Show and Tell Tuesday #1

Happy New Year, friends! I decided to start this year (on the blog) with a link up post. All of the topics are so fun. If you don't blog, enjoy following along but if you do, don't forget to link up with Andrea! Happy Tuesday. :)

So today's topic is Steal & Splurge. Maybe this sounds crazy, but I love sharing how we budget and save because it is something that actually works for us. It's the handy-dandy envelope system from Financial Peace University created by Dave Ramsey. My husband and I absolutely love it. It is eye opening to see how much money you could actually be saving. Insert wide-eyed emoji here.

FPU basically allows you to see the numbers in your budget as they really are as well as your debt. Our goal is to pay off our debt by the time we are 35 (God willing), so this allowed us to see how much we bring in, how much we need to live, how much we owe and how much we are wasting. By the grace of God and the help with FPU, we only owe on student loans as well as our vehicle (that we share). Do not be overwhelmed! It will take time and you may mess up a time or two but it is so worth it. If you are looking for a new way to budget or just need a budget in general, I highly recommend that you check out FPU. You'll thank me later. ;)

Ways we save include sharing a vehicle. This obviously won't work for everyone, but thankfully it works for us! We have the same work schedule and only work about 7 minutes away from each other. This allows us to save on gas and car insurance. Now, I am not a coupon-er (not a word but lets roll with it); however, I do watch for sales on laundry detergent, cleaning supplies, and of course clothing because those items can add up pretty quickly. I am a total toilet paper snob so I will splurge on it and get Cottonelle (Clean Care to be exact). As far as clothing goes, I seriously cannot buy anything that is full price and sometimes my husband will tell me that I cannot expect to always pay $5 for a shirt - haha. Maybe it's more than $5 but it absolutely must be on sale (and a good sale) or it must be a store like TJ Maxx. I also love Khols because they almost always have a sale going on as well as provide a percentage off. When it comes to groceries, I really do not need name brand items; however, I do try to purchase Organic or All Natural items so maybe this is a splurge? On to date night, we typically like to splurge on date night so that means pop-corn, movies, dinner, and dessert. The whole nine yards. Date night is super important to me and I believe ALL couples need to date each other and date AT LEAST once a month. To save, we do a lot of at home date nights which we both love because we are home-bodies.