I’ve been thinking a lot about our finances lately. I talked about my house being on the market and how it was definitely a financial stressor, but I actually kind of love that we are going through this time. Sure, it would be nice to be putting extra money away in savings, but I love what this time period is showing us.
First of all, we aren’t poor. Not even close. Candied Jansen is the master budget manipulator. Honestly…better than anyone I’ve ever seen. She has categories set up and money being put aside for vacations, clothing, graduations, birthdays, and every conceivable possibility that could present itself. When we need to cut the budget, there are always areas we can cut from. We were talking about which categories to cut money from because of a decision to hold off selling some stock that she had expected to add to the budget this month. One of the areas we decided we could cut a little money from is the grocery budget. We buy groceries. Usually lots of them. She is a big meat eater so we have a FULLY stocked freezer of meat. We can actually cut the grocery budget some because we honestly have enough meat to last for quite a while! We just have to be good and pass on the awesome meat sales that might come up between now and when we decide we need to buy meat again. I LOVE the idea of challenging ourselves to not buy meat for a while.
And while I love that we are going through the areas we can cut some of the budget on, I also LOVE that season tickets to the Texan games are on her budget and aren’t something that she has even considered cutting. She’s had the tickets since 2002…the Texans’ first season and they are important to her.
I LOVE that she has a category for eating out on the budget every month. We don’t always use it all so it gets put back into the general fund and rebudgeted (which spell check tells me isn’t a real word) at the end of each month, but I appreciate the option.
I LOVE that she has a plan for wedding money, and Cancun money, and trips to Ohio in 2017 if we decide we still want to do that. I love that we can find money in some of these areas if necessary.
I LOVE that we know that when the house does eventually sell, we have a full house payment plus utilities that we can save each month if we want to keep living the way we live now for a bit.
And most of all, I LOVE that Candied Jansen loves to play with the budget. She gets giddy when she has to make changes and work it all out. I LOVE how she has it all in a spreadsheet that is color coordinated to the point that I can barely understand it and printed in such tiny print that I can’t actually read it anyway without putting on my glasses AND squinting.
I know 2016 is going to be an awesome year for our budget!
Midlife Natalie 