frugal… and how the lazy do it…. how i worked out my budget

I did my first budget sheet about 3 years ago when we ran into a really slim time. We had to cut some money ..some how.. some were and it seemed imposable! I surfed the web and its i billion frugal sites and budget sites and realized my first step had to be the work sheet. and remember guys… the first time IS REALLY the hardest time.. once you have it down the first time its a heck of a lot easier from there.

and now because of a planned emergency were hubby may be looking at being laid off in a couple of months i have rebuilt my budget to downgrade and stock more into savings. we do not know if this will happen or not but the company has been making drastic changes and we want to be ready if its needed to have a larger emergacny fund and larger stock piling of food. so this is how we worked out the new working budget for our home to prepare a little.
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we do not have credit cards or store cards, if we do not have the cash we do not get it.. well.. ok we both blew are credit rating a long long time ago so this has saved us for sure because we are unable to get credit! its all been cleaned up in the last 4 or 5 years as far as i know but are score is HORRIBLE! and i hope it never improves. credit ..makes you a slave.. ask dave ramsey he will tell you!!
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one week ago we got netflix.. i’m sure most of you know it, you can get movies in the mail and also steam it on your computer for a small fee. we are doing the 14.99 ( i think) option that gives us two movies out at one time and unlimited stream to the computer.. we also bought the 100 dollar box that you connect to the computer to the tv and it stream the movies or shows to YOUR tv! its great.. the newer stuff is not really on the instant watch list so you still have to use your dvd player for the new stuff. there are lots of stuff that we cant get threw it but we can still get it on the dvd and keep untill the kids get borred and demand something new!

On reseving the netfix box we suspended are cable for 6 months ( its so cool that we can do this! ) because we are still under contract with them for another… 12 months i think ? not sure but it would cost 212 or something to brake the contract soo… we just suspended it for the moment so we can save up some money. netflix bill – the cable bill we are putting 47 dollars away in saving each month from that.

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we canceled the paper.. it was only 9 dollars a month but that too will be shipped into savings each month.

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i canceled one of the game sub because I’m not playing it atm but hubby loves his age of canan so we are keeping his and the internet, but looking into if there is a lower cable speed we can get. and that 14.99 is going to savings now as well.

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we don’t have cell phones but i do have a prepayed phone that i got about a month ago and it has 30 dollars on it. we don’t have cars and its basically used once a week when i go shopping IF my cab dosnt show up and i have to call or if hubby needs to get a hold of me .. but its really an emergency thing if anything used once a week but generally not. … i have to look but i think the min expire so i may have to use it.. just to use it and not lose them lol weird hu? well i will be looking and refilling it with the lowest that i can i think is 10 dollars and i believe that its 3 months on the min.

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we get payed weekly and i found after the first year that its just easier to brake it all into payments of 4 and we opened a separate checking account that all are bills are auto payed out off and a auto deposit is transferred over the day after pay day. it makes it so much easier this way i will tell you that, each week the bill money is pulled out and put aside and I’m left with savings, food money and weekly money.

so now are working budget looks like this

we make ………………….495 a week =1980 ( im a stay at home mom so his is all we have and after this budget don’t any of you say… we cant do it on one! )

spending

rent…………………………168.75 = 675.
electric…………………….28.75 = 115.( range from 100 to 140)
phone………………………7.5 = 30.
interent…………………..13.75 = 55 ( looking into the 25 dollor plan)
game sub…………………3.75 = 15
netflix………………………3.75 = 15
food…………………………150 = 600 ( not added to weekly bill transfer)
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total ……………………….375.50 = 1502
………………………………………….. – 1980 ( monthly money coming in )
…………………………………………. = 478 (left after bills and food )
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smokes/buss tickets..36 = 128 ( hubby’s )
cab ………………………….10 = 40 (weekly grocery trip)
hubby money…………..10 = 40 (his weekly spending money, pops , chips w/e we brown bag it )
coffee snakes ……………10 = 40 ( kids and i for shopping trip )
…………………………….total………. —–
248 ( total for weekly mis spending)
…………………………………………… – 478 ( minus the total left from the bills and food )
…………………………….total…….. = 230 ( /4 = 57. a week left from budget )
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savings……………………….32 =128 (128 a month into savings )
…………………………….total………..-230 ( what is left from bills and weekly mis)
………………………………………….. =102 ( /4 25 dollors free after everything)

in the end i have three running accounts. our personal one that the money is dumped into, the bill account and the saving account. this was just easier for me to manage it all and make it actually sepate things.
each week 495 goes in…225 goes to bills and 32 goes to saving. its all on auto transfer so there is no messing with it once you have figured it all out and set it up, its great.

ok so at the end i have 25 dollars that are not being used any where , its my just in case we need more milk or funds and if not it will go to savings… ok so usually it sits there until we have enought for delivery lol or date night or coffee out. its just are w/e money.

its all broken down and its all accounted for. you know were your money is going and you told it to go there! the food budget is high so i have room if i need it and since we have the funds to have it there that is were it stays. the money that is not used is either shipped to savings or used for mis stuff as mad money. i don’t fill bad about it because we have auto savings figured into the budget that is are emergency fund / holiday money / birthday money / school money… so the money is constantly coming and out BUT we have it there for those set reason and we know that when the kids d days come we ill have the funds to cover it, and when x mass comes there is money… not like the years gone past of.. OMG what can we not pay to get them something! no my friend we have planned it so we have a stash for just such reasons!

—- this is after a some subscription cuts and down grading but it works for us, we wanted to keep the internet because this our entertainment. hubby plays online games, so do i when interested.. i love to surf the blogs and the movies and tv now come from it! every one has a different must for there entertainment choice and this is just ours. your budget will vary depending on what you need to run your house and what you do for fun. the budget is not to tell you how to spend your money but to tell your money how to work for you. you know what you pay for your bills and then you plan for savings and your weekly needs.

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well guys i sure hope you understood my brake down and it helps you to build your own budget.. if i just did nothing then confuse and anger you.. im sorry and that my dear friends is a look into money! exciting trip ya? well go plan your own money trip now!

god bless

frugal… and how the lazy do it… learning to track down your money!

Well hello again..twice in one day LOL I’m getting back into the flow of it!

So, i got an email from my sister in law who.. is one of the THREE ppl who read this loyal..one is NOT family..I had sent her a link to Monday menu planning ( its on the sidebar! ) told her its great for dinner ideas with out working your own brain out. Her reply was.. were is more frugal sites! with gas being unbelievable and food going right up with it she is hoping to learn some of the secrets …which arnt really secrets because there are about ONE BILLION TRILLION frugal sites! omgosh its amazing! the stuff ppl will reduce.. reuse.. ( some of it i didn’t ever want to know my self ) but for the most part its all very practical information but.. yes its scattered and everywhere! who besides the lazy mom who uses the tv to babysit her kids has time to surf them all WELL not my sister in law!

ok side note.. this women amazes me! she has 3 of her own and is watching 2 more.. one is an BABY! … can you count? i can and i just wanted to hide from the thought of it! PLUS shes the kind of women that remembers EVERY ones birthdays, anniversary’s.. when you lost your first tooth! and… and she sends cards and throws party’s and.. entertains! oh man.. i have to lay down its all just to much! I envy her creativity ( ok envy may be the wrong word here as a christian.. i umm admire!) and dedication to the little details on stuff. she has just this endless energy for her family and making the ppl she knows fill important. ok now that i made her blush on to the real post /HUGS

I thought i would start off with the first well..not so simple.. things for you “M” that most the sites will have when you want to start cutting back on your money or.. monitoring were its spending its self.. because i know money has a mind of its own

ok get some paper or a budget forum, it helps to have your bank statement if you have lots of bills going out so you will be able to easily find the amounts now track your money down! and i mean every little penny you can think of! estimate what you have to for .. food budget and such that is not a set monthly amount. if your are doing this free hand with out a budget sheet here are the list i would make.

“what we make” … what is the money coming in? everything from hubby’s job to your work to anything ales. …

“what we need to live“— now put down your mandatory bills.. house, car, insurance, electric, water, garbage,food …cable is not a mandatory bills its an extra.. like you know..coffee~!

“what we owe” debt.. the evil evil plastic thing that i will have nothing to do with. here put the cards you owe.. don’t do them together but list them ( it may be scary from some ppl ) put your balance and min payments.. and maybe your interest you are paying on them… you may want to roll them to another card with a lower interest rate or hell CALL them and tell them your are rolling it if they don’t lower it!? then GET RID OF THEM!

“what we want” ok HERE is your cable, coffee allowance, cell phones, paper subscriptions, game sub, blockbuster, nexflix, Internet ( oh god i need this one! its almost a need to live one ) you get the ides.. this should.. i believe be the rest of your funds

ok… now you , close your eyes , and add it all up and compare it… there had better be a + number at the end or its time to cry and turn stuff off! ok ok so, now that you have spent a few hours or maybe days taking down all your monthly spending from your rent to your newspaper subscription.. then you will see what ever is left as free money and you may want to look threw the rest of your statements or recipes and find out what you do with the extras.

well at this point if nothing alse you have worked yourself into a freaked out fit of OMG moments ( did i say this would be fun? i hope not ) i would start here then we will move on to step two but this is were YOU get control of your money! its so easy to lose control of it and then just not have any idea were its going.. forgotten subscriptions that are auto deducted that you don’t even use that could be cut, the cable that had to be HD but .. we never watch HD CHANNELS! so you drop it and there is 10 more dollars… how often do you use blockbusters? nexflix is a great alternative for ( well my family , we dropped cable all together and are using netflix and its nifty box that streams stuff from the computer to are tv! ) movie rentals.

basically guys… spend a few days really going over all the bills and extras and put it on paper.. list it out.. work it out.. find out WERE its going and to WHO and WHY! then ask your money WHY IT IS LEAVING YOU!!! hehe ok i think I’m funny so its all good.

this will be easy for some and hard for others, but it is SO worth it. you may or may not change a thing but this way you KNOW were it is.

this is something that can take a few months to get all the exact numbers for stuff and to tweak and move around and minis stuff off that you don’t need. this is just the first step to see how you spend right now , today and see if you want to change any off it. if your like most of us you really have no idea what your money is doing

good luck and god bless.

reply to grumpy mans comment LOL

does this make me white trash?? LOL

hay grumpy. well the damn thing is to big to fit in a window.. we do have it tilted back the way the book says.. because of the step to the padio. we put something down to keep it up a bit but its tilted for the water to stay at the back of the ac. it does have a … drain plug but the drain cap is on now.

bugs? would’nt i get the same amount of bugs from it in a window as it sitting on the ground?… or from just leaving the back door open? lol

well thought id show you the set up.. this thing is a MONSTER! thanks for reading ben its nice you look at my site LOL
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here are the monsters, thought you would like an update emily, dan and keith with there d’s dad. this is what the… 4th time we have actually seen him, amazing how fast kids will take to a new person when you tell them its there grandpa.. and he has money to hand out LOL. they have been drinking crystal lite tea and it tends to stain little kids mouths who like to gulp it! ok well i should clean or something… lol ill post later.

god bless

LG window AC

ok so here it is! We had to put it into the sliding glass door in the back and tape plastic around the open part of the door to keep the ventilation outside, and we just left it there on the floor… ok so im not really sure how ok that is but, well 1. its like 100 lbs and we dont have anything to put it on that .. would not be like leaving it on the floor.. I.E a table? same thing i would think but much less messing with tape and tarp. OH it felt good! … untell about 45 min ago when we pulled it back in because the thunder storm was about to start and i thougt… omgosh is it suppose to get wet???

well i dont know! … the hubby after a few minuts is all. well.. sure they can. arnt they suppose to be MOUNTED to the window and left there??

well… maybe… i dont know! honastly the last ac i remember having was when i was preteen and that was a HUGE monster fixed outside! it had its own parking space for goodness sake.

ok it worked GREAT! untill i pulled it back in lol. now its muggy and blah and getting to close to when we would lock the house up anyways to set it back up. but wow was it great to have when it was hot hot out there.

now…. the planning ahead me…. umm were on earth are we storing this thing! its not a small window unit here, its a large BOX that weighs a LOT! .. ok ok so it sits at the door over the summer to be easily and painlessly pushed in and out of the door WOOT im all for that part ( /fear to look at power bills creeping in ) but.. what about later. i have no clue were we will be storing it! oh man lol well i guess i just have to worry about something hu? and i think its grand that thats what i have to worry about atm! were to put my over sized ac after summer LOL. i can deal with that.

the heat and an unexpected surprise

It was so hot here yesturday. We hit 99 here after sitting nicely at ..gosh i don’t know 70-80. Now any oh you who have lived in Oregon know that this is a HEAT WAVE! lol and we really only have a couple of weeks all summer that reach this or above. Most of us just suffer threw those days with lots of water and hiding in deep cold holes in the ground… ok so not the last hehe. My house we shut out the sun as much as we can and drink water and drape wet towels over are selfs and suffer. We never felt investing in a AC was worth the cost for two weeks of “real” need for it.

Well yesterday as the temp got higher i realized that i was going to have a really bad time this year. I have been having issues with my breathing at times… not that there seems to be a “real”reason according to the dr. They have done breathing test and such and told me my lungs are fine. Which is great news coming from an x smoker of 10 years! ( i quit 3 yrs ago when i developed this issue .. thank you lord for the help in stopping ) it is a mix blessing. It forced me to stop smoking but now rears its head at crappy times. some times it acts like an allergy … dirty air will trigger it… extreme weather change.. stress!

So as it got hotter it became harder to breath. Its not that i cant breath its that i cant get that.. full breath.. so i struggle until i get it then it starts over again. Cold stuff tends to help so i ate otter pops all day and ice water.. at least i stayed hydrated. Poor david , my husband, he felt so helpless because there just is nothing you can do.

Daniel our 4 yr old he sleep for like 4 hrs and when he got up was so sick from the heat. he was throwing up. we draped him in cold towels and pumped him full of water.. this is my fault for not making sure he stayed cool wial he sleep.. sigh, i just did not think of it. we were keeping the girl cool… well i will not beat my self up to much in front of you all.. any parent will know how i felt.

finally at 9 it was way cooler outside then in so we went out and played with the other neighbors outside cooling off, it was so nice outside! then back in for bed, and wet towels to keep us cool to sleep.

David wakes me up this morning at 6:30 to tell me hes going with his mom to home depo because he cant watch us be sick again because of the damn heat! and then he was off… and back with an ac! His mother fronted the money for us and we WILL pay her back ..regardless of her ” well just say its your birthday present” that offly nice but.. i cant except that for something like that.

So now its hooked up and OMG THANK YOU! its so nice. the kids are hogging it and i am in owe of my man for filling the need to save us from the heat. It’s moments like this women that you know he loves you and the kids.

thank you lord today for showing me what we mean to this man and for making this an option for us. god bless and stay cool.

random thoughts

well my sons favorite thing to tell me “Your a cookie head mommy” .. i have no idea really what this means but he says it to be silly lol he starts laughing and telling everyone they are cookie heads. i think its his way of saying he likes us as much as his cookies . at night when we do our bed time prayers they do the kids ” now i lay me down to sleep, i pray the lord my soul to keep, if i die before i wake, i pray the lord my soul to take” then i ask them what is one thing they want to thank god for and one thing they want to ask god to help them with… the most common answeres here our.. thank you god for cookies and help me with the ghosties.. they are in the monster under the bed stage .

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its suppose to be 100 today im going to melt!!!!

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one of my newer more favorite sites now is “Et tu?” its a women’s journey from being an atheist to a believer. she shares with us how she found her way back to god and how she fills him and sees him in her life now, and how her old views and ideas are being reformed. Jennifer is a powerful writer. She is so articulate in her blog that its very easy to understand what shes saying and get sucked up with her in her journey.

Today when i hopped over there she posted——The story of my conversion from being pro-choice to pro-life is in the current issue of America Magazine. Check it out here.——-

very very well written.

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my bean plants are growing and my tomato plants have little yellow flowers now! i love watching them grow and Emily loves to water them!

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ugg.. my husbands company is moving everything his branch does and moving it to another branch… and moving a new thing into theres .. but its 1/2 the work that they do now. they said by the end of july the transition should be made and they hope that they new contract work will pick up after they start working on it. From what my husband says if it dose not pick up from what they will be given to start there is no way to maintain all the full time ppl. there is 10 ppl in the branch but the work that will be coming in is realistically only enough for 5 or so.

so we are going over all the options and what if’s and planning for if they downsize the employees. He would get two months of full pay if he left then unemployment at just 100 dolors short of what he makes now so it would not be to hard, but i am going into super saver, frugal, stock pile save for that 2 month away emergancy mode!

I know the steps that should be taken to make sure if that happens we don’t hurt to badly, and that part of the strees will not be so bad. And either way it goes this will be a “work” blessing for hubby because this job just makes him mental! the only reason he has stayed is because of the benifet packets that it has provided for the family ( now is that a great man or what? ) so we are working at getting all the medical / dental stuff we can in the next two months to use what we can in case its going away.

oddly enough this is the track i … well we have been moved on.. for the last two months already. downsizing bills and being motivated to get dental stuff delt with now. I have been stock pilling stuff for a few months now, flour and cereal and condiments. I have been overly interested in survival sites and frugal sites and off the grid stuff. lol i told my husband it was a good thing we did not own our own place or id have had to much fun trying to harvest water and make the water harvest toilet. Id love to use solar energy! but you cant really do that in an apartment can you

well what ever happens im turning to god to help us threw, who better to make sure we don’t fall!

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well im going to try and stay cool today and not melt you all have a great one too!

rubies and diamonds

so… here comes uncle rodger to the door with a box from mom.. another box.. i just got 3 with what had to have been most of her cloths! This is my birthday present he tells me and so .. i RIP in to it not caring that its not my birthday for another week and 1/2…. and what… WHAT has she sent me! a beautiful ring! ruby’s and diamonds ( i sure hope mom the are lab created ! ) .

…. have you ever been so happy to get something but so mad at the person for getting it for you ?… why would she waste her money on a ring for me was one of my many thoughts lol because i know there are so many things im sure she would love to get… then the OMG SHE GOT ME THIS RING I LOVE IT !! is the best reaction

id post a pic but have been to lazy to take one yet.. maybe later.. you know when i send mom pics of the kids that i have been promising for 3 yrs?

thank you mom! love you! hope you like your gift too

what a surprise!

So mom tells me she is sending me a few shirts that she showed to me on the web cam. it was supost to be because its a BIZZILLAN degreas there and cant ware them. … do you think i pitty her? lol sooooo here come three box’s with 15 shirts… and only 5 are long sleeve.. she sent me so many pretty things and most i can ware now in the summer OMG im asumeing its my b day present lol and what a better one then a vertualy new wardwarb ! i finally ditched a few of my older… err… not so pretty shirts and replaced them with my new tanks! the extra bonuse tho was ( ok its not as weird as it sounds here!! ) when you smell the close it smells like mom that was a moment i didnt expect. to be taken back home on a summer day. it was such an unexpected moment and i think that was the best part of all of it. I felt a little closer to mom and that was nice because she is so far away and we rarely get to see them anymore, it was bliss to spend a moment remembering.

i love you mom and dad! we miss you and are truly jelious of your SUN! GRRR and the frogs! i hope you injoy your present when it gets there.

god bless!

what is love

1 Corinthians 13 (New International Version)

New International Version (NIV)

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society

1 Corinthians 13

Love

1If I speak in the tongues^[a] of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,^[b] but have not love, I gain nothing.

4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

now if i could tape that on a stick and hang it off the top of my head so i had to look at it every day… i may think about the words and filings that i allow to come out of me. lord help me love like you love.

what is "home" to you

home… i close my eyes and drift thinking, filling.. memory’s flouting around coming to the surface. I hear laughing and see loving eyes that you cant imagine ever hurting you…. There is a warmth in side like my soul was wrapped in a warm blanket that you use to snuggle deep into at night…. there is food! .. cold winter nights in a warm house full of love and hot coco and tv sitcomes… hot summer evenings with the bbq going and the family playing in the yard… dogs barking… birds screaming!.. friends free to come and go.. party’s! cakes! … forth of july birthdays in the back yard! … dad sneaking me my first drink? shhhhh!!… my first time behind the wheel and a screeching stop a few feet from are house LOL ( maybe why im scared to drive?)..

home is family and family is not only blood. it is those that love you and wrap your soul in a cozy blanket.
home is were you run to when your scared and you know you can lock it out because someone will be there to hold you and make the monsters stay at bay. home is were you are tough to fight the monsters.
home is were you are excepted. home is were you are tough to better yourself.

some days home is a soft spot and a great book…comfort…
some days home is knowing how much my husband hates his job but stays because it cares for us to well to just leave it….safely..
everyday home is the laughter or my children..acceptance’s
everyday home is in my bible to walk the true path to my home! .. being bettered

home a long time ago was fear and pain, uncertainty and unimportance, dark and lonely and there was no were to hide from the monsters because they were in my house. I did not have god to give me my home. then one day … one day i was told to go because I MADE THERE home disruptive… a prayer i never knew who to or how to pray was answered that day and i was sent… home.
How hard to go from cold and unwanted. lonely and scared to a place that you are loved and wanted, excepted and charashed? I was shown what warmth was, what safety was, what family was, what freedom was and my boundary’s. That i COULD do wrong and still deserve to be loved! i was shown strength and honor. I was shown the first steps of a life with god. I was shown how to be me… who ever i am or am going to be. i was shown how to…. be hugged, i do remember flinching a many times from a most wanted hug how this must have hurt them..

Home? i close my eyes and in my mind and soul i fill warmth and love and safety … thank you for showing me what home was mom and dad, with out you i would be one of the many that were never given this grate joy to pass on.. i hope that my children can one day close there eyes and hear laughter and juice and hot coca and talks of god !

what is home to you? i prey that everyone finds home here on earth but i prey more so that they find the lord there savior so they will have the home that is waiting for them in heaven. it will be all this and so much more.. so much more…