Yesterday I got in the mood for making lists. Everything from what needed to be done for Youth, to thank you notes I needed to write to Christmas presents I needed to buy/make.
Then came evening and time to sit down and do the finances with the hubs (we are now finally learning to allocate every dollar BEFORE we get paid, so we don’t spend it the minute it hits the bank). All our monthly expenses look good and then I pulled out my list. Once the list was complete and money allocated to my listed items–Robert says, “Well we did have money till you made a list.” Sorry sweetie.
I was catching up on some blog reading this evening (thank you Google Reader) and was reading the Simple Mom’s Plan for a peaceful Christmas. I will say I wish we saved all year round for Christmas–maybe that’s something we can start with the new year, but for this year we just gotta roll with it.
What about you? What do you do? Do you save all year? How about budget’s? Have any tips? Hubs took me to see Dave Ramsey Live for my birthday. I’ve been trying to get us on the Dave plan for quite some time and we were to some extent, but not all the way. Now thanks to that day together–we’re both on board and have finally put into place a zero budget. Just the word “zero” freaks Robert out, but so far it’s really working for us! (Can you tell that’s Dave in the picture?)
All this rambling to say, I think you should check out this post by the Simple Mom. And I’d love to hear any budgeting tips you have in place!
And Christmas shopping…have you started yet? Do you hit the malls, online, handmade (by others or you)? What’s your goal for this year?
On that note I did do some slashing to little etsy yesterday. Marked down some prices, marked down shipping and even added international shipping! Now that’s exciting!
Looking forward to hearing all of your ramblings—now that I’ve shared mine. Now…off to the sewing machine.