Stress and goals...

Here it is my update…STRESS!  Unbelievable mental stress right now and I need to just chill and calm down.  I’m having some “woman” issues and it’s causing me more stress than necessary.  But I promised myself that this month, no matter what, I would make sure to follow up on my goals.  Tracking expenses and my eating.

This week I tracked every dime and we over spent, but I can see why and how!  It’s such a revelation and I’m proud of myself and us.  We are talking more about our money, what is coming in and going out and it’s really making more and more sense where we overspend and why.

1.     We don’t see each other often, so when we do, we tend to spend money. 

2.    We try to “stock up” when we can

So my DH decided to stay home from work this past Friday b/c he was going away for the weekend for his military duty.  So we met up on my way home from work and picked up a few items of clothing for our E.  She needs the next size up in all her fall/winter clothes and Kohl’s was having a wonderful sale.  I set a budget of $40 and we only spent $31!  I was very happy that I stuck to it.  There is a big consignment sale coming up in October in our area, so I will use $9 I didn’t spend and get 3-4 more items.  Since it’s rare that we actually see each other during the week we decided to grab E from daycare and go out to eat.  I was disappointed in my meal, but DH was happy and E loved some tortilla chips, another $32.  What other way to spend an impromptu family date night then to stop and get frozen yogurt?  We did, but we’ve discovered those self-serve places, you can spend as much or as little as YOU want.  For 3 of us we spent $6.50, quite pleased w/ that!  Basically we spent $70 that wasn’t budgeted for this week.  Did we have it?  We sure did, thanks to DH’s overtime, but should do that every month?  Probably not.

Since its DH’s duty weekend, my Mom came to babysit and we were running low on bulk items (trash bags, paper plates, diapers, laundry/dish soap) and Mom has a Sam’s Club membership so shopping was the name of the day!  We decided to just eat out ($47, but putting $20 back in cash for Mom’s part of the bill) and then shopping for all our necessities.  I totally forgot to add everything up as I went along (I had a list!) but I made a point to walk back through and add up everything so I had an idea of what I was going to spend…$131.  I was actually pleased.  Almost everything I got is going to last us 3 months, if not more, so basically (as a friend pointed out!) that is $43 a month.  Not too shabby in my opinion!  The only problem is, I considered all those things as “grocery” items and since I haven’t planned any meals this month ahead of time, I’m concerned how much more a hit our budget is going to take.  We are at $253 already; I’ll be paying for our meat delivery this week ($260) so that leaves us w/ only $27 left for the month.  I know we will go over that, but I’m happy to see where it’s going and how we are spending it. 

I’m really happy about our budget and where we at right now.  It’s going to a be a work in progress for a few months, but in the mean time I can get a good look at the mistakes we are/were making and make an effort to change them. 

 

My 2^nd goal…my eating…le sigh!  I lost 1 pound this week, not sure how, but I did.  My eating, well, it’s not under control and I did my usual skip out on tracking.  I’ve loved WW’s in the past, but I do not love it anymore.  I think I’m going to go to good old pen and paper, just writing down everything, good, bad or ugly.  Not necessarily focus on the calories, so much as the serving sizes and how often I’m eating.   I need to work on eating more often and much smaller portions, rather than saying “Oh, I can’t eat this/that”.  I like food, I want to be able to eat it, but like our budget I need to plan for it.  I need to decide if dessert is worth the cost, not just hiking up the bill, but is it worth to me?  I need to do some serious thinking and figuring out how I want to tackle my weight. 

 

I know each week is going to bring something different and I’m going to have to do some tweaking in my goals, but I’m ready.  I want to do it!