How Did We Do?

On the major elements:

(1) Not shopping: great, until mid-December. The only notable purchases before December were 2 shower curtains (for a clawfoot tub) and a portable dishwasher ($125 from Craigslist), both when we moved into the new apartment. Oh, and 2 Halloween costumes purchased from Goodwill (and returned to the Goodwill bin, so the money spent was pretty much a donation, I think).

(2) Buying US-grown groceries or organic: okay. The organic exception was supposed to be for coffea/tea but I ended up using it more than I expected, which really adds to your grocery bill. But it takes about 5 seconds to look for an organic label, it takes about a minute to see if something is actually US-grown. Except for produce, usually the answer is unclear anyways. This was by far the suckiest part of the experiment. I thought we'd get into a groove of what we could/could not eat but even at the end I was still constantly checking labels.

(3) Not driving less than 2 miles: pretty good. Only major exceptions were late at night when I didn't feel safe walking home and maybe a couple of times last winter when the sidewalks were like skating rinks.

(4) Eating out at restaurants: limit was one breakfast or lunch and one dinner out per week. This rule didn't apply to Elliott, but even so I think we did pretty well. This is definitely one cost I think we should cut down on in the following year. The thing is, when you limit going out to eat, you feel entitled to spend more than you normally would. So you don't feel so guilty about ordering that extra drink or appetizer, or dessert, even if you normally wouldn't. Plus if you're not eating at a big chain restaurant, you tell yourself you're helping the local economy!

I'd say most dinners cost us around $30-40 total and breakfast probably around $20-25. So per year, a low estimate is $2,600; a high estimate is $3,380. That's a lot of money.