Start with $1 and end up with your Emergency Fund (it ALL adds up)

Added: 2026-06-03

[00:00:00]Oh yeah, every little bit adds up. There is no doubt about it and don't we know it. So instead of letting all of those small things work against us, we have decided that we're going to pay attention all week to all of those little things that can usually get you.

[00:00:18]And then we show up here every Tuesday and we've decided to put that money into our quick win savings challenges instead. watching it add up for something that really matters instead of letting it flutter away on who knows what. Now, the last few weeks I have been reminding that these small amounts could actually go for what we call micro payments and you could send those in to your credit cards. $20 here and $10 there because again, we are just fighting that interest one day at a time. I just paid off four out of five maxed out credit cards. I will pay off the last credit card in two weeks. Oh yeah, it works. Congratulations to the Lychens family. They are about to be out of credit card debt, you guys. Next week. Oh my god, what a huge relief that must be for that family.

[00:01:15]Congratulations, you guys. I'm so happy for you and I'm so proud of you. But today, I wanted to remind that we don't want to skip that $1,000 starter emergency fund. This is our little baby buffer so that every time something unexpected happens, we are not forced to whip out those credit cards and pay the attached interest. If you caught my most recent video, you already know that I had a water heater emergency. And it was a huge relief to be able to pay cash. No payments lingering around for months and months reminding me of this item that I never wanted to buy in the first place, and no interest piling up in the background. Just count it out and get my receipt. I fell off the bandwagon for a bit, but now I'm getting back at it.

[00:02:11]I've had to use my emergency fund for some stuff that came up, so I am saving it back up again. So, Randy, yes, me and you, girl, we are going to build our emergency funds back up together. We are a group here. Yes, we are totally in this together. I mean, we need to be, right? It is rough out there. So, with that being said, in our Tuesday video, we actually get to chat a little bit cuz yes, we are all saving money, but we are also people. We are moms, daughters, sisters, friends, co-workers. And when we're out there every day and we are just like trying to save money, save money, save money, it is really easy to start to feel bogged down when we're in that mindset. We need support. We need community. We need fun. Right. So, that's what we're doing here. Now, before we get started today, let's all welcome in Soapa Marina. She commented last week and she said, "Today, I set up my binder and started saving my first $30."

[00:03:22]Yes. Everybody, let's welcome Soapa to the hive. I get so excited when I see these types of comments, and it looks like you guys did, too. Look at that. 25 likes. I love that you guys are encouraging the new people. Thank you for doing that. And last week we talked about our favorite gift to get. Erica says, "My mother handmade a beautiful quilt for me for a Christmas gift. I love thoughtful gifts." Tennessee girl says, "I'm a bookaholic, so my favorite gift is a book that I really want to read." Trisher says, "I like to receive one-on-one time with my sons. One is a chef, so we cook together. And the other one, they like to do what I think is really cool. They search thrift stores for vintage jazz albums. How cool is that, you guys? So, she says, "Time.

[00:04:11]Time is my favorite gift from my kids."

[00:04:14]Okay, you guys. And God's anointed and Jenny's comments are my absolute favorite. God's anointed says, "My favorite gift is cash for my savings challenges." And Jenny says, "I don't ask my kid, but my husband, I ask him for money for my savings challenges."

[00:04:33]You guys, those made me giggle at first, but then I was like, "Yeah, no kidding, right? I mean, if someone asks, "What do you want?" Good old cash, right? Always works. And you can absolutely put it right here. So, let's get into this saving money part. Let's roll the dice and see what today's topic is going to be.

[00:04:56]Six and four. Favorite savings challenge game.

[00:05:16]Okay, so here is where my money is going to be saved up in these six savings challenges. Now, this is that money that didn't go to drive-thrus. It didn't go for a nail appointment. I didn't buy that yummy smelling candle. And I know, I know some of that is not fun, right? But neither is living paycheck to paycheck.

[00:05:40]Okay. and Tuesday's games. These are always going to be free games. Yay. And they are all linked below for you. You can download and print them out. The binder and the envelopes that you see me using, those are linked below for you, too. I say this every week for about $15 for the binder and the envelopes invested. You can start doing this, too.

[00:06:02]So fun, you guys. So, yeah, we've got six savings challenges. We've got the money. We've got our conversation of what is your favorite savings challenge.

[00:06:11]That's pretty cool, right? I can't wait to talk about that. And you're probably wondering if you're new, how in the heck are we doing this? So, here's here's how to play. We will use one dye. So, we just need this one. And we're going to roll one through six. Okay. And we've got how many games? Six games. So, what I'm going to do is if I roll a five, I'm going to go to one, two, three, four, five. My number five game here. And I'm going to place two bills on top of that one. And I'm just going to keep going until all of the money is gone. And that's it. Okay. So, as I said, these games are always going to be free. And speaking of free, before we get completely going, I just added the June freebie for everyone. Yay. This is linked below for you guys. So, don't forget to grab that while you are here today. And let's see who our creators are really quickly. We have Sassy Ginger Budgets, The Messy Budgeter, Purple Cow Corner, this one is from me, Two Sister Bees, Purely Budgets, and last but certainly not least, is Pink Plum Budgeting. Okay, so yeah, check them out, subscribe to their channels, watch a video or two. We all do things a bit differently and it's fun to see what everybody else out there is doing, right? Okay. So, the first thing I'm going to do is I've got some fives and a couple twos. I'm gonna kind of just throw these in here with all these ones.

[00:07:41]I'm just going to mix them in so that way we do not know which ones of these are going to get a little boost of extra cash, right?

[00:07:53]Okay. So, you guys ready? Let's talk about what my favorite savings challenges are. Oh my goodness, this is a tough one. But I think I I think I'm the perfect person to answer this one, right? I know all about my savings challenges. I would have to say that dice games right off the bat comes to my mind. Those are my absolute favorite. My sister always says, "Jen loves slinging her dice." And I certainly do. I mean, how can you not? It makes every game so much more fun to do.

[00:08:28]Who else out there loves them? A good dice game. I definitely do. Okay, so the other kind that I like, and these are probably, I guess you would consider them a little more serious. I do like the ones that challenge our behaviors.

[00:08:44]They get you to just think about what you're doing and do something else instead, right? And I actually have two in my Etsy shop and one is called yourself. I love that game. It basically just forces you, if you do treat yourself, like say you bought the yummy candle and you just couldn't help yourself. You had to treat yourself. You loved it. Say the candle was, I don't know, $10. You have to also in that savings challenge save that $10. So, you're getting to treat your present self, but you're also treating your future self. So, I really love that game. And the other one that I really love is the see it, like it, want it, save it. That's a very long name for a game. That one makes you wait. It makes you wait before you buy anything. You have to make sure you really want it, right? So, I really like that, too.

[00:09:37]Well, wait a minute. I don't think it really makes you wait. Maybe that's the see it like it 2.0. Yeah, I think that one is the one that makes you wait it out. The original one is the one that you save the money instead of buying the item. That's what it is. And you put 25 or 50% of the cost. So like say I wanted to buy, I don't know, a shirt, right, for 30 bucks. And instead of buying the shirt that I know I don't need for 30 bucks, I decide if I want to save 25 or 50% of that instead. And let's say I said 50. So I would save $15 instead of buying the shirt. I hope that makes sense. Not having it in front of me just makes it sound really difficult, but it's not. It's a great game. So anyway, that would be my favorite style of savings challenges.

[00:10:35]Okay. And I don't think that I said this when I started, but I did have $64 today for all of these. So, let's see what each one of our savings challenges got today. This cute little strawberry ended up with $6. And these are $1 a piece.

[00:10:58]So, let's mark those off. And this one is now up to 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12.

[00:11:12]Next up is our little panda bear. And these are worth $3 a piece. And that's exactly what we have. $3.

[00:11:20]So, let's mark one of these off. And let me double check. Oh, I do. I have money in the front. There's $2 there. It's going to have to stay until next week.

[00:11:34]So this one has 20 30 32 34 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42.

[00:11:45]Yeah, I have to say the other kind of savings challenge that I really really like are the ones that have like one big goal in mind. The ones that are like the 100 envelope challenge. I really love that one. That is like an oldie but a goodie. I have the honeydew binder that I really like. I use that one to save up for extra payments on my daughter's car.

[00:12:06]I like these box challenges that I've been seeing. I have not done one yet, but that is definitely on my list. But yeah, those are really cool, too. Okay, so you guys probably see this one only needs one more, and they're $2 a piece.

[00:12:20]So, let's take the $2 out of the stack.

[00:12:24]We're going to finish this. Yay!

[00:12:28]We are finishing one. And I knew I was finishing it, you guys. I checked before.

[00:12:34]Oh, you know what? This has an extra dollar in the front. I'm going to put it towards the next one.

[00:12:40]What was I saying? Oh, yeah. I knew I was going to finish this one. I checked before I started filming because I hate not being prepared with the next challenge. So, I've got one ready to go to put in this one's place. And that one will get this money. Okay. So, this one has 20 22 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 31 $32.

[00:13:07]Yay. Okay, so let me get a paper clip.

[00:13:10]Here they are.

[00:13:14]And I like to save these over time and then decide what to do with them all at once. I kind of just keep going until I either need the money, which is that's what's happened the last two times is I needed the money out of here. Maybe this time this one will bring us some luck. I won't need it for something boring like taxes or a water heater. We'll see.

[00:13:39]Okay, so we're going to replace this one with this one. I have it ready to go.

[00:13:47]And this one comes from Hustle and Flows Co. I loved it. How cute is this? The strawberry shortcake. So, let's see how much we're going to be adding. I'm going to make these amounts a little bigger because I can already see I've got some bigger amounts sitting here and I don't want it to be like gone in a week or two. So, not purposely anyway. So, let's make these worth $3 each. We'll do that.

[00:14:15]Oh, I forgot to write on the front of this one that I have $24. So, let's write it right there.

[00:14:31]Okay, so $3 each and we have 5 10 11 12 13 Oh my gosh, there's another five.

[00:14:39]Okay, let's try this again. 5 10 15 16 17 18 19 20 21. Okay, so that's perfect.

[00:14:46]We will mark off seven of these. Oh my goodness. one.

[00:14:54]Oh my goodness, you guys.

[00:14:57]Half of this over half of it is already gone. But that's the way it goes, right?

[00:15:01]I I just The dice did it, not me. So, I don't know if you guys could hear that, but I just sent my oldest daughter to voicemail. I hate doing that, but I'm filming. We've been playing phone tag like all morning, her and I. So anyway, I'll call her back when I'm done. Okay, so this one, these are $5 a piece. We've got five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10.

[00:15:28]And I do have some in the front again, but that's $3. So those aren't going to count until next week. Let's mark off two of these for the $10.

[00:15:40]And let's see what we're up to. This one will save us 60 when it's completed.

[00:15:48]So we should have 50 20 25 30 32 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 50. Yes, $50.

[00:16:05]Yeah, I'm just I'm sitting here thinking to myself how guilty I feel sending my daughter to voicemail. I hate doing that. Poor kid.

[00:16:13]Okay, so this one has 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13. Okay, so let's see.

[00:16:23]Oh my gosh, we're $1 away from finishing this one. I don't have any in the front, do I? Nope. Okay, so $13. We have five, eight, 10, 12, 13. Look at that, you guys. $1. So we will be finishing this one next week. Let's see what we're up to. So exciting when these get completed, right? That's the whole point. So, let's see what we're up to for this one. 20 30 35 37 8 9 40 50 51 52 53 54. Ooh. So, this one is $55 when it is completed. That's a nice one.

[00:17:08]Okay. And our last one. I like this one how it has little dice on it to keep track. We will be adding, and there's nothing in the front. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 doll hairs. Let's see. So, let's mark off three 6 9 10. And al together we have a lot of a lot of ones. We've got 5 10.

[00:17:40]Let's try this again. 5 10 20 30. Wow, these add up very quickly, don't they?

[00:18:08]Okay, now I'm not going to forget. We've got to mark off the savings challenge here. We're going to mark off this one, which was the favorite savings challenge game. And I am going to put I just took this from, as you can see, it's always dirty gross ones. These are the ones that me and Jason used. He put this up in like a basket that we keep over here. It holds like our keys and random stuff. He must have dumped this out of his wallet. He probably didn't want to carry a bunch of ones. So, I'm going to take it. And that's what's going to go in here. This is random.

[00:18:48]Every week it's something different. I have no idea what I'm going to put in this one. So, we we are adding 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12. All right. $12. That's a nice little savings today. Okay, you guys. So, I don't think I said it, but this video is called Your Turn Tuesday, and that's because it is now your turn. You've got to answer in the comments. What is your favorite savings challenge game? I can't wait to hear your answers. Maybe I'll get some good ideas on some that I don't know about. So, make sure to put yours in there so we can all see. And don't go anywhere. We have more, lots more. Okay, this part of the video is called Honey Drop and this is where I drop what is going on now, what's already happened, what is up and coming on the channel.

[00:19:43]Here it comes. Okay, so last week we decided, okay, I decided, but I'm taking you with me, that we are going to start saving for Christmas now. Yes, now. We have 30 weeks left to go. And I put this up last week to drive my point home that Christmas be expensive. And that even if we can get some of our money saved up, that is going to be better than none.

[00:20:16]And we will all be better off in 2027 because of it. Okay, you guys. Now, as you saw on the screen, we gonna need some monies for Christmas, right? So, I want you to download this.

[00:20:31]This is linked below for you. It is a savings tracker, and it has all 30 of those Fridays on it. So, I want you to pick your goal amount over here and then figure out what your weekly amount is going to be that you need to be meeting every single week in order to get that dollar amount. And we're going to track this all together. And I also have for $1 this Christmas guide. It is also linked below. Now, this has you guys all of the planning things that we are going to need. VIBs. This is free for you in your library. You guys just go and download it. But we're going to be following this here on the channel. So, let's get this started, right? So, I think what I'm going to do is I'm going to call this basically like jumpstarting us on Tuesday's video and then we can actually check in and make sure that we've completed the thing that we're supposed to do and that we have our weekly savings on my budget video. Now, this last month or so, you may have noticed I've been doing my budget video every other week, every two weeks. I've been doing one with you guys and I have been doing one off camera, but I think that adding this particular thing into my budget video makes the most sense. So, that's what we're going to do. And it is back to weekly filming for me. Okay. So, here is the jump start that we're going to do on today's video. I want everyone, including me, obviously, we're going to complete this page. It is called decide part one. This will be our week one thing to do. I'm so excited about this.

[00:22:24]So Jason and I, we just looked over this. I kind of like read it out loud to him while he was cooking dinner. But tonight we're going to answer these and then on the budget video, I'm going to say that'll be up on Friday. I will show you my responses. So, I want you guys to have yours completed by then and have your money budgeted so that we can save it and then we can mark off our first week on our 30week tracker together.

[00:22:53]That sounds like a plan right now. I would say if you are not subbed to the channel, now is a good time, right? Just do that and make sure to hit the bell. You want to subscribe honestly so that you can hit the bell because that's the most important part. That way you will know when a new video is posted and you won't miss any of this. Okay, so the next thing what we want to talk about for the honey drop is our VIBs. You guys, most of you know, but maybe not all of you.

[00:23:25]We are doing a giveaway and this Christmas bag.

[00:23:30]And look how much room is in there.

[00:23:32]Well, this is mine, but you guys are going to get the same bag. There's three of them. There's going to be three winners. This is going to be full of all kind of goodies for three winners. I have been adding some cute things. I'm not going to show all the things until it is completed, okay? I'm still working on this. So, go ahead if you're a VIB and enter for this giveaway over on Kofi. And our VIB winner for June is Miss Adrithena Draws. Now, she's going to receive this is a new perk that I just started last month. She's going to receive our digital download as a physical product. I will be mailing this to her. And this was this is actually her set, but that's okay. I can wrap it back up for her. I want to show you guys really quickly what our June VIB perks or whatever you want to call them.

[00:24:33]I don't know. Are we've got this? This is summer vibes. Absolutely love it. I ended up after I did this, I was like, you know what, Jen, you should make a whole set for the seasons. So, I did.

[00:24:43]I've got spring, summer, fall, and winter available in the Etsy shop. But my VIBs get this as one of their downloads. So cute. You save $75 when it is completed. And keeping with the theme, this one is called the ocean is calling and it's a scratch off. If you want, if you have scratchoff stickers and you want to put them there, you can.

[00:25:03]If not, there's a really cute icons underneath there. So, this one, you decide how much you're going to save.

[00:25:10]But I absolutely loved how that one came out as well. And then we've got the matching tiny that just says, "Welcome June." And I don't know off the top of my head, but I feel like this one saves $20. I think it does. So, Adraina, this is your set with some little extras, of course, I will be adding in for her.

[00:25:32]Congratulations. And she's already been contacted. She already knows she's the winner, and I'm going to be shipping that out for her today. So, I want to thank all of my VIBs for supporting what I do here. You guys, you are too much sometimes. Okay, now you might be watching and you're like, "What is a VIB? What is this lady talking about?"

[00:25:51]So, just click the link below. It explains it. And thank you as always for hanging out with me today. And I will see you next