this wasn't in the plan |but life is still pretty good

And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?”
“It came without ribbons! It came without tags!
“It came without packages, boxes or bags!”
And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store.
Maybe Christmas … perhaps … means a little bit more!”
From How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss

Who knew the Grinch was frugal? Okay well maybe not, but we can all learn a great lesson in frugality from this wonderful Christmas story. Christmas can be special without going overboard in your spending.

Here are some ways I plan on making this Christmas truly special without going into debt.

Watch Christmas Shows - On Tuesday night, I let Bug stay up late and watch A Charlie Brown Christmas. He loved it. Last night I taped How The Grinch Stole Christmas and we watched it today. Another winner. Taping these shows doesn't cost a thing and watching them can be a fun family activity.

Bake and Give Away Some of the Goodies - Bug loves to help me in the kitchen, and I love to bake, so making special Christmas treats to share with others will be something both of us will enjoy (and The Tall One will enjoy eating some things I don't normally bake).

Making a Special Christmas Breakfast - I think anything I can do to set Christmas Day apart from other days will help make the day something we look forward to. When I'm hosting Christmas (or we're on our own) I always make orange rolls, something I don't make any other day.

Make Crafts - I try and do art activities with Buggy, but they really are few and far between. Making December a month of crafts will make it fun for him, we can use what me make as gifts and we'll have some fun things to decorate the house with.

Talk about Jesus - This will be a big one. When I ask my kids what Christmas is about, I don't want the answer to be "Santa Claus". I think Santa Claus has his place, and we like him at our house, but I want my kids to know there's more to Christmas

Do Something Each Day - I plan on thinking of 24 things to do to celebrate Christmas, they will include all of the above. Each day we'll do something. I think this could be a great tradition for my kids and give them something other than presents to look forward to come December.

Gifts are great, don't get me wrong. I just want me and my family to have more reasons to love Christmas other than getting new things.

On Wednesday night, The Tall One came home with a very generous Thanksgiving bonus from his boss. So generous, in fact, that he could have almost gone out to buy that iPod Touch he wants so badly. I said no. I'm mean. No one's giving me huge bonuses to spend on expensive gadgets, so why should he get to spend it all on one?

On Friday night, we visited the iPod Touch at The Apple Store. Oh, how TTO wanted to bring one home. He kept reminding me that he had just enough money for one still in his wallet. I said no. But, man, these things are cool. The interface is amazing. After playing with one, I wanted one and TTO decided he needed one. I said no. But Christmas is coming. He knows that his grandfather will send a nice check and if he asks, his parents and mine will give him money in lieu of gifts. And I'm not so mean that some of his bonus can't be used towards one.

So, it looks like that through the power of saving up money, The Tall One will get his iPod Touch for Christmas after all. What a conept.

This week's recipe calls for chicken, but you could probably use some of that leftover turkey. We have this once a week it seems, and sometimes we toss in some spinach as well. Enjoy!

Angel Hair Pasta with Lemon and Chicken

1 package (9 ounces) angel hair pasta
1 1/2 cups cooked diced chicken
1/3 cup butter, melted
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or 1 teaspoon dried parsley
1/4 teaspoon marjoram
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

PREPARE pasta according to package directions.

TOSS pasta with chicken, butter, lemon juice, parsley, marjoram and garlic powder. Season with salt and ground black pepper, if desired.

Recipe from Meals.com

Is nothing.

Here it is the season of wish lists and letters to Santa, and my three year old apparently missed the memo. He's been in the toy stores, leafed through the catalog, and seen a few commercials, but he just doesn't have a case of the gimmies. I'm certainly not complaining.

He's got the concept down pat when it comes to the grocery store. We come within a ten foot radius of the string cheese and he starts whining for some. He doesn't even really like it, so of course I won't buy it. Then every now and then something will catch his eye and he'll point it out to me and demand I buy it. But this hasn't transferred to toys yet. He just doesn't make any connections between seeing a cool toy and wanting it for himself.

So, this Christmas I don't have to worry about making sure I fill his wish list, seeing as he doesn't have one. Maybe I'll get him some string cheese.

So a few weeks ago, I was all set to cancel our daily newspaper subscription, but instead went to Sunday only. Our delivery service has been horrible this past week. We were supposed to get daily papers until Wednesday of last week and then start Sunday only on the 18th. Tuesday and Wednesday's papers didn't get delivered, and neither did Sunday's. I was mad. I called twice on Sunday to request redelivery, threatening to cancel if I didn't get it, but still no paper. But what shows up on Monday morning? A paper. And on Tuesday? Another paper. Okay, so they do owe us two papers, but we got one today too. I called today to cancel it for good. I was really hoping they'd offer to give me a free month to make up for my frustration, but no such luck. I really don't want to cancel it, but it's the principle of the thing. I don't want to give them my business right now if I'm not going to be treated well. So I'm forced to save money. Which really isn't a bad thing, but I'll miss my Sunday paper.

Have you ever been forced to be frugal and wanted to spend money on something, but couldn't 't?

On Saturday night, we needed eggs. Okay, we didn't really need them, I wanted them so I could bake something. I made a list for all the groceries we'd need for the rest of the month (we'll be out of town for part of it) and we all headed off to Smith's. No really wonderful deals to be had here, Albertson's had the great deals this week, but overall Smith's has lower prices. I wanted a boneless half ham becuase they were on sale, but when I was picking one out, I noticed none of the half hams were marked at the sale price. I assumed this was because I had read the ad wrong and only the whole hams were on sale. But The Tall One was smart. We had an ad in our cart and he opened it up to check it. Sure enough, it said half and whole hams were on sale. We asked the butcher who was out on duty and he went back to rescale it to see if it came up the sale price. It did, hooray! So, when in doubt, check the ad at the store. Obvious to most, probably, but apparently not to me.

Today I went with the boys to Albertson's. I picked up some nighttime pull-ups for Bug that were on sale for $8.99 and used a $2 off coupon. The great deal here was the Pillsbury Crescent and Sweet Rolls. They were on sale 2/$3. And I had coupons. And the store was doubling and tripling coupons up to $1 off. So my fifty cent coupon became $1 off, my sixty cent coupon became $1 off and my thirty cent coupon became ninety cents off. I was pleased.

I spent (minus diapers) $30.99 this week. That's 19.01 under my weekly goal. Which will help with the weeks that I've gone over and overall help me be under budget in groceries this month.

I like recipes with just a few ingredients, but not so few that the food doesn't taste like much. They're easy to prepare and easy on the budget. Each week I'll try and find a tried and true recipe with under ten ingredients. This week's is what we had for dinner tonight - French Dip Sandwiches

French Dip Sandwiches

Ingredients
1 (4 pound) boneless beef roast
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 beef bouillon cube
1 bay leaf
3 whole black peppercorns
1 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon garlic powder
20 slices French bread

Remove and discard all visible fat from the roast. Place trimmed roast in a slow cooker.
In a medium bowl, combine soy sauce, bouillon, bay leaf, peppercorns, rosemary, thyme, and garlic powder. Pour mixture over roast, and add enough water to almost cover roast. Cover, and cook on Low heat for 10 to 12 hours, or until meat is very tender.
Remove meat from broth, reserving broth. Shred meat with a fork, and distribute on bread for sandwiches. Used reserved broth for dipping.
(Recipe from Allrecipes.com)

Tonight I used a pork loin roast instead of beef. It was just as yummy as it always is. I did not use a four pound one either, mine was probably 3/4 of a pound. I used 1/4 cup of soy sauce and just eyeballed the spices. I did not use peppercorns, since we don't usually have any, I just sprinkled some pepper in. I used homemade French bread that I made several weeks ago and froze. Works great for leftovers too!

Last week, our large griddle fell off the top of the refrigerator and broke. Yesterday morning, The Tall One whipped out some epoxy to fix it. Oftentimes our $5 garage sale microwave breaks, but TTO just puts in a new fuse (we got a pack of them for a few dollars) and it's good to go.

Many times I've been tempted to just get a new microwave that won't just randomly stop working (and one that's a little more aesthtictally pleasing), but I've never succomed. And recently, I haven't had that urge at all. Before we moved into this house a year ago, I got rid of our toaster and waffle maker. Both were functional, just falling apart and I really wanted new ones. So I got new ones, a relatively cheap, but cool looking toaster and a very nice new waffle maker (bought partially with a gift card). And honestly, I think buying those two things helped calm my urge to just get lots of nice, new stuff for this house. I still want new things, but it's not nearly as bad as it was a year ago. I'm much more at peace with making do with what we have and what we come across cheaply. I'm just glad it only took purchases of about $50 total to get me to that place.

Every weekend, I post a tried and true recipe (for my family at least) that has ten or less ingredients. Below is a list of all the recipes I've done so far.

• Homestyle Chicken Soup
  
• Garlic Alfredo Sauce
  
• Crock Pot BBQ Pork
  
• Beans and Papitas
  
• Oven Fried Chicken Chimichangas
  
• Hawaiian Kabobs
  
• Macaroni and Cheese
  
• Pepper Steak
  
• Easy Chicken Parmesan
  
• Macaroni Tomato Soup
  
• Chicken Nuggets
  
• Chicken Tortilla Soup
• Chicken Casserole
• Grilled Chicken Wraps
  
• Pizza Pasta Salad
• Mexican Pork
• Cream of Green Chile Soup
• Amazing Apricot Chicken
  
• Chicken Marinade
• Meatloaf with Potatoes and Green Beans
• Cabbage Sausage Soup
• Hamburger and Stuffing
• Cheesy Volcano Meatballs
• Lomo Saltado
• Tator Tot Casserole
  
• Chili and Cornbread
• Italian Chicken
  
• Cheese Enchiladas
• Chicken and Corn Chowder
• Taco Soup
• Lime Sauced Chicken
• Hula Bagel Melt
• Crockpot Chicken and Potatoes
• Easy Stroganoff
• Chicken Divan
  
• Porcupine Meatballs
• Angel Hair Pasta with Lemon and Chicken
• French Dip Sandwiches

I did some number crunching last night to find out how much we could spend on Christmas. When I showed the number to The Tall One, he was disappointed that it wasn't enough to buy him an iPod Touch. Darn. On top of that number, I have a few gift cards from doing online surveys that I've been saving for buying Christmas gifts (and no, still not enough for the iPod Touch).

I'm trying with all my might not to go even kind of overboard with gifts for the boys. Bug really doesn't have a huge case of the gimmies yet (more on that in a future post) and I want to take advantage of that. And well, I could give Monkey a piece of wrapping paper and he'd be happy. Besides they have other people buying gifts for them.

I really want to capitalize on the little things that will make my kids happy, actually I'd like to do that for everyone on my list, but it's easy for my boys because I'm around them all the time. For example, I plan on putting some glue sticks in Bug's stocking. He loves gluing things and will be thrilled. My dad will probably be getting some contact lens solution. Fun? No, but my dad's the type of person that will buy what he wants, so I've decided that the best gifts for him are the things he needs. I will probably also throw in some nuts that I know he likes to have on hand at work.

Because you see, the little things don't cost much, but here's hoping that receiving them can be just as good as getting an iPod Touch.

One year ago this month, we purchased our first home. Lately The Tall One and I have been reflecting on that decision. Literally the night before we found this house we had decided we were going to wait at least a year before buying so we could save up a down payment. But then we went house hunting anyway, because it's fun, and here we are.

There's really no way to know if it was a mistake or not. Sure we'd have more money in savings had we waited, but in the past year we've payed off a student loan and a car. When money became not so abundant after we bought the house, we really focused on getting rid of our non-mortgage debt. Would we have done that if we didn't buy the house? Who knows.

Money isn't everything though. We've made friends we wouldn't have met had we not bought our house. We've had opportunities we wouldn't have had if we didn't live where we do now. When finances are completely taken out of the picture, it's been the best decision we could have made for our family, and that should count for something.

I always love reading all the "this is what our family has done this year" letters that we receive in Christmas cards. Even growing up I thought it was great fun to read letters from friends of my parents that I had never met. Ever since we've been married, The Tall One and I have sent out a Christmas card letter. Last year I was tired of the same old same old and went for something different. I created a timeline that highlighted a few events from the past year. Here are some other ideas for sending out a Christmas letter that's a little different:

Use Numbers
Try and convert events from your family's year into statements relating to numbers, for example:

We moved ONE time this year, from Smallville to Metropolis
We spent TWO days at Funland this summer
John hit THREE homeruns this past baseball season
Mary got FOURth place in the state spelling bee
Dad planted FIVE rows of corn in the garden this summer

Use the Alphabet
Try to come up with an acrostic poem using things that happened to your family in the past year, for example:

W e moved from Smallville to Metropolis
H ad a great time visiting Funland this summer
A unt Sue visited us for Thanksgiving
T he boys did a great job on their baseball teams this spring

A nd Dad had fun coaching Timmy's team

Y es, Dad still works for ABC Company
E veryone is doing great in school
A lso, mom joined a tennis leauge
R eally, we all had a wonderful 2007

Change the Point of view
Let each kid write a sentence or two describing their year, or let the kids write the whole letter. If you have a pet, you could write the letter from the pet's point of view.

Make Some Predictions
I read a letter at my parent's house last year that was written in two parts, the first half in January with the predictions for what the year would bring and the second half at the end of the year with what really happened. This would have to wait for 2008's Christmas letter, obviously.

Keep it Simple
Come up with one or two sentences for each family member that recaps their year. Make those sentences be apart of the card (as opposed to on a separate paper), perhaps written under the family picture, or just have individual shots of each family member with the recap under the appropriate picture.

Those are some of the ideas I've had as I think about what to do this year. Any other ideas?

For a long time now, Bug's chore has been to gather up the newspape and take it to the recycling box in the garage. But since I've changed our newspaper subscription to Sunday only, he'll only be able to do that once a week. He needs a new chore. I want it to be, like the newspaper, something he is completely in charge of, something that we won't do for him. If for some reason he didn't do his chore one day, I could just push all the newspaper out of the way and he could do it the next day. And I want it to be in addition to picking up his toys. I've thought about having him clear off the dishes after dinner, but if for some reason he went to bed before that got done I wouldn't be able to ignore the mess until he could do it the next day. Maybe I'll just re-subscribe. Any chore suggestions for a three year old?

I decided to brave Walgreens today and snag some good deals there. I was very excited to use their store coupon for 99 cent Colgate toothpaste and toothbrushes and stack it with a 75 cent manufacturer's coupon I had. But when I got to the register both coupons were nowhere to be found. Since one was a store coupon, the cashier rung it up for me, but the other one was just lost.

Now we back up a bit...

I don't know why I often enter stores with the dilusion that Bug will be well behaved if he's not in the shopping cart. But silly me, I decided it would be okay to have him walk by me. Ha. He soon lost that privilege, and I hoisted him into the shopping cart. No easy task since I was wearing Monkey in the sling. At one point I was thinking rationally and since the small Walgreen's shopping carts won't hold both boys, I decided I'd use the sling for Monkey so there'd be plenty of room for Bug in the cart. And then apparently I got hit by a ton of bricks and all common sense left me. Anyway, the coupons were on the seat of the shopping cart and I think they fell out of the cart when I put Bug in. I do hope someone found them and put them to good use.

I got some fabulous deals at Albertson's this week. Stove Top Stuffing was on sale for $1, not so great considering Target has it for 79 cents this week. But, there was a coupon to buy three and get one for free, so that becomes a great deal. Dry onion soup mix was also on sale for $1, toss in a coupon for 75 cents off two and another good deal for me.

I went over my weekly budget by $7.55, but I also bought toilet paper, shampoo, toothpaste, and toothbrushes totalling $13. I haven't decided if I'm going to include that stuff in the grocery budget. In the past it just depended on how I do in the grocery category, sometimes that stuff goes over into household (our catchall category, basically). I really should decide on one category or another, though. Things are still looking good as far as the month goes, considering we'll be out of town for Thanksgiving.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we were challenged to live off the food we currently had for one week. We did it. I did cheat (sort of) and went to the grocery store on Friday to buy dish soap and dishwasher detergent. Since this was a learning experience more than anything, I learned that it's no fun to completely run out of such things and bought two with the intention that I will always try and have a back up around. This is not the first time I've had to make a trip just for one of those things, but hopefully it will be the last.

I've been thinking a lot this week about food storage and decided that probably the two main reasons we'd need to live off what we had on hand would be financial reasons or some sort of emergency that caused a wide-spread power outage.

In the event of a power outage, it would be very important to have lots of non-perishable food on hand. We currently have quite a bit (our pantry isn't really what needs restocking at this point), but that's totally a fluke. We normally really don't have much. I want to keep my supply up and add a few more things to it, like tuna fish and canned chicken maybe. Recently someone suggested to me that it's good to have minute rice on hand (I normally don't buy it because it's more expensive) because if electricity is the problem, you'll need to cook with propane, or another alternative fuel, and it would take much propane to boil rice for 20 minutes.

If finances became suddenly very tight, the grocery store would obviously still be there and be accessible, but we'd want to stretch what we had, so that grocery spending would be as minimal as possible. I certainly did some stretching this week. I would have never imagined a gallon of milk could last 10 days in this house.

Another thing I learned this week is that Bug doesn't drink nearly enough water. In an effort to make the milk last as long as possible (and the juice too), I tried to get him to drink water and unless it was bedtime he wouldn't have it.

So, if one week ago all the grocery stores in the city I live in closed their doors, we'd have survived. We would've had dirty dishes, but we would have been nourished.

The Tall One has been bugging me to turn our pumpkin into puree and make him a wonderful treat. So today I decided why not. I had never done this before so I first did some research. This website provided some good directions. I did the baking method and I was going to keep careful track of how long it took me to cook it (since I found that it could take anywhere from 20-90 minutes), but the timer went off while I was feeding Monkey and then I lost track of time. I'm guessing it took about an hour. At this point, one side was good and mushy, but the other side was not. I simply peeled away the skin (which is very easy after it's been cooked) and boiled the not quite cooked side for about 10 minutes. I mashed the cooked pumpkin with a potato masher and now I had some fresh pumpkin all ready to make some cookies.

I used the following recipe and it turned out yummy. This recipe comes from a family friend who is an awesome baker


Pumpkin Drop Cookies

Mix together:
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp nutmeg

Mix and fold into above mixture:
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 cup pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla

Bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes
Frost with cream cheese frosting


I ended up with almost five cups, three of which I froze. Not bad for a $2 pumpkin.

At the mall today, I saw a toy store advertising a 'Toy Stock Up" sale. Wow, I mean, this week I've been thinking a lot about being prepared in case of an emergency of some sort, but it never occured to me that I should be stocking up on toys!

I really don't see the purpose of stocking up on toys, unless maybe you find a good price on something that would make a good birthday gift should your child be invited to a last minute birthday party, but even then, there really are more important things I feel I should stock up on.

This sale really wasn't all that great either. It looked good, you buy any four toys and one of them is free, but when you think about it, not really spectaular. The lowest priced toy is your freebie, so the best discount you can get is 25% off your entire purchase (and feel free to correct my math if I'm thinking about this wrong) assuming each toy you buy is the same price. Which is good, I do like discounts, but this store really doesn't have the greatest prices. If you bought the same toys elsewhere, you'd probaby spend less without any sort of discount.

Now all that said, I did buy a toy there. I got a Christmas gift for Bug, a Percy to go with his Duplo train set. I had a gift card that we got with our Discover Card cashback bonus so it cost me $0.14 . Now that's a deal.

So look before you leap, is that great sale you see advertised really all it's cracked up to be?

I called this morning to cancel our newspaper subscription. We love getting the newspaper, but our subscription is expiring and I want to free up that money for Christmas.

But I didn't end up doing that, instead I changed it to a Sunday only.

All the customer service rep had to say was "you don't want to change to Sunday only?" and I was convinced. This past Sunday I was somewhat mourning the fact that we wouldn't be getting a Sunday paper anymore, so I know it's something that I would totally miss if I didn't have it and there are those coupons. I probaby save, maybe $3 a month using coupons, so there's half the monthly subscription. And Bug does really like going outside to get it in the mornings, so it could kind of count as a Christmas gift for him, right? Okay maybe not. A Christmas gift to myself is more like it.

I prefer sitting down with Bug and doing a craft as opposed to playing cars and trucks. It's just more fun for me. Here's two things we've recently done.





Buggy is pretty darn obsessed with all the leaves that have fallen from the trees. We went on a walk to collect some and then made a leaf picture. I used clear contact paper and cut a big rectangle and then folded back only half of the backing. He put the leaves on the sticky side and when he was done, I took off the rest of the backing and folded it on top of his leaves. Using the contact paper allows it to have some dimension to it, yet the leaves stay in place. No pretty fall leaves were broken to create this craft.




The second is Fall wreath of sorts. I saw a wreath made of handprints in a neighbor's window and decided on this much simpler version. I'm a paper scrapbooker and keep my paper scraps, so I went through them and pulled out all the reds and browns I had. I cut a circle out of a cardboard box we had in the garage and we took turns cutting and ripping and gluing shapes. He then added stickers (all the letters for Thanksgiving - and then some - are there, he just chose to write some in).



Another great thing about these? I've hung them up and they serve as some pretty neat November decorations, too!

Forget your wallet.

Really, it works like a charm.

I needed to return something, and pick up something for The Tall One. I got a gift card for my return (since it was a gift) and was a bit angry that what I needed to purchase for TTO would have to come out of that. I browsed a bit anyway, because that's what you do at Target, and saw this cutest little Thomas the Tank Engine scrapbook kit on clearance and thought it would be a fun thing to make for Bug for a Christmas gift (he loves looking at picture albums). But the gift card was only for $6.30 and wouldn't have quite paid for that and what I needed to buy. You can bet that I would've bought it if I had had my wallet though.

So there you have it. And I imagine such advice would work if you were trying to save money at other stores too.

I'm not quite sure, but once upon a time, I imagined I'd graduate from college, get married, and have lots of money. Well, I've got the first two taken care of, but I've come to realize that the third one is a work in progress.

But that's not a bad thing.

Things can turn out fine even if they aren't how we imagined them. I'm happy and loving where I'm at right now. So now I've got a new plan. But I am still thwarted and new fun things keep coming up that aren't a part of that plan (like needing to fix the car) but we deal and tweak the plan and life goes on.

We've been challenged by local leaders of our church to live off the food we currently have for one week as sort of an emergency prepardness drill. That means no trips to the grocery store. I learned of this challenge this morning and my first thought was, why didn't we get any advance notice on this. But my second thought came very quickly. Duh, you don't usually get too much advance notice in the case of an emergency.

We have enough food to last us a week no problem, milk though, that's a problem. Based on what we've got now, I'd need more come Wednesday or so (Buggy and I are both big milk drinkers, well so is Monkey, just not that sort of milk :). I'll survive, but should we run out, Bug won't be so happy. So, grocery store, I will miss you, but see ya next Monday!

Well 12 if you count the two I bought at Smith's.

My first grocery shopping trip of the week was a screaming success. I did go over my weekly budget by $6.21, but there was a sale that I couldn't pass up. Albertson's had Honey Nut Cheerios on sale for $1.77. Time to use up all those cereal coupons I had stockpiled. I had two coupons that would save me $1 on two boxes and another to save $1 on three boxes. Then, as luck would have it, there was a coupon dispenser thingy there by the cereal with coupons to save $.75 on two boxes. So I snagged one of those. Now, I could have used three of those and not used my $1 off three boxes coupon, but Monkey was having a fit at the time and a well meaning employee was hovering over him commenting on how sad he was so I had other things on my mind instead of how I could save another fifty cents.

So, yes, I bought ten boxes of the stuff because if I bought ten I could get two free tickets to see Bee Movie. That means ten boxes of cereal for $13.95 (after coupons) I also bought two boxes of Life cereal across the street at Smith's and was very upset to find them for the same price, just a larger box, at Albertson's. It was not in the weekly ad, so how was I to know?

October was a good month, well other than the car, that is. We went over budget about $35 plus whatever The Tall One spent on my birthday gift (he entered it in the computer as seven cents, but I'm thinking he spent more than that). The $35 is about how much I went over in groceries last month. I did a lot of stocking up at the grocery store this past month, thanks to some fabulous loss leaders ($1 for five pound bag of flour, can't beat that!) and then there was Halloween candy to pass out to Trick or Treaters. Theoretically November should be under because I won't have to buy the things I stocked up on last month. We'll see. We don't budget to spend nearly $500 to fix our car each month, but we do set aside a little bit, combine that with things like dining out (which we didn't do at all) and the fact that I budgeted a bit too much for diapers and we came in under on gas for the car and we had a good month.