January Expense Report

 

I don't really know how to go about this, but this is part of my yearly goals, so I just tracked everything I spent and shall move on from here.

Big expenses:

The largest chunk is savings, which is good. I need to bump this up a bit and I think I can do that because my credit card bill will not be an issue from here on out since whatever I charge will be categorized in other entries.  This credit card bill was mostly December expenses, including a lot of holiday presents and shipping.

Other big chunks are groceries and my beloved pets. January included food for both girls, lots of one-time, first of the year things like a license and dog park registration, and included a six-month supply of Hannah's flea, tick, and worm preventative, as well as her allergy medication. Hannah went to the groomer twice in January, which is a real luxury, but she needed it.

Breakdown: 

Bills - This includes our water/sewer (bimonthly), car and homeowner's insurance.  (5.5%)

Cars - Gas and an oil change.  (2.5%)

Charity - A couple of local fundraisers and my undergrad alma mater (4.2%)

Communication - Greeting cards and Zoom account (1.7%)

Credit card - Again, this paid off expenses from December, so it won't come up again.  (22.9%)

Eating out - I went to a local restaurant once for takeout when I was having a particularly bad day and the rest is just me stopping for coffee when I take Hannah to the dog park. (1.3%)

Entertainment - I bought a state park pass for our car. I refuse to feel terrible about this. I take the dog to state parks all the time and Dr. BB rides his bikes in the parks, so it's a one-time fee early in the year and we'll use it several times. (0.7%)

Fitness - This includes my yoga pass for unlimited class during the month and my local health care's system that allows me access to unlimited classes during the month, as well.  I consider this an investment in both my physical and mental health, so I will happily pay this every month. (2.5%)

Gifts - Part of the rules of our marriage is that I do all the gift and card procurement. I take this job seriously.  One of our nieces and two of our nephews had birthdays in January, along with my sister.  (4.4%)

Groceries - This is a little light because Dr. BB went one week instead of me because I was quarantined (no, I did not have Covid, but I had symptoms).  (16.7%)

Office supplies - We needed paper for our office printer.  (1%)

Personal care - In a normal year, I would go to my salon's end of year sale when everything is 25% off and buy everything I need for the coming year. I did not do that and I'm finding myself running out of all my face, hair, and nail products.  I imagine this category will be fairly sizeable in the next couple of months as I try to figure out what pandemic NGS needs. This is fine because I'm not getting my hair or nails done in a salon, so these are mostly to keep me from looking too haggard.  (2.5%)

Pets - Seriously, the dog costs a lot of money. (10.3%)

Savings - This is savings I do on top of whatever comes out of my paycheck for my retirement through the university. (23.7%)

I think it's worth pointing out that my husband pays the mortgage, car payment, and cell phone bills, so this is literally not a good portrait of what our actual total household budget looks like. It's also missing any health-related costs because I didn't have any in January, although that seems unusual.  My real goal is for me to really track my expenses and then he and I can figure out a way to try to and make it so that we're living on only one of our incomes and saving the rest. That is more of a 2022 goal, but I'm inching closer to it by just starting to track things.