August in review

As you can probably tell, we didn’t manage to stay under $200 for our groceries this month. I tallied everything up and subtracted non-food items, and in the end we spent about $237.75 on food. However, we also ate out more than we should have (especially at lunch) but those totals aren’t included.

This was our first month tracking spending so closely, and we’ll now be able to fine-tune our budget and tweak where needed. Most of all we need to curb that “Oh, I don’t want to eat, let’s eat out” urge we are used to pleasing. There were also things we bought at the grocery store that probably weren’t needed, most notably the junk food. We’re both trying to get over the junk food madness but it definitely is hard. Fat and sugar and salt taste so good!

It is interesting to track things like this. Because you are paying attention to what you’re spending money on, it makes you think twice about what you put in your cart. Even though we did buy junk food most of it was on sale. Buying in bulk is awesome. I pay more for the foil packets of tomato sauce instead of getting the cans, because one packet is the perfect size for one pizza, but I know I could buy a bigger can and split it. The “ethnic” section of the grocery store is the best place to buy staples. For some reason a bag of lentils from the Indian section is so much cheaper than a bag from the dried beans aisle. Good luck even finding a bag that big in the dried beans aisle.

In terms of our debt, we paid off two credit cards this month. We are on track to have three more, plus my lowest student loan, paid off in November. Husband has taken a side job of about 20 hrs/week doing more programming, and I’ve been experimenting with online surveys and being a ChaCha guide (more on my results later). Obviously his extra work will bring in more money than mine, but every bit counts.

September will have some extra budget issues: Bob’s birthday, buying a new carseat for Reese during the Britax sale, refinishing our starter emergency fund since we went over budget this month. Hopefully that will all be taken care of with the extra income. After that we’ll be setting aside some extra money for travel in December, and throwing the rest at debt. It’s a pretty awesome feeling to see those last payment dates creep up more and more!