Earnings and Spending – February 2010
There is no getting around it. We spent more money in February than we made. OUCH. However, once you dig into a little bit, it’s not as bad as it first looks. It still stings, just not as bad.
In the month of February we made $5,400.83. However, we spent $6,349.72. To get right to the point, this means we are in the hole by $984.89 for the month of February.
Let’s take a look at the damage, shall we?
A few things to point out about the expenses…
CC stands for credit card. RSL-1 stands for Renee Student Loan 1. RSL-2 stands for Renee Student Loan 2 which is paid quarterly.
Living expenses include rent, utilities, cell phone and renters insurance.
First thing’s first, the biggest expense was to the Church. It was our tithing from December and January (plus a donation to Haiti) which is money we were holding in our tithing account. If you subtract that from the February spending total, it puts us back in the green. Not great news, but I think my hernia is gone.
The next thing you will notice is that our living expenses are less than $200.00. That’s because we paid most of our living expenses for February in January. Don’t worry, next month’s expenses will jump right back up.
The medical expenses are mostly for my medical drama in 2009. Don’t get me started again about medical costs . About $100.00 is for new medical and dietary adventures that we’ll get into later.
The fact that the gas and grocery bill for February is so high irks me, mostly because those are two of the expenses that we have the most day-to-day control of. In January we depleted our pantry of a lot of food, so that had to be restocked, and Steve had to buy groceries when he was in Miami for a week. We also had to start buying more expensive foods because of that dietary adventure I told you we’d get into later.
On the subject of gas and groceries, we use CC YELLOW to pay for our gas and groceries, and then we pay off that card each month, well most months. Starting in March the balance will be completely paid off, and we will continue to pay it off each month. Because of this, it looks like we are spending more money than we actually are. We track the gas and grocery purchases, and the CC YELLOW payments. I just realized this problem half way through February, and still haven’t come up with a solution. Well, I came up with the solution of simply not using CC YELLOW, but Steve shot that down. I really don’t have time to get into that now, but don’t you worry; it’s on my list of things to write about. The whole point of this was to say that the $600.00 we paid to CC YELLOW should be subtracted from the total expenses because it looks like we are paying for things twice. Does this make sense? I am so confused. All of this would be solved by not using CC YELLOW, but it would create new challenges.
This month we made about $300.00 outside of our normal income. We took that money and applied it directly to CC PURPLE. We paid the $300.00 plus the minimum payment of about $150.00. Take that CC PURPLE! That was one of our financial victories of the month. Now if we can keep snowballing that credit card, it will be paid off in no time.
What else is there to point out? Oh yeah, we hired someone to clean our house biweekly. At first it was hard for me to give into the idea of a “cleaning lady,” but after throwing myself on the couch on a regular basis because I couldn’t I keep up with Moanna, Steve, a demanding job, housework etc., I surrendered. It’s still hard for me to pay someone to do things that I can do for myself, but I feel no shame. My fits on the couch are for completely different reasons now.
The practice of tracking every penny and dollar we make and spend is still new. This adventure has been a real wake up call, and by tracking our spending throughout the month and studying our finances on a regular basis have more control over our money. We can see where it is going, and what we need to do to refocus and stay on track to accomplish our financial goals. February at first glance made me panic. Once I studied the spending, I realized that the overage was reasonable and anticipated.
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If you can afford a cleaning lady, go for it. There is absolutely no shame in that whatsoever.
You bet, Meredith. Let me tell ya young gals. Trying to be superwoman doesn’t earn ya Brownie points with anyone. Been there and didn’t do that…. Besides, if you work and can afford to pay someone to clean for you, you are helping another woman who’s trying to make a living. That’s a win-win!
I agree with both Meredith and Auntie Jill. There is no shame to it, thanks for the post.