Are You a Weekly or Monthly Budgeter?

Howdy friend-os!  It's been awhile!  I hope you're all doing well, saving your money and enjoying a Lean with Green life, even if I'm not here to keep you company as often as I used to be.  Sorry about that.

As I was tracking my weekly spending habits over on Mint.com (you should sign up for it - it might change your life), I noticed I had nearly blown through my shopping budget not even halfway through the month.  "It's okay", I rationalized to myself.  "I won't shop for the rest of the month, plus I got those shirts on sale and I needed them."  Hmm.  Okay.  Need might be the operative word there.  True, most of my shirts are either old maternity shirts (totally cute when you're NOT pregnant anymore) or don't fit quite the way they used to (oh, the joys of body after baby).  I digress.  But what troubled me was I started telling myself it was okay to spend everything I allocated within the first 10 days of the month...what happens if there's a better sale at the end of the month?  Will I justify it then and completely go above and beyond my budget?

Usually, a monthly budget works fine for me, particularly on things like dinners out (delivery or take out these days) or grocery shopping.  I have a weekly "target" if you will ($75 on groceries, for example) - if I spend over that one week, I'll scale back on groceries the next.

So, dear readers, I ask you - how do you budget?  Do you set a weekly budget to keep a tighter grip on your money or are you more comfortable with a monthly budget for some wiggle room week to week? 


Psst - if you're missing BudgetBabe in your life, check me out as Mama Mahvelous on my mom/life blog.  I like it.  You might, too.

Reader Praise!

I wanted to give a special shout-out to one of our best readers: Newlywed Next Door! First off, she is a regular commentor, she has written a guest post, and she has definitely increased our readers by featuring us on her blog! Thanks!


I wanted people to know that she just finished a year of tracking and budgeting all on her own! She details her experience here, but I wanted to say CONGRATULATIONS! It takes a lot of hard work, patience and dedication to hawkishly track your budget for 12 months!


I wanted to see if any of our other followers had a financial success story they would like to be featured on Lean with Green! What made you realize you needed a change? What was the milestone you reached? Share in the comments or write us a note at leanwithgreen@gmail.com and if you'd like, we'll make you your own entry deserving of your success!

Beauty on a Budget

For years I spent a lot of money on buying high end make-up and then equally high-end cleansers to remove said make-up Years and years went by and I never did actually achieve clear skin. I didn't have like full-blown acne, but I always had one blemish, or my skin was too dry or too oily.

A few months ago I realized that the challenge was I wasn't removing a lot of my make-up. Sure the eye make-up came off okay, but my foundation, powder and concealer was hanging on, no matter how many times I washed or what products I used. This of course lead to a cycle of buying ridiculous amounts of make-up removing wipes and facials. Which was a hard hit to my budget.

Then something possessed me to try cold cream (I use Ponds). Yes, I used a product with mineral oil as the number one ingredient and smeared it all over my face. I was sure I had gone mad and that I was sure to have even oilier skin followed by crazy breakouts. But you know what, nothing bad happened, so I kept using it. Then pretty soon I noticed my skin was getting more even with less blemishes. AND I was getting the make-up all off of. My skin was soft, clean and balanced, not dry, not oily. After months of use I can easily say this is the best beauty product I've ever used. And my skin has never looked better. The best part? It's about $3 for a jar that lasts about a month and a half.

The key to the cold cream is to use it properly. Use it liberally and massage all over your face to loosen dirt and make-up. Then use a damp washcloth to wipe it all off. Your skin will feel soft, but not oily. If it feels oily, you need to keep wiping. The whole process takes about 1 minute. And you don't need to follow-up with a moisturizer.

I'll admit that it felt sooo weird to not lather up, but the results have been amazing. As a result I've cut my beauty budget by at least $30 a month for the expensive cleansers, clarifying masks and moisturizes. I do still use a basic cleanser in the morning followed by a lotion with SPF.

Ladies, you must try this miracle product!

Discussion - How Do You Manage Your Finances?

I loved this post by J. Money at Budgets are Sexy so much that I decided I wanted to hear from you guys about how you make your finances work. Here are 6 questions and I'd really love to hear from you!



1) How do you spend: cash, debit, or credit?


I am all about using credit cards RESPONSIBLY. This means paying off in full every month, and deciding what credit card suits your needs and lifestyle. I think credit cards are convenient, they help me track my finances better AND you get cash back or other rewards. Nice!



2) Do you bank online? Do you use a financial aggregator (Mint, Wesabe, etc)?


I am completely paperless when it comes to banking. I pay bills online with Chase, although I'm thinking about moving my money. I also have accounts set up with USAA (love them!). And you've definitely heard me rave about how much I heart Mint. It's so easy to track your spending and also figure out if there are better options for your banking needs.



3) What recurring bills do you set on autopay?


I only have my car payment, cell phone bill, and cable bill on autopay. Everything else fluctuates a little too much for me to have it on autopay and I think it keeps me more on top of my budget when I look at my bills every month. (Another plug for Mint - it reminds you of due dates!)



4) How are your finances automated?

The only automated part of my finances is funding my 403b. Other than that, I move money from one account to another as it's needed. I'm trying to keep just what we need with a tiny cushion in checking while putting the rest (and promising not to touch it) in savings.



5) Do you use checks? If so, how often?

Our joint checkbook is so old, it has our previous address on it...and we moved almost 4 years ago! My personal checkbook has my COLLEGE address on it. Wow. Needless to say, I'm not a big check person. Just rent. And scratch paper.



6) Where do you keep your short-term savings?

I keep short-term savings in a savings account; however, I am thinking about switching to a no-penalty CD, which have higher interest rates than most savings accounts.

There! As I mentioned, I would love to hear how you all keep it together - respond in the comments with your 6 answers!

No-Spend January

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and it was filled with the 3 Fs: family, friends and freaking good food!


So what about going a month without spending money? What?! A month without spending? Well, I'm definitely toying around with the idea. I L.O.V.E the holidays but come the second week of January and the excitement has worn off, I usually feel a little sheepish about how much I spent. So - a detox, of sorts.

This was the post by Sox in Budgets are Sexy that inspired me. Now Sox is pretty intense, and I don't know if I can quite do what he did, but I'm determined to reign in my spending and hopefully learn a few things, too.

Here's my proposal:

*No spending money on clothes, shoes or other accessories. Period. The holidays will have just happened, and while there will be killer sales, I can suck it up for a month. It's a high probability that I will get at least one clothing item for Christmas, and really, I have plenty of things to wear.

*No spending money on going out for meals or drinks. This does not mean that I can't eat out in restaurants; this just means I cannot pay for a meal in a restaurant. If my husband and I go out for dinner, no joint account money (thanks babe!). Do I have any friends that would like to take me out to lunch or dinner in January? :)

*No other incidental purchases, like coffee, nail polish, candy bars, etc.

*I WILL spend money on things that need to get paid - rent, groceries (I may have to look at upping my budget to account for how much more I'll be eating in), bills, and gas. Obviously, if an emergency expense comes up, I will have to pay for that as well. But we're not talking an I-was-hungry-and-so-I-got-Thai-takeout emergency; this will have to be something that will significantly impact my day-to-day routine (sickness, car emergency, etc).

What are my strategies?

- Be much better about packing my lunch. The expense of lunches out has started creeping up on me again. Stay tuned for another lunch post on how to actually eat and like what you pack for lunch...

-Preparing. I'll be getting work on my car done in December and going to the dentist/doctor to not have any co-pays or other forseen medical expenses taken care of.

- Host people at my house for dinner/drinks instead of going out.

- Getting tips/support from you all! :)

I'll be tracking my progress on the blog so you can hear about my triumphs and struggles. Anyone else want to have a No-Spend January with me?

The Envelope System

One of our favorite readers Dave mentioned in on of our earlier posts about using the envelope system for budgeting. Essentially you take out cash (yes I know this is foreign concept) and divide it up into various categories. I decided to try this out this month and so far it's worked very well. We set up a detailed budget with all of our bills and expenses included. We keep the money for our bills in our account and pay those electronically and we do gas on our cards as well. Here are our cash envelope categories:

• Free money for myself and husband
• Eating out
• Groceries
• Entertainment
• Pets
• Car insurance (we pay bi-yearly)
• Health and Beauty
• Misc.

So far it's been working out very well. It definitely helps us realize how much we mindlessly spend and think about our purchases more. For instance I'm much less tempted to spend my free money on lunches out when I could instead buy clothes.

Also by taking the cash out ahead of time you don't risk over spending and then not having money in the account when the bills start to roll in.

I'm not gonna lie. It's a bit depressing when you realize how easy it is to go through these envelopes so quickly. We've spend 75% of our entertainment budget and it's only the 6th of the month. I guess we'll be learning to find some even cheaper activities.

All in all its a learning process, but I do enjoy knowing exactly how much I have to spend and feeling confident that we have enough money to pay all of our bills and put a lot into savings.

Anyone use the envelope system and have any tips?

Budgeting - Not a Dirty Word

Hi everyone,

Obviously, the current economic situation has made us all pause for the cause and re-evaluate if we are spending our money wisely. Maybe not even that, but how many of you have ever looked at your W-2 at the end of the year and asked "Where did all of my money go?". The solution: set up a budget. Now, I think what that initially says to people is CUT BACK. But the word "budget" is actually defined as an itemized allotment of funds for a given period. There, that's not so bad, is it? Basically, having an idea in your head about how much you want to spend is essential to keeping all of your financial ducks in a row.

Some advice I've heard is to keep ALL of your receipts for a month - even if it's a quick coffee run or an unexpected car maintenance bill, keep it all. Then, you can see your spending patterns for a considerable amount of time. This seemed like a little bit of a hassle to me. I didn't want to be that person with a huge stack of strips of paper in my purse. Like there's even room in there anyway. Plus, it's not exactly the most eco-friendly solution to opt to get receipts if you don't have to. Enter my favorite tool in my budgeting bag o' tricks: mint.com.

Mint is a FREE (always a good price, but especially in a recession) expense tracking website. You can input your bank accounts, credit cards, auto and personal loans, and retirement accounts and monitor them at the same time. Then it automatically categorizes items that you're spending money on as "food" or "entertainment" or "gas". At the end of every week, it emails you a report of income, expenses, and upcoming bill due dates. Normally, you'd have to pay someone to do that. On top of all of that, it even searches for deals for you when it comes to interest rates on other credit cards, or banks offering better rates on car loans. AMAZING and way easier than doing all that work yourself with hundreds of receipts. Don't worry - Mint is not a sponsor. I've been using it for 2 years and it has revolutionized the way I look at my spending. I have since realized I spent way too much on coffee per month (uh huh - it definitely adds up), and not enough on saving for emergencies.

Budgeting - not a dirty word. Instead, it's the first step in a long and happy relationship with your money.