April Goals Progress
This month isn’t going quite as planned. I made 3 goals for myself and it looks like I’ll not meet any of them.
Goal #1 – Not exceed $150 eating out
Current Progress: $163.73
Comments: No more eating out this month! I should be able to make this happen as long as I keep cooking dinner at home. I have an interview next Friday and will need to plan ahead to take a lunch so that I don’t rationalize eating out again.
Goal #2 – Deposit $840 into savings
Current Progress: $480
Comments: That covered 3 weeks of back pay and a week of current pay for house cleaning. However, I will not be getting any more because I finally had to cut something out of my schedule and unfortunately the cleaning had to go. This means I’ll be short on savings for the house, but I’m just so strapped for time as the semester ends and house buying and the wedding approaches.
Goal #3 – Reduce transportation costs
* Current Progress: $239.09
* Comments; A lot of things have come up this month that I didn’t expect and are not normally part of my transportation budget. I realize I need to separate gas from other transportation/vehicle costs. First, I spent $10 on airport parking when dropping my daughter off at the airport. Second, my car threw a tensioner and that resulted in a tow ($57 paid from partner’s cash), repairs ($175.40), and gas in the partner’s car that was on empty when I needed to borrow it for a few hours ($20.04). I’ve only spent $33.65 in gas and will need to fill up one more time ($40 at current prices) — this is within my expected budget/cost at least.
Overall, I’m disappointed that I have not worked harder to keep within my dining out budget. I’ve really gotten carried away in that department the past few months and have been rationalizing eating out too often. I currently only have $60 left in this month’s budget and am not sure how it’ll work out. I should go buy some groceries but I don’t think the budget will allow for that and the gas I need to buy tomorrow.
Also, I feel bad because I said I’d sign the daughter up for soccer this spring, but it is starting to feel like that $140 will be hard to pull. Especially since I’ve been averaging about $100 a month on her for the past few months. Oh well, we’ll have to wait and see. The first session was cancelled and the second one, today, she’ll miss because of the field trip ($33) at school.