little white truths

Well, we're two months in to my self-imposed spending ban, which I'm hoping to do for a whole year.

If you want to learn more about why I'm doing this and how I've been going, see my initial post here and my one month post here.

While the first month was really hard (much harder than I thought it would be), this past month has been easier. Hopefully that's part of a continuing trend, and not just because we've been so lost in buying prams etc, renovating the kitchen and generally trying to organise ourselves for the baby, that I haven't had the brain space to think about what beauty products I want.

What am I talking about?!

I'm always thinking about what new products I want. Ha.

Part of the problem is that I'm a member of various FB groups related to beauty and subscription boxes etc, so there's always a conversation to be part of and plenty of photos available of what people want and have been buying. Plus of course we're in the lead-up to Christmas, so there's been heaps of sales (Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Pre-Christmas, god knows what else) and it's been hard to turn a blind eye.

While I'm managing (just!), I've had quite a few Memeboxes turn up in the past ten days (these were ordered prior to the spending ban), so I'm not totally deprived. And I think I still have two final Memeboxes coming in the next month, plus there's my LHI women's box (that stops in January), Violet Box and Marie Claire's quarterly The Parcel (which I really wish I could cancel, but I was silly enough to buy an annual subscription to that back in September).

I guess what I'm saying is, things aren't too hard now - but they will be soon!

Despite the influx of Memeboxes, I'm happy to say that, aside from the obvious financial benefits of banning myself from buying anything new, I've been happily watching my stock go down over these past couple of months. This is partly because I've already packed a bunch of Christmas presents with unopened goodies I don't need, but I've also been getting through the stuff I have open - finally!

My monthly empties posts have been ridiculously jam-packed, largely because I've had so many products open for ages and I'm committing to finishing those off in turn, rather than always reaching for something new. On top of that, I've donated a bunch of eg lipsticks and eyeliners that I'm not using to a charity that supports disadvantaged women and accepts open products. The products aren't out of date and they're good products, it's just that I know others will get more use from them.

Storage space is opening up and, even after two months, I'm feeling less overwhelmed by cosmetics. That has to be a good thing (!).

This past month, only one item made it past my 'spending ban rules': I had a Priceline club voucher for around $12.50, so I used that to pick up the cheapo Models Prefer Nude Eyeshadow palette that everyone's been raving about, and used the leftover to buy tissues (so exciting).

A good month!

Hopefully this coming month will only get easier. All I can envisage 'buying' is something from Memebox, since I have a bundle of review points to use up and should be able to get something free of charge.

I'll check back in next month x

If you're joining me on a spending ban, whether now or once the new year hits, do let me know how you're going!