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It’s the first day (er…second, actually) of the month and that means the next installment of my Saving on a Shoestring updates and a chance for you to win an Amazon gift card!
In case you aren’t familiar with my Saving on a Shoestring series, it’s my monthly summary of how we are pinching our pennies and tucking some away for a future reward. At this point in life, we have three fun goals:
- To save 100% cash for a cruise next year to celebrate our 10th anniversary (been saving for about a year and a half now).
- To save 100% cash for a mini van to replace our 1995 Camry (been saving for over 5 years for this one).
- To set aside reward points and rebates to cut our Christmas spending out of pocket to $50 or less.
Here are my latest numbers. Remember that you can download your own copy of the Cha-Ching Christmas Club Savings Tracker (click on ‘File’ and then ‘Download’) and then make it all your own.
Project Cruise 2012: We are up to 42%.
Mission Mini Van: We are at 83%.
Cha-Ching! Christmas Club: I am at 54%.
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How about you? Have you been saving and scrimping toward a reward or are you a part of the Cha-Ching! Christmas Club? Then leave a comment or a link below sharing your savings update.
AND just to add to all the fun going on around here, I will give a $5 Amazon gift code to one person who leaves a direct link to their savings post or a comment sharing an update on their savings. (I figure it’s just one more way to help you save on that shoestring!)
The giveaway will end Friday, May 6 at 10 a.m. EST. I’ll randomly select the winning comment or link. Winner will be notified by email and listed on this site.
Note: If you have a blog, here is the HTML code for the Saving on a Shoestring button above:
<p><a href=” https://chachingonashoestring.com/category/saving-on-a-shoestring/” title=”Saving on a Shoestring”><img src=”https://chachingonashoestring.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Saving-on-a-Shoestring-button-1252.PNG” alt=”Saving on a Shoestring” /></a></p>
My savings are going pretty well like always. I’ve decided the next thing I want to save towards is a Dyson vacuum! I’m trying to use only “free” amazon $$ to buy it and so far I’ve saved about 13.8%!! Hopefully I’ll be able to get one before the end of the year!
I’ve been saving for a few months for a car. I estimate that I’ve saved about 5%. I’ll be saving for a while. 🙂
I estimate that I’m about 80% funded for Christmas. I have lots of Swagbucks saved up. I like to enter instant-win games and sweepstakes, so I’ve already won some presents for birthdays & Christmas. I recently got an offer from American Express to obtain a credit card & if I charge $500+ in 3 months, AMEX will credit me 75,000 pts., enough for $750 worth of gift cards. I never carry a credit card balance, so this is perfect for me. I already have the card & am using it for gas purchases, so it will have a $500+ balance in no time. 🙂 Hopefully, next time I can report what gift cards I will have picked out.
We do a pretty good job budgeting for Christmas – it’s all the other birthdays and holidays that we don’t plan for that throw us off. Therefore, it was my goal to not pay out of pocket for any birthday/non-Christmas holiday gift this year. We’ve been entirely successful so far, with the exception of the flowers I just bought for Mother’s Day via the Plum District and LivingSocial deals you posted yesterday! They were such good deals I couldn’t resist!
My savings for Christmas is at 50% saved so far. Pinecone Research has been awesome for me lately. I’ve been using my Swagbucks for diapers though. Otherwise I’d be much closer to my goal. Next year I’ll set a higher goal if I reach this one early.