Too many toys, chocolate, austerity, upcoming resolutions

It's almost over. Just one more weekend of New Year's madness, and then peace and quiet.

Franklin got toys from just about every person on the planet, it seems. We're swimming in toys here. I don't like clutter, so we bought him four or five things; at this age he just wants to chew on things, or maybe bang them on the floor. Our relatives did not have such restraint. There were more presents under the tree for Franklin than for Partner and myself combined over our entire marriage, it seemed!

We spent two days at the inlaws' house in London, eating way too much chocolate and watching way too much tv. I don't even like tv, but their austerity measures meant the heating was off and only the fireplace was on. So tv it was. We watched World Championship darts. I'm not making this up: two fat old men loaded down with gold jewelry and facial hair from the 70s throwing darts at a dartboard. With slow-motion replays of them throwing, arm fat wobbling. Actually, it was kind of awesome.

Speaking of austerity measures, Partner and I have agreed to lower our monthly personal allowances by £5 each. I may put most of mine into my savings account. Also, I've made a commitment to go into town and open a bank account with a monthly direct debit for subsequent Christmases. We sort of did it for Franklin; he's got his own savings account, and we bought his presents out of it, and any left over after his birthday will go into his investments account for when he's 18--I sometimes wish my parents had done that for me. I might have gone to university after graduation, instead of waiting all these years. Of course, I wouldn't be where I am now.

So I'm looking for ways to save money and get us back out of debt. We're not too deeply in--but buying a car earlier in the year was a setback, and as I'm only working weekends, my pay has gone down drastically. Setting a monthly personal allowance has been a huge success as far as curbing spending. We have the rule that we get a set amount on payday in cash to spend on ourselves. Bank cards are only allowed for groceries and diesel. Since implementation this summer, we've saved more than a £1000. That £1.50 here and £5 there really added up, and half the time we didn't even remember what we'd spent it on. If anyone else has a good suggestion for saving, I'd love to hear about it.

I'm thinking about goals for the coming year. I had a huge list of things I wanted to accomplish last year and having a baby really put a spanner in the works! I had a spreadsheet covering each month, and the first two months (January and February) have all the goals ticked, and subsequent months have none. Not a single yearly goal accomplished from March onward...