Paying for your craft supplies

[BernardandMissBianca]

Buffy, you're funny!

Finally, DH has it "down" - every Friday morning he hits the "Entertainment" envelope and grabs out $10 to go out to a Chinese food lunch buffet with a gang of his co-workers. And every week, they tease him about "his allowance" from me, blah, blah, blah...but last year, we managed to put 32% of our 2008 household income into savings - either short-term liquid savings or longer term investments. Not sure if we'll hit that mark again this year, rolleyes1 scrappy and WDW habits - eek!) but hope to come close. I'm not convinced any of his co-workers can say that...!

Funny but true. DH is never home, ever. So he gets his $100 a week for little things and the rest goes on the AMEX card for work.
He calls me to see if there is enough money for Mini parts (expensive when shipped from the UK).

I control the check book, bill paying, etc so I stash some aside every week for my hobby. But I try to shop wisely too. I very rarely spend full price on paper, carts, storage, etc. Other then the carts on Turkey Day, I haven't bought much in a while. I'm trying to use my stash. Plus I'm packing up my space to paint the room.

 

[AlexWyattMommy]

I do have to confess that my DH does know how much I spend on my hobby.
The cool thing is he is really into tools and gadgets and software.
I have the Circut, the carts, the Sizzix machine and dies and SCAL. I have more paper variety than any single store and embellishments out the wazzoo.

I told my DH about the $350 a page and he looked at me and rolled his eyes. Been there, done that. Got a few pages to prove it.

My DH is also my enabler. I will ask for some adhesive and he'll bring home 6 boxes. Asked for a single cart and he brought home 3. On sale, $40 each. When he sees a cart on clearance at a store he'll call me to see if I already have it. He really will just into a scrapbook store to see if there is anything new I don't have. He's the bestest DH for me.

 

[rlovew]

I told my DH about the $350 a page and he looked at me and rolled his eyes. Been there, done that. Got a few pages to prove it.

Hey- you have at least 6 pages that only cost you $5-6 a page and not much time either. I love the organizer system- I use my stickers and such more than I ever did before.

I will have to say that with the number of pages and such that I create my cost per page is less than $5 a page.

I do try to keep my purchases to a minimum now that our income is down with my not having one and DH's salary drop.

Rebecca

 

[AlexWyattMommy]

I those pages. They are split up between their books.

I'm glad the system is working for you. I had way too many of larger EK Success ones. I had them four and five deep in a pocket. And way too many empty spaces because I had no stickers that fit.

Not that my current system of all stuck in a fabric box is working real well for me.

 

[ZeroToHero]

I, too, feel like I spent $ on Christmas things that were unnecessary. So, on Black Friday evening (believe it or not!) DH and I actually went back to Target and returned about $50 worth of things that I had bought a week or two before. We just didn't need them - we have enough for under the tree already.

Good luck with your resolution and let me know if there's any help (or encouragement!) I can provide.

See, isn't it nice that I don't ask for things? Well, besides that 3$ camera case... that's probably all I'm getting. Or did you return that too?

I started working as a merchandiser & mystery shopper during the school day to support my craft habit. Currently saving for the CHA winter 2010 releases ... 12 new colors of Distress Ink and Tim Holtz' Sizzix dies. Ooh-la-la!

....there goes my paycheck. 12 new colors?!?!

 

[MazdaUK]

DH knows I have as ton of stuff but has no idea the cost - he knows its a LOT but if he actually added it up I'd be on bread and water and no vacations for 10 years Next year I'm going to be really good as we want to go to California in 2011 (my friend is planning on getting married in las Vegas so we'll be on the way there anyway ) So everytime I don't spend something even though I've had an email to tempt me I'll put that moeny aside. But I need to spend £50 per month to keep active on CM - or I'd be paying full price for stuff.

 

[NemoMom07]

Good luck with your resolution and let me know if there's any help (or encouragement!) I can provide.

Maybe I can use you as my support buddy. I am going to do the envelope thing for the scrappping budget, but not everything. I don't think I could keep up.Maybe in Febuary I can add our "bite and play" envelope. Bite and play is when we are out I take ds3 to McDonalds or Chick Fil A (not as often). If I did those two that would be a good start. I don't really shop for clothes (go to Kohls maybe 6 times a year if that and when I have a 15% off of everything card and I only shop the clearance racks.

ZTH cracked me up with her comment on taking her $3 camera case back with the other Target stuff. I was rolling on the floor with that one.

 

[ZeroToHero]

Maybe I can use you as my support buddy. I am going to do the envelope thing for the scrappping budget, but not everything. I don't think I could keep up.Maybe in Febuary I can add our "bite and play" envelope. Bite and play is when we are out I take ds3 to McDonalds or Chick Fil A (not as often). If I did those two that would be a good start. I don't really shop for clothes (go to Kohls maybe 6 times a year if that and when I have a 15% off of everything card and I only shop the clearance racks.

ZTH cracked me up with her comment on taking her $3 camera case back with the other Target stuff. I was rolling on the floor with that one.

Don't encourage me, is what she's going to say!


I realized I never gave my 2¢ here - I work two jobs, plus babysitting..... and pretty much whatever I don't use for paying my cell phone bill and buying school books goes towards scrapbooking..... it's pretty bad. I was amazed the other day when I looked at my bank account and realized how much money was in there, since we don't have the second car, we hadn't been able to go out. (But it's gone now.... )

I'm trying to save more now though, since we're going on the cruise next year.

I too, rarely shop for clothes... and when I do, I go to this thrift store near us. I think I'm stuck in the 70s (yes, I know I wasn't around then...) - I refuse to pay more than 15$ for pants and nice shirts... I went into Express the other day, thinking I might get a shirt - when I saw a regular tank top was 20$, I turned around and walked out.

 

[New England Eeyore]

Quite honestly, if you are looking to save money on scrapbooking, the #1 piece of advice I could give you would be to stay away from these boards! You could call the scrapbooking section of these boards "Enabler City." I had scrapped for several years before I found the DISboards, and I don't believe that all the money I had spent in the 4 years prior equalled even half the money I spent in the first year post-DIS. Sizzix, Cricut, punches, Bazzill, Zutter - just a FEW of the things I was introduced to via these boards. And don't get me started on the exponential influence that swapping has had on the size of my stash. And before I knew it, I truly did have to give an entire room of my house over to my scrap stuff (and it's still spilling over into other rooms!)

But honestly I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm fortunate enough to have a good job and scrapping and vacations are my only 2 weaknesses - I'm pretty frugal in most other aspects of my life.