I started going through my receipts for the year so far. I entered all my 2nd quarter numbers into a spread sheet. My categories are Eat Out, Groceries/Household, Kids, Adults, House, Gas.
I am sure the gas and eating out numbers are off, hubby is terrible about keeping receipts. Spreadsheets like this are helpful to me because I can look and see that in May we were spending money 6 out of 14 days, 3 in a row, eek! I am pretty sure we were doing a project on the house, but still, we could have planned our trips a little better!
I am encouraged to see that we only spent $951.29 in the Grocery column. I included all household, toiletry and gift items in here as well. Most of the Kids purchases were baseball related.
I don't have any amounts for the bills we paid yet, that's step 2! Most of them are paid online, so it won't be hard to assemble that data. Then I can combine the numbers and paint a better picture to create a real budget, with a plan and everything!!! I am doing this now because I want to really cut the extras out, so I can start birthday and Christmas shopping.
Some helpful budgeting links:
Free Budget Forms
Simple Debt Free Living
Create a Budget
Kiplinger's Budget Tool
The Day My Personal Financial Statement Talked To Me
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