I know a lot of you are wondering how our budget came out. I will tell you we put it off until late last night, so I will get to that in a minute. To start off the weekend, the first in a while Dan hasn't had to work. We got bills paid and mailed, after sleeping half the day away (literally). Laundry, and cleaned the kitchen, then headed out in the rain to run some errands. We went to the good ole' dollar store to pick up some car cleaning products. Headed to the store to get our groceries which enter side notes here:
I have a friend that is doing the Total Money Makeover as well, she actually got me to do this, I thought about it but I just couldn't bring myself to it. However I finally did, and if any of you have taken my advice and listened to Dave on the radio or read his book he talks bout the E- meal Plan. $5 a month and they send you the meals, and a grocery list. You can do family or just for two. It's cheap meals with out having to live off rice and beans and he puts it. check out the example of our week of dinners below:
Even if you aren't doing the Dave Ramsey plan I find this would be great for anyone as it's hard to plan meals for every day especially when our lives get super busy, it's always easier to just call in pizza or run through the drive thru. You can cancel at any time so why not give it a chance?!? Here's the link for you to check out... http://e-mealz.com/
We had to get some dog food for the puppies, pick up some bones, and well Hershie needed a new collar. Some of you asked if that was in the budget, and yes, we do budget for the dogs, however, here is the story on her last color. It was originally Tyson's, however it was too big for him so we bought him a smaller one (pre-Dave), then Hershie adopted the collar, and it was working fine, until I came home Friday from work and she had made a swimming pool in her kennel and swam in it, literally she was drenched in her urine (gross I know, but that's the story). Had I not washed it 2 times before and it wasn't unraveling she would have kept it. Needless to say I was ready for some wine and the couch after the end to last week. Her new collar is super cute though, check it out--- I might add it was also on sale, $4!
After getting to the store and home and unpacking everything it was about 7:45. I was tired, and I'm sure the weather didn't help that at all. We put a pizza in the over, and I broke out some wine, and we watched the Iowa game. I feel a sleep in the middle and still woke up in time for the end, although I didn't miss much, bad loss for us :(
Sunday, I must admit we slept in again, skipped out on church. I did some laundry, made some breakfast, Dan made me some delicious coffee, while I did homework all afternoon. I feel school is officially in session when it takes a whole day to do homework for only 2 classes. We were bums all day, watched football, and did homework, I thought I would get a walk with Hershie in but the rain would not let up. I know, I know...sooo when did you do the budget....Okay here it is.
We did the budget, now, this week is just a quickie budget. It doesn't have to be exact, just numbers, you can see the sheet below. You can imagine that our take home pay isn't the most right now being that I only work a few hours a week and go to school full time, so basically we live off of Dan's income, which is great for only being out of school for 2 years, and being at this job for one. We probably wont put any numbers up for people to see though. Either way, the goal of this budget is to put every dollar somewhere. There should be no leftover money at the end of the month, you should be at zero, being that you give, save, and pay bills. I must admit though, having zero at the end of the month comes rather easy for us.
Feelings on how the budget went: Putting everything on paper makes you stop and look and realize that we are spending a ton, when we could be giving or saving a lot more. It makes me stress looking at the numbers, it scares me that we have let ourselves come to this and thinking it's okay. But, that's why we are here, taking the class, getting things straight and on our way to debt free. I know some of you are thinking we are crazy for giving "stuff" (aka cars, nights out, super nice clothes, and vacations) up, however, we are thinking the "whole you guys are crazy," is coming from broke friends. We have to start with the people in the mirror. Another side note, a great song for this is "Man in the Mirror," by Michael Jackson. We used to sing this before every game in college, I guess now it's really making an impact.
Love,
Dan,Hollie,Tyson, and Hershie :)
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