Day 19

A talent of yours:

I'm not sure if this is really considered a talent, but I'd say something I'm really good at is managing money. I love to budget! It's weird, but it's like a game to me. I like to set an amount of money I'm going to spend every month in multiple areas such as groceries, misc., Joshua, and fuel, and then see how far I can stretch it. At the beginning of this year Beau and I switched over to the cash only system just to try it out. We've always been really good at being conservative with our spending and making sure to save some each month, but I wanted to see if we could set an amount for everything in our lives and not go over by even a penny, and also see if there were any areas we could save more in. So at the beginning of the month I would fill my little envelopes with the designated amount of money and keep them in my wallet. Then when I went to the grocery store I'd pull out the envelope and see how much I could spend that trip and that's all I'd spend. Sometimes I'd have to get creative on meals those last couple days of the month and other months we'd have extra. But we never went over, assuring that we had a certain amount to put into our savings account each month no matter what. It was the coolest thing and the best thing that we could ever have done! Literally watching the dollar bills leave your wallet does something to you that doesn't happen when you just had over the card and swipe. It makes you think twice about every penny you spend! We did that for six months and it completely changed the way I view spending money. I've become an even bigger tight-wad.
That was fun to me! And I got seriously good at it...so I'd say budgeting is a talent of mine.