Budget Plans

We hit the big old goose egg in the bank account, Ugh! I was panicking the whole time too. I was super worried about all the auto payments that would come out on Monday and how we wouldn't receive a paycheck until Wednesday. I just didn't want to have to pay bank fees and deal with all trouble.

Enter stage left My husband was here to save the day! He had a solution and fixed everything. I finally have my banking software balance current since a 0 makes things really easy to handle. The paycheck went in and I got to work planning how we would spend our money responsibly and not have to rely on credit or see that dreaded goose egg again.

I'm sure there is some deep meaning behind my inability to plan things out but it just hasn't hit me over the head just yet. 

So I took a deep breath Ok maybe I took two. I put my big girl panties on and I got to work. I have been using a print out sheet just to sort of track at a glance how I am spending my money and to see what bills are due.

It's nothing fancy. I tried to break things down weekly so it is manageable. The amount category is in grey, since most bills are semi predictable I just put the average. Things like our weekly car payment withdrawal almost never get written over. But things like the water and electric tend to change a little. I used to track our fuel expenses religiously but have gotten out of the rhythm of tallying it each week.

If you'd like a copy of my form just leave a comment and I'll send it you.

Have a great day!

Nina

tired

Have you had one of those days....

Where you feel like no one is listening....

and you're repeating yourself all the time.....

It was one of those kind of weeks for me last week. I was irritable at the slightest thing and no one wanted to be around me. And I honestly can not blame them. But what is a Mom to do when things are beginning to circle the drain?

 You can scream, yell, shout and completely alienate your family. You could run away and join the circus. Lock yourself in a tower and wait for your prince charming to rescue you (hubby comes home, whips everyone in to shape and saves the day)

Or we could try something new.... Ignoring things that are undesirable. I am starting a new thing where I give warnings once on certain things. The particular example that comes to mind is shoes and back packs being left where ever the boys feel like it. 

Our slab house doesn't have the most ideal entry way. I tried to use the maintenance closet as a catch all and when one child had a back pack and gear he wanted to take care of it worked great. Now DS4 wants to take care of his own things and I need to have more kid friendly and accessible storage.


This is what I started with.....

This is the after! 

I piled most of the crud in the middle of the garage and started with a blank slate! The carpet remnant is an odd shape but I found it works great if I place the trimmed out corner around the bench. The bench was a project from last year that didn't turn out quite as expected since I cut the pieces with the lengths and widths mixed up. But I was able to make it work and the original bins hold misc toys around the house. 

I removed the pink bins and decided to use just one bin so we can fit snow pants in there this winter. By moving the bench to the other side of the door when there is an over spill of shoes I won't trip over them when I am leaving for work in the darkness at 4:45am.  

Stay tuned for more I have even more areas in the garage to tackle!

Nina