Some Sustainability Goals for the New Year

I’ve been thinking about trying a shopping/sustainability challenge in the coming year. The past couple years I’ve tried to buy as much secondhand as I can, and that’s something I plan to continue indefinitely. But in 2026 I’m considering expanding on that, and only acquiring things locally, as well as secondhand, whenever possible.

Secondhand or not, I’ve been buying too much stuff and I want that to change. Turns out, it’s actually really easy to browse Poshmark or Mercari or Ebay and find something I absolutely HAVE to have, that I had no idea even existed five minutes before. Or when I otherwise learn of an item I’m interested in, scouring those same sites to see if I can find it secondhand so I can justify buying it, when I still didn’t actually need it or maybe even want it. And it never ends, because there’s always more stuff. I don’t to spend the money, but I’m also tired of spending my time and mental energy thinking about things I’ve convinced myself are missing in my life.

The thing is, I like stuff. I like clothes. I like a comfortable home. I like finding toys I know my kid will be really excited about. But I want to be very intentional about the items I bring in, and impulse buys online – secondhand or not – don’t fit into that. And specifically with secondhand purchases online, if they don’t end up fitting right or I don’t like the color in person or it’s just not what I expected, they usually can’t be returned.

My general shopping strategy is to only buy things I see myself still using in five years. That’s especially true for anything I buy new, but it’s the goal for secondhand items too. That means skipping trends that’ll be out of fashion in three months, it means choosing high-quality items that will last five years, and it means only bringing in things I really, really like. Many of my favorite items have been purchased from Poshmark or similar, but I’ve also wound up with quite a few things I’ve regretted, and then I have to go through the process of finding a new home for them – taking photos, posting on the sites, finding a place to store them, waiting in line at the post office when they do sell – usually at a financial loss. Taking a break from online buying means not just saving money, but also taking a break from all that buyer’s remorse.

I don’t anticipate needing any clothes for myself this year – I have so, so much already – but my son will likely need some things. I’m fortunate to live within walking distance of both a women’s consignment store and a children’s consignment store. A short drive away is a second children’s consignment store and a Goodwill. If I’m looking for something specific for my house or for my kid, Offerup and Facebook Marketplace might have just what I need.

Basically, I’m hoping to extricate myself from the cycle of always wanting something new. I want to be happy with what I have, and to stop thinking so much about stuff. And I want to live a little smaller by lessening my participation in this system where you can dream up a want and have it arrive on your doorstep the next day.

There will be a few exceptions to not buying online.

• Yarn: I crochet, and I can’t always get the colors I want from a local store. Any crochet project I undertake, I want it to turn out its best and settling for colors I don’t like won’t get me there. I don’t buy plastic yarn, and try to only buy natural fibers from companies known to implement ethical and sustainable practices so I’m already somewhat limited. (I do sometimes buy acrylic yarn scraps from a local second-hand craft supply store!)
• Gifts: I would rather buy somebody exactly what they want and will use for years than something that isn’t quite right and they might not love and use. And I do think gifting holidays are a great time to ask for what you really want – I’d like to instill in my kid that we don’t just get everything we want all the time, that new clothes and toys are a sometimes thing. But that if there’s something you do really want, maybe it’s something to ask for for your birthday or for Christmas. That way he (hopefully) learns to value what he does have, really appreciate the times he gets new things, and differentiate real wants from just seeing something cool. And isn’t that how adults should be going about things, too?
• A new mattress for my son. We’ll be moving him to a real bed in the spring, and while I happily took in a used race car bed frame I found on Offerup, I’m going to buy a new mattress. We’ll probably order one from Costco.

In addition to sustainability and consuming less overall, I’m also very interested in saving money where we don’t actually want it spent this year. As this stay-at-home-mom experiment goes on longer than we originally planned, I’m grateful we’ve been able to do it and I’m very aware that things like our choice to only have one car, to stay in our small house and to focus our spending on things we truly enjoy (travel, going out for a beer here and there) are what allows it to continue. When the kid gets to be school age, we’ve discussed our hope that I can get a part-time job rather than a full-time job so we don’t have to stress over finding before or after-school care, nobody having time to cook dinner, entire weekends dedicated to the chores we didn’t have time for throughout the week. Or alternatively, spending a small fortune on housekeeping services and meal kits. Our version of “having it all” involves having a little less, so we can have more time.

I plan to keep myself honest here by sharing weekly “buying” posts detailing what I wanted to buy but didn’t, what I did decide to spend extra money on, and maybe some frugal wins (for example, I just moved my phone service from T-Mobile to Mint during a promotion where my credit card was offering 45,000 bonus points for making the switch, so on top of the $65 I’ll save each month on my bill, that’s $45 I can redeem toward an upcoming travel expense). I won’t post our pre-planned grocery trips or mortgage payments or that kind of thing, but I’ll post if I had to run out for additional groceries, if I stopped somewhere for a scone, if I bought anything at Goodwill or if I took my son to the local gymnastics studio’s indoor toddler play hour, an activity that might just allow us to survive the winter. These extras aren’t necessarily things I consider bad, just choices I want to make mindfully.