on a budget

Every week I look in the flyers, make a meal plan and a shopping list.  i even clip coupons when I can.  I do I quick guess of how much each item will cost, or how much I'm willing to spend on certain items, like meat.  I leave a little bunker room just in case I end up going over on something.

I usually take my kids with me (which can be it's own adventure!)  I avoid certain isles if I can, or pull the cart just inside the isle and then run up to get what I need.  I can bank on my kids asking "mommy, can we get this?"  Sometimes it's junk like cookies or ice cream.  Sometimes it's healthy stuff, like hummus or fruit.  Regardless of what it is, I will say either "that's not in the budget" or "Let me see if there is room in the budget for that".

Pumpkin, my 5 year old, asks "what's a budget?".  I tell her that we work to ear money and that money pays for things like electricity and oil and water and our house and food - so we need to make sure that money in is more than money out and we can't spend more than we make.  I allot a certain amount of money each week for food and I need to stick to that amount, so I make a list and price things out to make sure.

Then I pull out the cash and explain that this is money and once it's gone it's gone, so I need to spend it carefully and that's why I sometimes have room for extra things, and sometimes not.

We were looking at BBQ's (we will be buying one this summer) and Pumpkin was asking why we couldn't just buy it now.  I said that for bigger items or items that cost more money, we need to save up.  So we have to exercise patience.  If we don't have the money for it at the time, then we won't buy it (unless it was an emergency - like when our washing machine broke.)

I hope that by teaching her about money smarts she will avoid some mistakes that I made because no one taught me how to manage my money.