2020 preparation: the budget thing

the budget thing

2020 preparation

This is the year that I want my finances to return to a more positive situation. Over the last two years, I had sixteen months where there was no space for me to earn money. I work from home. This was incredibly difficult and frustrating, and seriously ate away at my savings. But now I'm in a place where I can work from home. Moving three times for various reasons, over two years, didn't help either.

the time budget

In a way, a lot of my organising for 2020 has been about this. 

It's quite different from when you get up and leave the home to go to work. Working from home, I've found that I can get really slack and waste time. And I also can just obsessively work dawn to dusk. I'm looking at a "middle ground", and I feel that this also is just like a budget: a time one. 

Because working from home does require "rules" for myself, just to get things done. And also, time off working. 

Hence my spending a lot of time and thought on advance organising. So that I don't spend hours every week in cafes, nor waste hours on the internet. 

my $ budget

For me, money is more than about earning. It's also about how I spend my money. Which I think is also important. Just as I don't like to waste my life, I also don't like to waste money. Which, incidentally, I have been. I've been careless which mysteriously eats away at funds. 

I've already started the $ thing. For example, I was out briefly doing food shopping today, and realised I was hungry, and craving sugar. I didn't want to go to a bakery nor a cafe, and a banana wasn't going to do the job, so I spent time reading  labels on biscuit packets. I managed to get one without sugar, without palm oil, and I calculated the $ to see how they worked out cost per serve. And had some at home with a cuppa. Then I reveled in "saving money" smugness. Of course, that banana would have been better for me.

Disorganisation with food has been my worst area, and doesn't help with weight problems. It works out expensive in the long run. 

I've taken myself "in hand":

• I worked out what I was going to be eating at home, and when. Guilt for having been so hit or miss here
• I made sure that what I needed was in the cupboards or fridge which was not what had been happening
• I do not stock up as though a famine is coming, because, yep, that's also a great way for me to waste money with produce going "off"
• I've resumed cooking. Yes, I've bitten the bullet and done it

I feel as though I deserve a medal.

what else?

• I have avoided all of the clothes sales and op shops 
• I am meticulously and systematically going through all of my skin care and make-up with a self imposed ban on buying more
• I have a yellow beetle (VW). Yes, serious envy from many. I know. However, it will be hell getting a baby (new grandchild is due soon) into a car seat in this adorable little yellow bubble, with only two doors. So I am saving for a more baby-child-friendly car. Not an expensive one, just a more practical one. The things we do for love!
• I've joined a new, very local, gym. It's mega cheap, the personal trainer sessions are ridiculously low, and it will cost me less than one coffee and nibble cafe visit per week. Someone told me that they found it easier to go to the correct place to do a workout, and this has preyed on my mind as a good option. So I've bitten the bullet and signed up 

my clothes budget

This is not how it seems. It's more about how I spend $ on clothes rather than setting aside a sum of money. 

Some years ago, a friend told me that she had four tops and four bottoms (skirts and pants) to wear with her flat heeled knee high boots, for work. And, she always bought her clothes second hand. She also had jeans and such for when she wasn't working, but definitely not heaps of clothes. I realised recently that I had taken her advice to heart, without even realising it, and for years I had only been doing the four tops and four bottoms thing, summer and winter. Not including cardigans and coats.

It has been difficult, on reflection. Who are these minimalist people who have ten garments at a time? Does that include shoes, bags, coats, and so forth?

Do they have clothes dryers? I don't and I can tell you that a lot of my time is spent getting my washing dry so that I have clean clothes. This is not good for my time budget. 

So, I have decided that it has to be five tops and five bottoms. I can manage that.

What do you do?