Tag: budgeting

Meal Planning
Lifestyle

Meal Planning

rdominico1 Comment

Funday Monday

I’m linking up with Molly from StillBeingMolly.com and Carly from LipglossandCrayons.com for Funday Monday!

Since I’ve been married, I’ve developed a love for cooking. I love to try new recipes or to create my own dish with whatever’s on hand. I’ve spent hours on Pinterest looking for new meals and sweet treats to test on Josh, and I normally have good luck with them. I try very hard to stay away from box meals or frozen meals—though when I’m exhausted, I’m thankful I have them in the freezer or pantry. This love of cooking has helped me get into a weekly meal planning rhythm which really helps when it’s time to go grocery shopping.

Meal planning is a great way to help you stay on budget every month, if done correctly. Before you plan your meals for the week, you need to think about what you already have in your pantry, fridge and freezer, what’s on sale at the grocery store, and how much time you’ll have to cook during the week.

What do you already have?

I try to keep some staples in our house at all times.  I know that I use these items in lots of recipes and they can be used to make a quick meal when I just want something quick.

  • Various types of pasta
  • Pasta sauce
  • Ramen or Rice noodles
  • Rice
  • Salad dressing
  • Chicken broth
  • Garlic
  • Ground beef
  • Chicken breasts
  • Frozen stir fry vegetables
  • Frozen pizza dough (lots of grocery stores carry fresh pizza dough in the deli section, which can easily be frozen and thawed to use later.)
  • Eggs
  • Parmesan Cheese

You might also have leftovers from the previous week that you’d like to use up.

What’s on sale?

I always check our grocery store’s flyer which comes out every Thursday. It gives me an idea of what’s on sale that we might not normally buy—like Ahi tuna, salmon, pre-made kabobs—,what kinds of produce are on sale (because fresh produce is expensive), whether or not I can stock up on some of those staple items, and generally what’s going to be a good deal.

Note: I do not coupon—mainly because I haven’t had the time or patience to sit down and figure out how to coupon and partly because we didn’t have much room in our apartment kitchen for me to store many items we wouldn’t use right away. Now that we’re back within Harris Teeter realm, it’s possible that I might try to take advantage of their great coupon policy, but I’ll keep you updated.

How much time will you have to cook?

This is a huge factor in meal planning. Some of my favorite recipes are very time and labor intensive, so I know when we have lots on our plate for a particular evening, I’m better off cooking something easy and quick. Also, I know that on Wednesdays I tend to come home exhausted—it’s the middle of the week and I usually just need a break, so either Josh is in charge of dinner or we do something quick and easy. Then on the weekends, when I get home early from work or don’t have much to do in the evenings, I might make something that takes up a little more prep time and little more cook time.

Once you’ve figured out what you have, what’s on sale, and how much time you have to cook, you can commence with meal planning. I like to use a cute template like these two–Green one, Red and Blue one— to help me plan the meals and make my list.

I like this one because it has a grocery list attached
And this one is just so cute!

I normally plan to cook 3-5 times a week, depending on our schedule and how many leftovers I anticipate on having. If I’m cooking something like a big pasta dish, like Italian Drunken Noodles, we may have enough leftovers to take to lunch and have again for dinner; however, when I make fish tacos, I’m only going to buy enough fish for dinner and maybe a lunch leftover for Josh, because fish is expensive.

I normally budget for 2 nights of leftovers through the week, with a possible 3rd leftover night which can be substituted with Breakfast for Dinner if there are no more leftovers. I also budget for us to go out to eat one night a week or over the weekend, because sometimes it’s nice to not have to cook. I give myself some flexibility with when I make a particular dinner or when we go out to eat, because I don’t know how I’ll feel after work or what might come up. I just like to get a menu down on paper for grocery shopping and so I feel like I know what we’re doing every night.

I’m also conscious of what foods need to be used first, like seafood or certain produce, so that it’s the freshest it can be when I cook it.

I hope this helps you with your meal planning! I’ll be posting a grocery shopping guide to pair with this meal planning post, so be on the lookout for that!

–Mrs. Dominico

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10 Tips to Survive Your First Year of Marriage
Wedding and Marriage

10 Tips to Survive Your First Year of Marriage

rdominico5 Comments

When you’re getting married, everyone tells you the first year of marriage is the hardest. For Josh and I, our first year has included moving to Florida, living in Florida, starting 5 new jobs between the two of us, moving back to North Carolina, moving in with my parents, and hunting for our first home. Yeah, we’ve only been married 9 months and they’ve definitely been hard. So here are some tips for surviving your first year of marriage-

  1. Communication, communication, communication.

Do you see a pattern here? Making a marriage, or any relationship, work takes constant, honest communication. When you stop talking, you start fighting.

  1. Divide the chores and take turns.

Cooking, doing the dishes, taking out the garbage, cleaning the litter box, doing the laundry, folding the laundry, vacuuming, dusting, grocery shopping, and the list literally goes on and on and on. Josh and I each have particular chores that we almost always tackle ourselves and others that we do together. To make it easy, use a cleaning chart like the one below to remind you of what needs to be done and whose job it is to do it. This is the 21st century, gender equality isn’t just for the workplace.cleaning_Printable

  1. Decide how you’re going to handle your money.

Josh and I decided before we got married to share a bank account, to have a monthly budget to stick to, what our savings goals were, and over all how we were going to manage our money. I create our monthly budget and record our spending and Josh is in charge of making sure all the bills get paid. We both agree on how we’re going to handle our finances, so we’re always on the same page.

  1. Set aside money for each other every month

Built into our monthly budget, Josh and I each get a little money every month that we can do whatever we want with. Typically, I spend mine on makeup or beauty supplies. And Josh normally forgets about his, or spends it on brake pads (men…). Whatever we want to do with our money is fair game. It keeps us from going over budget on miscellaneous wants throughout the month and allows us a little freedom to do what we want without talking to the other first.

  1. Understand and accept that you’re going to do things differently

You were raised in two different families and will do things differently. Whether that’s folding towels, holiday traditions, or what your definition of “I’ll do that in a minute” is, you’re going to think and do things differently and that’s ok. That’s even a good thing. You’ll introduce each other to new traditions and new ways of doing things. Embrace your differences!

  1. It’s ok to agree to disagree.

Going along with doing things differently, it’s ok to disagree on things. It’s ok that you fold towels differently or you open Christmas presents on Christmas morning and he opens presents on Christmas Eve. There’s nothing wrong with disagreeing on things—it’s healthy and you should expect it. And it’s ok to disagree on bigger things, you’ll just have to keep an open mind and communicate honestly to come to an agreement–and a glass of wine for when you can’t.coffee-wine

  1. Remember that it’s you two against the world

As most of you know, sometimes life sucks. Things might not be going well with work, sometimes trying a new recipe results in all the smoke alarms going off, maybe the cats clawed up the brand new curtains, or  maybe you’re just in a bad mood (for 4 months). Whatever’s going on outside of your marriage, remember that at the end of the day it’s just you and your spouse taking on the world together. You’re fighting the same fight, so fight together not against each other.

  1. Don’t stop dating.

Marriage can be kind of boring. You get caught up in the day to day of going to work, coming home, having dinner and going to bed during the week and the chores and errands you have to run during the weekend. Making time to continue to date your spouse is incredibly important. Go on dates, make each other breakfast in bed, pack sweet notes into lunches, be spontaneous and try a new type of restaurant or go to a new place, be silly, send each other texts during the day to say “I love you”. Go out of your way to make the other feel special and you’ll remind them of why they fell in love with you in the first place.

Josh always draws or writes something on my sandwiches
Josh always draws or writes something on my sandwiches
  1. Tell your spouse how grateful you are for the things they do.

Remember to thank your spouse for all the hard work they do in your marriage and in your household. Everyone wants to be appreciated and recognized for the good things that they do, and your spouse is no different. It means so much to me when Josh stops to tell me how much he appreciates me doing the laundry or making dinner every night.

I Love you bc
I’ll be making one of these for our new house

10.  Pray for each other every day.

This is probably the most important thing on this list. Josh and I pray for each other every day. We pray for each other’s safety. We pray for guidance at work and the strength to get through stressful days. We pray for each other’s happiness and contentedness. We pray for our love and faith to grow stronger every day. We pray that we are able to remember all of the reasons we love each other when we feel ourselves becoming angry or upset. We pray for our future family and the wisdom and patience to understand when the right time to start it will be. We pray to give each other strength when it feels like the world might come crashing down. We pray for each other because that’s the least and most we can do to show the other that we love them and are truly committed to building a life with them.

Bonus– Keep a bottle of champagne in the fridge at all times. You never know when you’ll have something to celebrate, or even better when you’ll need literally anything to celebrate.champagne

It takes a lot more than these 10 tips to get through your first year of marriage and to continue to have a happy and healthy marriage for the next 50 years, but hopefully these will help you through that very tough first year. Just remember the reason you said “I do” in the first place and how much your spouse means to you, and you’ll be alright.

–Mrs. Dominico

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High Five for Friday · Lifestyle

Why It’s Important to Budget Even in Your 20s

rdominico4 Comments

Going from a broke college student to a gainfully employed young adult can be a very dangerous financial situation. You’re finally earning a steady pay check and might even be making more money than you actually need to pay rent and the few bills you might have. It can be tempting to spend your paycheck in one go on eating out, going to the bar, at the mall and on new stuff for your new grownup life, wait for the next paycheck and repeat. That might get you by every month, but if you want to pay off your student loans, save for that trip around the world, and buy a house in your 20s, you need to be wise with your money and the easiest way to do that is to budget.

Josh and I have taken a honeymoon, paid off a student loan, bought an apartment full of new furniture and have recently signed a contract to purchase our first home—all in the 10 months we’ve been married and the year that Josh has been working full time, all thanks to a strategic monthly budget.

Before you start to plan your budget, you need to know what to plan for. Josh and I use a wonderful little website called Mint.com. Mint allows you to link your bank accounts, credit cards and loans to an account and will keep track of every transaction you make and will place them in a spending category.Screenshot 2014-04-06 21.08.06

Mint will keep track of every time you stop at Starbucks, every time you buy groceries, every time you fill up your tank, every time you get your nails done, and every purchase you make. This way you’ll be able to see where you’re spending your money and where you could be saving.

Once you know how you’re spending your money, you can plan accordingly and you can start to budget. Mint has a budgeting section that can be pretty useful, but I prefer to use an Excel spreadsheet (like this one). Monthly Budget

Start with what your monthly income and subtract the expenses you know you’ll have each month—like rent, utilities, cable and internet, your cell phone bill, groceries, gas, and your student loan payment.

Then you should budget for your savings—an emergency fund to be prepared for when your car breaks down or your pipes burst; a short term savings for things like trips you want to take or for Christmas presents; and a long term savings to prepare for things like buying a new car, saving for a down payment and preparing for the future. Set savings goals, like that backpacking trip, to help motivate you.

After you’ve taken care of all of your monthly expenses and your savings, you can add budgets for things that you want—like shopping, going to the movies or concert tickets, a new TV, going out to eat, or whatever you might want. Be sure to leave yourself some wiggle room in case you have to go over one of your necessary monthly budgets.

The last step is to STICK TO THE BUDGET! You might go over in your gas budget or your grocery budget, but you’ve prepared for that so it’s ok. At the end of the month, if you were under budget you can use that money to spend as you see fit, pay down any debt, or get a jump on your savings goals.

Keeping up with and sticking to a budget might not be the most fun, especially when all you want to do is stock your closet, but when you’re able to buy a house in your 20s you’ll be thankful that you did.

Good luck budgeting and good luck reaching your goals!

–Mrs. Dominico

Remember to like The Unfinished Mrs on Facebook, follow on Twitter and on Bloglovin