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!
AHHHH! I’m LATE–I thought there were only 30 days in Aug for some reason! How stupid of me…Better late than never!
Budget–went grocery shopping but did a great job saving $$, this trip will last us a few weeks, and we kept it under $100
Minniemize–6 mile run/walk
No Dining Out–Ate at home
Declutter–dug through the garage today, I cleaned a small space out and gave up!
Sorry I posted twice. My first posting didn’t show up immediately and then when I checked several hours later, it was still not showing, so reposted.
I hope I’m not too late – it was a rough night last night!!!
Budget – we did GREAT last month!! Had just over $100 to add to the fund!!!!
Declutter – i can’t believe how muchw e got rid of…and how full my house still is :-)
Minimize – no loss, but no gain either so that’s good. I stopped breast feeding this month, so this has been tough for me!
No dining out – just once this month, and it was planned for and budgeted for so we were good!!
NO DINING-Another good day as DH brought his lunch and I made pasta with fresh tomatoes and basil and garlic bread. Overall I’d say we did very well this month.
Minniemize- Walked 2 1/2 miles with my son and played with him at the playground. Made good food choices. My weakness is still sweets,but I haven’t been eating a lot of them and everything else is healthy and I’ve been working out so very discouraging to see no results. Budge scale budge!
Budget-Like I mentioned in the first day my budget is set up a little differently,but so far we are on track except the day we spent $65 at Target getting misc. things we needed. Even used a $10 off coupon,but that’s how it goes sometimes. Spent $17 at the resale shop yesterday,but was able to get my son a mini Boden sweatshirt,pj’s,gap shirt,an I spy game,and 2 old canning jars for myself which I love and use for organization and decoration. So doing well on my budget for my son’s clothing.
LOVE re-sale/consignment shops!!!! I do a lot of my daughter’s christmas/birthday shopping here too :-)
Dining – had a planned meal out tonight. I allow one night a weeek.
Minimize – Wii fit for 39 mim
Budget – no money spent other than the planned/allowed for dinner. Right on target with budget this month.
No dining out today.
Sent a couple items out today that I sold on Ebay. Now to start sorting through my daughter’s toys since she got new ones for her birthday.
Budget:
Didn’t spend anything yesterday.
Dining out:
None yesterday
Minniemize:
Do chores count? xD
Declutter:
Some cleaning yesterday. Bedroom somehow always gets in disarray :/
Minniemize: Walked 2 miles last night and tonight. I’ve lost 6 pounds this month just by walking. Thanks Kristin for the motivation!
Declutter: Major clean-up project at work. Rounded up all the extra stickers laying around the house and put them in the reward box for potty training!
Declutter isn’t going so well, but we’ve been so busy that I am having a hard time keeping up with everything. Hopefully next month will be a little better as far as decluttering goes.
Minniemize: My little one and I did the bike path, she rode her little bike and I jogged along side. Of course, sometimes I ran ahead and circled back to increase the distance a little bit.
Dining Out: Made a recipe in the crock pot, cheddar chicken, which I found tasty. So no dining out. We’ll be right on track if we don’t go out tomorrow, but tomorrow is a soccer night so there isn’t time to go out. :-)
Budget: didn’t spend anything
Declutter: nothing today
Minnie: ran about 2.5 miles
dining…free kids meals, free tickets, free food vouchers=a free night at the Florence Freedom baseball game tonight
budget…$0 grocery budget spent
exercise…one-hpur exercise boot camp
..
This has been a great challenge for us trying to keep dining out to a minimum
FREE MEAL UNDER “NO DINING OUT” CHALLENGE. USING X2 OF MY QUIZNOS HALF OFF YOU PICK TWOS, MY MOTHER TREATED US OUT FOR THE REST! ONLY $7 & WE BOTH ATE WELL!
Minnie- Didn’t do any exercising today, spent the day…
Decluttering- WOW hubby and I worked our booties off cleaning out his tool closet today. It is also a closet when “hurry they will be here in a minute” stuff ends up. It was a mess! But we did it.
no dining out for us yesterday or today or tomorrow or Friday! Saturday is up in the air.
budget…spent the grocery money on treats for my daughter’s 6th birthday party. We have plenty of groceries to get us through the week anyway. Still under budget, but doubt we stay that way with a birthday party and my college kid daughter coming home for the weekend.
minniemising…still no desire or energy. I’ve got to get this turned around.
decluttering…threw out expired coupons and inserts. Also sorted my daughter’s stickers while decorating party bags for her bday party.
Budget – Right on track with changes for the better coming within the next month. No money spent today.
minniemize- I tried a new yoga dvd today :) 15 min of yoga and a 20 min walk.
NDO – Ate my food from home all day….yogurt, sandwiches and chips for lunches for all, and rice, peas and chicken for dinner
Declutter- completely cleaning out all my kitchen cabinets over the next week….tonight is the first 5! Donating 4 items already.
NDO-Brought breakfast and lunch to work today. Dinner in crockpot.
Budget-No money spent today. Deposited money into vacation funds from rebates from Staples and Office Depot ($30).
No Dining Out: We’ve done pretty well so far, but I haven’t looked to see what we’ve got for dinner yet!
Minniemizing for the Mouse: Kinda failing at this one. Though I did switch to diet pop earlier this month…maybe one day I’ll cut it out entirely!
Budget Challenge: This is about to take an unexpected hit, as our toddlers have started throwing things away…time for a new, more toddler-proof garbage can!
Decluttering Challenge: While not removing a bunch of items, we’re not buying or adding a bunch either, so I feel like that’s a win for this category!
No Dining Out: Hubby bought pizza with a coupon yesterday…it lasted us 3 meals! Not bad for $12 and 3 people!
Budget: still within our new cash budget…got some bills paid a few days early today even!
Minniemizing: after hearing that there was no progression on baby coming (dr appt yesterday morning), we decided to walk as much as we could yesterday. Spent a good hour walking the mall trying to get some contractions going!!
Decluttering: Organized my stockpile, my stock of Christmas/birthday gifts and got my “to-dos” organized for today. Down to the last few now! Going to go organize all my coupons into my brand new sorters!!
Minniemize – did my 2 miles on the treadmill, plus arm exercises and push-ups. UGH!
Budget – totally shot. In the past week my cat was diagnosed with kidney stones and my daughter was hit by a car while biking home from school. My daughter is OK. My cat has cost me $200 in vet bills.
Declutter – had a garage sale last weekend. Only made $80, but it’s better than nothing!
No dining out – no worries there, we have no money, LOL.
Declutter- Does unpacking and doing laundry count? lol. Getting ready to pack away all the summer clothes and get out school clothes but it’s gonna be 90 next week! Thank you summer, for waiting until September to show up! :(
Budget- Well we DID track our expenses while on vacation but could have done a LOT better on spending! We learned a lot for next time! Kids will be back to school soon and we can get back to business!
Minniemize- Walked a TON while on vacation, but still gained 4 lbs- getting back on track TODAY, well yesterday, actually! Went for a walk with the kids to pick blackberries! Next stop, Wii Fit!
No Dining Out- Just got back from vacation so it’s time to get back on track! Hubby and I both packed our lunches today! Good news- when I was eating out (while on vacation) I got some great inspiration for “make your own at home” copycat meals!
Budget: Did my September grocery shopping today (payday). Spent $42 for $120 worth of groceries, and I have $30 left in my budget. I’m planning on finishing my shopping tonight at walmart, where after free gift cards and coupons, I’ll spend about $15 for $100 worth of groceries. Then we’ll be set for the month. I’m putting all the extra money that I didn’t have to spend from savings and/or gift cards into the fund.
Minnimizing: Mostly been dieting, but I have been walking a lot. Today’s exercise will be cleaning the rug with my little carpet cleaner–that is a sweaty job.
No Dining Out: We haven’t eaten out all week! :)
Budget – Checked balance on a two year old Krogers gift card and it had $10 on it! Went shopping at Krogers and got the free body wash and minute maid novelties. Got a $50 Lowes gift card at Krogers and 200 bonus points and had to fill up my gas tank. Saved .30 cents a gallon. Split gas to go to grocery store with my neighbor. Got free gum at CVS and completed a raincheck ECB deal for the G2.
No dining – Have dinner planned. Went to DQ last night for dessert. Had a BOGO blizzard coupon, free treat and free drink all stacked so I paid $2.87 for four desserts.
Declutter – Going through more boys clothes to separate for consignment. Getting packed up for a trip. Want to leave the house clean while I’m gone.
No Dining Out: DD had an out of town appointment with a specialist yesterday. I treated her to a breakfast treat, we packed our lunches, and then I bought a drink for the way home. With coupons, we spent a little under $6.
Minniemize: No walking yesterday but watched what I ate and am down another half a pound since the weekend.
Budget: This has been a tough one this month, with end of summer (our hardest time of the year with the budget) and back-to-school expenses. I hope we’ll be more on track for September.
Decluttering: Cleaned out all of the kids wall files for their new school year papers.
No dining out- ate sloppy joes at home last night. Yay!
No Dining Out: salad from garden for lunch
Minniemizing for the Mouse: walked outside during lunch- perfect weather
Budget Challenge: Saving money thanks to Kristin
Decluttering Challenge: cleaned out laundry room to make room for my stockpile. Started 4th of July weekend. I am finally getting my stockpile
Minniemizing for the Mouse: Did another 30 minutes on the treadmill!
Budget Challenge: Spent no moola for another full day
Declutter Challenge: Went through another 3 storage boxes of kitchen & household items – most of which ended up in the yard sale pile! I now have a huge pile destined to grow my fund at our yard sale!
NDO- Breakfast,lunch and dinner at home!
Minniemizing- p90x
Budget- doing ok!
Declutter- Took the day off to enjoy the silence!
No Dining Out – Ate breakfast at home. Having leftovers for lunch. Going to cook something for dinner, just not sure what yet. Do you have the “What’s For Dinner” posts anymore? I like to hear all the ideas. Gets me out of my weekly rut.
Minniemize – Ran today.
Budget – Not spending any money today.
Declutter – Threw out some expired coupons.
No dining out:
I was planning on cooking supper yesterday, but I got some bad news and so my sweet husband went out and got pizza! Yum!
Minniemizing:
Stayed under calorie budget (even w/ pizza), and my 2 weeks of no exercising because of surgery ends today…so tomorrow it’s back to work! :)
Decluttering:
Just the usual picking up around the house. Today I’m going to clean our shower and our tub, and hopefully I’ll get around to mending the comforter on our bed too.
Budget:
Went a little over this month (because of buying smart phones), but being able to video chat when my husband goes on deployment will DEFINITELY be worth it!
No dining Out
We did eat out last night. But we used coupons we had for free food at Twin Peaks. So no money out of pocket. Their Chicken fried steak is awesome!!
Minniemize
Still 5K training. My race is October 1!!
No Dining Out: Daughter had an out-of-town appointment with a specialist yesterday. Took her out for breakfast at Chick-Fil-A. With coupons spent $1.70. We packed a lunch but I bought her a treat for the drive home. Spent $4. I’ve been doing the NDO for over a year now. The accountability helps!
Minnemize: No walking yesterday but also didn’t eat too much. Weight down another half a pound since this weekend.
Budget: Now that summer is over (our hardest time to budget for,) hoping to be a little more on top of this in September.
Decluttering: Am sorting through my youngest’s paper/craft collection today while he’s at school. Hoping to pare things down a little. :)
NO dining: Ate at home, we had hawaiian haystacks for dinner
Budget: Husband filled his car up with gas yesterday, but totally within budget and that was the only money spent
Declutter: organized and cleaned the shelf in my laundry room
Minniemize: Yesterday was not a good day when it came to eating, but I did get some good exercise in. I walked for 35 minutes and then worked out in the yard for an hour.
This was a rough month for dining out since we were out of town for 12 days, September will be better!
Budget – Doing great, savings is starting to build up and things are looking good, I will be spending more on gas with school back in session for me so I need to readjust things
Minimize – Eating healtier and school has added 2 miles a day to my walk!
Declutter – Finished my deep work before school started on the 22nd, since then the challenge has been not to let it pile up!
No Dining Out – packed both my lunchand my son’s today, made breakfast and have leftover spaghetti for dinner!
Minniemize Me – Walk from the parking garage, plus I perused Target this morning for half an hour with some extra time I had!
Budget – Spent less than $4.00 at Target for $20.00 plus worth of stuff – the $4.00 was for benadryl I needed and the rest was free!
Decluttering – I went through old magazines last night and made a pile to take to the doctor’s office next time we go!!
No dining out: Brought my lunch for today and plan to have a quick dinner at home before church tonight
Budget: Don’t plan to spend any money today and I forgot to say yesterday that I saved $54 dollars on groceries this week and spent way less than I should have! So pumped!
Minniemizing: Today’s diet off to a good start. I have my clothes in my car to hit the gym after work.
DeCluttering: Still need to work on cleaning out my back bedroom before my in-laws come to visit…
Decluttering Challenge—-does weeding count as decluttering? Plan to clean & reorganize the bathroom this afternoon
Budget Challenge—-still have some money left to spend this week
Minniemizing for the Mouse—-getting ready to go outside (while it is still cool) & weed my front flower bed & then cut the grass (with a push mower—will take about 45 min to do)
No Dining Out—-we ended up eating out at Wendy’s last night—-I just wasn’t in the mood to cook after grocery shopping with the kids—spent $10 to feed 3 of us
No Dining Out – We went out for lunch with Daddy at work yesterday since he’ll be gone this weekend. then we had Baskin Robbins last night, but at least it was half off.
Budget – I went over budget for household things this month, but hubby allowed me to. I was about $20 over budget.
Decluttering – Sadly, I didn’t do very well this month with this, especially compared to last month. Some cleaning out of stuff, but a lot has been in limbo waiting for little miss to go back to preschool. September I have to get a lot done though
No Dining Out – We did well this month. We rolled over one third of our restaurant budget into our food stockpile budget.
Budget – I did a lot of stockpiling and still came in $8 under budget.
Declutter – Sold my first piece of “clutter” on Amazon. It’s so great to make money on an item that is taking up space in my house and sell it to someone who will actually use it.
NDO – wanted to eat out so badly, too tired to cook. But I didnt :) Managed to make a chicken salad.
decluttering – cleaned up a couple of small piles
Budgeting – paid all bills and set up new budget for the 2 weeks. No monsy spent except for bills
Minniemizing – walked for 1 hour, eating habits so so/
No Dining out: Well I am not sure that we met our goal but I know that we tried really hard and are getting back on track!
Minnimizing: No change in weigh either way
Decluttering: Alot of changes this month! Loved the streamline this has created in my kids rooms
Budget: Boy Scouts is creating havioc on this currently. Hard to get ready for camping when you own no camping equipment. But good news is it is going on sale this week!
No dining out: we have eaten at home all week. It has been great. We also have been taking lunch to work and school everyday.
Minniemize: lost 2 pounds this week. Very proud!
Budget: Ugh…not doing so great with the budget. My 4 year old is having surgery soon, and the cost of all the co-pays, medicines, etc. is killing our budget. As if that wasn’t enough, my husband is a diabetic, and dropped his meter. We had to replace it, and we couldn’t just get any meter because he is on the pump. So a chunk of change later it has been replaced. Our poor budget is SHOT. But, there is always next month.
Declutter: haven’t had time to really work on this like I want too…
Decluttering: We cleaned the carpets today, so while we were moving furniture we also put away things.
Budget: Yesterday, it was my high schooler’s book day so we did spend some money for her books and lunch money. Plus, we got a ping pong ball at a discount store for our son’s science project.
Minniemizing: Just Dance
No Dining Out: We were out late trying to find a ping pong ball so we ran through McDonald’s :(
NDO- nothing yesterday, had steaks. looking back, i think we only ate out once this month! wayyyyy under budget. :)
budget- spent nothing yesterday, going to run my errands today though! with it being the summer i haven’t been too excited about deals, so we really didn’t do any shopping all month.
declutter- went through the papers in our office, i’ve been keeping too many unnecessary paperwork and started shredding.
MtM- had two hours of coaching volleyball, my legs are looking toned (wish volleyball was in the spring for bathing suit season…lol). also spent an hour picking about 150 pounds of potatoes out of the ground.
No dining out – Well, a late night at school blew this one!
Minniemizing – Nothing here
Budget – We were under budget for last week and were able to deposit $21.00 to our Disney fund!
Decluttering – I have two bags FULL of clothing to take to Goodwill today!
No dining out: Ate Zaxby’s for lunch ($6) but made dinner at home. Overall for the month of August we didn’t do too badly.
No Dining Out: eating leftover for lunch.
Minniemizing for the Mouse: Bootcamp class at 1200noon today
Budget Challenge: Target had the best deals this week. Saved a bundle
Decluttering Challenge: A lot of coupons expire today…cleaning out coupon organizer :-)
Minniemize: I did about 30 min of “just dance” with my daughter last night, and will again this afternoon.
Declutter: Today we are going to spend time cleaning my daughter’s room. My goal is to say bye bye to at least 10 stuffed animals. How did we get so many?
Working on not eating out so much, and cooking at home more. Also doing meal planning to help out with this.
Working on exercising every day. You do do a lot of walking there and I do’nt want sore feet!
We have been decluttering our house for the winter. I’ve been donating and also taking the kids clothes to the consignment shops to help earn money too.
no dining out-ended up getting icecream yesterday cost $6 I got diet coke and hubby got milkshake both 1/2 off on dairy queens 2-4pm deal
minniemize-walked all over the mall yesterday then 1 1/2 times around neighborhood didn’t buy anything at the mall
declutter-just wallet seperately receipts to file from coupons
budget-did great at target pairing up coupons and getting snacks to pack for lunches and to have in the car then went to CVS spent $23.75 saved $10 in coupons and got my first gas card Yeah!!!!
Budget – no money spent
Dining – no eating out. Ate at home.
Minniemize – still on track with weight watchers. Lost 1.5 lbs!