Money Matters
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Save on Groceries With a Pantry Challenge
It’s been said there’s no such thing as a free lunch, but a pantry challenge might come close! What is a pantry challenge? A pantry challenge is a way to use up items that you purchased in past grocery shops but have been sitting unused in your cupboard. Why do a pantry challenge? There are a few good reasons to do a pantry challenge, but probably uppermost in many of our minds right now is the current cost of groceries. Though the items sitting in our cupboards likely weren’t free, you don’t have to buy them again! As such, using these items up can reduce the amount you need to…
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What do Finances have to do with Living Life Sustainably
If you’ve explored our blog, you’ve likely seen that I spent an entire year going through Gail Vaz-Oxlade’s Money Master Class. I posted weekly recaps about the class, which you can find here: Money Master Class – A Year of Financial Guidance. Since our blog is a sustainable lifestyle blog, have you ever wondered: What do finances have to do with living life sustainably? Why Personal Finances Matter Finances are intertwined with every area of our life. In our world, money matters. So it makes sense that our own personal money and our personal financial life matters too. My Financial Story Up until my mid-20’s I was okay financially. I…
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Money Master Class: A Year of Financial Guidance
If you’re looking to learn more about your personal finances, get your finances in order, get out of debt, save more, or any combination of these, bookmark this page! This Money Master Class will take you through a year of financial tasks, advice, and times of reflection–all with the purpose of getting your personal financial life in order. At the beginning of 2020, Gail Vaz-Oxlade came out of retirement to share her wealth of financial advice with the world one last time. She launched her Money Master Class on Twitter, sharing daily tweets with advice, homework, and, questions to start conversations. I’ve summarized all of these tweets into weekly recaps…
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#MoneyMasterClass Recap-Week 52
The year has come to an end! Believe it or not, we’ve made it through 2020! It was a full year of thinking of finances every day and examining how our money is working for us. If you’ve made it through–even partway–CONGRATS! You’ve put in work to get yourself in a better position financially. A Year’s Worth of Lessons This year Gail took us through so many aspects of our lives. Some of my highlights from the year’s lessons were: Focusing on my core values and goals (Week 1) Making my money work harder by choosing better High Interest Savings Accounts (Week 10) Learning about concepts such as Curveball Accounts…
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#MoneyMasterClass Recap-Week 51
This week was a short one and it really does feel like things are starting to wrap up for the class. The brief topics touched on were helping others and taking care of our stuff. Helping Others Gail has focused a lot on helping others this year–so much so that her requested “payment” for the #MoneyMasterClass was for donations to women’s shelters and food banks. She carries this message through the end of the year, talking about helping others this week. Stuff and Things Are you a part of any barter groups or neighbourhood groups? They are a great way to connect with others for items to borrow and share.…
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#MoneyMasterClass Recap-Week 50
Budget! It’s one of my favourite words! And in this week’s Money Master Class, Gail had us looking over and refining our budgets. Budgeting Gail started by getting us to check how our budgets are balancing. It’s important to review your budget–especially if there are changes in income–to make sure the budgeted amounts for each category is realistic. I am a huge fan of keeping a spending journal. It can sound like a lot of work to write down every single purchase you make, but once you get into the habit, it takes no time at all. The spending journal helps me to track my spending, ensuring I don’t go…
