June Income & Expenses!

Whew! I just made it. I barely made getting June's income/expense report up in July. I think I've decided that next month I'm not going to wait until I get my bank statement (since it usually arrives after the 15th), and instead, reconcile with my online statement so I can get a better handle on where the money's going. What happens to Basil and me is that we have a good month, and then celebrate the next month, yet we don't realize how much we've spent until yet another month's almost gone by. We used to try to go over expenses weekly, but that kind of got away from us, too.

Unfortunately, as you can see, we ended up in the negative this month. But that can be explained by the purchase of a car and registration for Number One Son to take to college. We also had an airline ticket for Number Two Son to fly to visit his father for the summer.

The good news is that we quit randomly driving around and combined errands, so our gas went down $60 for the month. Basil had a lot of art income, but that was mostly spent on art expenses, supplies and for when his parents visited, but hopefully in the future a bigger cut of that should go toward the credit cards.

We kept groceries down to around $400 which is where we want to be, but that could be because for one week of the month there were only two of us. Also dining was cut by half to $236 (but I'm afraid that July's will be back up).

Entertainment was high because of Basil's family visiting.

Gifts Given was high because there are A LOT of birthdays in my family in June including mine, two of my sons, three of my sisters, and a friend's. Add to that that Basil's brother graduated from high school and I think we did pretty well in the gift giving department.

Everything else is pretty normal, but car insurance will be going up with an additional car $60 a month. We're hoping to change our cell phone package to try to get that lower, but with four people in a family plan, I don't think $142 is too bad, especially since we don't have a land line we're also paying for.

Hopefully next month I'll get July's budget up much quicker, because we've got to get this debt paid down, plus save for a wedding in the next 11 months. I think we're going to implement a budget through Quicken and see if that helps us.

May Income/Expenses

Wow - what a month! The bottom line doesn't look too bad, but I put some expenses on the credit card to delay them a month (dental bills, glasses), so next month will be crazy. We're still having a problem making ends meet because of the extra $100 a month in rent increase as well as the extra $100 a month in gas. We're going to try to cut back the unnecessary errands.

There wasn't as much art income this month because Basil saved the money to spend when his folks were visiting.

This month we started adding interest income and expense. I have a savings account that earned $17 worth of interest, and Basil's credit card interest was $119, but that included a $75 charge for moving credit around to get a lower interest rate, so next month that will be much lower.

The clothing expense was up, but that was paid with extra money I got from selling some artwork.

The scary/bad category, as always, is the dining category. We spent $499 in one month! Ugh! So with the $500 in groceries, that's $1000 in food for the month! Granted, most of the time we ventured out to cheap fast food joints, but often there were four of us as Number One Son was staying with us for two weeks. We also celebrated the end of the semester with a nice meal out as well. Something has to be done! Basil and I decided that if we're really serious about saving for an emergency fund and getting out of debt, we're going to have to sacrifice. So we've decided to follow in the footsteps of An English Major's Money and use an envelope for our monthly dining out funds. We're going to budget $30 a week for eating out, which will amount to $120 for the month instead of the $500 we spent this month. That would give Basil $380 extra to go towards credit card debt. Since that's our worst expense, we thought we'd try it for a month, and if it works well we may go to other categories as well. It will be hard because Number Three Son comes to visit July 9.

The only other problem was that last month I posted that we got the electric bill only every other month....well, I was wrong. We just missed last month, so we had a double bill this month.

Everything else was pretty standard. It's kind of depressing sometimes to see how much we spend in a month, but then we get competitive and say "We can do this thing! Let's not eat out at all next month! Let's pay the credit cards off by Christmas! YEAH! GO! GO! GO!" Then we come down off the furniture and get a little more realistic, but still determined to beat this debt.

Budget Followed, Spending Watched - What The Hell Is Wrong With Me?

The parents are off. And there is still some money - granted, most of it change - in my pocket. I feel giddy. Weird.

I knew my parents were coming, so a month ahead of time I diverted my second job earnings (previously earmarked for extra debt repayments) into savings for when my parents were here. I took out the cash before they arrived and put it in an envelope in my sock drawer. Every day I would take out how much I thought I would need for that day. When that money was gone, it was gone. No more fun - at least fun I had to pay for.

And it worked. I would pat myself 0n the back, except I gained so much weight from eating out I can barely touch my left shoulder with my right hand. No back patting for a week, at least.

Budgets work. Saving works. I feel like some real Bizarro World progress was made.

April Income/Expenses

See, I still have two days left of May and I'm getting my April income/expense sheet up. I think it's partially late because I've been afraid of what I would find. Yes, we're in the red by $1029, which is due to my plane ticket to visit my grandmother ($280) as well as my extensive dental work ($471). Luckily we had a great month in March, so we haven't bounced any checks, though you'll notice that the credit card payments are down. This is also due to the fact that Basil's family is visiting in June, so he's saving his crafty side-business income for June, rather than making extra credit card payments. Also, rent increased $100 a month, so we'll have to get used to that.

The other really big increase is gasoline. Just two months ago we were paying $250 a month for gas, then March was $350 and now April is $375! That's $125 more! During the week we pretty much just commute to work (public transportation isn't much of an option where we live). I drive 20 miles round trip and Basil logs 50 miles. The problem is our weekend, because to do our free things, we sometimes drive a little distance. Maybe we should try to do as little driving as possible one month to see if we can bring that down. That would be tough, but worth it.

Our dining was half of last month, but still more than we'd like at $306. Plus, we had a visiting teenager, so groceries were up to $514.

Our household expenses were way down as we only bought a water purifier pitcher for the fridge, to cut down on buying bottled water. We'll check out next month to see if that worked.

Everything else is pretty self-explanatory. We only get an electric bill every other month, but it's still cool, so there are no outrageous a/c-related expenses yet. Basil has to have rivulets of sweat dripping off his horned-rim glasses before I'll allow him to turn it on anyway.

So with $125 more a month in gas and $100 more in rent, that's $225 that we have to figure out where to cut or bring in as more income. I may have to start my own crafty side business.

March Income and Expenses

I know it seems like forever for me to get the monthly expenses up, but I know from experience, that there's always something that doesn't get entered into Quicken, so I have to wait until I get our bank statement. Sure enough, Basil and I each forgot to enter a deposit for a paycheck, which is why I was panicking that we were going to run out of money. It was an insane month for income and expenditures, but I'll try to explain them all. First of all, I dropped the cents part of the chart since it was just distracting.
Art income was way up because I sold two paintings (yea!) and Basil sold mucho items in his crafty side business. Salaries were also up because I get paid weekly and there were five Fridays in March. On top of that we both got our tax refunds back, plus Basil still gets birthday checks from his relatives because he writes great thank you notes. I know I've about given up sending gifts to nieces and nephews because I never get thank you notes. I'd even take an e-mail thank you, but noooooooo. We also got a partial security deposit refund (see previous post). Anyway, we had a LOT of income for March. On to the expenditures....
We also spent a lot.
Art expenses and supplies were up because we had some big projects.
Fuel was way up because my Number 3 Son was out visiting on his spring break and we drove him around sightseeing, etc.
Clothing: I splurged with some of my tax refund money and bought some work clothes and a nice outfit because we had a couple of events to go to.
Computer Expense: This is the Applecare for my new ipod. I've known too many people who's have crashed after a year, plus my old one died at two years and nine months, and as the Applecare is for three years, they had to replace it, and it's still going a year later after I gave it to my son.
Credit Card: Basil paid quite a bit and was happy about it.
Dining: Uh oh....how do I explain this? $604! When I told Basil to guess how much we spent he wasn't anywhere near close. Last month I lamented that we'd spent $273! All I can say is that we REALLY celebrated: Basil's birthday; Number 3 Son visiting; my selling two paintings; all three sons, Basil and myself getting together for the first time in over a year...you get the picture. Now with our monthly challenge, we should be better in April and May.
College Expenses: Emergency funds for Number 1 Son. You know--he's a college student, they always need money.
Education: AP Exam fees. I hope he passes at least one of them....
Gifts Given: Basil's birthday, plus my father's and Basil's brother's.
Groceries were right around where we want them....at least we're doing something right.
My tax preparation was paid, and well worth every penny as I had my refund in the bank while my niece was celebrating the fact that she had two extra days to procrastinate doing her taxes.
Next month things will settle down and I hope to add my savings and Roth IRA, etc. to this report. I did transfer $1000 over to my high interest savings account (close to 5%), and I'm still waiting for my college refund for Number 1 Son. Hopefully some of that will go into my Roth IRA.

February Income and Expenses

I balanced the checkbook this past weekend, so was able to do February's expenses.


Our February budget ended up in the red due mostly to $1500 less salary income. We actually had less expenditures, but not enough to break even. Basil didn't have the overtime that he had in January, so we'll have to take that into account since we're now coming into the slow season for both our jobs.
Much stayed the same. We had higher art supplies and expenses, but also had quite a bit of art income. Our gasoline was down $50 because we've been staying home more on the weekends.
Basil paid $807.60 toward the credit cards, which was lower than last month, but about $100 more than he was paying last year.
Unfortunately, our weakness showed up again in the dining out category - $273! That's twice what we spent last month! I'm afraid we've fallen off the wagon on that one, but we're trying harder this month, though with Basil's birthday, we did go out to celebrate a bit.
The College Expenses were incurred when we took Number One Son to Target to restock supplies. The Education expense was a photo lab fee for Number Two Son.
Gifts Given: Valentine's day and a nephew's birthday, plus a gift card for Number One son for during midterms.
Groceries were up by $150. Not exactly sure why. Basil did stock up on bottled water which we're still drinking mid-March.
Health Insurance was higher this month because one son's I pay monthly and the other I'm billed bi-monthly. Not sure why since it's the same insurance company.
Misc.: This is up and included gloves and a knife for work for Basil which came to $58.
The shipping refund was an internet sale Basil made, but accidentally sent to the incorrect address, so he refunded the shipping.
The electric bill was for two months which is about the same as the last bill.
Tax Preparation: Basil paid to have his taxes done, but I didn't get all my forms, so my bill will be on next month's budget.
The overall picture doesn't look so good, but we're hoping to get back on track. March could be pretty shaky as well as both Basil and I have been doing big projects outside of work that have been taking all our time. And when we're under stress, we tend to eat out. We still have time to correct that, though my Number Three Son is coming in for his spring break this weekend so I'm sure I'll be spending money. Our rent is being raised $100 a month, too, so I think the credit card may not have as big a payment next month. Once I get my income tax return money, I can pay off my car and we'll have that extra money to cover the rent increase.

Finally! January's Income and Expenses!

Well, I finally got the January income/expense sheet done. I'll put up the December one as well so you can see if we did any better.

Income: Our income was higher because Basil went through our bookshelves and sold anything he hadn't looked at for a while. I wasn't as generous and kept all my books, though I don't have nearly as many as he does either.
Expenses:
A lot of the expenses don't change from month to month, like rent, and gas for the cars remains around $250, though January was higher because Basil had to pay for gas for the company car, but was reimbursed for it. I raised my car payment to $500 and did that again in February. I hope I can keep it up because I actually feel better getting into my car knowing that it's getting closer to being all mine, debt free.
Clothing is something we've really cut back on, though we didn't buy many clothes in December, probably because of the holidays. We only had to buy Basil one pair of work pants in January. I may have to break down and buy a pair of jeans as I only have one pair that can actually be worn in public, unless I don't want to breathe or eat.
Credit Cards: Basil only paid $326 toward the credit cards in December because we were busy buying gifts, and upped the payments to $1012 in January. Yea! It would be nice if we could keep that up, but we both had a lot of overtime in January and both our jobs will be slowing down in the spring and summer.
Dining: I know we were trying to cut out all dining, but we did at least cut it by more than half. We still spent $145 on eating out, but some of that was me eating with my co-workers and other times were when we were picking people up from the airport, etc. I'd say we're doing much better, but we just ate out yesterday for dinner and today for lunch in celebration of my getting two paintings accepted into group shows at two new gallerys. We took my son out with us for dinner which ran $40 last night and today's lunch was $20. I guess we'd better get back to In-n-Out if we want to keep within out budget.
College Expenses: These were down because my son finally filled out his loan forms so I think they're all coming through and I won't have to pay any more tuition til next fall (so I'd better have my car paid off then).
Gifts Given: Under this category, some of the Christmas presents were put on credit cards, and I have a niece who has a birthday in January.
Groceries: We were afraid that groceries would go up since we cut back on eating out, but were pleasantly surprised to find they actually fell by $3. What's up with that?
Household: Our household category is usually small, but before we started this new year, I panicked and replaced our VCR which had died with a DVR/VCR which I'd put on a credit card and paid for this month.
Misc.: This contains all the stuff that doesn't quite fit under any other category: soap, detergent, shampoo, etc.
Postage: Our postage is still high because Basil's been shipping all the books, so hopefully it will come down next month.
Utilities: This remains pretty much the same, except for the Natural Gas bill which apparently we hadn't paid for four months. Neither of us remember getting a bill, and upon checking the accounts, it hadn't been paid since October. I'm not sure who was getting out bills, but now we will be getting our bills via e-mail and will not have one as large as this again. Laundry means the quarters that go to paying for it. I used to have my own washer and dryer and after years of saving quarters I finally felt like a grown up. Now I'm in an apartment and back to saving quarters. One day I will be able to do laundry at midnight if I want to and not leave my house....

So that's it. I'm glad we're in the black for two months in a row. After looking at last year's Quicken accounts, I see we were in the black for only 50% of the year, and the other six months we spent more than we made. Not this year.

A December to Remember

I finally got our expenses posted for December, but not without a lot of hair pulling and cursing. I guess the html coding classes I took at the community college finally paid off. As you can see, we go a little crazy around the holidays and every celebration was an excuse to eat out. We're correcting that this month and as much as we wanted to grab a bite to eat after an early matinee (only $6 and using Christmas gift cards), we went home and had sandwiches. Also a big purchase was a new computer for me as mine was randomly shutting down and it was getting very frustrating to even sit and get anything done at it. Ask Basil about the heavy sighs. I put it on a credit card and paid the amount in full when then bill came due from money from my savings. Anyway, check out where the Bizarros spent their money in the month of December.

December spending

I promise to get our December budget posted this weekend. Basil just entered the last of his December receipts into Quicken last night. Good thing too, as I had a mini meltdown this past week because I had to transfer $750 from my savings account to cover our December expenses and was bitterly complaining because Basil had gone to Vegas with his brother and used his Christmas bonus, and I was using mine to cover everyday expenses. Well, seems that with the holidays and everything, Basil had forgotten to enter his paycheck from the 21st into Quicken, which was $1100. So now I'm happy again and look forward to paying a chunk of my car off with my bonus. Yea!