Today is Day 8 of the Collins Family Challenge. While it has lost a little of it’s zeal for our children, we have pretty much kept to all our rules. Saturday was Birthday Party day for the girls and it was a doozy. We were up late into the night creating, borrowing, and scrounging to make the party a success without buying too much of anything new. I did end up not using several of the decor items I bought at Hobby Lobby, so I’ll take those back. I’m planning on doing a full recap of the party for Friday’s post, so stay tuned.
Discarding 10 Items Each – We did so well on our first several days, that we took off Saturday and Sunday collecting items. Saturday was just a wash because we had out of town company, the party, and then we were EXHAUSTED. I also didn’t want to be pulling items out while we were cleaning items up for guests. Sunday was a super busy day with our church services and the church Fall Festival. However, the kids have committed to discarding 20 items each today. Plus, before the party I was throwing out like nobody’s business. At a little over halfway there, I’m surprised at how little 600 items has made a dent in our level of stuff. Quite convicting.
One Hour of Screen Time Each – Well we did GREAT on this during the school week. Saturday was a little harder. The boys wanted to play video games after the birthday party and it had been such a long day! The girls were napping and Mom needed some down time, so they played video games for about an hour. That night was football…… I’ll call Saturday a screen time FAIL but at least the boys shared their screen time together and the family shared ours with football and grilling out. Sunday the boys did great on their one hour until after the Fall Festival, the Saints game was on. Heaven help me with boys and these football games. I am justifying it because we were doing it all together as a family. Maybe???
Intentional Consumerism – I tried desperately to pull off this party with bare minimum purchases. I did buy a little decor and food. On Saturday I did end up buying a few flowers from Kroger. I got the cheap baby’s breath, one bunch of hydrangea, and two bundles of roses from the “flower sale” rack…a dozen roses for $4.99. I borrowed, found, or made pretty pretty much everything else. Yesterday I did end up having to buy Wil Franklin a pair of khaki dress pants. He has outgrown his so much and we are having family pictures for my mother-in-law today. Henry’s outfit for today is a hand-me-down from our cousin Ford, and my mother in law bought the gorgeous dresses for our girls. I ended up buying one more thing yesterday for Wil Franklin, his backpack for school had the zipper break. This is the third year he has carried it, so I felt like it had lived its best life.
I’ll post some more progress shots on our Instagram Stories. {Follow us @frontporchframeofmind} All in all this challenge has maybe not been life altering yet, but it has definitely put our habits in perspective. I am definitely more aware of the difference between want and need and our children are definitely learning to realize a difference as well. Stay tuned!!!
Love, Amberly
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