I used to post my monthly budget here couple of years or so ago and I think it helped me a lot staying on course.

I will have a very tight budget this month. i find that if I start the year tight it does a lot for achieving the budget for the rest of the year. I find it very hard to pull back once we have already over spend. Some thing always comes up.

This month the key to achieving our $21K challenge/ spending plan for the year. This is the month our car and home and content insurance is due, so if we can keep this month (and maybe the next couple of months)as low as possible then we can breath a bit easier for the rest of the year. A little bit of sacrifice now for a better year.

This is what our budget for this month:

Grocery - $150.00
Utilities - $90.00
Home Phone - $25.00
Mobiles - $30.00
Internet - $45.00
Fuel & Fare - $170.00
Car Insurance - $477.95*
Home & Content - $566.55*
Health Insurance - $230.00
Entertainment - $80.00
Gifts - $40.00
Per/Med - $30.00
DH Allowance - $100.00
My Allowance - $75.00
Misc Items - $20.00

TOTAL = $2,129.50

(* Actual Amount Due - Annual bill)

Grocery and Entertainment are extra tight this month. So does income so it needs to be done.

In saying that we do have some fun things that we have already organise this month. We will be going to a cricket match this weekend. It will not cost us much, the tickets was what I gave DH for christmas. Will take some snacks with us so we won't be tempted to spend on those. Also we might use another 1 of our restaurant voucher to go out for dinner before the game or we might just eat at home first before going and use the restaurant voucher some other time. We still got 3 vouchers left and they are due in March, so we will need to use them up soon. One a month I reckon.