Summary
And there it is – our June spending – our final month on our own! Baby Way is now over-due and will be with us before the next monthly spending post. We’re really excited and looking forward to showing that it doesn’t have to be a crippling financial decision, as most of our peers seem to insist!
Our total spend for the month was £1,928. We’re pretty happy to come in under our £2,000 target again despite a few big expenses this month.
We break our main expenses down into broad categories starting with the big 3; housing, food and transport. Everything else falls into the entertainment category, with any large inclusions explained in detail.
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Housing | £1,284 | See below |
| Food | £286 | See below |
| Transport | £34 | See below |
| Entertainment/misc | £324 | See below |
| Total | £1,928 |
We break each of these categories down in the following sections, giving detail for any large expenses.
Housing
The housing category consists of our mortgage payment, overpayments, bills, insurance, DIY costs etc.
A slightly higher total this month due to our dehumidifier breaking and an annual insurance renewal!
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Mortgage | £415 | |
| Overpayment | £335 | |
| Bills | £113 | Gas, electricity & water. |
| Council Tax | £105 | |
| Internet | £6 | Correction of overpayments |
| DIY | £120 | Dehumidifier for basement |
| Insurance | £190 | Home & contents renewal |
| Total | £1,284 |
We continue to be very happy with our energy supplier, Octopus Energy. This month we received a refreshing email from them saying they would again be reducing the cost of our energy, following cuts in wholesale prices.
Our energy is from 100% renewable sources too which is a great bonus. If you are interested, click through this link and you will get £50 and so will we! It can be hard to find a decent energy company but we really do recommend Octopus.
Food
Our June spending on food was £286. As explained previously, this includes everything on our supermarket shop receipts for the month.
Transport
Our June spending sees the return of transport spending! We haven’t topped up the car for a while but had to this month! We’re only using the car to go to the supermarket so very low cost.
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Fuel | £34 | |
| Total | £34 |
Entertainment/Misc
We decorated our kitchen a few months ago. We’ve been meaning to buy a new kettle, toaster and microwave ever since and finally got round to it this month! We spent a bit more than we usually would to get something to our taste – not so frugal for once!
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Phone Bills | £14 | |
| TV License | £13 | |
| Lottery | £8 | |
| Sports Team Costs | £6 | Match fees, floodlights, equipment etc |
| Presents | £48 | |
| Bed Sheets | £2 | Used an amazon voucher too! |
| Kettle & Toaster | £90 | Splashed out a little |
| Microwave | £99 | |
| Mug | £4 | |
| Face Masks | £10 | A Covid purchase! Hand made locally |
| Sewing | £2 | |
| Shredder | £28 | Ours broke! |
| Total | £324 |
Running Totals
There are a few big things going on in our lives at the minute. We wanted to this section to the end of our Monthly Spending posts to keep track of our total spending on both the wedding and Baby Way.
To be honest this is as much for our own interest/records as it is for our readers!
While these aren’t all spending items from this month, we think it’s useful to keep ‘running totals’ for these longer term categories.
Wedding
No extra wedding costs this month! We’re making progress behind the scenes but we’re a bit nervous about booking anything else when things are so uncertain.
Total to date:
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 'Save the Date' Cards | £26 | |
| Postage | £22 | |
| Registrar | £100 | Deposit paid. £525 more due before wedding. |
| Total | £148 |
Baby Costs
Baby Way is now imminent! We’re currently a few days over the due date so any time now…. We’ll keep a track of the spending going forward but it’s interesting to note that the total pre-baby spend is £444.
All of our baby-related spending will appear in Entertainment/Misc for now, but we’ll also track it separately here. We’re convinced we can spend significantly less than our peers so it’ll be interesting to see how we get on!
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Pregnancy Vitamin Tablets | £8 | |
| Antenatal Class | £80 | |
| Cot | £80 | |
| Nappies | £100 | Second hand reusable nappies |
| Pram | £0 | Free!! |
| Baby Book | £9 | |
| Baby Scan Photo | £5 | |
| Baby Bath | £5 | |
| Yoga | £21 | |
| Reusable Post-partum Pads | £25 | |
| Baby Bed Sheets | £30 | |
| Second Hand Baby Sleeping Bags | £20 | |
| Yoga/Birthing Ball | £13 | |
| Second Hand Baby Clothes | £18 | |
| Breastfeeding Cream | £8 | |
| Breastfeeding Bras | £3 | |
| Perineal Ice Packs | £19 | |
| Total | £444 |
See you next month, when we will be 3!
good luck
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