Yeah yeah yeah. Fear, too. But for now, I am focusing on sartorial matters.
In the past, I didn’t include gear purchases as “clothing” — gear was more along the lines of “exercise equipment” and I put it into the “healthcare” portion of my budget. But I noted that some forum members (Sal, Jenn, LaPed come to mind -- also maybe Carla??) do include gear in their clothing budget. I've always been in awe of this, a little bit, because they also have relatively small wardrobes! So if you take away the gear -- there's not all that many items left for "regular" wear!
Now I've been wondering if I ought to make this switch in thinking as well. because this year, my gear purchases far outnumbered my “fashion” purchases, not to mention the fact that I ended up wearing gear throughout my day far more often than I would have done in the past.
Part of this is just…COVID. Instead of exercising at a class or a gym, early in the morning, I’m exercising at home at inconsistent hours. I end up putting on the gear and wearing it to do housework as well as workout.
In addition, certain purchases crossed over easily -- the Icebreaker shorts I bought for hiking turned out to be good enough looking to wear for whatever else I might want to do.
I also need to factor in non-COVID-related lifestyle change. I moved to a suburban area and took up gardening and biking and increased my hiking so I needed different “equipment” than in the past. Hence -- purchasing to meet the need.
Fortunately, I got everything on substantial sale, so while it added up to a hefty-for-me sum, I was still well within budget overall.
Some of these items are still under consideration (i.e. they have not arrived so I don't know if I will keep). But am I nuts or am I nuts??? The thing is, I am wearing and USING it all. So I guess it was sensible.
