Oh, crap. I need to budget.

So we (my husband and I) decided about a year ago after having my son, Wesley, that I should quit my secure full-time job to pursue real estate full time and stay at home with our son instead of putting him into daycare.  The cost savings on daycare has definitely been worth it so far, but dropping a full time income SUCKED.  It’s pretty difficult to watch our son FULL TIME and pursue a career full time.  I’m realizing now that my job is pretty much being a stay at home mom.

I remember when we first thought of the idea of me staying at home while I was pregnant.  I thought I’d be SO bored and not having ANYTHING to do.  How naive was I?!? HA!  I don’t have time to even shower without my son in the shower with me.  Staying at home with him IS A FULL TIME JOB!  A job I wouldn’t give up for anything, but seriously, my time is still just as limited as when I was working 40-50 hours at my old full-time gig (without the pay).  So now, while my husband makes really good money, we are basically a one income family.  I still do real estate and have a few listings, but seriously, real estate isn’t stable income.  I could have months where I make nothing and others where I make $10,000.  Budgeting (ugh, a word I’ve ALWAYS hated) around those hills and valleys is SUPER FUN. Unpredictable income is always a blast.  So I haven’t really been budgeting.  Like, at all.  I have probably 5 budget apps downloaded on my phone, that would be collecting dust if they were material items.  But I have finally decided to commit to budgeting and cutting back on things we don’t need (because I spend a lot on stuff we don’t need.  Like, I don’t NEED another pair of shoes, I just WANT them.)  So this will be my little budget diary of things I’ll be doing, and to hold myself accountable.

I just want to say I’ve gone 23 days Starbucks free.  That in itself is a beast I didn’t think I’d be able to tackle, but I had to justify spending $99 on a new coffee maker because our old one bit the dust.  So really I haven’t SAVED anything.  It probably equals out to be the same.  But yesterday I cancelled all my app subscriptions, called Sirius XM and cancelled it because I never listen to it (which, holy moly ,they try SO HARD to not get you to cancel, I said JUST CANCEL IT probably 50 times on the phone) and a kindle unlimited subscription I forgot I even had (I use Hoopla and Overdrive apps for FREE ebooks and audiobooks from our library).  I saved $71.00 a month just by doing that!  I cut back on how much we were contributing to our son’s college fund because we were putting a LOT in there (still contributing, this kid will NOT have student loans like we do!).  That saved $150.00 a month.  So in about an hour, I’ve saved us $221.00 a month so far.  Not too shabby.  I went yesterday without spending a dime.   I’d like to try a no spend week, but I don’t know how that will go.  I’ll try it next week, this week is shot already.