My 2009 Shopping Hiatus

I've mentioned in a few posts that I plan to stop shopping (for non-essential items) for six months (January to June) because I feel that my impulse shopping is the biggest leak in my budget. I never spend a lot at one time, but I often buy myself little treats. For some people, food is a vice, for me, it's clothing and accessories. My small shopping splurges add up to a rather large amount of money, according to my Mint spending trends. I want to see more progress in debt repayment in 2009 than I did in 2008, so sacrifices must be made...sigh.

Rules:

1. I cannot purchase the following clothing items (with the exception of gift card purchases, I expect to get gift cards for my birthday): ~Coats ~Jackets ~Blazers ~Apparel ~ Shoes ~Accessories
2. Undergarments and work out clothing are exceptions to the no- shopping rule.
3. Household decor items cannot be purchased unless they are saved for and serve a purpose (seating or storage,)
4. iTunes downloads... (I can start trading music with friends if I get sick of what's on my ipod)
   
5. Books (with the exception of textbooks). I always get sucked in by cheap books on Amazon...case in point, the Twilight series.
   

Dry cleaning expenses will also be kept to a minimum by washing items that aren't extremely delicate by hand. Dry cleaning is also a large budget leak. I get really lazy with this sometimes. It's just so much easier to drop them off and have someone else launder/iron your clothing. I also plan to try to increase my income through some type of part time work during 2009. The most preferable method of doing this would be freelance writing or blogging. Any extra income made in 2009 will go toward debt repayment first and savings second. I'll give periodic check-in's of my progress on this blog. This sounds pretty easy now but could get difficult...I just saw all of the cute new additions to the Target Go International line this week...