A Year Without - The List

Here it is.  2013 will be the year of "Without" and Josh has decided he wants to join me!  So, each month we will give up something.  I hope that it will help us recognize the things we have and fully appreciate all of it. 

Rules:

1. The "Withouts" are not cumulative.  Once that month is over we can have/do that thing again.
2. Each Without must be something that is a challenge to give up.
3. I will update the blog at least once a month about my progress on that month's Without.
4. If one of us falls off the wagon, the punishment will be one dollar into a jar.  Our ultimate goal is to have as little money in the jar at the end of the year as possible.  By the end of the year we will come up with a really great way to give that money to charity.

The List:

January - The Snooze Button 

February - Swearing

March - A thing.  Get rid of one thing every day, all month.  It doesn't matter if it goes in the dumpster, to a friend, or in the Goodwill pile, as long as it goes.

April - Coffee.  Tea is still allowed, I'm not a masochist.  Josh may restrict himself to one cup a day, coffee is an integral part of his morning routine, whereas I just really like it.  Updates on this as we get closer.

May -  Alcohol

June -  TV

July -  Meat.  This is prime veggie season, so I'll have the farm stands working on my side.

August - Make everything from scratch.  No store bought, prepared anything.

September - Complaining.

October - Spending money on anything that is not fresh food.  This means I will need to plan at least nine days in advance for Josh's Birthday, unless between now and then he gets really into eggplant.

November - Chips and Sweets - neither of these seem overly difficult to me.  So, I'll combine them and see what happens. 

December - Popular Radio.  NPR and old time radio recordings from the library are still allowed, so is music.  This is purely in response to my annoyance this year with radio commercials.  Wendy's: "mozzerella-la-la" will never be a holiday tune.  But it will get stuck in my head.  Jerks.  And Fred Meyer's Snow Mom: you are Mrs. Foreman from that 70s show, stop pretending otherwise and giggling like the Mid-West version of the announcer for every BBQ sauce commercial (you know the ones where they want you to know their sauce is authentic so they hire a southern-middle-aged-black announcer to tell you all about it and then chuckle good naturedly?).  Grrrr!!  See September, and possibly February.

This is it, wish us luck!  Happy New Year!