Checking In

Hello, gentle readers:

Yep, still poor. In fact, we may be more poor than before. I'm just going to go ahead and take responsibility for that. I kept on telling (still-out-of-work) Husband that our financial position isn't great. Usually this "telling" came in the form of teary fights. But because he wasn't balancing the checkbook, he didn't realize what this meant. So one day, I gave him the check register and back statements. Things may have gotten worse once I did this. I use a credit card for day-to-day purchases (groceries, gas). I do this because I've paid it off every month (yes, sometimes dipping into savings to do so) and the cash-back bonus funds a good portion of our Christmas gifts. However, because Husband didn't see those daily purchases coming out of the account, he disregarded the amount of them and we couldn't pay off the balance last month (without dipping into savings more significantly this time).

So, starting today:

1) We are a debit card/cash only family. (Except for our 5% off purchases with the Target card. We'll still use that.)

2) We are on a wallet diet. We talked about it this morning and agreed that we won't be buying anything this month except necessities. This means every meal will be based on something that is in the pantry/freezer until we have nothing in the pantry/freezer. (Of course, supplemental food will be purchased to make a meal out of the stash.) This also means that we will only purchase toiletries and cleaning supplies when we've run out. (And maybe not even then. For instance, I can live without paper towels but I'm not sure I can convince Husband to try it.)

3) Other little things: The heater is set at 66. I'm only taking the toll road to commute 5 times per week.

Today's spending so far: $-20.30 commute tolls + return of unused items for Halloween costume