I said yesterday I was working on something to contain the mountains of cash I have rolling around all over my house.

So here’s the thing:

We try to do the cash only thing …each payday we withdraw the cash for all of our spending and stick it in envelopes…when the envelopes are empty no more spending. 

We’re not gonna go into how disciplined we are about really not spending when the cash is gone.

What I want to talk about is the envelopes.

I found a long time ago that the envelopes are useless if they are kept at home.  We just end up using the debit care because we know we have the cash at home, and then of course the cash never makes it’s way back to the bank… you get the idea.

So generally I carry the envelopes in my purse (now I guess you all have enough info to rob me!).

Here’s my problem:

The envelopes do not hold up well in my purse.  They tend to end up in shreds.  And it’s annoying.

So I decided to make something to replace them with.

I started by tracing rectangles a little larger than an envelope onto an old pair of jeans.

After cutting them out, I embroidered names for all of our designated funds on them:  Food (groceries), Fun (spending money), Love (gifts), and Health (medical expenses).

(The dollar sign is for the front).

Then I cut out pieces of scrap fabric to back each piece, sewed them together wrong sides out and flipped them,  finished the edges, and finally sewed all the pieces together with some embroidery thread along the bottom and sides.

(Sorry I didn’t take pictures of each step; it was getting a little tedious)

The finished product is a kind of accordian style little pouch.  Much like the bunch of envelopes I had stapled together, only hopefully tougher.

I put  a button on the front piece and a loop on the back to secure the money inside.

It turned about the same size as a checkbook.

Not glamorous, I know.  But I think it’s kind of cute, and hopefully it will do the job