Living on less

A few blog posts ago, I wrote about our new budget. I wanted to give a little update. 

We are just about to start our third month on a full budget. We have learned a whole lot these last couple of months. The first thing is that restricting ourselves financially is not that bad. Actually it has freed us to do more things. We plan ahead to make sure we budget fun things. For example...a trip to the zoo, the purchase of an amazing $100 used sectional couch for our basement, the purchase of sporadic rewards for the kids when they obey mommy. We have also paid off all our medical bills and one other large debt. We are about 2 months away from paying off the van then we'll start on our last debt (other than the house)...the truck. It's a wonderful feeling!

The main area of our budget cut is in groceries/tolietries. Our goal is $400 a month. The 1st month I used a little of my personal spending money for groceries at the end of the month. So we spent $440. The 2nd month callie's birthday party and trying to buy organic messed me up. I spent $480. This month I'm going to get back on track. It's possible to stay in the $400 budget, I just have to stay focused and plan well.

Ways we save money...

We don't buy paper products. No paper towels, plates, napkins or plastic silverware to use at home. We use huck towels for paper towels and kitchen cloths. I love them!

We have one child in diapers. We don't use cloth diapers because it wouldn't work well in this particular situation but I do use cloth wipes at home. I cut an old t-shirt in squares for the wipes.  I make a solution of baby wash, baby oil and water to moisten them. I put a days worth of wipes in a air tight container along with a little of the solution.  I do buy a small container of disposable wipes for outings.

I make a meal plan for the whole month. This saves money because you can buy in bulk.

I stock up on organic flour at our local organic store to make bread and snacks.  The kids love homemade pita bread for their sandwiches and a new favorite is homemade saltines. I'm going to try adding cheese to the saltines to make cheese crackers.