The Bookkeeper

With our new lifestyle comes many changes with how we spend our money. When we began this adventure I became the full time manager of the house. That means I am in charge of everything from the cleaning to the bill paying to the day to day operations. Having said that, it does not mean that I do it all on my own (ask Trent, he helps out with the cleaning, cooking and best of all he folds all the clothes!). I recently took over the bill paying. Trent said it would be nice to have one less thing on his plate since he is juggling a job and his workouts. I agreed!

No, I do not have a finance degree, but I do have lots of common sense when it comes to money. When I took over the bill paying that meant I would have to use the online bill pay with our bank. Therefore, I would be looking at our accounts on a regular basis. I also began analyzing our credit card bills. It was very interesting to see where our money was being spent! The kindergarten teacher in me made a spreadsheet of our expenses (no I did not use Excel... I used a 1/4 of a poster board, a ruler and some bright colored markers)!

There were two areas on our credit card bills that I really disliked: groceries and diapers. We were spending WAY too much on groceries. This is a hard one because we try to eat extremely healthy. It's also important for Trent to get the proper nutrients with all of his training. I began to look at our receipts. We were splurging on things that were not always necessary. I began looking up recipes and making our own almond butter, peanut butter, granola and bread (I already make all of Jonah's food which has saved us tons). We also joined a vegetable co-op. Having done some of these small measures we are able to save $30-40 a week on our groceries!

The other expense I mentioned was diapers. I was ordering diapers online twice a month. Each time it would cost approximately $50. That was $100 or more a month on diapers.... you know the things babies pee and poop in and then they end up in the trash. Each diaper costs around 20 cents each, sometimes they can cost 27 cents each! Trent and I humbled ourselves and invested in cloth diapers (gasp!).

This blog is not intended to be used to tell you how to save money or spend money, but rather share with you about our journey in this new lifestyle. As I've mentioned before money is not our number one concern but it does impact our day to day life. We are trying to be creative with our expenses, and who knew it could actually be fun!