Category Archives: Budgeting

Money Update- God Provides

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Gensis 22:14 “Abraham named the place Yahweh-Yireh (which means “the Lord will provide”). To this day, people still use that name as a proverb: “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”

I can say that I know how it feels when God provides for our every need. One of the hardships associated with Zach’s scheduled surgery for the end of the month was the financial aspect of it. I used all of our Medi Flex for the year to cover the dentist portion of the bill. I was told up front that we would in addition receive an anesthesiologist bill in addition to the bill from the medical center for the facility use.  On Wednesday, I was greeted by the anethesiology bill and it was one that took my breath away. My medical insurance would cover half after meeting a separate $600 co-pay, all total $881 is the expected amount to be paid prior to March 21st in order for the surgery to occur on time.

Today I sat down to pay our regular bills and then started looking at just how and where this money would be coming from. I did have to pull most of it from our Emergency Fund but it was not the end of the Emergency Fund, it still has 1/4 of our first amount or $250 left.  I have paid this bill and feel really at peace with the whole process now.

I am so excited because God has again provided abundantly!

Stretch our money- Chicken

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As I was digging in our chest freezer last week, I found a 5 lb bag of chicken legs. I have  learned in the past year that Matt does not like barbecue chicken legs so I was on a mission to use these legs so that we all could enjoy.  I found a simple recipe for the crock pot so I thaw the legs, seasoned with Paula Deen seasoning. They cooked for about 8 hours on Sunday while we were at the cheerleading competition. For dinner, I made homemade bread, green beans and corn and the chicken legs. Everyone ate at least one legs but I still had about 10 left. I decided to make a chicken and broccoli casserole after de boning these. In addition I was able to cook a pot of chicken broth to be frozen for later use.  I made the casserole ahead on Sunday and it was our dinner on Monday, as well as my lunch on Tuesday! So out of my $5 bag of chicken I was able to serve 2 meals as well as the broth.

Things that Work

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I wanted to share with you things that we are finding that work for us as we continue to reduce debt and live crazy busy lives.

  1. Weekly menu lists:  a very simple list of 5-7 meal that we have all the ingredients for. Each day Matt or I or both can decide what sounds good for dinner. We usually make the list on weekends and it most likely follows a trip to the building to grab items from the freezers. Currently we are focusing on using up what we have an only adding items that are awesome deals. In the future we are considering purchasing a half cow but don’t have enough space for it right now so cleaning out is serving multiple purposes as well as keeping us to the $600 grocery budget.
  2. Zaycon foods: My plan is to order another 80 pounds of chicken breast this month for pick up in April. This will be the 3rd time we have ordered the chicken breast. 80# last almost 6 months for us. I have also been pleasantly surprised that each time we order the price per pound has dropped!  Another item that has been great is the uncooked chicken tenders. I will be purchasing more if they are offered in our area again. We have considered the bacon and hamburger but the price per pound seems a little bit much for us currently but I will keep options open!
  3. Coupons especially when playing the drug store game at CVS. I have reduced my spending greatly as CVS recently but it is still the best way for  me to save money and by lots of items. .
  4. Costco- this may seem out-of-place but I hate to grocery shop! Costco makes it fun and easy. I watch my prices and do try to purchase as much as possible with coupons but if we run out of an item than Costco is definitely cheaper for us that paying full price at the local super market!
  5. Coke Rewards- I am actually more impressed and pleased with this reward program than either diaper brands! I simply enter points and redeem for free product. The great thing is that they always offer free coke products and unlike the diaper reward programs the prices have not changed greatly!

Saved 95% at CVS

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I mentioned yesterday that we were currently $0.30 over our grocery budget for the month. I have done most of the grocery shopping this month at Costco but I continue to shop CVS for free stuff and good deals on everyday items like Diet Coke. I did make a trip on Sunday where I purchased 15 2 liters and some other items. I left the store with 5 ECBs. One of the debates was if I was to go back to the store and stock pile more drinks rolling my ECBs. The decision to try to stick within our grocery budget this month made that a no go but of course on the same day, I ran out of hair spray. I attempted one day without using anything and that was not a good choice so off to CVS to use my ECB to purchase hair spray.  I had read on Southern Savers that using a store coupon and one from Sunday’s paper you could get a tube of toothpaste free so I decide free is always good and grab that coupon as well. I was able to purchase a can of hairspray, tube of toothpaste and 2 Diet Coke for $0.54, which is strictly the tax. I saved $10.72 or 95%!!

Budget vs Reality

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I don’t know that I have clearly explained on the blog why budgeting has become such a priority in our lives for the past year. Today, I am going to clarify that as well as discuss some changes that I have thinking about making.

First why is budgeting so important for us right now. We are in what we think of as “our lean years.” For the next 3 years, Matt will be home full-time with the kids, which results in no steady income. He is working on establishing his web design business and God continue to supply us with just what we need but we both know we need to be on a budget during this time. We have been working on reducing our debt to therefore reduce the monthly expenses but we also want to be realistic with what we have coming in.

One thing that has really been useful is our “Freedom Account.” This is actually a second free checking account that we are making monthly deposits into. This account has our car insurance and AAA membership money, our gift fund, clothing fund and auto fund. Car insurance and AAA membership amounts are easy to determine I divided the bill into 12 months and that much is deposit into this account each month. The other areas have been tricky and I am continuing to change. The gift fund was originally at $50 a month but when I looked and this was supposed to include birthday and Christmas present, I up the amount to $100 a month. I also used this fund for buying gift for parties the kids are invited to as well. I still am not sure this is the right amount and will consider raising it to $150 at the point we are out of debt and have enough coming in to cover that amount.  Moving on to the auto fund, this is designed to cover maintenance cost such as batteries and tires, in the future it can also be expanded to include saving to purchase a new to use car as well. I currently place $50 a month into this area. The final amount in this fund is clothing. I originally planned to place $50 a month into the account but at two months in I currently have a negative $80 balance. When looking that I have not even purchased a new season of clothing I really feel this amount needs to be raised to $100 a month or $200 a person for the year. However that in reality will mean that I will have to reduce the amount somewhere else because we simply don’t have the steady income for it. II do keep a fund for hair appointment and such but I am currently keeping these in cash. In the future, I also plan to add a travel fund but this year it was funded by our tax returns.  I think I should also add that our Emergency Fund is different from this account as well.

The other major items beside standard bills that I budget for each month are Gas and Groceries. Gas is the only area that I am consistently under budget it. However we have decided to not reduce this amount because of the unknown with gas prices at this time. I have noticed a 7 cent increase in a week here. The excess gas money will be used for extra things and/or added to the “Freedom Account” for clothing.

Groceries, the one area that I can’t seem to get a good  handle on. Last year the budget was $800 a month. I ended up spending $773 on average a month. In order to reduce our spending, I set the goal for $600 this year. In January, I was $120 over which I deducted from February’s budget. As of today, the grocery money is over spent by 20 cent. So I am trying to take a good hard look at this to determine is this amount realistic or not. A picture by numbers-$600 a month means $100 a person per month of our items including personal hygiene and cleaning products. Broken down even further that is $1.11 per meal per person or $150 a week for 6 people. .Currently both Lily and Haley eat lunch at school most days so that leaves close to $10 a week for the cleaning and hygiene items.  I am going to attempt to stick to this budget for the rest of February and March. By then I will be able to tell if it is realistic or needs to be increased by $100. I have a great stock pile at this point so I am hoping to keep it down to $600. What do you do?

What’s Up

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After the month of January seemed to drag on and on. The first week of February has flown by.

Last Saturday (2/3) we spent the majority of the day shopping in Winston-Salem. Both Lily and Kendall were able to pick out new frames for glasses that should be ready some time this week. I was also able to find some awesome deals on dress clothes for Zach. I purchased 3 suits (shirt, pants, tie and vest) for $46 total. We also had a huge stock up for the month trip to Costco.

Sunday was supposed to be an easy day for me but I had forgotten how much food I had planned for our Super Bowl party. The party was awesome with a great time had by everyone. I really enjoyed myself and we cleaned up and watched the last few minutes of the game in bed!

This week I have actually worked more than any week since the first of December. I worked a total of 31 hours at the hospital and another 5 at the Nursing home. Lily has cheer-leading 3 nights a week with church on Wednesday. In addition to all that I have managed to make it to YMCA 3 times to exercise!

An unexpected blessing this week is that our Federal tax money arrived. I was so shocked to discovery that after one week our refund was in the bank.  Our decision to split the money into 3 different areas seems wise to me at the moment. The first portion we used to pay down credit card debt. After discovering that currently we were paying 29.99% APR this became a very apparent good step to make. This is also a huge step toward our overall goal to be complete out of debt except for the house by June! Next we decided to use this to pay upfront for an education class for me. This will eventually be reimbursed by my employer. At the time of the reimbursement, the money will be used as travel money.  Finally, we used the money to purchase several items that we have been wanting for several months. The biggest of these is a Kitchen Aid Mixer. I have been looking at this for at least 3 years. I have watch the prices especially around Christmas when they should be prices lowest. At Costco today, we decided to check out the mixers. I was amazed to find it priced at $199 with a $20 mail in rebate! The other good news is that we will also get credit for this at the year need with our 2% rebate from Costco.  I am excited to finally not only to have matching dishes and glasses but a real kitchen appliance! I can’t wait to use it!

Next week does not look any less hectic as we have a fundraiser at church tomorrow where I am in charge of the food. I also have the continuing education class on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday for 8 hours each day. I am working extra on Monday and Tuesday to cover for missing so much of the week.  My goal is to  find at least one time during the week to make a post!

January in Review 2013

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Financial goal: 
 Pay off all outstanding debt except the mortgage by June– We did manage to pay off one of our credit cards. I am proud to say out loud that for the first time in 5 plus years, we owe the big orange home improvement store nothing!
Emergency fund to $2000–  No progress yet
Maintain a budget using a form of the envelope system –  I love the budget app I found for my iPhone. It keeps everything at my finger tips! This month we are over our grocery budget of $600 by $120. My plan is to take this out of next month. We are under our gas budget by $130 which we used at IKEA for some storage stuff. I am also keeping track of clothing and gift purchases. So far I am really surprised at our clothing expenses. I may have to add to this fund after a couple of months.
Overall, January was an excellent month for us financially but I did the budget for February and it is scary! Matt has several leads for additional work right now so if just one works out I will breathe a sigh of relief and thankfulness!

Blogging:  Goal: 15 per month  This is my 13th post of the month. I have really got to get in a good routine for posting.

Devotions: Goal is 5 a week   GOALLLLL!  I have finally found a time, in the mornings, that I am consistently able to read and complete a devotional! I hope to continue!

Weight: Goal to exercise 3x a week and to be down to 150 by December by losing around 4 # a month. I am most excited because just this week, I have discovered 2x a week that I will be able to exercise at the YMCA on a consistent basis! I know for me if I can do something on a schedule it works out much better! I have not check the scales but I am almost certain I reached my goal of 4# this month!

Saved 88%

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I think that the TV show “Extreme Couponing” has really done massive damage to the couponing in general.  I want to debunk  some of the myths that it has implied with my real world experience. Today I knew I needed to make a stop at CVS to pick up Diet Cokes with a rain check I have been holding, so this is my real life example of how anyone can save money.

On  “Extreme Couponing” the folks spend between 30-80 hours a week couponing. Come on who has that much time to waste? Total time I spent planning, clipping and shopping for this trip was 1 hour.  The next myth is that you need “at least one newspaper subscription per person in your family” or that dumpster diving, begging neighbors coupon inserts or even stealing inserts from empty houses are necessary to get great results. I have ONE newspaper subscription! I gladly will accept any insert you don’t want but other than my own, I usually end up with my parents” inserts as well. However most weeks like this one, I receive the inserts at least a week late or the paper person even forgot a couple. Finally, in order to stay in the rules and have the least out-of-pocket a minimum of 10 transactions are require. I completed 2 transactions today!

Today at CVS, I spent a total of $6.83 and saved $48.35 or 88%. I did start with a $10 Cash card from buying drinks last week. Before work this morning I spent less than 10 minutes on Southern Savers clicking on any items from the CVS list I thought I might wanted, printed out the list and clip coupons while sitting at the store. I also did discover an awesome 75% deal on deodorant so pulled up the coupon database and head back to my car to grab 2 $1 off coupons.

First Transaction
2 Suave Kids Shampoos   $2.00 each    $0.50/2 coupon
4 Suave Body Washes      $2.00 each     B2G1 free coupon
2 Tubes of Colgate toothpaste @2.99 each    2–$.50/1 coupon
$10 CVS cash card
Total out-of-pocket $5.69
received 4 ECB for purchasing $12 in Suave, 2 ECB from Toothpaste and 1 ECB for using Green bag 4 times

Second Transaction
5 2L Diet Cokes    raincheck for $0.88 each
1 bottle each of Tresseme Shampoo and Conditioner     $4.49 each  B1G1 coupon, CVS Coupon for $2/2 bottles of Tresseme
2 Sticks of Advance Control Mitchum deodorant $1.99 each   2-$1 off coupons and CVS coupon for $1 off $4 deodorant
1 Caramel candy 0.33 cent
Used ECB from above
Total spent $1.14.

 

 

The Best Laid Plans

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As most of you know, I am a planner. I like to plan it gives me a sense of control and peace with  my life. This month just seems that every time I make a plan it needs to change. I am proud to say that I am just rolling with the changes or at least I hope I am rolling with them. So here in random order are my best laid plans and how they have changed.

  1. In September, I began working “full-time” which for me is 30 hours a week. My plan work 7.5 hours a day and then have the extra time at home. Of course this is not working. Part of the problem is that our patient load is really low. So since the first of December I have been taking anywhere from 6 to 16 hours of PTO every 2 weeks to keep my hours at full-time. I am thankful that I have the option to do this but I really would like a schedule that is not so flexible!
  2. For the past two weeks on Friday we have had icy/snow and just generally cold weather. Our plan was to head to Vision Works on Saturday, order new glasses and then Costco to have a tire on my car fixed. Instead, after arriving home at 2pm Friday afternoon, I was not going anywhere. So I spent most of Saturday, cooking. I was able to make several dishes up for this week so again it turned out okay. I also worked hard on catching up and even getting ahead on laundry.
  3. After cooking on Saturday, in my head I decided that I was going to have a day off on Sunday. WRONG!  We ended up picking up pizza for lunch that I ate while preparing Taco Soup and Plum Crumb desert for our church annual meeting. We left early around 330 to deliver food to a family. Next was the annual meeting. After arriving home at 8pm I was done for the day with no rest.
  4. I was excited to get a menu plan together for the next 2 weeks on Saturday but I changed the plan tonight. It was 65 outside and I really wanted a steak for dinner. I needed to stop by the store for milk and ended up purchasing steaks, salad ingredients and desert for tonight. I was happy to only spend $20 on the splurge but it definitely was not what was on the menu plan.
  5. I was planning to complete our 2012 taxes this past weekend. We ended up cleaning our some cabinets and shredding a lot of documents. Friday night, Matt and I organized all the tax paperwork and I made out all the spreadsheet so that I could easily imput data on Saturday. I actually did sit down on Saturday to complete the task to discover that I saved the wrong pay stub. I saved the first one of this year instead of the last one of 2012. I was able to complete our taxes on Monday and am thankful for a refund!
  6. This last item is a plan that I hope will not be changed. I have really been trying to get a work out in 3 nights a week with at least one of those at the YMCA. On Monday, I realized that if I take Zach and Kendall to the YMCA while Matt takes Lily to tumbling, childcare is provided!!! I was so happy to go last night and the kids enjoyed it. My plan is to make this a Monday night routine!

As you can see this past week has all been about my changing plans!

January BLAH!

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This month, January, feels like it is dragging by for me. I was thinking about it today and came up with several logical reason that it feels so long. It is a full 5 week month, I receive 3 paychecks this month, it is freezing cold outside (36F) today and my crazy work schedule does not seem to be helping.BLAH!  I should be excited about 3 paychecks this month and I am. I actually used part of one to place a deposit on our beach trip this summer. But I also am trying to reduce our overall spending. One of the biggest reductions is in the area of grocery. My plan was to go from $800 a month last year of which we ended up spending an average of $773 to $600 a month this year. Currently I have overspent the budget by $83 but I am hoping to make this up and even save some more in February. The reason this is so difficult for me is that we are also at the point where alot of my freezer pre-cooked meals are gone. Last weekend I cooked up  beans to freeze and am currently working on pintos as we speak. Matt informed me today that I need to fix another big batch of chicken to shredded for soups and pies. It is just easier to run to the store and grab “x” to make this meal or go out to eat than try to re-stock the freezer but Matt is great and with a flexible menu plan we are sticking pretty darn close to the budget. I will be cooking and shredding chicken this weekend. BLAH!  Next is my crazy work schedule, for example today I worked until 11:30 and last Friday I did not go in until 11:00. I really don’t mind because Lily and Haley have been out of school for the past 5 days but I hate using PTO time because I want to make sure I have enough for the summer. BLAH! Another reason this month seems so long is the fact that I wanted to really really lose weight, I have been working out 2x and sometimes 3x a week but still have not broke through the weight that I have been stuck above for the past 8 months. To try and help in this area, I am also going to set a goal to drink at least 6 glasses of water a day. Today was a success but of course the scales did not change  BLAH!  Last but not least did I mention that I really really dislike COLD weather!  BLAH!