No New Necklace

At the beginning of the month, I wrote about a necklace that I was thinking of buying.   The sale price ends next week, and and I had decided to think about it during the month and make my decision near the end of the month.   I decided last night that I’m going to pass on the necklace.   I know that we can afford it.   And I do really like it.   But I think that there are better ways that we could spend the money.   I paid attention to the necklaces that I wore this month, and found myself coming back over and over to my funky jewelry.   The washer on a chain that my sister gave me.   The painted seashell that I got for $5 on Oahu’s north shore.   The beads on a leather string that my husband made for me when we were first dating.   A wooden bead necklace that I got in Africa.   All together those  four probably cost less then $25, and I always get compliments on them.   I’ve been wearing them for ages and still get a lot of pleasure out of them.   I guess I’m really not a diamond necklace kind of girl (even if it is a fake diamond).  

We’ve been spending a lot of money lately on our house renovations and our midwife, and I’m really looking forward to getting back to our $1000/month spending limit.   By not buying this necklace, I’m helping us get back on track with our spending, and that feels good.   It’s nice to be in a position where we could afford the necklace if I had decided by now that I really still wanted it – several years ago I wouldn’t have even considered it because we wouldn’t have been able to afford it.   And who knows, maybe a few years from now I’ll decide that I do really want it and can buy it then.   But for now, I’m going to just appreciate how far we’ve come in our financial journey, and remind myself that the way we got here was by NOT buying every little thing that we wanted along the way.   Knowing that we’re not broke is a far better feeling that having a new necklace.