Well my end of the month savings numbers are in and I am SO happy to say I met my 5000$ goal early!! I was hoping to get it done by December! I also took the 1076$ I got from my income tax I spent 34 on tanning sessions for myself and the rest got moved into my baby ef until I decide what I'm going to do with it. I messed up majorly on my budget, didn't track my expensese, stop tracking my money in just a bad month but I am starting fresh in May and back to writing everything down.

I booked the hotel room for mine and dds mini vacation! Now to really cut my spending for may so we have some extra money to spend! I am so excited and relieved right now!! Time to think of a new set of goals for myself!

I failed big time on my "no spend week" I made it till Tuesday and then I took the kids and mom out for lunch. Mind you it was 26$ for 5 of us to eat, it was really good, lots of food even had left overs BUT thats not the point of a no spend week is it. I did Good Monday and Yesterday two no spend days, tonight shouldn't be I'm planning on going to the gym tonight which is covered under my membership but its rainy and gross out so I may stay home and have a movie night with dd either way it should be no spend.

I wrote last week about being overwhelmed by the state of my apartment well since then I kind of jumped from room to room and really didn't get much done so yesterday I sat down and made up a big 3 page list of things I want to get done starting with dds room. I want to turn it into a space for just her, with some special toys if she wants time alone she can go and play and then that way she doesn't have to share all of her toys with the children I watch and I am proud to say I am pretty much done! I have a small table and chair I need to move outside when the rain stops and then I have 6 boxes of clothes to sell but I am done! Her room is so neat and tidy now, closet is so clean, even extra hangers in her closet! Next will be my bedroom with the main goal being to remove the playpens from the children I watch right now its a bit of a maze to get to my bed I packed up one to sent home today and the other one we will work at sleeping on couches this afternoon. So hopefully by tomorrow I will have 2 out of 3 gone!! I then want to make my room more relaxing, comfortable for me to get away in, my own space since the rest of my apartment is full of toys!

Tomorrow I will post my end of the month savings totals and its looking pretty good that I will make my 5000$ goal!! I am still wavering back and forth about what to do with my income tax, either bank it all or 500 towards a camera, 50 for a pinic table for outside, 100 towards getting my dog fixed, 50 towards shopping when me and dd take our over night trip next month, 200 towards my large ef and 176 towards my small ef. But then I feel like I should be putting at least half into savings, but I really have wanted a new nice camera for awhile. All the choices!

I woke up this morning and went to transfer some money out of one account to my savings account and there was a deposit made in the middle of the night to my account of 1070 and some odd cents. Now I have been waiting for my income tax refund but from what my mom worked out she thought I would be getting 1700 back and when I looked it over I thought around 1400/1500 so maybe its my income tax with an adjustment? I checked to see when it says and it just says deposit, direct deposit is great until you end up with money that your not sure where it came from! I almost don't want to transfer/spend it incase its a mistake and they try and take it back out. Now if it is mine time to decide what I'm going to do with the money, if I had have gotten the 1700 back it was going to go like this: 500-small ef, 500-large ef, 500-new camera, 200-dog fixed. Since its not as much I'm not sure how I should break it up I'll think about it this afternoon and if anyone wants to tell me their opinion then let me know!! Hope everyone has a great day

We had a great and very busy Easter weekend! We seen lots of family and even had a Egg hunt through the woods at my grandmothers my dd loved it! She had so much fun and loved that she got to eat jelly beans for breakfast!

Today I am catching up on cleaning and 5+ load of laundry, I am trying to budget for next month to include a trip to a hotel, summer shopping and zoo with dd and planning for a full week off with no pay in August. I am hoping to do a full Monday-Friday no spend week, I filled up my car on saturday so I shouldn't need gas, I got enough groceries to hopefully get us through so hopefully I can make it! Save a bit of monry for the trip and then plan for a low spend weekend!

I hope everyone had an amazing Easter weekend!!

Yesterday was payday and I ran to the bank this morning to put some money in then back home to do all my banking. I took money out for rent, 200 back to my baby ef bringing it back to 500, paid the 114 off on my credit card bringing it to a 0$ balance, paid my cellphone bill, put 75 into my christmas fund and took out some money for groceries, an activity this weekend with dd and fun money! I feel more in control this week after paying all that and still having a bit in my chequing account!

This morning I painted Easter eggs with dd and we went out for breakfast, I'm hoping for a really nice day tomorrow so we can enjoy the trampoline and maybe go to the park and for a walk. Then Saturday night the Easter Bunny comes! Or as DD calls him Super Bunny! Sunday morning will hopefully go good, DDs dad is coming out to spend the morning with us so he can see her going through her easter basket and then I have a family dinner in the afternoon. I'm hoping for a really nice day so we can go outside blow bubbles and play with some of the outside toys!! I hope everyone is having a great weekend and a very Happy Easter!!

I am sitting here in my living room SO overwhelmed with stuff, books, toys, papers, craft supplies, more toys and books blankets boxes of clothes just so much stuff. I don't even know where to start. I watch children out of my home and need to keep a variety of toys for the different ages but I'm beginning to lose the battle and my home. Where do I start!! It's so stressful to sit here and look at everything, I did one corner this morning packed up a bag of books to send away, and a bag of papers to get rid of. But now what. What do I do with toys I spent good money on but dd just isnt interested in playing with them. She actually doesn't play with at least half of her toys because there in piles in the "playroom" that we don't play in because its to full Of stuff! Do I just get rid of it all? Even though I spent money on it? I could sell it but that seems like a lot of work. What about boxes? How long is to long to keep them? I've had a huge 42" tv box along side my stairs for 2 years! I keep thinking what if I move and need to move it? Someone please offer some advice in where to start to regain control of my home!!

I've made some really bad financial decisions lately, I actually said the other day frig the budget, if I want to buy something I'll buy it. So tired of counting every cent, writing everything down, only spending this much on this or not having any money left in this envelope till I get paid again when I know I have money sitting there in the bank. So I went and said forget about the budget, went out and did some shopping and out for supper 113$ later on my cc, spend 60$ on a night out with friends, and took more money out of my baby ef which is now down to 300 because of bad choices. I sat down this morning and check my bank account and could have smacked myself, who in the right mind says frig the budget and then goes shopping!! Bad Bad idea! Anyways I went over everything and get paid this week, I will put the 200 back into my ef, send 113 off the to cc company, take out my rent money, pay my cellphone bill, add a bit into savings, into dds education savings account, my christmas account and will hopefully be back on track. I am still hoping to finish off my large ef of 5000 this month even with all my extra spending, and then back to my normal budget still not sure about keep/getting rid of the envelope system though. Rant Over

I've been trying really hard to stick to the envelope system and am having troubles with it working for me. I think I'm going to quit using it except for certain things, car maintance, clothes, babysitting, going out, but for things like eating out, misc, groceries etc I think I'm going to use debt. I'll still set my limits and write down what I spend but its starting to be a pain splitting up the money trying to split a 20 into 5s so I can fill an envelope. I don't have time to get into the bank to get the proper bills, hopefully this doesn't completely ruin my efferts and send me back into crazy spending! But its just getting a little to easy to spend those twenties, I'm homing it'll be easier to say no to swiping the debit card. Has anyone else tried and given up on the envelope system?

Well it was another spendy weekend, took dd swimming and out for supper on saturday and then out for supper again sunday. We got the trampoline up and spend all of yesterday out side SO nice! I paid off my cc on Friday took the money out of my misc savings account and got dds Easter stuff and am happy to say I stayed around my 110 budget!! I haven't gotten the chance to put any extra into savings this month and it's not looking like I'll have much extra to add it. As long as I can find an extra 85$ I will be very happy and my first goal of a 5000 ef will be complete! My car went in for an oil change but that will come out of the car fund, and I am going over my budget and putting in my numbers from the weekend! Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Is anyone else budget crazy or is it just me? Almost once a day I go over my budget, my income, what has to come out, what goes into savings, how much I have left in each category! (my period key just broke so I apologize for the run on sentences and commas out of place lol)
I made some changes and added a new category to my budget for activities with dd I use to take this out of misc but I ALWAYS went over! Hopefully this works better it ups my budget a bit each month but hopefully it will work out with the overages, Tomorrow is pay day which makes me happy time to fill all my envelopes, pay off my cc for dds trampoline AND Easter shop tomorrow night! I have a budget of 100$ for Easter things for tomorrow I'm going to try VERY hard to stick to it. (it worked!) I already picked up 2 baskets, chalk, bubbles, and eggs to fill that I'm not going to count in my 100$ so total for her basket will hopefully be 110 or less! I had planned on giving her the trampoline for Easter to but she was with me when I picked it up and every day since we bought it she has to check to see if the snow is all gone so we can set it up! So excited! Well I hope everyone is having a GREAT Thursday!!!

Well I had a really bad start to April, eating out twice, movies, treats for the movies, trampoline, grocery, gas. All out of my 150 over fund, and my misc savings and some on my cc. Looking at my budget and what I spend so far I feel like I've ruined April already and its barely even started! The trampoline was something I had planned to buy dd, I did put it on my cc just because I was to get some credit going so when I do decide to buy a house some day I have something they can look at. My plan is to put my whole misc fund onto my cc, and then put the rest on it when I get paid on Friday and to redo my budget taking into consideration the things I've already spent on for the month. Its times like this where it stresses me out being so organized with my finances/budget sometimes I wish I could just be like most other people and just spend when I want to spend, buy what I want to buy and not think/worry so much. But then I'd more then likely be in debt and worrying even more! So I'm going to stick to tracking all my money, where every cent goes, and trying to save as much as I can. I really hope I can go up from here and add a bunch of extra into savings finish off my large Ef and fund a weekend trip with DD in May! I hope everyones April is off to a better start money wise then mine!!