Creating and Maintaining a Monthly Budget {Free Excel Spreadsheet}

With baby #2 coming, we've been more mindful than ever about where our money is going and working hard to stay on-budget. By closely keeping track of everything we're getting a better idea on where everything is going and where we can shave off a few dollars. With only one income and a lot of expenses (both expected and unexpected) it can make it very challenging to stay on-budget each month. | This post contains affiliate links. |

Creating and Maintaining a Monthly Budget - FREE Customizable Excel Spreadsheet

Here I've shared a more simplified version of the spreadsheet we use (since we're self-employed we also need to set aside money for quarterly taxes and other expenses). You can change the Expense titles in the left hand column to fit your needs, but I've tried to include all the basic expenses that most young adults will have.

Next replace the monthly Income in the example with your own monthly income (I had to put in a number here as an example so the formulas wouldn't result in error). Then go down the Budget column and fill in what you expect or budget your bills to be. As your bills come in, put in these figures in the Actual Spent column. All of the percentages and totals will auto-update as you fill in the chart.

Creating and Maintaining a Monthly Budget - FREE Excel Spreadsheet

Download FREE Excel Spreadsheet Here

Over the course of the next few months, you'll see how your expectations (Budget) line up with reality (Actual Spent) and will be able to identify trends. Maybe you spend more for Gas than you thought you did.. or maybe you realize that you spend too much on Entertainment and should put some of that towards other bills...? Keeping track of where everything is going is very eye-opening and will help you stay ahead. The most important thing is writing everything down and sticking to it!

In the event the doing an Excel spreadsheet isn't your thing, there are also many great paper-based Budget Planners/Trackers you can buy out there! I haven't used it myself (yet), but I have heard great things in particular about this highly rated Budget Planner Notebook.

Check out some of our other Money Saving posts:

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New England Maker: Birch Landing Home

As you know by now, I love sharing about companies and products we love on my blog and our Instagram - and most especially those made right here in New England. I decided it would be so fun to highlight some of our local New England Makers regularly on my blog and thought I would kick off the series by sharing a little bit more about myself and Birch Landing Home by answering some frequently asked questions.

Birch Landing Home is best known for hand-etched wooden ornaments, garland, and other handmade crafts. I also run this blog where I mainly focus on New England lifestyle, motherhood, and budget-friendly DIY projects.

Tell me a little bit about yourself and your business.

My name is Sarah and I’m a wife, stay-at-home mom, and self-confessed Pinterest addict living in rural New England with our dog and chickens. I started Birch Landing Home a few years ago after our daughter was born because I was looking for a flexible, creative outlet to work from home while still being a stay-at-home mom. I’ve always loved making crafts and thought selling them on Etsy was a good start, I also thought it would be fun to document the little DIY projects I was doing around our home and so I started this blog also.

What does a typical day look like for you?

My #1 job is stay-at-home mom… so my priority is taking care of our daughter, our animals, and chores around our home. During nap time and after we put our daughter to bed for the day is when I get a chance to work on crafts for my Etsy shop and write articles for the blog. I’m thankful for the privilege to be a stay-at-home mom and the flexibility to be able to work on Birch Landing Home when I’m able to.

What’s your favorite part about owning your own company? And least favorite part?

My favorite part about running Birch Landing Home is the flexibility and adaptability… when I first started my Etsy shop I was making jewelry but then decided to go in a different direction and focus more on rustic-style crafts. It was great being able to change my focus like that and make Birch Landing Home what I wanted it to be.
My least favorite part is probably self-doubt… Every time I send out an order I worry if the customer/store will like it, what they will think of it, etc - I don’t want to disappoint anyone. Also, because I use a lot of natural materials there is quite a bit of variation in my work too and I worry people won’t appreciate that rustic aspect of it.

What has been the most exciting moment for Birch Landing Home since starting?

By far my most exciting moment for Birch Landing Home has been being featured in Martha Stewart Living Magazine as the Instagram Favorite for that month. I was so thrilled to be selected and featured - I have been reading Martha Stewart Living Magazine for years and have several of her craft and cookbooks. Such an honor!

What advice do you have for people just starting out?

My advice for those who want to start a handmade business or blog is… just start! It’s easy to overthink everything, over plan, and obsess over details and never get anything in motion. In my opinion it’s better to get things started and then tweak and finalize things as you go. It’s also important to keep finances separate and keep track of all income/expenses for tax time.

What is your long-term goal? Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

My long-term goal is to continue to grow my Etsy shop and blog. I would love to get more wholesale accounts for my crafts throughout New England, it’s so exciting to see my items in local shops. I also hope to continue to grow my blog following and hopefully get more opportunities to be featured in print. I’ve been lucky enough to be featured in a few print magazines so far (including Martha Stewart Living Magazine, Food Network Magazine, and New Hampshire Magazine), and I hope exciting features like that will continue in the future.

Why do you love sharing about New England Makers?

I love sharing about New England Makers because I think there is so much talent in our area that deserves to be shown off. There are so many wonderful, hardworking, creative people who work in lots of different materials and styles. I always love discovering new-to-me businesses and sharing about them.

Keep Up with Birch Landing Home

Some photos and info updated 2021

DO YOU OWN A NEW ENGLAND-BASED BUSINESS AND WOULD LIKE TO BE FEATURED IN AN UPCOMING INTERVIEW? OR WOULD YOU BE INTERESTED IN HAVING ME STYLE, REVIEW, AND FEATURE ONE OF YOUR PRODUCTS?
Please drop me a note.

More Interviews from New England Makers:

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New England Maker: Early American Painter, Suzanne Carroll Korn

New England Maker: Mermaids + Madeleines

New England Maker: Rock Art by Grace Howe

New England Maker: ReclaiMEd Maine Co.

New England Maker: Away Up North

New England Maker: Two Little Beans & Co.

New England Maker: Sara Fitz Studio

New England Maker: Simply Equine Design

New England Maker: Sewcialite

New England Maker: Wolfeboro Candle Company

New England Maker: Woodboogah {+ Giveaway!}

New England Maker: Watts in Maine

New England Maker: Birch Landing Home

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How we Make it Work on One Income: Becoming a Stay-at-Home Mom

When we started growing our family, our original plan was to have me go back to work part-time but once I started maternity leave, I realized I just couldn't go back... breastfeeding was a HUGE challenge for me in the beginning and I didn't want to jeopardize it. We also quickly realized it wouldn't be as practical as we first thought for my husband to shift his schedule around to watch the baby. Daycare did not make sense financially for us and we had personal reservations of letting someone else raise our baby all day. So after a lot of discussion we made the tough decision to have me stay home full time, which was a definitely a wake up call. | This post contains affiliate links |

How we Make it Work on a Single Income

Now I certainly wasn't making the big bucks at my job, but suddenly loosing that income and adding a dependent definitely strained our budget - hard. For a little background, my husband is self-employed which means that we essentially have to pay for everything 100% out of pocket ourselves - health insurance, retirement, life insurance, etc. - there is no paid time off or sick days and no "benefit perks" that come with his job. No Christmas bonus to look forward to every year either. We also have a mortgage and are still paying off college loans - over all it becomes a lot of expenses once you add everything up. In order to make this work we had to cut back a lot, but it's worth it to be able to stay home with our little one.

Here's what we did to make it work:

BUDGET

I can’t say how important it is to have a budget and know where all your money is going. By seeing what all your bills are and how much money you have it will help you efficiently allocate your paycheck and plan for the future. {Please read my blog post on Creating and Maintaining a Monthly Budget if you’d like more information on how to create budget as well as download a Free Excel Budgeting Spreadsheet.}

Called Around to Lower Bills

Make a list of all your utilities, car insurance, home owners insurance, phone plan, etc. Call around to each one and ask if there's anything they can do to lower your bill. Often if you've been a customer for a while and your rates haven't been adjusted in a few years, they will be able to give you a bit of a discount.

If they can't give you a discount on what you have, re-evaluate your current plan. There might be something unnecessary in your plan you can drop to save some money on your bill or consider switching to another provider for cheaper service/coverage.

Cut Cable, Limit TV Streaming Services

Cable TV is expensive - SO expensive. Ditch that bill and you can easily save $100+/month. Subscribing to multiple TV streaming services (Netflix, Hulu, HBO Now, Amazon Prime, etc) also adds up fast. We originally subscribed to several services but now just use Amazon Prime since we pay for that subscription anyways for it's shipping perks.

One Vehicle

Having just one car won't work for every family but we decided it was something we could make happen. With my husband working from home already, we really only "needed" a single car for errands and school drop-off... sometimes there are conflicts when we both need to be somewhere different at the same time, but we've learned to plan ahead for these conflicts and carpool or rearrange a schedule to accommodate each other.
By having one car that means just one car payment, one insurance bill, and one set of carseats to purchase.

Save on Health Insurance and Medical Bills

Ha. I'll use the term "save" loosely here. Health insurance and out of pocket medical costs are sooooo expensive these days and sadly there's not much you can do if the plans available to you are limited and you don't qualify for reduced premiums (both of these situations apply to us). But there are some small tips we've found over the years to help save a little on our health-related bills - these include using your credit card rewards to your advantage, shopping around for care, and asking for prompt payment discounts.
{How to Save on Health Insurance and Medical Bills is a separate blog post that goes into more detail on all the ways we save on health bills if you would like to read more.}

No More Date Nights/Takeout

Before kids, we had date nights a lot - going out to eat, to the movies, etc. But all that spending sure adds up fast. Once I became a stay-at-home mom, date nights were limited to special occasions only and takeout nights have become few and far between.

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No More Personal Shopping

What do I mean no more personal shopping? I mean no more shopping for "fun stuff" for ourselves just because we want to. Gone are the days when we could spend all day wandering around the outlets picking up whatever we liked. Now when we buy clothes it's justified: it's because we actually need a new pair of sneakers or because we have a wedding to attend - no more "just because" shopping. These days we do a lot of consignment selling and shopping, especially for baby/kid's clothes - that way we're never really spending, just "trading up" for what we want or need.
We also don't buy books or movies anymore, we borrow them from the library instead.

Saving on Groceries and Meal Planning

The big weekly bill you have the most control over? Your grocery bill. Groceries are expensive but there are lots of tricks to save that can really add up. Meal planning is probably the biggest one - by planning out your meals for the week ahead you'll waste less and use more wisely. You can also clip coupons and use couponing apps to save even more.
{Saving Money on Groceries is a more detailed post on how we save on groceries using these tips and more if you would like to read more on it.}

That Nap Time Hustle

Even though stay-at-home mom is my #1 job these days, finding something for me to do to generate some kind of income from home was important - which is how Birch Landing Home was born! I started this little blog and Etsy Shop as a way to make a little extra money during nap time. Birch Landing Home certainly isn't huge (yet), but it's an enjoyable outlet for me to work towards growing more. If you have any kind of hobby you can make some side money with, definitely go for it! Just make sure to keep good records because you need to declare this income on your taxes.

Pay Yourself Every Month, No Matter What

This is something my Dad instilled on us from the first day we got after-school jobs. Every month put some money in a separate emergency savings account that you don't touch. Ideally you budget this deposit into your monthly expenses so you know you are definitely putting $X-amount-of-dollars away each month. However even if you can't commit to a definite amount every month you still should put something - anything - in that savings account each and every month (my Dad said so, haha).

My Extremely Hardworking Husband

It goes without saying, but all this wouldn't be possible without my extremely hardworking husband of course. He puts in long hours every day and weekends too to make sure everything keeps rolling. There's no way we could make this work without his dedication and resourcefulness.

What we Should Have Done Differently

We made good headway from the beginning cutting expenses but we should have started A LOT sooner. How soon? Well as soon as we started trying to have a baby! In hindsight, we really should have drastically cut all expenses way before we ever got pregnant and put my whole paycheck away into our emergency savings (or at least 60% of it since I was originally planning to go back part time). Then we would have spent all those months really trialling and perfecting the single-income lifestyle to see what was working while creating a substantial safety cushion.

To anyone who is considering going from two incomes to one after baby it definitely can be doable but I would recommend evaluating all your expenses early and saving as much as possible - that way, it will be a lot less scary of a leap into stay-at-home-motherhood. Good luck and enjoy the journey!

Thank you to my friend Michayla for inspiring me to finally write this post!

Please note: These tips relate to what we've learned in our own experience, but please do your own research for the best information regarding your own situation. Use the information in this post at your own discretion and risk.

New Year, New Resolutions to Save Money

New Year means time for new Resolutions. Usually they boil down to a lot of the same things, and a big one for us is always saving more where we can. Every year everything gets more expensive - groceries, gas, clothes, healthcare, etc but our paychecks always seem to stay the same.
I decided to compile some of my best blog posts on saving money and I hope it will help you jumpstart your savings too!