A Few Aims for 2015

I do love this time of year when I find myself  looking forward to the year ahead and thinking about what I want to achieve therein.  I like to have various projects on the go, be they financial, personal or domestic.  Following on from my progress post regarding my aims for 2014, here are some of the things I've decided that I'm aiming to achieve in 2015. 

1 - Live Within My Means - Having almost paid off my overdraft in 2014, I aim to live overdraft free in 2015 if I can.  I may need to dip into it occasionally on very expensive months, but hopefully I will largely keep my account in the black this year.

2 - Continue to Pay Off My Credit Cards Fully Each Month - Again with the aim of living within my means, I want to pay any debt off before incurring any interest.  Ideally, I want to try to minimize spending on credit cards, although they are handy for internet purchases or unexpected expenses.

3 - Minimize Waste - I started to try to do this last year, but I can't say that I had much impact on the whole.  I did try to reuse or recycle items where possible and will continue to do so, but this year I'm going to focus on not purchasing as much, so that this will lead to less waste in all areas of life.

4 - Save More - This year, having virtually achieved my aim of being debt free, I aim to save more in 2015.  I'd like to start putting spare money aside whenever I can, so that I build up a reserve for emergencies and contingencies.  I will continue with the sealed box, trying harder to put more of my change in there and will continue to save in my building society by depositing any cheques in there, but I also would like to transfer money to a savings account each month or most months if I can too.

5 - Build a Capsule Wardrobe  - To contain only things I really enjoy wearing. By buying one quality item per month I'm hoping to complete this challenge and feel a lot happier with my wardrobe by the end of the year.  I will be posting about this particular aim in a separate post at some point.  As you can imagine, I am looking forward to meeting this aim in 2015.

6 - Read Two Books Per Month.  - (There's an even bigger pile of books to get through this year so I need to be a bit more ambitious in order to clear them!)

7 - Declutter, Declutter, Declutter  - Aiming to pare back and live more minimally in 2015.

8 - Finish Outstanding Projects - I've got a number of outstanding sewing and DIY projects that I've been aiming to do or working slowly on over the last year.  Aim to finish them by 2016.

I think I'll leave it at that so as not to get overambitious.  Wish me luck and a Happy New Year to everyone reading.  I hope 2015 brings you lots of good times. good health and good fortune.