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 exampleโฆ 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 donโt 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 familyโs eating habits, you can participate!
- You are allowed 1 freebie meal that you donโt 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!
Lisa says
No Dining Out
Today was our farmer’s market day so we bought 1 lb of pork BBQ and turned it into pork omelets at home. For dinner we had white bean chicken chili, also at home!
Minniemizing
I made some bacon and caramelized onion corn muffins to go with the chili so it looks like I need to do a little extra exercising tomorrow!
Denise says
No Dining Out: no dinning out – frig and freezer are full
Minnimize: 45 minutes treadmilll
Budget: 10 bags of Pepperidge Farm Gold fish; One 20pound box of cat litter; and 3 pounds of banana for 87 cents at my local Safeway Grocery Store. Gold Fish was the biggest find this week. Safeway had them on sale for a dollar a piece – used my 55cent off coupon which was doubled – all my goldfish snacks were free plus some change left over to pay for the additional purchases.
Declutter: Todays declutter project was the garage
Cathie says
Minniemize: walked a mile with the kids tonight
Declutter: Re-arranged stockpile. Gathered things that were free or cheap to give to our summer babysitter to take to college. It was fun to “shop” at home for her!
Gina says
No dining out- So we’ve been continuing to do great with it and had our pizza night last night.
Minniemize-You know not to compain or anything,but I really miss your posts here-they motivated me. Anyway still haven’t lost a thing. Did my 30 day shred twice this week and walked the 2 1/2 mile trip to the library twice this week as well and cleaned my house on Thurs. for hours.
Budget- My DH spent $16 at the bread outlet because it was our stockup time which was fine as it helps us to stay in budget for our grocery bill.
Lee says
Budget-no money spent
Dining-fixed 3-ways, veggies and dip, and cantaloupe for supper
Declutter-well, I actually added by canning 22 jars of peaches, pickles, and jams!
Brigitte says
No dining out: we stopped at 6:30 this morning to get mcdonald’s breakfast on our way to a neighborhood yard sale
Minniemize: carried a lot of stuff around setting up for the yard sale, didn’t eat much today
Budget: doing ok, made $180 at the yard sale today tho!!
Declutter: got rid of almost everything at the yard sale (feels so good!) and donated what didn’t sell to a church for their church sale!!
Katie says
No Dining Out: We didn’t do too great today. We had McDonald’s for lunch because we were at a yard sale all day and we did it away from home.
Minniemizing: We had a yard sale so I was sitting in the sun for what seemed like forever. And then we had to walk around, help people. I did my minniemizing.
Budget: Spent $0 besides lunch and we made money! This will help our fund a lot.
Decluttering: We had a yard sale and got rid of all our unwanted toys, backpacks, home items, and outdoor furniture. Anything we didn’t sell we took it, as soon as we were doon, to Goodwill.
Melanie says
Minniemize – I don’t work out on weekends, but I do watch what I eat and I’m doing fine there.
Dining out – we’re having pork chops for dinner, so no eating out for us.
Budget – we have no income, so we’re working hard to keep expenses down. No going out for us. I hope the free Blockbuster codes work so we can rent a movie or two.
Declutter – went thru DD’s bucket of markers & crayons and tossed out all broken & beat up ones.
Moe says
MinnieMe – went on a bike ride with the kiddos without hubbys help, since he is working a ton. I definately got the cardio up-not only from the bike ride, but a few close calls with cars too!!
Dining out – We are going out tonight but for a great deal. Our local pizza place is giving free meals out the next two weeks when you eat there tonight, so basically half price :)
DeClutta – Had the carpets cleaned yesterday, so today before we put anything back on the carpet we are cleaning it up and getting rid of stuff we don’t use/want.
Budget- went over for the carpet cleaning, felt it was worth it to pay extra for super clean and spot free carpets for the family.
Bethany M says
No dining out yesterday. Made some steaks in the crockpot with cream of mushroom soup and onions on top. Tasty! Also, if you need a yummy idea for frozen peas, take some and saute in 1 Tbls (or however much you want) butter with some sea salt, add chopped onion and italian seasoning. Cook until done. So good! I honestly cannot remember the last time we ate out. It’s been a while.
Kristin says
No Dining Out: After no dining out all week (which is huge for me and my husband) we treated ourselves to Mexican last night. It was pretty cheap and it was nice to have a date night. Tonight he has to work so I’ll be eating a frozen pizza.
Angela N says
Declutter – Still working on the closet. Spending a lot of time and money there:).
Budget – Did excellent on the grocery budget. Still have 25 dollars left to carry over to next week.
No dining – Ate up all my leftovers for lunch. Better come up with a dinner plan quick.
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
I love when there is money left in the budget. :)
Amy W says
No dining out:
Well we did eat out last night, but it was at a mandatory Navy party. It was already paid for but with our money…don’t get me started.
Minniemizing:
Stayed under calorie budget again! Logging everything I eat onto mapmyrun.com is really keeping me accountable! :)
Decluttering:
Cleaned out my purse!
Budget:
Spent no money yesterday because we had already paid for everything in advance.
heather h says
No dining out for us, we had bacon & egg cups, super yummy!
Stephanie S says
Dining Out: No dining out here today.
Budget: Working on my August grocery budget and coupon binder today. Saved almost $40.00 at the grocery store yesterday. Woot woot!
Minniemizing: Just had my low-calorie breakfast and I have my healthy lunch and dinner menus already planned out.
Decluttering: Cleaning out our spare bathroom today and throwing away items that are expired.
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
Good job!!
Nichole M. says
Budget-Working on my SuperDoubles list for Harris Teeter. Printed off CVS and Walgreens list to compare coupons. Envelope system is still working, but waiting on next paycheck to add to funds.
Julie H says
No Dining Out – We went out for dinner Friday night but ended up just getting Quizno’s instead of going to a restaurant. So still cheaper.
Budget – Finished my price comparison sheets and list for Sam’s Club. Hubby officially thinks I’m taking it WAY too seriously.
Declutter – Sorting mail
Bre says
No Dining Out: Still going strong!
Minnimize: Went for a walk to relax.
Budget: Spent 14ยข on two 3 packs of cascade complete, degree travel size deodorant, and 3 pack of ivory soap. :D
Declutter: Called the local elementary school and dropped off the box tops I had been saving all summer.
Kristin of Couponing to Disney says
You are doing great on your budget! :)
Tammie W says
no dining out-no dining out for us
minniemize-slept in today and feel really good hoping to get out with the girls on scooters today and walk around the block
declutter-nothing
budget-printed all the $1 deals from walmart and CVS just need to match them up and I just need a couple things from the grocery store
Tonya says
No dining out: We had sammies and chips for supper.
Budget: $0
Minniemize me: Weight keeps going up & down. Water, green tea and I need to really stick to portion control.