Changing my money jar amount

Since the start of this journey, I used the money jar (Gail Vaz Oxlade) ,method to help me stay in control of how much I was spending on variable expenses.

At the start I had actual jars with the categories

• groceries (and household)
• gas
• spending money
• entertainment

I went to the bank and took out a week's worth (or two, depending on how often I wanted to go to the brick and mortar), came home and filled up my neatly labelled jars.

Once the money was gone, the spending for that category was gone. 

Some people use a spreadsheet. Some use envelopes. This worked for me. So well!

I went to the brick and mortar because my ATM only gave out $20s and I needed other denominations for the budgeted amount.

After awhile and a budget tweak, I would go weekly to the ATM to get my $, and come home to divide.

At the time I only got paid once a month, so I balanced the calendar to create 3 fake paydays to go along with my real one. I found that dividing my variable spending into four weeks allowed me to be much more successful than one large amount for the month. Hey whatever it takes to make it work.

I don't use the physical jars anymore for these categories.

The last time I see I did a $ amount was here in 2015.

Before that, it was here in 2014

I believe I have been using $280 a week since the 2015 date.

$180 groceries

$20 spending

$20 entertainment

$60 gas.

Some weeks I was hyper vigilant and keep 100% faithful to the amount.

Some weeks I was less so.

But I have kept to my weekly withdrawls for 'jar money'  for over a decade now. It has been one of  the critical pieces to whatever successes I have had.

It is time for a bit of a tweak.

Even though gas prices have gone up ( and down and up and down and up), I am not driving nearly as much. No kids to run around. Significantly less driving since Covid. That will change in the fall. I hope.

As for entertainment...we really don't do a whole lot. The past two years I did almost nothing, taking care of my parents. That amount usually just got funneled into groceries.

Groceries - well I am doing a lot more bulk shopping than I used to. Which really should be the way it is done anyways. Once  a month when I am in the city for my infusion, I hit Costso.  I had never really budgeted for that so it always threw things off and I was scrambling to cover.

So I have taken out the $20 each for spending and entertainment.

I have lowered my gas $ for each week

I have juggled things to make a Costco line that will balance out what I buy there in bulk with what I buy elsewhere.

I guess we shall see if it works.