In May I realized our budget was in trouble. In our family I handle the finances, with support from my husband. I am the more organized one which helps me handle the budget. However, in May, I realized I needed help. I needed my husband to step in and be a second brain. So we looked, and crunched and looked some more. At the end I felt much better about everything and we had a new plan. The new plan has been working so well!
Let me tell you about our old budget first. I had tons of categories and I would have a piece of paper in a binder for each one. Then, I would take every receipt and calculate how much money of each category had been spent. Then I would write that amount on each corresponding page. Confused? Yeah I know. It was incredibly time consuming and very hard to keep up with spending. I found myself over spending in almost every category on a monthly basis. I was so disappointed in myself an overly frustrated that I was not being a good steward. I even felt belittled by my husband a few times when he would make comments about the bank account (he did not realize that it was bothering me, so don't worry. He was only making general comments but since I was already insecure about the budget it made me feel attacked.
So the budget now? Simplified by a million! I combined most of the categories and narrowed them down to the basic. The kicker? We are on the cash system now! Oh my goodness, if you have never done it.... you should! It has been the best budget system for us yet! Each week I get out our set amount of cash, then once it is gone.... we are done spending! This system does require more planing with my shopping but that has been helpful to me. It has shown me how careless I was before. It has also shown me how little we really need to be happy. I am enjoying this new system for lots of reasons!
So what do you and your family do to help with your budget?
4 comments:
I could not count how many times in a year I have worked on our budget. It can always use a little tweeking. Have you read any of Dave Ramseys books? They helped me out a lot. But I am still looking for way to cut things out.
By the way, I will be praying for you and the family that you are helping out. How blessed they are to have someone like you in their lives.
Wow! That was a lot of work for you originally. I am glad you found a way to streamline it and make it work. We don't really do a budget, but we should. We are not in any trouble financially, but we all should be good stewards of the money God has entrusted to us. Thanks for this reminder!
ha Amy I am so horrible with money that Robbie does EVERYTHING, I am only allowed a certain amount for the month for groceries. He takes care of the rest. SO I couldnt even tell you how much money we have! ha. I know I need to get better at it that way if something happens to my husband (God willing it wont) Than I wont be stranded having no idea what we have.
I have heard so many good things about the cash system.
Post a Comment