Lets Keep track of our Money (TIPPY TUESDAY #6)

Date	Item	Price	Need	Want (Shopping)	Gift
Jan 4th	Wal-Mart (Basic Necessities)	$17.19	$       5.00	$                 12.19
Jan 5th	H & M - jacket	$77.00		$                 77.00
Jan 4th	Superstore - Grocery	$58.00	$    58.00
Jan 6th	Bus Pass	$86.00	$     86.00
Jan 6th	Wal-Mart (Grocery)	$22.97
Jan 6th	Dollarama	$7.42		$                  7.42
Jan 7th	Car Gas	$44.00	$     44.00
Jan 23rd	Shopping	$82.00		$                 82.00
Jan 26th	N. Birthday Gift	$44.00			$     44.00
TOTAL		$438.58	$193.00	$            178.61	$  44.00
		100%	44%	41%	10%

Happy Wednesday everyone! It means Tippy Tuesday (a day late -sorry!) and Today I am sharing with you a tool I developed in Excel a while ago to keep track of my spending (a.k.a. Financial Tip).

If you have made it reading this far, great job! Because I know many people who hear budget and they run as far and as fast as possible.

At first I started just a simple tracking sheet - where and on what have I spent my money but over the years I have been wanting to tracking where does most of my money go. So I decided to track some %'s how much is need, want, gift for others. Like in the above chart, I know that through all my spending, I have spent 44% on need, 41% on want (ususally called shopping), and 10% on gift for others. I can see month to month where I tend to spent most and where I could possibly cut back.

Above is a real snapshot of how much money I had spent in Jan 2011 as a sample. If you know how to work with excel, it is really easy to make and go ahead with tracking your spending.

Caution: It was a little inconvenient at first trying to track everything on where I spent my money. Some days I did not want to do it. But then I felt like I had no control of my finances. Then doing this exercise might make you feel guilty on how much we consume. Thats why I put the sheet into percentages so we only target one category at one time. Sometimes, instead of keeping tabs everyday, I sit on the weekend and take out all my receipts and started tallying. or if you are a keener like me, what I do is input what I purchased as soon as I get home after my trips.  It has led me to make more mindful decisions about when and where I spent my money.

Let me give you how this tool has benefited me:

During my first year of school, I used to buy breakfast everyday (thats 7$ everyday - over a month that is $210 and over a year it is about $ 2500). Crazy right? and I didnt even realize or even feel guilty when purchasing breakfast because in my mind I had justified it as a need so it was ok to spend that money. Well guess what I started getting up half an hour early everyday to have breakfast and save $2500. I still do go out sometimes to grab breakfast still but as a treat, not necessity.

We all want to acheive many goals in our life and many of us have dreams such as saving for a down payment for my future house, family vacations, wedding, funds for a rainy day, saving money for some major projects in life - I have made many tools like this one, if you are interested, leave me a note below and I would love to share more tools like getting the most out of our income, acheiving financial goals with a financial plan.

As a side note, I am a fanatic when it comes to financial planning. I love to read, write about the tools I have learned over the years. But I am no expert! I am only sharing what I know, what I have learned and decided to pass it on my readers!

If you are interested e-mail me at: ngaraha@ualberta.ca and I can send you the template by e-mail. I hope you enjoyed this Tippy Tuesday episode. Please leave me comments below to give me feedback. I love to read comments, feedbcak and questions. Thank you for stopping by and have a great day! =)

Stay Tuned for a very special Financial Planning book review I will be doing soon!!!

How do you track your spending?

TIPPY TUESDAYS #5

Happy Tuesday!

How do you store your belts? Do you put them in a drawer and never look at them or use them because they are so tangled and bent?

AND

 Where do you store your bracelets? Would you like to learn how to store them or hang them where you can see them and coordinate with your outfits?
If you need answers to all the above questions......you have come to the right place. Let me give you a little background story!


I was pretty frustrated myself at the thought of organizing my belts and bracelets - 2 things i need on day to day basis and i always found them tangled. but no more of that because I found a way to organize that and I hope this will help you 2!


So I am going to share with you an effortless and cheap way to store your belts and your precious bracelets! (with pictures) 


All you need is:

• 1 wired hanger (open the top of it where it kinds closes - you need to rewire the top - refer to pic below:

• 1 solid hanger which can hold some weight - could be wooden or sturdy plastic ones
• All your belts
• All your bracelets
• Shower Curtain Hooks - 3 or 4

Let me show you first the bracelet organization first:

and this is how I store my bracelets in my little jewellery section - they stay in one place, untangled, and I can see all of them at once when getting ready in the morning.

Now onto the belts!

Get yourself this kind of show curtain hooks (with a little opening) - I got mine - a pack of 5-6 for $1 from Dollar Store

 Now take your belts buckles and insert them through that opening showed above - I put in about 4 belts per hook.

Then grab your hanger and insert the hook through the hanger now like in the picture 

Repeat this until all your belts are hooked onto the hanger. Mine hangs like this at the front of my closet. I dont have to bend them anymore (bending them in the past ans shoved into the drawer damaged many of my belts).



So was this easy to learn? I hope the instructions made sense. It was so easy and using stuff lying around the house with minimal purchases, made me feel good about this one =]

I hope I saved you some minutes getting ready in the morning. How do you store your belts and bracelets, earrings, scarves? Please do share! Sharing is caring!

Till next time,

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Tippy TUESDAYS!

Hello my dear readers, I am going to be a series called "Tip Tuesdays" where I would post one tip every Tuesday. It could be beauty, fashion related or just things that I have discovered over the years through trial and error or something I am passing onto your guys that I are called "Family Treasurers" You get the idea. Check back every Tuesday for helpful tips and I would love to hear some of your fun tips too! Dont by shy, pass them along! Sharing is Caring!

First tip is going to be an organization tip: How I organizing rings, studs, or small earrings, light bracelets etc. Last Christmas, I got so many chocolate boxes as presents esp those ones which have many individual chocolate spots (like this one from purdy's below)

I bought some home (empty ones) and cleaned it and organized all my rings, small bracelets, studs in it. Its all in one place and when i am heading out the door in a hurry, it takes literally seconds to grab something and wear it.

How I organized smaller earrings

Hope you found this tip exciting and helpful! How do you ladies organize small accessories? Is your way working out for you? Sharing is caring.

Have a great Day! Check back nexst Tuesday for another exciting tip. =)
xoxo
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