I've been debating if I should combine March and April since April is practically over already...man time is flying by. Didn't we just celebrate Christmas? But as of now I'll just stick with March.
March wasn't too bad, at least it didn't seem like it to me, Malachi and I stayed home all month (that may be the one and only month all year!) so I felt good about the lack of spending needed for this month, like extra gas and food that comes with traveling. And actually stayed on budget in all those categories, even with my sisters visit during their spring break. However, Andrew had his 2 week military training in Alaska. We knew he had this training coming up and we added a little extra into his Drill column, but for some reason we didn't adjust realistically and it ended up over budget. Dave Ramsey always says it takes at least 3 months to finally get a budget on track with reality but it's been three months and I sure feel like we are struggling to get it adjusted correctly. I blame it on the fact that Andrew gets paid weekly rather than monthly or twice a month and the fact that we live in Canada but get paid in US dollars, more on that in April's post.
Positive Experience this month: To add more money into Andrew's Drill category we took some away from groceries. Which honestly kind of seemed fun, seeing as grocery shopping is kinda like a game for me now rather than just a chore, like it used to feel. I like the challenge of going to the store, keeping a running total as I add items to my cart and staying under my goal for that shopping trip (and when I say trip I mean trip. It is cheaper to drive to Bellingham WA, which usually takes about an hour, one way; fill up on gas and do our grocery shopping there rather than here in Canada, and then bring back enough cash to exchange for rent and utilities. I usually just coordinate those trips with my prenatal appointments so it didn't seem to ridiculous as I was killing two birds with one stone). Anyway, I was able to stay within the slightly reduced budget for groceries this month, making me wonder if we could reduce it even more and be okay...
Challenges/Unexpected expenses this month: Like I mentioned above, Andrew's military training set us back a bit, not really unexpectedly...we just didn't plan like we should have.
Helpful tip from this month: I can't think of a helpful tip for this month regarding finances only, so I'm going to share a quote that I like helping me to remember that with God all things are possible:
Let nothing disturb you,
Let nothing frighten you,
All things are passing away:
God never changes.
Patience obtains all things
Whoever has God lacks nothing;
God alone suffices.
-- St. Teresa of Avila
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| Budget committee meeting before April |
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| I think Andrew only likes Budget committee meetings so he can make charts and graphs...he LOVES this aspect of all this! |
