Budgeting… blah… that’s what most people say right?

Me… I’m like… budgeting… yay!

Guess I’m a little odd that way.

So if you’re like me, or curious about people like me – read on. There might just be a few things for you in this post. If not, no hard feelings – I’ll catch you next post!

Now… budgeting… yay!

Sorry – can’t help it 🙂

In my efforts to get back to “normal”, I went through the budget after all the changes of the last few months – Josh’s salary, selling 2 houses in a buyer’s market (one being a rental house that provided income but needed alot of upcoming work), and buying one house in a seller’s market.

It looks pretty good. We have a few budget to-dos (some bigger than others) that we’ll need to follow through with in the coming months, but overall we should be just fine!

If we stick to a budget, that is. Same as always – the budget is what’s kept us on track financially and helped us get where we’re going.

That, and LOTS of learning about how to stay in the budget.

Lots of new habits 🙂

But we’ve been doing them for so long, they are second nature now. And I’m excited to get back to it.

I’ve only had about a month here, and it’s been a doozy of a month for the most part, so I’m only just beginning to find my tried and true stores and adjust to new stores in my new city.

The other day I did a bit of shopping and as I looked at the totals on the receipts I realized just how good it felt to be back to budgeting. And to put back into practice all the things I’ve learned through the years to help me stay in the budget.

Take at look at just 3 receipts and see what a difference some resourceful budget-keeping can make…

1. Spur of the moment trip to Shoppers because it was across the street from the library and I just needed a couple of things. I remembered ice cream and pizza were on sale from looking at the flyers last night, so I knew I could save at least a few bucks. These weren’t even amazing deals (except for the ice cream), and I forgot my Optimum Card, but I still saved $16.00. Just from looking at the flyer for about a minute tops. AND I gave a$1 donation (if the cashier asks I try to give – I always write Caleb’s name if they have a special something to write on that will get displayed in the store – today it was a leaf 🙂 ) AND I had to buy a plastic bag for 5 cents because I didn’t come prepared! Even after all that, money was still saved.

2. Only needed Tostitos and chocolate milk at Food Basics (yes, this is just something I buy for my youngest. He never asks for any special foods except chocolate milk… and lately a Burger’s Priest combo… can’t blame him – they really ARE amazing burgers and fries and I don’t even like burgers most of the time!). I always browse through the reduced sections at grocery stores – I never buy anything that looks weird – usually I get the stuff that is best before either that day or the next, and throw it in the freezer as soon as I get home, and cook it from frozen in the crockpot when we’re ready to eat it) No harm done. Food Basics had some great deals on chicken thighs and drumsticks, so I snapped those up 🙂 And the Tostitos we needed for dinner that night were on sale too – score! Saved about $12.75 on this 5-minute trip to Food Basics.

3. With the crazy heatwave the last few days, and insane decluttering the last few months, I was down at least a few t-shirts and needed to replenish my supply so I could make it from one laundry day to the next! And I do laundry twice a week! Yep, it was a DIRE situation since most of the t-shirts I did hang on to had gotten pretty trashed in all the work I’d been doing with packing up our old house and renovating right away in the new house. Ah well, one thing I seem to enjoy high turnover rates for is my wardrobe – I’d much rather have less clothes that I like and wear very often, then replenish when their time is done, than too many clothes that I don’t really like and never wear. There’s many reasons why I shop thrift, but basically I love the selection, I love the prices, and I love that it helps even just a little around the globe. And I clean whatever I bring home pretty immediately. My guys don’t share my love of all things thrift, but they do enjoy a good bargain, whether it’s new or used doesn’t matter much to them. And I do buy new things sometimes – SOMETIMES 🙂 On this day, I had a $2 coupon from Value Village, and I also joined their Super Savers club (so easy, just went online, and now you don’t even need your card when you go to the store, just your phone #) which gives a discount, and I tried my best to just stick to getting a few t-shirts. I managed to find 3 that fit well enough, plus a PJ shirt (it was mixed in with the t-shirts – what could I possibly have done ? 🙂 ), plus a red Canada shirt with moose on it for Josh (again, mixed in with the women’s t-shirts, and just to clarify it’s definitely a man’s shirt 🙂 ). Saved $4 off the already low prices – these clothes new would have been at least $80, and that’s leaning on the conservative side. So I could go so far as to say I really saved $62 with a half hour of shopping thrift (not to mention the savings of time and gas required to get the variety of clothes I bought all at the same place).

Grand total of about $33 saved at the 3 quick stops (or about $90 if you count the full thrift savings) 🙂

So this is a great start as I get back to budgeting… yay!

Sorry 😉