In conjunction with the Living on Less Than $28,000 A Year series, I started sharing periodic Financial Updates. I don’t always give specific numbers, but I thought it might be helpful for those of you in a similar situation to have a little window into how things go at our house.
August was a good month for us. We made a few hundred dollars more than normal, and thanks to a $100 Walmart gift card we earned through Perkstreet (see the details here), we were able to get my husband a new mp3 player and $60 worth of clothing for my daughters for FREE! I love FREE!
Here’s a look at our spending for this month. Amounts in red were over the budgeted amount. Amounts in green were under the budgeted amount.
Utilities $400 ($300 budgeted–$100 over)
Groceries $588 ($500 budgeted–$88 over )
Gas for Car $265 ($320 budgeted-$55 under)
Toiletries and Nonfood $34.97 ($50 budgeted- $15.03 under)
Clothing $21.59 ($50 budgeted-$28.41 under)
Eating Out $75 ($50 budgeted- $25 over)
Miscellaneous $135.77 ($75 budgeted-$60 over)
Most of the money that we overspent came from extra money in the categories of the Freedom Account (read more here). For example, we put $75 from each paycheck into the Utilities category of the account and we leave the money there during the months when the power bill is lower. Then when the bill is higher in the summer months, we have the money to cover it.
I do have a budget confession though. We took $200 from our emergency fund (not shown in the figures above) to buy a new bookshelf and to take some friends who were visiting from out of town to dinner (please don’t tell Dave Ramsey). We had to spend money from the emergency fund last month to pay for part of a car repair, so we are down several hundred dollars. If we were perfect, we would have skipped the eating out and the bookshelf, and left that money in the emergency fund. We would have also skipped the other eating out we did and added that amount to the emergency fund.
Um…as you can see, we are far from perfect.
I will be making an concerted effort this month to put that money back into the account (scout’s honor!).
How did you do last month? Were you able to stick to your budget? Leave a comment so we can encourage each other. 
August was good, but September is already been expensive and we are only three days in.
We had to have our truck brought in for 2 major unplanned reapirs (thank goodness we have saved over the past year so we can pay it off in cash); our toilet in our camper is leaking; my youngest is invited to a birthday party….forgot to budget for this as he was not school age last year; and our new power company budgeted amt is $23/month more than last year. It will all work out thanks to budgeting.
I also found out we are getting 27 paychecks this year so I needed to rework the budget amounts per payday.
So sorry about your truck and the other issues, but good for you for staying on top of things!
I have really enjoyed your blogs. We are at the stage in our lives where everyone is either getting married or having a baby. That can get real expensive real quick. Any tips on saving money but still giving a nice gift?
I have a post on gift giving on a budget this week! 🙂
We were over budget in almost every category! We made some extra money but I really wanted to put it toward a large purchase instead of clothing, groceries, and piddling it away. We also had 2 sets of company & that’s put us way over on food. Did september budget last night & it’s not pretty!
Hang in there Cristina!
DH has a new job, pay is almost half of what we are used to, so getting a bit behind on things here. It will work out, we can cut back where needed. Our kids are healthy, we are too. Healthy, wealthy, and wise in all things that matter. Love your blog, Thank you!
Good perspective Teresa!
I’m glad to read you aren’t perfect. It’s so easy when you follow a blog sometimes to think of the authors are being perfect and never veering off course!
We moved in March and have been figuring things out slowly, very slowly..haha! August was our get back on the Dave Ramsey track but then an unexpected death in the family wiped out what we were going to save. September is here and we are starting again…Thanks for being real and keeping us posted..it’s encouraging!!
I’m sorry that you had a death in the family Jennifer. I hope you are able to save some money in September. 🙂
This past month our grocery bill was out of this world. Our son is formula fed and he had a major grothw spurt. This month my husband is returning from deployment and income is changing so we are back to the tracking expenses and figuring out where we need to be. Best of luck to you Kimberlee!
I am so glad that your husband is returning, Niki!
after many lazy months
we are starting September
back on a hard budget
we have enough
to make it work
(although our emergency fund
is nil at the moment)
working on getting the ER fund
built back up
and sticking to our guns
congrats on doing well
and here’s to a great month to come!
alison
Yes, here’s to sticking to our guns (and our budgets)! 🙂