Since I've been on bed rest I've been keeping better track of my expenses. Having twins isn't going to be cheap so I wanted to start seeing where we would be able to safe. I should have done this years ago...then maybe I could have saved myself a lot more money. As I look at what we've done this year in attempts to save, or things mother nature has done (The cool summer where we didn't have to run the air and this past weekend where the heat didn't run at all!!) I've noticed some great things about our expenses!
- In the first 5 months of the year we spent more on cable, phone, and internet than we did in the last 7 months. How? We switched providers and cut our cable. We don't use it much any way, and most shows we like to watch we can find on Hulu.com. Not only did we increase our savings on these amenities but we also increased our family time! What a wonderful thing to say! Not only that but my projections for what we are going to save next year by being with the current provider is we will be spending 46% LESS than what we would have with the other.
- These last two months are critical for our heat/air/gas bill (Consumers Energy). We normally see a great increase in the payment due around now. But this summer did save us. We turned our air on very rarely (and that wasn't easy with me being pregnant and warm most the time!). And in the first 2 months of fall we have had such great weather that our air can't run at it's current setting anyway! This is what I call a blessing!!!
It will be interesting to compare next years figures to this years. I hope to keep track of it like I have this year. It'll be much easier come tax time, since I plugged some of those numbers in as well...like how much we spent on medical! Whooooweeeeee, now there's a big number! Not to mention our home and upgrades and/or repairs that we spent this year! So glad we finally finished the basement!
Maybe next summer we can finally find money to take a family vacation!!! Maybe!
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