I haven’t updated recently about how we are doing with sticking to our financial goals. We have had some ups and downs. One thing I have realized is that we have to have planned splurges. They give us the motivation to keep going. Meaning…..we follow our debt prepayment plan and any extra money even beyond what should go to the debt repayment goes to our debt. This year with the extra we bought a new TV – paid for in full. Could that have also gone to our debt repayment?? Sure…but it makes it worth all the saving through out the year to get one thing you want!
So far this year, I have paid off the Blazer Loan – paid off one year early.
Paid for the new TV in full.
Rolled the Blazer Payment over to the next debt. Starting this month the money that would usually go to the blazer lona payment will go to our credit card bill. That credit card should be paid off in one year or a little less. It seems that each year we have one less bill and are closer and closer to being debt free!!
The one things that has really helped is I run the household within a weekly budget. I set aside an assigned amount for Grocery, Household, Allowance, Church, Gas and Fun each week. We stick to that pretty close every week. I have found that I spend less money each week if I get groceries every other week. So I plan my meals two weeks at a time. The other must do is menu planning. I save so much money by only buying food that I know I will need for the next two weeks. I also buy very few processed foods, unless they are at Aldi.
Technically my food budget for the family of 5 is $320.00. But now I have added into that budget also some of my household items. etc. I use cash for Aldi of course, but I use gift card for Cub Foods as we get money back on Tommy’s tuition for school by ordering the gift cards. They only come in $25.00 cards, so I have to get that amount. So each month I usually have $340.00 to spend each month, but I always have money left over.
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I have two shoping trips a month for groceries and I spent the following in March.
Shopping Trip # 1 3/9/08 = Aldi – 72.10 and Cub Foods – 27.50. Bread Thrift Store – 6.09 = 105.69
Shopping Trip # 2 3/16/08 – Aldi – 92.88 and Cub Foods – 65.24 = 158.12
Total Groceries for March = $263.81
I could even decrease this by an additional $5-10 each shopping trip as I do usually buy one or two 24-packs of pop each shopping trip. But it is a splurge we can afford and that makes me happy!!!
We usually use the left over money to treat ourselves out for supper once a month or something. It pays to be frugal so you can enjoy the things you really want to in life!!
Wow! Great job, Jen! We sooo want to be out of debt too. We might make it in a year. We’ll see. (Except for the house of course), Jenn
As Dave Ramsey would say “it sounds like you know how to act your wage!” In my opinion when you “act your wage” you still have some money to buy some splurges like pop and tvs just not quite as often. But when we buy them there is no financial guilt that goes along with it and we appreciate the splurges so much more!
I was doing couponing combined with sales ads for a few months but with two little ones it was taking up too much time and I wasn’t enjoying it, plus we were buying way too much processed foods. We just stopped doing coupons but I found a kroger store near us that marks down their precut produce and veggie trays between $1 and $2 per pound when they are close to the sell by date. So we’ve been eating TONS of fresh fruits and veggies.