I love my gift cards! (I had to laugh when I saw someone else had the same post this weekend ).

I had gotten a DnD gift card for Xmas and used that (plus a coupon) to pick up a $.99 coffee yesterday on the way to the mall with Mums. Since I used the GC, I don't count that towards my Weekly Spending.

At the mall I returned a dress that just didn't fit right, even after I tried some non-permanent and non-damaging minor alterations. It had tags on it, but since I didn't have the receipt (it was in my old wallet, which was stolen last month) they wouldn't take the charge off my CC. I can understand it because they need to make sure I didn't steal it, but since they could have just looked the purchase up on my CC history, I was pissed that they insisted on giving me a GC and not the refund. I'm going to call the company on Monday and see if they will transfer the GC amount to my CC even though you can't usually use a GC to pay a CC bill.

If they won't, I'll have a $59 GC to a store I like. I will use it, but I would have rather had the $59 taken off my balance. But hey, at least I can say I tried and then I can buy a new pair of shoe without feeling guilty, right?

I also used a GC to Amazon today to buy a book I've been reading. I borrowed it from my BFF, but I know I'll reread it several times. It's humor, and not much makes me laugh these days, so when I found myself cracking up this afternoon, I knew I had to get it. It's written in short chapters, and each chapter is a little memoir-type story. There are crude and funny drawings with it, and it's the type of book you can pick up and read all the way through or just one random chapter at a time. I bought a used copy and after shipping spent $10.97, which is a great deal since it would have been $17.99 new.

So basically, I consider this a No Spend Weekend, even though I did buy a coffee and a new book. How about you guys? Do you consider GC's "free" money?

I was planning on staying home today. I have laundry to do, some work for the week to finish up, and I want to list some things on Craigslist. I thought if I did go out, it would be to the used bookstore to drop off some books for store credit. But Dads called so I went out with him, and grabbed a $20 on my way out the door. I'm not letting myself use my debit card for "fun" money anymore.

Afterward Dads and I had lunch, I stopped by a consignment shop and dropped off a painting. The man who owns the shop agreed to take it for me and priced it at $30, of which if it sells I'll get $20 back. Yay! I also bought two books there; one for myself and another one that is a rare one I can resell online for anywhere from $20 - $50. Total for the 2 books: $5

All was going good, until I stopped to put gas in the car and put more air in my always-low tired. I get my check next week, and I need an oil change, so I was planning in getting the tired checked then. But when I put air in it, the valve started to snap off in my hand. So I detoured back to the mechanic to have him replace the valve. Usually they're only a couple bucks. But my car has the fancy one's with the sensor's on them and it cost me $154.87! Ugh! After it was fixed, I found out I don't HAVE to have the ones with the sensors installed. Next time I'll just go with the cheap $5 one instead.

Earlier in the day, I had decided that since I was going out, I'm stop at Walgreen's. I needed to pick up moisturizer for my skin, and I had a coupon for one that is also a concealer. The coupon expired in two days, and Walgreen's was having a sale, so it was good timing. I stopped there on the way home, and picked that up, along with some snacks for the house (bad, bad decision). Good news was that I also had enough points on my Walgreen's card to get a $5 coupon off my purchase. I spent $13.45 at Walgreen's.
The $1.55 I have left over will go into my savings jar

So even though I had to spend $155 on my car, I was able to keep my "fun" money to under $20. Yay!


2014 Car Costs: $154.87