A Penny Saved

Well, as I thought, May was a rough month.  We had one really long trip of about 6 hours each way that we drove to a friends wedding.  At $3.49 a gallon, that eats into your gas budget a little.  Obviously, we were unable to avoid going over that part unless we just didn’t go and that really wasn’t an option.

A food intolerance issue changed our diet very suddenly and we found ourselves giving away about 60% of all the food in our house.  And when you give away 60% of your food, you need to replace some of it.  Grocery budget?  Through the roof.  Same with the eating out budget due to the trip to the wedding, my work related New Orleans trip, and Mothers Day.

We also spent way more on gifts in May than we had ever planned on.  Of course, we had forgotten that May was graduation month.  My little brother, a friend, and several relatives graduated.  We also had one wedding that we attended and one we were unable to that we got gifts for.

Towards the end of the month, we ended up pulling some of the money from our emergency savings to cover our account rather than getting overdraft fees.  In the end, we came within$40 of going over our total budget number.  We didn’t, but that’s closer than we have on any other month.  Normally, we’re $2-300 under.

On the bright side, June could be shaping up to be a great month.  Only one short trip so far, one birthday, and not much else.  Plus, there could be a couple of bonus incomes that will happen this month that don’t normally.  If so, we’ll try and use those to get further ahead of our selves and back on track after May.

Want to start your own Total Money Makeover?  Buy the book at Amazon!

Technorati Tags: total money makeover, may, june, budget, monthly budget