month! Working some OT this weekend so that should help! Having to buy camping stuff for the scouts so maybe it wont kill the budget.
Decluttering: This was a great thing for my family last month! I hope that it only proves to be better this month!
Denise says
No Dining Out: leftover for lunch. Cereal from home for breakfast
Minniemizing for the Mouse: treadmill – 30 minutes
Budget Challenge: I spent $20.07 OOP at Target but get back 1) $5.00 Target g/c 2) (TWO) &5.00 Disney Visa g/c+plus catalina for free photobook retail value $29.99….which means I got everything for Free
8 boxes of Nutri-Grain bars
8 Trail Size Cascade
5 Fabreeze items
1 box 6 Danimals yogurt smoothies
1 Backpack
Decluttering Challenge: I now have enough items to make use of a stockpile shelf area in the house. So I need to delcutter and make room for such a handy useful item
MM says
NDO- nothing yesterday, had hot dogs, corn on the cob, and creamy garlic shells (knorr pasta sides)
MtM- coached volleyball yesterday, picked MORE potatoes after practice and dinner…just two more rows to pick
Budget- spent a little more than i hoped. $1.00 at the drugstores, $45 at grocery store, $108 at walmart…needed a lot of things since we really haven’t shopped in a couple of months (like realized that our little one got into a “big” bed and only had one set of sheets…OOPS!) so we got a lot of home stuff and stuff for our farm.
declutter- cleaned off the counters in our kitchen (it’s a huge bar area and it’s amazing how easily it gets cluttered if i’m constantly not straightening it up)
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
You didn’t do bad on your budget for buying sheets and such! :)
Katie says
No Dining Out: We had four cheese lasagna for dinner. Pizza for lunch.
Declutter: We got everything in my stockpile of school supplies ready for my girl to come down and pick what she needed.
Minniemize: When I dropped off my daughter for orientation, I went to the park and jogged!
Budget: I went to Borders and got some amazing newer books for like $2.00 each! That’s cheaper than my local Half Price Books! We also refilled a balloon that we got at Party City. They only charge you .69 cents for a refill and they were really nice about it to!
I can’t wait to see how today goes. Our daughter’s school was pushed back 3 weeks so I’m trying to think of ways to keep her entertained on a budget. She wants to go back so bad!!
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
Your food sounds yummy!
Lois says
No Dining Out: I made a really good egg/bean frittata recipe I found on-line for dinner, along with a salad. No dining out for us.
Minniemize: I was on my feet all day long, but didn’t actually make it around the block. :-) I did give a friend’s daughter a piggy back ride from school to the car though, does that count. She blew out her flip flop and the sidewalk and street were too hot to walk on.
DeClutter. I moved everything from one side of the garage to the other so we could pull out the trailer for camping (but we have to move it all back, so I guess it doesn’t count. LOL
Lois says
Budget: I have to share this. Hubster was running out of deodorant (I stockpile then forget for a while). He was mad that I didn’t get any on my trip on Tuesday, but I was waiting for the ads to come out. On Wednesday they were running a P&G promo, buy 4 get $4 off. I stacked the coupons and check this out: 2 men’s bodywash, 2 deodorant for him, 2 deodorant for me and 2 Crest prohealth rinse: $5.12. How’s that for budgeting. I was so excited. i had the P&G MFQ’s from Aug and Sep, so I used the best ones.
Julie H says
Good job! Yeah, I’ve had hubby buy something and then a few days later it goes on sale and has coupons and I just tell him “we could have saved X on that if you’d waited a few days for me to go shopping”. Oh well. Good for you!
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
That’s awesome!! :)
Tammie W says
no dining out-went to Mcd’s for playgroup really fun used coupons and spent $11 then icecream later after intense walk for hubby and kids $2 bad news another playgroup tonight at burger king but I got burger king coupons in the mail yesterday shouldn’t be bad
minniemize-yesterday did jillian michaels workout and then walked the park and this huge hill today today on break
budget-nothing spent yesterday except mcd’s