Category Archives: Budgeting

Thursday Random, Budget Related Thoughts

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I made the comment last week that September was turning into a very expensive month. I am relieved to say that things have calmed down a bit and although it will still be an expensive over all month, I am hoping that we can stay on track budget wise.

As of today, I have spent $380 of our $600 monthly grocery budget. This does include a 120# of chicken from Zaycon food, that will not be picked up until mid-October. I currently am planning to do a freezer cooking day with my BFF on Saturday which will add somewhere between $50 to $100 to the budget. This will give us another 10 crock pot meal for use as well. I am expecting $20 in rebate cards from my stock up of Tide Detergent. I will be using this as they come in and moving $20 into our special saving funds, which I will explain in a minute. I also have $7 left on a gift card from CVS. My goal for the rest of the month is to speed as little as possible on groceries. I will definitely be under budget this month, the only question will be by how much?

Currently we have $240 remaining in our gas budget for the month. I estimate we will need to use at least $180 of this but should be able to hang on to the remaining $60.

I was able to finish out Zach’s clothing needs for the fall by purchasing some clothes from a friend!  She has the next size up as well so if Zach decides to grow I have an option to purchase  without breaking the budget again.

The weather has been very usually in North Carolina this week. Beginning on the 7th, we have not used out central air. I am so excited about this, I have been keeping a close eye on the weather and realized that today (Thursday) was the warmest out of the week. The temperature did get up in the high 80’s and the temperature in the house was sitting at 84, but we survived and with a cold front passing through along with rain, our goal is to make it at least 2 weeks without central air in September. We are usually able to enjoy a lower electricity bill for October and November so this should generate some nice savings for us.

Now for the announcement of where these savings are headed.  We would like to make a trip to Michigan to visit with Matt’s family over the Thanksgiving holiday. However, after much discussion and a hard look at our budget, we agree that in order to make this trip we will need to save around $1800 for the trip. So we are both search for any extra money in our budget in addition to searching for extra ways to earn money. For us this is a lofty goal for an 8 week period but I am excited to see where this challenge leads us!

 

Budget Busting Week!

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I had such high hopes for September, budget wise that is.  I discussed in my month end post for August, that I was not going to officially join in on any of the challenges for saving in September but did plan to try and save so I could met several of my year long goals.  However, at a week into September, I feel like I am already falling behind, my only thought is that maybe the rest of the month will get much more less expensive.

The first hit that our budget took this week was unplanned medical expenses. Both the girls had eye appointments on Thursday, which were accounted for but I have ended up taking Kendall to the pediatrician this week as well as Lily to a dermatologist. On Thursday alone, we spent over $175 on medical expenses, which does not include my dentist/cleaning appointment that will probably end up costing around $100 after the insurance pays.

The next hit is in the area of groceries.  My plan was to spend less than $100 besides the huge chicken order that I will be placing this week. I had forgotten that I would need to pick up a few last minute things which ended up being almost $80 including a flea collar for the dog.

Finally, gas, in addition to spending so much on medical expenses by the time we went to three different cities on Thursday, we had put 225 miles on the van. Which means that both the car and van need to be filled this weekend as well. So we will have spent almost half of our allotted gas money for the money in the first week. Yikes!

August in Review

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Blogging:  Goal: 15 per month  Post number 15!  Goal met!  Busy month again but at least that gives me something to say!

Weight: Goal to exercise 3x a week and to be down to 150 by December 2014.   I have only lost 2# this month and definitely have not made it with exercising 3x  a week. I said last month I was rethinking this goal and have decided to increase it to 175 which is the point I stayed between the girls and little kids in addition to the point I was at when I met and married Matt. I know this is probably not where most people think I should be but it is where I am comfortable and plan to stay!

Financial Goals:

1.  Pay off all debit by July 2015, except for mortgage.   Updated this goal again this month as other than credit card debit we have a personal loan and after taking a hard look at this we have changed our plan to get all debit paid off !  At this point, I am unsure if we will stay debt free but it is a goal I want to achieve prior to making any other larger purchases.  Goal met for this month.

2. Emergency Fund to $2000.  We are sliding backwards again on this goal. I can’t seem to get my self ahead on this goal. It is currently sitting at $100.

. 3. Groceries: Spend $600 a month . Goal Met  Total spent $600. I had planned to come in way under for the month but with some of the purchases we made at the beach in addition to stocking up on meat. I am glad to report that we did not go over for the month. In September, the plan is to make a huge chicken purchase but little else so I hope to be under for the next couple of months.

4. Gas: Spend $400 a month with any remaining to be move to Auto fund for repairs.  Total Spent $499.72. Goal MET.   I did add an additional $100 to the budget this month for our trip. The amount spent includes a small repair on the van and inspection, taxes and tags for the car!  Hopefully we have gone over the hump with gas spending for the year!

Overall I did meet 4 of 6 goals. This is the same ratio as last month but different goals achieved. I am feeling much more optimistic about our finances so that is a huge step for me.

I have noticed that during the month of September, several of the blogs I regularly read are doing challenges for saving money and/or cutting the budget for the month. I am not going to participate officially with any, but I do hope to place a little more in savings this month. One of the reason, that I am choosing not to join in is that currently our budget does not have any wiggle room. If we stick to budget, than that is huge and means additional savings but in addition we are in the middle of Birthday season and I have already started slowing purchasing Christmas gifts, so no extra spending may be difficult as well.

Thursday Shopping

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We need to have a couple of pairs of glasses worked on in Winston this week so after checking out a couple of ads, I decided we would make a couple of stops to coupon as well. Overall I am very pleased and actually think this is one of my better savings trips overall.

First stop was Harris Teeter- I spent $14 and saved $65 or 82%   This include 5 packs of Oscar Myer hot dogs for $0.51 each, 2 cups of Greek yogurts-free, Laughing Cow Cheese and hair products!

The second stop was at Target- I spent $27 and saved $50 with $3.00 remaining on a gift card. The saving was 65%, however because Target prices are lower than most this is actually a huge deal. My purchased included 10 boxes of cereal, 5 2L drinks, 2 packs of juice boxes, 4 Rev sandwich  wraps, a couple packs of cookie dough and some school supplies.

Finally stop was Home Depot.  I do have a Home Depot Credit Card and usually use it to make purchases for the house. Over the last two years, I have not paid any interest or fees to this card so I am not opposed to use it. I received in the mail on Thursday a 10% your entire purchase coupon. We were able to purchase a new gas grill for less than $150 combining this coupon and a great sale. I am not even sure how to calculate the saving but wanted to include it so that you know to watch your mail and use what companies send you!

I do want to mention one more stop we made but it was actually in Lexington. We went to the Food Lion to pick up some pasta salad mixes for Zach’s birthday party. We had excellent timing and walked in just as the meat was being reduced. So we decided to go ahead and grab what looked good and we knew we could use. This ended up being around $110 of meat including hamburger, beef and chicken. At first you might think this is not a great deal but in addition to the hamburger we already have this should be enough meat for us till mid to late October.

Overall I am very pleased with this shopping day!

 

Shopping Savings

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I have been able to get in some extra shopping over the past couple of days, so I thought I would share with you. I was able to pick up several items, including Lunchables to use in the girls lunches as they head back to school. Stocking up on these at $1.00 each is much better for us than the $2.85 a day for lunch at school. I am sure that as the year goes on we will be back to packing our own lunch combo but these are definitely worth the convenience at the stock up price.

Magic Mart– Not sure how wide spread this store is but I found some awesome deals yesterday with no coupons.
Hunt Pudding packs- $0.88
Lays Stax (Blue containers)  Barbecue or Sour Cream/Onion $0.88
Reese Peanut Butter 8 packs $1.03

Walmart–  I hate this store but need to pick up a birthday gift and decided to use some coupons while I was there.
Notebook Paper- $0.75 each- Not the best price but much cheaper than $1.59 which is the regular price.
Lunchables $1.00 each
Suave Kid’s Shampoo- $1.50 each, printable coupon $1.00 off so $0.50 each (I got two)
Mitchum Deodorant-$2.97-  $2.00 off coupon paid $0.97.  This is one of the few items I remain brand loyal to so I try to always buy at less than $1.00
Hawaiian Punch- $1.98- coupon for $1.00 off so I picked up two for $0.98 each
Minute Maid Juice- half gallon on sale 4 for $5, two $1.00 off 2 coupons and submitted to get a Walmart gift card $5.  I will update when I actually receive this gift card.  Even without the gift card less than $1 each.

Target– My favorite store!  I love the way they let you combine coupons. Read more about it here.
Sharpie Highlighters- 2 pack, $1.98 each, Mobile coupon for $1.00 off two. Ending up being $0.98
Scotch Tape- $1.02- Target Coupon for $1.00 off.
Post- It notes $0.99- Target coupon for $1.00 off
BIC mechanical pencils (8 count) $0.99 each, Target coupon for $1.00 off 2.
Skippy Peanut Butter Singles (6 pack) – $2.60- 30% off with cartwheel and $0.75 off 2 from newspaper.
Lunchables- Buy 5 get 5 free final price $0.75 each.
Light weight Gray jacket for Zach $5.00

CVS– I decided against working a $10 gift card deal this week. I am trying to save money for the beach and although the deals were good they were not rock bottom and honestly we didn’t need any so I just picked up the mandatory diet cokes and cereal.
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cereal- 2 for $4, with 1 ECB with the purchase of 2. I had two  $0.50 off one coupons, plus a $0.50 deposit into my saving star account. They ended up being $1 a box so my buy price.

 

The biggest reward I got this weekend is by catching in my Saving Star money. This is a simple app that is tied to your individual reward cards or can be used by scanning in Walmart receipts as well. I had $12.15 deposit in my checking account on Saturday from this!

Grocery Budget-Motivation

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Our largest category of spending is Groceries.  I budget $600 a month to go toward this but for this year so far I am averaging over this amount by $14.  I often plan and set a goal to reduce this category but it is the most difficulty one for me to control or at least that is what it feels like. If you read my July update, you probably are aware that I plan to save at least $250 of this months grocery budget to use as fun money at the beach.

Every time I make such a plan, things seem to come up and usually I tend to cave and just buy what we “need”. This month, as usual, already we are starting to run out or run low on a number of items. However, I have not caved to the pressure, simply because of the motivation to have the extra money to use at the beach.  I will say that this is becoming harder by the day and we still have 2 week prior to leaving for our trip.

One of the items that we are running out of currently are spices. I have just started a list on the back of the monthly calendar so that when we do head out to shop, I can be assured that we are not forgetting anything. We are starting to run low on several items that I would usually plan a trip to Costco just to pick up such as milk and eggs. We brought up from the freezer, our last gallon of milk yesterday.  I had originally planned to keep this frozen and use as an ice pack in the cooler but this will not be the case. I have decided that we can always purchase a gallon of milk there it will come from the same money but it at least will be a beach purchase. We have exactly 24 eggs left. The kids have been enjoying at least one egg a morning each with their dad and at that rate we have about a weeks worth left.

A final item that is going to take a little bit more planning for the next two weeks is menus.  Our only chicken meal left in the freezer is Chicken Fried Rice, slight problem we are out of soy sauce to complete.  The good news is that we have plenty of pork and beef items and even a seafood meal.  The addition problem is that starting this week the girls will have cheerleading two nights a week which means that we have to have semi quick meals.  I don’t want us trying to save the grocery money to turn into eating out because it is easier.  I am hoping that by writing things down it will make me more accountable. Wish me luck!

Target Shopping

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I can honestly say that I enjoy shopping more at Target than CVS now!  The only thing that could make me like shopping Target anymore would be if it were physically closer to me!  Over the last several months I have been making it a habit to watch the Target ads and stop by any time I am in Winston.. On Thursday, we spent most of the day shopping and our first stop was Target. I am going to give a lot of details about this trip and also how anyone can combine all the promotions at Target to save even more money!

The final saving at Target to me is the simplest. You save an additional 5% of your bill after all other coupons by using a “Red Card”.  My red card is not a credit card but simply a card that is tied to my regular bank account. I use it only in Target and it works like a regular debit card although it usually takes about a week for it to post to my account. On our trip Thursday, I saved $4.53 by swiping this card instead of my regular debit card.

One of the biggest ways to save at Target is to combine sales with coupons. You are allowed to use 1 Target (store) coupon in addition to a manufactures coupon.  Target actually has 2 different types of coupons. First they have printable coupons from the website, in addition, they have mobile coupons which are texted to your phone. Although you can use both a manufactures coupon and a Target coupon on one item you can not use both a mobile coupon and a printed Target coupon on the same items.   On this trip, I purchased “Right Guard Deodorant” this was not on sale. The price was $3.34, I used a $2.00 off Target coupon and a $1.50 coupon from the newspaper for this item, which made it entirely FREE! I don’t think that Target allows overages but I can’t really tell from my receipt but FREE is still Free!  Target also puts out very different coupons than you generally see. For example I was able to purchase a roll of Scotch Tape and a pack of Post It notes  for $0.02 each by simply using the store coupon. Another advantage to the Target coupon is that some are for their house brand items, which are usually less expensive. For example, I purchased the house brand sunscreen and used $1.00 off store coupons.  I have really been surprised at how many coupons I find on their store brands.

Finally, in addition to use both a store and manufactures coupon, Target has a program called “Cartwheel”  This takes a little bit of work and planning but as you will see well worth the time in the long run.  To use the “cartwheel” you have to go to the Target website and sign up for the account, I used Facebook so it was simple. Cartwheel items are generally for a % off an item.  You are limited to 18 Cartwheel offers at a time but can easily remove and add. I always print my Cartwheel list from the site so it is a simple scan of a barcode in the store. On this trip, I took advantage of several of these offers including 20% of kids shoes, 30% off Nutty Poptarts, 25% off Swimwear, and 15% off Coopertone Sunscreen. I was able to combine the cartwheel and coupons to purchase the Poptarts for $0.66 a box and the sunscreen for $6.50 a bottle. The percentage of saving comes off the price of the item before coupons which is an advantage.

A final reason I like shopping Target is the convenience of having everything in one store!

July in Review

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Blogging:  Goal: 15 per month  Post number 15!  Goal met!  I will be the first to admit that this has been a real struggle for me this month but I am glad to say I can accomplish it!

Weight: Goal to exercise 3x a week and to be down to 150 by December 2014.  The more I look at this goal the more I am wondering if it is realistic. However I am going to leave it in place for now. Officially I have lost 39#  since January. I am getting help with a medication but I am also still try to keep with the goal. I need to focus on the exercise part of this goal for sure.  I am claiming goal met!

Financial Goals:

1.  Pay off credit card debit by June 2015.   I did change this goal to reflect the purchase of the new dryer last month. I did pay off all the debt except for the dryer this month.  Goal met for this month.

2. Emergency Fund to $2000.  We are sliding backwards again on this goal. My emergency fund is down to $100.  I know this needs to be important. I just can’t seem to get it in place!

. 3. Groceries: Spend $600 a month  Total spent $690, this is over $100 less than last month but it has also raised my monthly average to $617. The good news is that we have purchased all the stuff for our vacation. My plan is to at least the first half of our grocery money in August for spending money on the trip. I know that in the next two months I will also be placing a large chicken order so I am not sure if I will be able to met even the average of $600 for the year.

4. Gas: Spend $400 a month with any remaining to be move to Auto fund for repairs.  Total Spent $381. Goal MET.  I am excited to see that we have finally been able to reduce our total gas usage for this month. This amount does include an oil change for the van.  My monthly average is sitting at $417, this will also have to be a goal looked at closely at the end of the year to determine do I need to increase?  I am also increasing this by $100 in August to cover our travel expenses.

 

Overall I did meet 4 of 6 goals. I am feeling much better about this month than in June. I do realize that I simply may need to raise both the grocery and gas budget by $25 to $50 at the end of the year to achieve a balance!

40# of Ground Beef!

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Matt and the girls picked up our Zaycon ground beef order. Zach got to enjoy some unexpected big sister time with both Haley and Amanda due to our central air problems.

We were unsure of what to expect but after ordering and enjoying several boxes of the chicken breast, I was hopefully. This meat was awesome. Matt placed the 4 tubes in the cooler with 2 ice packs from around 10:00 until 7pm. Either of the ice packs melted and the meat was still very cold.

I had been debating and thinking about the best possible use of this meat. In other words what do we need to do to get the most use with the least effort. I am pretty pleased with the results so I thought I would share with you.

I frozen 10# raw. 4 bags of 1.5# and 4 bags of 1#.  I will insert that I have been using regular sandwich bags for freezing and have not had any huge issues.

We ended up using 3# for making Taco Rice.  I am going to estimate that this is approximately 6 full meals. We usually keep a container in the fridge for a quick meal. I used 2 of my side by side crocks to simmer  the ingredients while working to prepare the rest of the meat. I am going to estimate this as 6 meals.

Next up in the third crock is Sloppy Joes. I used another 3 pounds of ground beef for this. I am going to estimate 3 total meals.

Matt loves Salisbury Steak so we also made 3# worth of these which totaled 5 additional meals. Last Saturday, I used around 10# of potatoes that were not looking the best to make mashed potatoes. So this is a quick and complete meal.

The remaining 21 pounds we browned with onion to be used in a variety of dishes as it is needed.

Overall meals = 45 meals
Total Time= 4 hours including clean up with both Matt and I work.

 

10 Things Tuesday 7/22

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Not sure if Carla is going to post this today but I wanted to get ahead of the game and I simply LOVE this format for catching up!

1.  My BFF is enjoying a week at the beach, she had a hard time finding someone to take care of her dog so the little kids are dog sitting for the week.

2.This week and next week should be the slowest of the summer!  Swim team is over and the currently plan is to start cheerleading the first full week of August.

3.Both Lily and Kendall are enjoying piano lessons but neither likes to practice!  I am very impressed with how quickly they are picking up the skills.

4. I did finish the reorganization of the office, playroom and our closet last week. Total spent was $27 but the difference is huge!  I totally feel like my closet is finished now!

5.  On Sunday, I spent most of the afternoon, sorting our recipes. I filled a 3inch 3 ring binder with recipes we like and really want to make again or several times, a second 1 inch binder with “stockpile” or make ahead recipes and a third binder with recipes that I have printed from the internet and want to try.

6.Zach finished swim lesson but still does not like to jump into the pool. He did tell our swim coach that he was planning to swim on the team next year so we shall see. I am glad that he is able to go underwater now and is a little bit more comfortable without arm floats.

7.Because of the odd weather we have been having, dry and huge temperature swings, I had to throw out our squash and about half of our bean plants already. We are able to harvest tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers on a regular basis still.

8. We were all excited to realize that currently we have 3 watermelons and 2 cantaloupes growing so far. I am guess we should be able to eat one of each in the next week or so!

9.July is one of two months that I receive 3 paychecks in the month. It has really helped to cover not only our beach trip but also to set aside money for cheerleading fees for the girls.

10. We saw “Planes Fire and Rescue” on Saturday, the kids really enjoyed it but it definitely is not on my favorites list!