Demerits and Gold Stars: October– November

First – a very Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends in America. While you’re eating turkey and watching parades it’s just…a regular Thursday in my part of the world. I hope the food is delicious, the naps are restorative, and the time spent with family or friends is amazing. (If this is a tough Thanksgiving season for you, the Frugal Girl has an excellent post on the topic.)

Now on to Demerits and Gold Stars. I have a list – lots of fodder on both sides so let’s get started.

DEMERITS

• On shoes. I was full of enthusiasm when I bought into the On running shoe hype, but I have ended up extremely underwhelmed. For starters, these shoes wore out shockingly fast. Maybe if I kept all my movements inside they’d be okay, but I bought these in April, rarely wore them in July and August, and the treads are completely gone, the fabric backing on the heel has worn off and I am already on the hunt for new sneakers. So they’ve had like…4 months of regular use and all they have been used for is walking (on a mix of sidewalk and crusher-dust trail; no running, no hiking). I wrote the warranty department and they told me what I was seeing was normal wear and tear. They offered me 20% off to buy a NEW pair of On sneakers. NO THANKS! I am tremendously brand loyal when I receive good customer service, and I was less than impressed by On’s; they will not be getting any more of my business. I think it’s time to go back to Asics. Any Asics wearers reading today – what’s your go-to style?
• Videoing the contents of our house. For insurance purposes I’ve been meaning to video the contents of our house. For years. There is no good excuse for this demerit. It would take far less time to video things versus cataloguing contents with a spreadsheet or pictures. It’s one of those projects that could get done at any time…so it gets done at no time. But I want to make this a priority as I feel like an ounce of prevention would be worth a pound of cure?
• Forgetting coupons. I rarely use coupons these days as it feels like such a hassle (and there are fewer coupons in general, at least where I live). But…I had a coupon from a local grocery store where if I spent $50, I would get $5 off my purchase. As one might imagine, spending $50 at the grocery store these days takes about one millisecond and/or three items. I had two of these coupons, spent over $100 and forgot to use either coupon and didn’t get a chance to use them before they expired. *Facepalm*
• Electric toothbrushes for the kids. Both kids have electric toothbrushes and Belle actually has two (she got one from the orthodontist when her braces were put on). She was faithfully using an electric toothbrush but then slowly slid back to manual which is not nearly as effective at cleaning braces. I don’t micromanage the kids dental hygiene, but finally had to step in and enforce electric toothbrushes again. I can already see improvements in their teeth. So I guess this demerit has slowly edged into gold star territory!
• November weather. It has sucked. The last two weeks have been nothing but rain and wind. It’s so depressing and basically the exact opposite of October’s glorious weather. 0/10 stars.
• The postal strike. I’m not taking sides because it feels like a bit of a hopeless situation for both Canada Post and their workers, but the net result is really crappy timing for not being able to send/receive letters. I will still be sending out Christmas cards (they’re already addressed), but it looks like people will be getting them sometime in the new year.

GOLD STARS

• Removing the drain stopper. Because we have someone with braces in our house, sinks get easily clogged with chunks of food debris that are stuck in said braces. The sink in the kids’ bathroom was draining very slowly and I was going to use Draino when I decided I should just learn how to remove our stoppered plug. It was a bit of a hassle and it required contorting myself under the sink and I even needed some tools, but I got it done and it was so much more effective to properly clean out the gunk!
• Mom’s food. It was nice to go home and have Mom’s home-cooked food in October. Gold stars to her for so sweetly making many of my favourite dishes during the week. It made me feel extra special and loved.
• Insurance. Our home insurance was up for renewal and I shopped around and ended up moving our home insurance over to the broker who handles our auto insurance and we will save $300/year. It took quite a few phones calls and e-mails and was actually more of a hassle than I anticipated, but it probably only took about 2 hours of combined time (though far too many phone calls for my liking), and I suppose $150/hour isn’t a bad ROI.
• Boy socks. In addition to losing some article of clothing, his lunchbox or his waterbottle at school every single week (and let’s not forget wearing holes in his sneakers and pants is one of his superpowers), Indy is SO. HARD. ON. SOCKS. He wears them until they are threadbare and have holes, but I cannot fathom how a tiny human can so quickly destroy even high-quality socks. The last few sets I’ve bought/he has been gifted have been multi-coloured/patterned. It means that when one sock goes missing or gets a hole, the other sock is practically useless (he doesn’t like to wear mis-matched socks). So I bought him new socks a few weeks ago and they are ALL black with the same ribbing and styling. This means when individual socks wear out, I can set the mate aside and combine solo socks into new sets.
• Indy’s birthday party. I’m so happy with how things turned out and feel like we managed to pull off a simple celebration that was still very worthy of his milestone birthday.
• Christmas gifts. I am almost done buying AND wrapping!!
• October weather. October was basically the exact opposite of November. I can’t remember a more beautiful October…ever. It was warm and sunny with striking foliage that stayed on the trees longer than normal. 10/10 gold, shimmery, magnificent, ginormous stars.

And that’s my recent list of Demerits and Gold Stars. What articles of clothing do you wear out most quickly? Do you ever use coupons? Please tell me your go-to brand/model of sneaker! (I’m relatively flat-footed, have a wide foot, and will use them primarily for walking – based on past experience, Asics has typically been my preferred brand.)