The month of May carried its share of strengths and weaknesses for our finances.
On the plus side, I saved a TON of money using coupons this month. In fact, I saved a grand total of $297.97!
And we had some extra money come to us: we got our economic stimulus check and my husband’s contract got settled, so he got a nice back pay check and a slight pay raise.
But we spent quite a bit more than we usually do. We bought a laptop and printer for me, a gas grill (which has been on our wish list for YEARS), and another flu bug cycled through our house, which meant a total of FIVE visits to the clinic and FOUR prescriptions. And the sickness is not done yet!
While our extra purchases messed up our May budget, we still did not mess up our overall spending plan. We budgeted for and planned for each of these expenses. We researched and talked about what we wanted. We made sure that we had the money to pay for these items in cash.
It was fun spending some of our money. But it’s fun saving it, too. We realize how long it takes to save money and how quickly it disappears. We’ll be back to our normal spending in June. No more big expenditures for awhile.
As for the pay raise, we are putting half of it into our “Buy a Car With Cash Fund” and the other half will help us cover our increased expenses (primarily gas and groceries). We channeled the money into our appropriate accounts right away so that we wouldn’t get used to bigger pay checks. It will be nice to watch our savings grow a little bit more.
How was your month? Was your spending on track or out of whack? What’s your plan for June?
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