Our Family's Finances - Weekly Wrap-Up

Expenses – Since I’ve been doing these weekly wrap-ups over the past four weeks, I realize that I really don’t spend very much money on a daily basis. Generally, I go food shopping to a few grocery stores each week and I might hit a thrift store or a couple of yard sales but that’s it. I don’t normally spring for extras during the week. My kids are signed up for many activities that are already paid for and we take advantage of free activities like the library and playgrounds. Other than that, I see why I am a good saver – I don’t spend much money. Pretty simple. Anyway, on to my expenses this week – I spent $25 at Giant, $33 at Safeway, and $10 at Costco for a grand total of $68 for food this week. My husband went out of town this week for work, so that probably accounts for why we didn’t need much – he is by far the biggest eater in this household. I’m sure my husband racked up many expenses on his boondoggle, I mean important business trip to Scottsdale and the added leg to visit his sister in California. But I am unaware of such expenses yet (and I probably won’t be privy to some of them ever).

Deals – Let me let you in on a little secret. If you ever want to get a deal on something, bring a couple of screaming kids with you to the market and let them handle the products. I usually like to shop by myself but since husband was out of town this week I had no choice. Anyway, I went to Giant and picked up some butter, which I thought was on sale for $1.99. I ran it through the self-checkout and it rang up at $4.47. It turns out it was a 3-day sale earlier this week, but the circular was unclear. Problem is, my 21-month old son opened the butter, pulled out a stick, unwrapped it and was holding the naked stick in his grubby, little hand. Oops. The guy helping at the self-checkout said, “I’ll just give that to you for the sale price.” “Thanks,” I replied. “I don’t think anyone else will want to buy this one.” Besides that screaming good deal (literally), I got several pounds of grapes for 99 cents and 12-packs of Thomas’ English muffins for $2. Other than those, I don’t remember any phenomenal deals. I didn’t study the circulars too well this week since I was flying solo.

Investments – I haven’t done a darn thing in this area. I know I still have $3000 I need to invest for the first quarter of this year. I am hoping to put in at least $2,000 of it by next week.

Income – I only sold a couple of things on eBay this week for a grand total of about $25 but my husband sold something for $40. I haven’t done much else in the area of income. I need to work on listing some more of my items. I have a couple up there now, but no bids yet.

Giving – It seems like the supermarkets have become the place for collecting for every cause lately. This week it was Knights of Columbus at Safeway. I put in my spare change, and that’s it. I also started a new bag of unwanted things to give away. As I find more stuff we don’t need, I add it to the bag.