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January was a big month.  I was so busy blogging every day of the month that I didn’t have time to spend money.  That’s not a bad thing!

I think it’s great when you can find frugal hobbies and activities to occupy your time.  Not that us parents have a lot of free time, anyway.

But now the groundhog has seen his shadow, and it’s time to reflect on the progress we’ve made on our SMART goals for the year.

SMART Goals and Debt Payoff for 2017

*Last month I told you that I’d share my blog goals in a separate post.  Then I realized the enormity of the 30 Day Money Challenge I was writing.  So I pushed it back.  But you can expect to see blog goals coming soon!

Home

Our 1950s home needs many updates.  Our kitchen aggravates me a ton.  But all of that will have to wait another year.  I’ll avoid cute remodels on Pinterest to help keep my annoyance at bay.  That said, there are other goals I have for our home this year that won’t cost money.  And other things that can’t wait and will have to be addressed.

• Remove all items from each bedroom and start fresh  (Planning to begin this project in February!)
• Shelving in dining room corner  (I’d like to make this a closet, but we already have the shelving on hand.)
• Repair dining room ceiling
• Clean out the basement  (Began this last month)

Family

• Take a beach vacation.
  • So far we’ve booked the house that we’ll share with two other families.  The costs of this will be just a few hundred to house our family of 7 for an entire week!
  • I also found a great deal on a rental van that will cost us half what it has in the past.  Whoop!
• Continue to practice swimming.  Waiting for warm weather.
• Two hiking/fishing/camping trips for every warm month.  Our family loves being outside.  Chasing 4 different baseball teams all summer makes this difficult.  That’s why I will make this more intentional.
• One on one time for each child, every month.
  • The kids enjoyed running special errands with me, grabbing the free sandwich one had earned for straight As, and a frugal trip to a playplace.

Marriage

• 12 Dates in 2017.
  • January: Went to see Garth Brooks.  If you ever get the chance to see him in concert, DO IT!  This was our Christmas gift to one another.  🙂

Personal

• Yoga & movement.  Not in January.  🙁
• Read On Writing.  Not yet.
• Read through the New Testament.  Didn’t get to this every night this month, but more than I’d expected to!  I’ll continue to make this a priority.

Our Financial Goals: #PressOn

Honesty is important to me, so let me lay down a hard truth: Moving past the #yearofno has been HARD.  In our minds, it seems like the year is over, so we should be able to relax our spending. We have been able to find a balance, though.  We did loosen up a bit in January to do some of the things we asked our kids to skip for a year.

But we didn’t go crazy.  There were still plenty of spending opportunities that we turned down.

In February, it will be important to avoid fast food and pesky leaks in our budget.  We did hit the fast food places a couple of times in January, and that’s not habit I ever want to get back to.

The Goal

When last we checked in, we had hit 78% of the goal we wanted to achieve in 2016.  As we begin February, how is that number looking?

Well, we are hanging in there at 81%.  But we crossed another big digit milestone, and that always feels awesome!

With the chaos of January behind me, I’m ready to bring in some more income to #presson and knock out this big credit card.  I’ve already taken on more freelance writing work to help me accomplish this task.  I also plan to relist a few Ebay things I have around the house.

As for savings, I’ve already begun to bake and cook more items to keep on hand for snacking and taking for those on the go days.

New for 2017: A Link Up!

Link up your own goals and let’s hold each other accountable!  I ran out of time last month, but this month I will visit everyone’s post to see how we’re all doing.  Be sure to visit other blogs and see how their goals are going.

#PressOn!

Go get those goals!

Did you keep up with the goals you set early in the year?  Or have you made adjustments?