August 2007 Budget Update

Well, just five days into this months budget and I'm facing some serious problems.

1. Only $125 left from the grocery category. This might be a problem. My current groceries will probably last for two weeks, but it will be tough to get through the rest of the month on only $125. I usually plan on $90 per week, but spent a lot this week. First, I spent a lot on actual groceries since I hadn't been grocery shopping in nearly 3 weeks. And then a large amount was spent on vacation food.

2. Only $20 left from the vacation category. This will be a problem because we have the following vacation activities planned this month:
- visiting my sister in Maine for 3 days and planning to take the kids to Story Land for one of the days
- going on a 2 day camping trip ($35 fee for the site, shouldn't cost too much more, hopefully)
- neighborhood block party, we need to plan a game which shouldn't cost much or anything, and will need to bring food, which could be fairly inexpensive (and the food could come out of the grocery category, although that category also has very little left)
- neighborhood yard sale, may need to chip in for a permit and an ad in the paper (this probably doesn't fall into the vacation category and may be taken from the misc. category).

It certainly has been eye-opening tracking every daily expense and purchase. I guess it is good to be aware of the problem areas while there is still time to do some readjusting rather than waiting until the month is over and seeing that we were way off target.

Does anyone else find it helpful to track your daily spending?