Ideas and information welcome, no WANTED!

I just want to thank everyone for your words of encouragement and all the money saving tips. I have had friends and family sharing their budget ideas, ways to save on formula, and even a website for a weekly news letter. I want to share them with you and ask that you post any great information on this site for all to see.
Enjoy! And thanks again!


Budget Ideas

I love your new blog about finances. I think it's great that you've been able to change your habits and make things work. That's such a relieving feeling. I thought I'd share some of things we do with you, and maybe something will help:) Before Tyler and I got married we mapped out our finances and decided who would pay what. Because Tyler keeps a detailed register, and I manage my finances by having 4 separate accounts, we keep our money separate but are completely honest with each other about all our spending. When we first got married money was really tight (after paying for wedding stuff and tuition and everything). So when I started by internship at RR Donnelley and started getting paid almost twice as much, we acted like we still had the same income. I put $300 away every paycheck so that we wouldn't get used to the extra money (since it was only a 5 month internship), and so we could save up for a car. I had that money go right into a separate account and never withdrew any of it unless we had other car emergencies. During the 5 months of my internship we've saved $3000 and we'll be able to replace my truck with a car that actually runs and go on a cruise in December!A main backbone to our finances is an excel spreadsheet that I made to keep track of EVERY expense. Before the beginning of each month I estimate our income and expenses. If our income is a little less than expected then we see where we can cut back on expenses. Tyler gives me receipts and I ask him about his expenses so we can track everything. It's great to see how much we can save by doing this. Honestly, we haven't stuck exactly to it every month, but it does help to mentally know where we need to cut back and to see the outcome. The thing that has worked best for me is to have separate accounts. I have one account with automatic withdrawals for insurance, cell phone, and internet payments. I have another separate account just for savings (which is our car account right now), another account strictly for school, and just a normal checking account. I guess it's kind of my way of doing Dave Ramsey's envelope method thing. I know this doesn't work for everyone, cuz Tyler thinks I'm crazy for doing it that way, but I love it!Well, that's mostly how we've made things work for us. It's kept us on top of things and happy. It's so much better to have your money work for you, rather than have your money work you over. This semester has been really neat too because I have a class about Estate Planning, one on Retirement Planning, and one about Real Estate and home buying. I've really learned so much about money this semester I absolutely love it!

Lindsey


Save on formula

Just wanted to let you know that Costco has formula... you get two 25 oz cans for like 20$, buying the Kirkland brand saves me over half of the cost of name brand formulas.

Cathy

Helpful websites and newsletters

http://www.utahsaves.org/
daveramsey.com
mytotalmoneymakeover.com
(if you are a Zions bank customer, you can sign up for My Total Money Makeover for free for 3 months. You will receive news letter and a site to track your progress. It’s really fun! I think you have to get there from Zion’s page to get the deal.)