February is Double Challenge Month!

A lot of you are probably already quite aware that Carla is hosting a double challenge month for the month of February: Low/No Spending, and Decluttering!

Fancy that, I could use a heaping serving of both in my life right now.

I didn’t officially jump on board for the January Low/No spend month, even though reading all of your posts about it helped keep me in check, but I’m right on board for this one. These are my targets for the month of February:

*Financial Goal*

My financial goal for the month of February will be getting my Line of Credit balance below $4,500. This is a little bit of a stretch goal, seeing as it’s sitting over $6,500 as I’m writing this. It’s going to be ridiculously hard. I’m going to have to slash my budget, ramp up my payments, take in the pop bottles, get stuff up on Etsy, you name it. Now that my sewing machine is fixed that last one is a little more feasible. I’ll be doing my usual biweekly budgetting, but I’ll also be tracking my no spend days and updating everyone on it during the month. The only thing I can see popping up is Valentine’s Day, in which case I’ll appeal to The Boy’s stomach by baking stuff for him out of my pantry.

*Decluttering Goal*

My decluttering goals for the month are as follows:

1. Personal Space – Getting my room/closet completely decluttered and back in order.
2. Family Space – Turn my living room back into a functional decluttered living room rather than a living room/sewing room/office/mail drop zone.
3. Productivity Challenge – I’m really going to have to think about this one. What would make me most productive is unplugging the internet, but that kind of conflicts with maintaining a blog :s Any suggestions?
4. The “Dreaded” Challenge – Finish unpacking the boxes in my basement. *gulp* It’s been over 2 years, and they have slowly been getting emptied, but I still have a pile left to go.

I’m seriously not looking forward to posting my before photos for the world to see. Carla, Judy, and the rest of the moms out there are going to be scolding me and sending me to my room house to clean. The purging of 29 objects should be easy for me. I already have a couple items set aside to go to the Salvation Army or Goodwill, I have a stash of magazines that I’m going to get rid of, and a good portion of the stuff in the basement will be going buh-bye. 29 might become 290 at that rate.

Are you guys all on board for the low spend/decluttering challenge? What would you suggest for a productivity goal?

Random side question: Is anyone else randomly having problems posting comments on blogger based blogs? I’ve tried posting on 2 different sites recently, and my verification codes get rejected despite being correct. I even tried the audio code without luck. Thoughts?

Recommended Reading: Needs vs. Wants: The Gray Area.