Welp, the results are almost in… like tomorrow is the last of the month and really, what more do we have to buy tomorrow? Except maybe some ham… because it’s Easter and we don’t have any. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to have? Well, I have deli sliced ham, so maybe we’ll just have that instead and call it good.
It really hasn’t been too terribly hard for most things to keep a lid on the spending (for ONE month). The places I found it the most difficult to avoid were clothing and random (read: non-essential) household items. Both of which, I have a certain price point that I’m willing to pay. I can’t remember the last time I paid more than like $10 for a shirt, because I am a clearance bargain shopper. The problem is that when I see something I would like to have on sale, I have to jump on it. Especially if I know it will be difficult to find at that price point again. Therefore, I had to intentionally steer clear of the clearance sections and sale zones. This was especially difficult because I happened to spend three hours (THREE HOURS!!) at Walmart waiting for tires to be put on one of our vehicles this month. What do you do at Walmart for THREE hours? Well, that’s another post.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, at the risk of overshare (honestly, I don’t care if you know our entire annual family income because there’s no way you can be jealous and I’m pretty ok with our standard of living, so it’s really just a number), here’s the actual number totals from the included territories:
Groceries – $60 (did weekly grocery shopping and intentional menu planning using up items we had on hand, basically $40/week, so not as great as our $30/week, but still not bad.)
Gas – $6 (We didn’t do much special here, but we did sort of limit the number of trips out of Siloam.)
Household – $55 (I am proud to say that I did buy stuff in this area, but we had enough overage from last month that this month’s entire budget can go!)
Amusement – $36 (I accidentally scheduled a coffee date with a friend and didn’t realize it was into March until it was too late.)
Clothing – $30 (Last month we were over by $5, or we might have a bit more)
Dri & Ansen’s individual fun money – $20
Total = $207 toward vacation!
I didn’t really know what to expect, realistically. This is pretty good. I think if we did it again (at a later date) maybe I could do a little better (like $30/week groceries!), but it’s not too bad. Add that to our current $10/month + random odds and ends deposit into our vacation fund and we have like $400. If we go on a cruise, that just might get a ticket for one of us! Unless I want to go alone, I guess we’d better keep saving. Maybe we’ll get there before our 10th anniversary!