September Recap / October Goals

SlurpeeLove · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

3. What were your greatest achievements?

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

hoffse · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? Pretty good - we went a bit over in house stuff, but we took advantage of some deals. It will be pretty easy to make up for it in October.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Nothing really

3. What were your greatest achievements? Furnishing our living room for less than $1,000 for new furniture, rugs, etc.

4. What were your biggest downfalls? Going over in house purchases... but we have re-jiggered October to make up for it.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Break even with our savings goals (by making up for September).

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? Delay buying more house stuff since we're pretty well set up for now.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Savings - I fell off the wagon a bit tracking expenses in September. I'm back on for October though.

SlurpeeLove · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Yes, we stayed in budget for most things. We went over in gas and cable bills, but were under on our electricity. Overall, I'm very proud of us!

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

We built a new budget in YNAB. I hadn't used the software in years and definitely didn't understand it the first time around. It helped so much! We were able to use it to curb our spending on groceries and eating out.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

We put $392 in savings and paid off about $400 in debt!

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

I thought we made more each month than we actually do! Oops! I ended up overbudgeting because of this, but was able to cut in a few places to make up for it.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

I'm building up a one month buffer so I can live off last month's paychecks. It won't be done this month, but I'm hoping to put $200 towards that using the extra income from renting my car out. Anything over that, I want to put towards paying down debt.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

We started renting out my car and assigning some of our regular income to build our buffer.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

I want to see if we can cut more for groceries. I lowered our budget from $400 a month to $360 to see if we can do that.

formerlyGDaisy09 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Pretty good, we did do a minor bedroom re-do (I'm quite pleased with how it came-out I'll have to AW some photos when I get a chance) so that was a few hundred that we hadn't planned on, but we were able to cash-flow some of it and off-set the rest with savings earmarked for home improvements. this was a month of transition from us from our little mental break from savings/debt pay-off, so there were some credit card bills still refelcting that, that said we were able to stash almost $1000 into savings.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

H and I re-grouped and re-outlined out shorter-term goals for our money. we have mostly low-risk debt at this point (SLs under 6% interest, our mortgage (3.75%) and our car loan (1.99%)). We both agreed that we'd like to re-focus on our pre-TTC goal to finish a bedroom and 'bonus' room in the basement, once that's done we're going to spend a few months beefing-up savings before TTC.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

H really seems to be on board, last time we re-focused our money it was to pay-off his CC debt, which he was pretty embarrased about, so it was a very stressful thing. now that its more project and future oriented he's much more relaxed and excited about it.

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

we did really well this month, I can't think of any major downfalls, everything we spent money on we agreed on and came-up with a plan.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

keep doing what we're doing. It feels like we're finally in control of our money.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

we're going to relax a little bit, we have some mini-trips planed the next few months, white water rafting this weekend, and maybe a brewery-tour weekend in Nov. right before H heads into time-off black-out for the holidays at FedEx.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

really we need to repeat what we did this month.

jessica490 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Overall, pretty good and we were able to lower/cut some expenses!

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

I started buzzing H's hair myself saving us $20 every 3-4 weeks. I just got our cell phone plan lowered $15 per month. I started a part-time job. I was able to buy some new work clothes for my second job and also for myself with b-day money.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

We were able to bank $2500 over the last 2 months towards our mortg principle. We are 1/4 of the way there! Hoping to be at $10,000 or so by spring. We just paid our last insurance bill for the year and we will get a check in December for the dividends if the company makes it's numbers.

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

Eh nothing really

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

Keep building our mortg principle account with savings from our regular jobs

Round up our e-fund to the next thousand increment with $ from my second job (at least 2 more paychecks)

Once that is all set, start adding $ from my second job to our house DP fund to round that up to the next $5K increment

Also, Our dog is having serious stomach/back issues that have just not stopped since his surgery in July for removal of a cycst (totally not related), but we may need to see a specialist this month. We bring him in this weekend for a physical and to discuss options, but I just know there will be a lot more to this ($$$). Breaks my heart....

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

Just keep savings and being frugal

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

Not much this month, our cable contact ends in November, so I will probably start checking options out at the end of October.

vlagrl29 · October 2014

I need to go over our Sept. receipts before I can better reply to this post. I do feel like we kept eating out to a minimum and shopping for household items are down to 1x per month. I find I will spend less if we shop less. In october I want to do more of the same and continue to stash more money in savings.

abrewer5 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? Not too terrible. Still need to work on paying cash for everything. I put getting my hair done on a credit card, now I won't pay interest on it. It will be paid off soon, but I know that's not the best idea for me.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Paid cash for most things, only used my debit card for gas and tried to stick to my budget. I also set up a direct deposit to joint savings for $100/pay check. This should help a lot. It will delay debt payoff slightly, but I want to build a good savings and my interest rates are pretty low.

3. What were your greatest achievements? Setting up a DD for savings and using cash more. And not MM related we got new carpet in our basement! The other carpet was gross and needed to be trashed.

4. What were your biggest downfalls? Using my credit card still. And over spending on our carpet project. In the end we got a higher quality product, but we went over about $500.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Use my credit cards for rewards, but pay them off right away. So far so good. Continue to pay off debt and stick to my budget including my $150 allowance.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? Pay off cards right away instead of waiting until the bill comes in the mail. I've already started which feels good! Put more money away in savings!

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? I'd like to work on eating out. This is a constant struggle for me and H, I'm really hoping we can slowly work towards not eating out at all. I'd also like to work on the house budget. We usually spend more than expected on house projects so I need to get that under control.

lifeonthehill · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? Fantastic! We stuck to the budget and even had some extra to use towards SL debt.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Nothing. We made the decision to pull from our E- Fund to pay off SL debt but that neither helped nor hurt. We owe $0 on loans but now owe ourselves instead.

3. What were your greatest achievements? We are officially DEBT FREE!

4. What were your biggest downfalls? Nothing really this month. H may have overspent on beer last night but we decided it was to celebrate and it was okay this once.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Save $2000 toward my spring semester in college.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? We have gotten a lot of great odd job opportunities lately. We are now starting to get paid for a few we did last week and that will go as extra to the savings goal.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Nothing. We need to just keep staying cheap. H's grandmother decided to do Secret Santa instead of having everyone get gifts for 17 other people. Thank goodness for that.

brij2006 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

H's car repair definitely threw the budget for a loop, but we were still able to put $400 into savings after paying for his $1,200 car repair and him not having any overtime.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

Really watched things. I only bought what we absolutely needed for groceries and came in way under budget. We also only spent $4 on entertainment.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

Spending $330 on groceries for the month.

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

H's car repair.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

Stay within budget and not need to dip into savings for house remodeling. We will be starting on the last and final room in the house, and are hoping to do it as reasonable as possible.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

I'm gone 2 weekends this month to visit friends, and am going to stick to the budgeted amounts for those. Hopefully even come in under budget.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

I am hoping to find a better internet provider. We only pay $50/month now, but it's terrible service and we can barely stream Netflix. This may or may not help our budget though.

cbee817 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Pretty good- had some car repairs ($1300 for both) and DH and I went away for a weekend to a concert out of state ($800- for hotel, tickets, gas, dinner, breakfast, and IKEA on the way home). We didn't take any $ out of savings- just didn't save anything extra this month.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? N/A

3. What were your greatest achievements?

Not taking any $ from savings and getting a weekend alone with DH- a once a year treat since the girls have been born.

4. What were your biggest downfalls? N/A

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

To get back to saving $500/paycheck, but it may be postponed until November so we can get a new mattress and rug for our bedroom makeover (desperately needed- DH and I sleep on a full bed.. that's right, we're not even at a queen!)

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

We'll probably not save much this month just so we can get the mattress and rug- our old rug is going into the girls' bedroom so it will be used again. It's from Pottery Barn and it's orange and cream with a large floral pattern- it'll look cute in a kids' room. Their old rug (remnant that was bound from HD will be trashed.. anything that's not wool isn't allowed in the house anymore!)

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

We'll keep everything normal- our day care bill is for 5 weeks this month so instead of $1,764, it'll be $2,205- ouch!

We should be back on track in November to saving $500/paycheck and I will bump my 401K contribution from 10% to 11% (increase it by 1% every 6 months). We do have a CD up at the end of this month- $6,000 of it will be used to complete our 2014 Roth contributions and the balance will go into our savings account for now. It's earmarked for the girls' 2015 529 plan contributions of $5,000 each but that won't happen until we do our taxes for 2014 and I can see what type of break we get from the state. We also got a Family tax relief check from the state last week too- $350 extra.. every bit helps!

Xstatic3333 · October 2014

SlurpeeLove said:

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Well...not so great. We made two big purchases that were not goal related. With H's encouragement I'm doing a local dive trip I've wanted to do for years, and with my encouragement H joined a meat CSA. These items, plus my dental work, a baby shower I'm helping with, and the aftermath of switching our cars to RI ($400 total between us!) meant not too much extra to goals this month. That said, we've stayed within budget as set.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

Cut our grocery bill down to $50 a week when we're not entertaining.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

Pretty much nothing except the grocery bill, and signing up for life insurance. We did reduce our beer spending a bit too which is good for money and health.

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

All the spending. At the same time, life is not just about money, and we didn't build any debt, so we're choosing to enjoy what we spent on and not beat ourselves up.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

Back to paying off those darn cars, continuing to save for the holidays

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

No major "fun" stuff that hasn't already been paid for; I will pick up extra daycare work and dive classes

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

Fun. I've just got to stop! We're also contemplating resuming travel savings, but I need to crunch the numbers about whether or not that's realistic at this point. I'm tossing around the crazy goal of paying $1000 towards my car October 15-November 15 ust by pulling it from somewhere (selling stuff maybe?)

Wulfgar · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? Not too bad, could have been better.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Got my first pay check after my promotion.

3. What were your greatest achievements? Paying cash for MW's birthday present and giving it to her early since it was a camera and the free one that we were given was acting up.

4. What were your biggest downfalls? I still have a habit of going over our food budget at times and we tend to eat out/ order out more than we should.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Try to pay cash for Halloween, make extra payments towards my credit card, pay for MW's car repairs, and start to accelerate paying off her car.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? Need to balance paying off debt while trying to plan for Christmas gift giving.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Paying off my credit card to free up money for Christmas then to paying of MW's car.

smbenevides1989 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Not very good. I was hoping to cut back a lot but we spent a lot more than expected on food and dining out

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

I didn't spend my total gas budget since I'm not working.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

Not spending a lot on gas. We also signed up for life insurance.

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

Overspending in most categories.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

Not going out and avoid spending.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

To avoid shopping unless necessary.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

Eating out and grocery. I'm just trying to use up what I have at home before buying more groceries.

noffgurl · October 2014

I am going start participating in these check ins to hold myself accountable. I connected our accounts to mint.com and what I found on our spending is downright appalling. Big changes are going to be made.

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? My biggest goal this month was to get all the birthday presents done, which I did. And, set up a doable budget to get our credit scores up, still working on this. And not fall behind on any bills.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Really planned out each paycheck.

3. What were your greatest achievements? Not falling behind and getting birthdays done. Also having half of Christmas done as well.

4. What were your biggest downfalls? Seeing the brutal truth on mint.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Finishing Christmas shopping, and installing an uber frugal menu plan. And trying desperately to give away some dogs without getting kicked out.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? Really tracking and planning.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Our groceries, between dogs and people we spent $1600+ In the month of September. I didn't realize we even had that much money.

jessica490 · October 2014

noffgurl said:

I am going start participating in these check ins to hold myself accountable. I connected our accounts to mint.com and what I found on our spending is downright appalling. Big changes are going to be made. SEPTEMBER 1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? My biggest goal this month was to get all the birthday presents done, which I did. And, set up a doable budget to get our credit scores up, still working on this. And not fall behind on any bills. 2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Really planned out each paycheck. 3. What were your greatest achievements? Not falling behind and getting birthdays done. Also having half of Christmas done as well. 4. What were your biggest downfalls? Seeing the brutal truth on mint. OCTOBER 1. What are your goals for this month? Finishing Christmas shopping, and installing an uber frugal menu plan. And trying desperately to give away some dogs without getting kicked out. 2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? Really tracking and planning. 3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Our groceries, between dogs and people we spent $1600+ In the month of September. I didn't realize we even had that much money.

Good job for signing up with mint.com. I use that as well and it really gives a good snapshot of our financial picture very month. This will be a good start for you.

uncreatedsnow · October 2014

I love these posts!

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?
Pretty good considering all I am doing right now is HOARDING savings in case my moonlighting gig falls through or until I can pay off my car, whichever comes first.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?
I started moving any money leftover from the previous pay directly into savings. For some reason I'm not even a little bit tempted to spend my savings money, but can't wait to spend what's in my regular account, so I started capitalizing on that this month. I also put the vast majority of my Birthday Money into savings, which is a first.

3. What were your greatest achievements?
POSITIVE NET WORTH! I'm still so excited about that!

4. What were your biggest downfalls?
Not sticking to my envelopes as much as I used to. I didn't throw everything to the wind, but could have done better.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?
Continue to put every red cent that I can into savings.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?
STRICTLY follow my envelopes so that I'm not dipping into anything that could go into savings.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?
I really need to stop buying things I don't need. I'm going to use all of what I have at home before buying new. Shampoo/Conditioner is a good example. I just buy new whenever I run out in my shower and forget to look in my closet to see if there is anything stockpiled. Last night I even used an old sample that's been taking up space and bought me another day of not needing to buy something new. I think that will help with my envelopes as well. It's always interesting to me to see how those little things can really add up over time!

hoffse · October 2014

uncreatedsnow said:

I love these posts!

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?
Pretty good considering all I am doing right now is HOARDING savings in case my moonlighting gig falls through or until I can pay off my car, whichever comes first.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?
I started moving any money leftover from the previous pay directly into savings. For some reason I'm not even a little bit tempted to spend my savings money, but can't wait to spend what's in my regular account, so I started capitalizing on that this month. I also put the vast majority of my Birthday Money into savings, which is a first.

3. What were your greatest achievements?
POSITIVE NET WORTH! I'm still so excited about that!

4. What were your biggest downfalls?
Not sticking to my envelopes as much as I used to. I didn't throw everything to the wind, but could have done better.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?
Continue to put every red cent that I can into savings.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?
STRICTLY follow my envelopes so that I'm not dipping into anything that could go into savings.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?
I really need to stop buying things I don't need. I'm going to use all of what I have at home before buying new. Shampoo/Conditioner is a good example. I just buy new whenever I run out in my shower and forget to look in my closet to see if there is anything stockpiled. Last night I even used an old sample that's been taking up space and bought me another day of not needing to buy something new. I think that will help with my envelopes as well. It's always interesting to me to see how those little things can really add up over time!

H and I are bad about doing this too. After moving, we finally decided to get more organized as we were unpacking. We made a designated box of "extras" for toiletries, etc. Actually, we ended up with 2 boxes because we found so much. We also made a box for extra cleaning products that we are storing in our laundry room. Our new rule is "Check the box before putting it on the list." I couldn't believe how many tubes of toothpaste I found. And lotion... my god, I have enough lotion to last the next 10 years. The only caveat is that when we run into a smoking good deal (super clearance, etc) we can buy it and add it to the box.

We also made a designated box of sample/travel sized items.

uncreatedsnow · October 2014

hoffse said:

uncreatedsnow said:

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?
I really need to stop buying things I don't need. I'm going to use all of what I have at home before buying new. Shampoo/Conditioner is a good example. I just buy new whenever I run out in my shower and forget to look in my closet to see if there is anything stockpiled. Last night I even used an old sample that's been taking up space and bought me another day of not needing to buy something new. I think that will help with my envelopes as well. It's always interesting to me to see how those little things can really add up over time!

H and I are bad about doing this too. After moving, we finally decided to get more organized as we were unpacking. We made a designated box of "extras" for toiletries, etc. Actually, we ended up with 2 boxes because we found so much. We also made a box for extra cleaning products that we are storing in our laundry room. Our new rule is "Check the box before putting it on the list." I couldn't believe how many tubes of toothpaste I found. And lotion... my god, I have enough lotion to last the next 10 years. The only caveat is that when we run into a smoking good deal (super clearance, etc) we can buy it and add it to the box.

We also made a designated box of sample/travel sized items.

Same. I actually haven't bought toothpaste in forever because my dentist gives me so much. Make-Up is another good one. I've just started going through and delibrately using up old stuff instead of impulse purchasing stuff. My only exception is Nail Polish, but I only buy one brand of that and only when it's below a certain price so I let that happen.

I know what you mean about lotion though. I've just gotten to the point where I take it back when I get it as a gift. I have really sensitive skin so can't use Bath & Body or Victoria's Secret or any of that. Heck, I just got a $20 lotion(with the tag still on it) for my birthday. I'm going to take it back. I can't possibly go through that much lotion in a lifetime. And that $20 lotion will turn into a $20 gift for my sister at Christmas-time since I don't shop at that store. Win-win-win.

brij2006 · October 2014

@noffgurl So happy to see you in this thread and that you signed up on mint.com. It's crazy to look at the numbers once you really sit down and have them all together. But the best part is that you can now see where and what you want to change, and decide on how to make it different.

You can definitely do this!

vlagrl29 · October 2014

I went thru all of our receipts today. We spent $100 less on eating out in Sept which was great, BUT we spent more on the grocery bill because of a cook out and stocking up on meat. Hopefully the grocery bill will be less next month. Stayed in budget on household items ($100). We had to buy more clothing for DD - leotards/tights/shoes for dance class. Fun money was within budget ($30). Gasoline was also within budget ($340). All in all I'm pretty pleased with Sept. We even put $300 in our basement fund, $187 in savings, and $112 in IRA. We had to spend $407 on a car repair for myself but it was budgeted.

For October I'm hoping to keep the eating out within budget but it probably won't happen because DH and I are going out to a nice place for dinner tomorrow night to celebrate 5 years! We aren't doing gifts though in order to save $$ for St. Lucia next year. So I would also like to keep the grocery bill lower than Sept and household items in budget. It would be nice to book more weddings this month so I can put it all in savings. Hopefully less on the medical bills too. DH is almost done with physical therapy but has about 1 more month left with a chiropractor.

juliebeannn · October 2014

I've been mostly lurking here for the last few months, but DH and I need to get our finances more organized. We opened a rewards card (0% interest for 18 months) when we bought our house back in April of this year and our spending got out of control. We use some savings but mostly put things on the card. Smh. But, we're back to budgeting! Thanks in advance for the accountability!!

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?
We are done with most of the house projects that we set out to do in our first year in the house, so the Home Depot trips have leveled off, so I guess that's a win for the month of September. We also cashed out some points on an old credit card, so, any Home Depot purchases we did were covered by those points (yay gift cards!).

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?
I actually looked at our budget spreadsheet for the first time in a while. We dusted off the virtual cobwebs and looked at it with fresh eyes.

3. What were your greatest achievements?
We admitted that our spending got pretty crazy and determined to do something about it!

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

Over the last 5 months, we got ourselves $5k in the hole.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?
BUDGET! BUDGET! BUDGET! -- and follow it!

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?
Get back to YNAB-ing! Weekly/Bi-Weekly budget meetings with the hubs.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?
Our main area of budget-busting has always been eating out. If we get this under control, we'd have so much more to throw at debt/savings. I need to get a good meal planning regimen going -- any suggestions?

als1982 · October 2014

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month? Pretty good! Goal was to get our new HVAC system paid off.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped? Kept on keeping on.

3. What were your greatest achievements? n/a

4. What were your biggest downfalls? We've both been working like crazy this month so there weren't too many issues. I did spend a little more on good seafood over my allotted stipend during a business trip earlier this month.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month? Start putting a $1,000/mo. into savings for bathroom remodel, pay $500/mp. towards our next big vacation in May, and put everything else toward my student loan, hopefully that should put my payments at close to $1,500/mo.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal? H received a raise and promotion, and reallocation of monies from HVAC debt.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that? Pouring every extra cent into getting my student loan debt paid off, hopefully by March!

kmurphy2131 · October 2014

A little late to this, I just finalized all my numbers this morning. It helped keep me accountable last month so I want to post again.

SEPTEMBER

1. How good were you at keeping your money goals for this month?

Good. My biggest goal was to get our grocery/other household necessities (toiletries etc) under $800. A really high number for a lot of people, but a challenge for me. My secret midmonth goal became 600 which was a little overzealous. We ended the month at $760. I'm really happy as we were over $1000 for a few months.

2. What did you do differently this month that helped?

I have always been a meal planner, but I got better at making planning meals with similar ingredients so that nothing went to waste. I switched to shopping at 3-4 different stores rather than just going to whole foods. I also made even more things from scratch than I normally do, such as making my own peanut butter. Next step is making hamburger buns and bread.

3. What were your greatest achievements?

Meeting (surpassing) my goal for groceries. Especially because we have 16 more homemade frozen veggie burgers and 8 quarts of homemade soup in the freezer so we will have some freezer meals for next month(s).

4. What were your biggest downfalls?

I wouldn't call it a downfall, but we are only putting $1600 in savings this month despite my goal of ~$2000. We booked our anniversary trip for April and I had to put down $500 so we had higher than expected expenses this month despite my savings elsewhere.

OCTOBER

1. What are your goals for this month?

I want to keep groceries under 800 again, I would love to be able to keep it under 700 this month. I would like to save at least $2500 this month, hopefully $3000.

2. What do you plan to do differently to get to your goal?

Keep following last months plans, try making breads from scratch, and make sure that I eat the freezer meals I have. H has an extra paycheck this month, I have a small (<200) bonus coming, plus H is working a lot at his side job this month so that should help with the savings goal. Mathematically we should be able to save >$3000 this month but both of our cars need and oil change and at least one will likely need tires.

3. What area of your budget do you want to work on this month, and how do you plan to do that?

Groceries and eating out. Our goal is eating out 2x this month, each of us pulling from our fun money once. I have upped it to 3 times because we just got a gift certificate to our favorite place.

September Recap / October Goals

Re: September Recap / October Goals

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