The WHOLE SHABANG!!

 There are MANY different ways to build a budget.  I have shown already my 3 basic categories!
Bills 
Food
Other

Now we have a few steps we should take.
Something to remember: a BUDGET is a living breathing document.  It changes more then anything else out there.  It is necessary to work on it, and there is no such thing as a perfect budget, because it CHANGES!
 
1: Get rid of the Credit!!!
When working on a budget you need to take a Leap of Faith.
-Hebrews 11: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

I will discuss a few things in the future about His money Her money, but NOT today!! So stay tuned.  The readers digest version I DO NOT believe in separate money.

With this leap of faith, it is time to cut up all the cards. EVERY ONE OF THEM, even if it saves you 2%.  YOU NEED THEM GONE!!!

2. Have everything in ONE account.  It is really easy to lose things when there are many accounts you need one.

3.  Now you need to decide a time frame.  There are a few options

   a. Monthly

   b: 1st and 15th

   c: weekly

   d: biweekly

   e: MIS.

This is how you will break down your budget.  For my family for all of 2012 and prior I did it monthly.  While working on our budget for 2013 we decided to mix it up.  We have changed our budget to biweekly.  My husband and I get paid every other week, so we used that as our framework.  The once a month budget wasn't working so we needed to change it.  

4. Decide what form you will use a spread sheet, a Google doc, or a plain peace of paper.

5. Now the fun part :) Well if you are me.  

Start by working with your time frame.  If you choose 1 month, put all your bills and the dates they are due.  

I do mine biweekly (since my bills are due the same day every month, but my paychecks are not on the same days)

 This is MY budget for Aug 2013

We get paid on 8/2, 8/16, and 8/30 (a 3 check month!) 

Bills

Daycare (1)

HOA (1)               Check 1

Power (1)

Mortage (15)

Gas (23)

Cell Phone (23)

Insurance (24)         Check 2

Student Loan (25) 

Internet (26) 

Netflix (28)

Debt

I have 2 debts take those and split them in half.

Now that I know what bills go where this is what I do next.

 

	Check 1
	Income
Bills	Daycare
	HOA
	Power
Debt	Car
	Credit Card
Food	Food
	Dining Out
Other	Boys
	Church
	Clothes
	Dates
	Gifts
	House
	Personal
	Shady (dog)
	Spending
	Check 2
	Income
Bills	Mortage
	Gas
	Cell Phone
	Insurance
	Student Loan
	Internet
	Netflix
Debt	Car
	Credit Card
Food	Food
	Dining Out
Other	Boys
	Church
	Clothes
	Dates
	Gifts
	House
	Personal
	Shady (dog)
	Spending

Build this!! Now we need to put money into it.  

This is REALLY the hard part!

	Check 1	Money	Amount Left
	Income	2200
Bills	Daycare	600	1600
	HOA	110	1490
	Power	100	1390
Debt	Car	133	1257
	Credit Card	125	1132
Food	Food		1132
	Dining Out		1132
Other	Boys		1132
	Church		1132
	Clothes		1132
	Dates		1132
	Gifts		1132
	House		1132
	Personal		1132
	Shady (dog)		1132
	Spending		1132
	Check 2
	Income	2200
Bills	Mortgage	1200	1000
	Gas	100	900
	Cell Phone	25	875
	Insurance	120	755
	Student Loan	130	625
	Internet	100	525
	Netflix	9	516
Debt	Car	133	383
	Credit Card	125	258
Food	Food		258
	Dining Out		258
Other	Boys		258
	Church		258
	Clothes		258
	Dates		258
	Gifts		258
	House		258
	Personal		258
	Shady (dog)		258
	Spending		258

From here you can see we have quite a few blanks, ALONG with having an extra amount. 1132+258= $1390 to still work on. And this is the challenging part.  We have all the food and others to break down now.

This is when I recommend you pull out your previous bank statements and find out an average of what you spend, or just break it down.  Take what we have and use your best guess as to where to put it.  For ME I would take the 1,390 and divide it by 2.

Giving me $695 for 2 weeks.  Then time to break down.

Time to continue to think about this.... This is a LONG Enough post for one day.  We will meet back here tomorrow to finish building this budget!