Summary
Welcome to our September spending post! Our total spend for the month was £1,636. We’re really happy with this as it’s significantly below our £2,000 target.
Before we get into the spending, we want to apologise. We haven’t been creating any blog posts recently, other than these monthly spending breakdowns. We’re determined to get back on it soon, but we’ve just been so busy since Baby Way arrived in July. He’s taking up so much of our time! There has also been a lot of work for Mr Way managing his tennis club (he’s the chairman!) and Miss Way has started doing some teaching over Zoom. Mr Way has also been told he’s in line for a promotion (about time!!) this side of Christmas so his work is busy too. A combination of all of these things have meant the blog had to take a hit. Anyway, on to the spending!
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 | £979 | See below |
| Food | £303 | See below |
| Transport | £36 | See below |
| Entertainment/misc | £318 | See below |
| Total | £1,636 |
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.
Our September spending was fairly standard in the housing category!
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Mortgage | £415 | |
| Overpayment | £335 | |
| Bills | £113 | Gas, electricity & water. |
| Council Tax | £105 | |
| Internet | £11 | |
| Total | £979 |
We continue to be very happy with our energy supplier, Octopus Energy. This month we received another email 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 September spending on food was £303. As explained previously, this includes everything on our supermarket shop receipts for the month.
Transport
Another good month for transport costs. Our September spending consists of a single tank of petrol!
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Fuel | £36 | |
| Total | £36 |
Entertainment/Misc
This was a fairly standard month. Slightly high eating out costs again, as it’s one of the only things we can do at the moment! Miss Way is getting out to see her friends for coffee/cakes with Baby Way. We also finally booked our wedding band! See the wedding section below for more details.
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Phone Bills | £14 | |
| TV License | £13 | |
| Lottery | £8 | |
| Eating Out | £83 | |
| Sports Team Costs | £14 | Match fees, floodlights, equipment etc |
| Masks | £14 | We wanted spare masks for when we wash the others! |
| Baby Clothes | £7 | See below |
| Birth Certificates | £22 | See below |
| Plant Pots | £17 | |
| Bed Sheet | £13 | |
| Packing Tape | £2 | |
| Wedding Band Deposit | £100 | See below |
| Baby Carrier | £11 | See below |
| Total | £318 |
Running Totals
There are a few big things going on in our lives at the minute. We wanted to add 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
We finally paid the deposit for our band this month. We’re still struggling for motivation on the wedding planning front. It seems unlikely at this stage that we’ll be able to have the day we want by July next year. If that’s the case, we will be postponing until it’s possible.
Total to date:
| Category | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 'Save the Date' Cards | £26 | |
| Postage | £22 | |
| Registrar | £100 | Deposit paid. £525 more due before wedding. |
| Photographer | £238 | Deposit paid. More due before wedding depending on package. |
| Band | £100 | Deposit paid. £700 more due before wedding. |
| Total | £486 |
Baby Costs
This month has seen another few small additions to the baby costs table. These are explained below, but overall we’re keeping spending very low. We have £21.05 per week rolling in in child benefit, so Baby Way is probably making us money right now!
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 | |
| Baby/Mum Vitamins | £53 | |
| Baby Thank You Cards | £26 | |
| Boots | £6 | |
| Baby Related Tablets | £41 | |
| Baby Music Classes | £12 | |
| Birth Certificates | £22 | See below |
| Baby Carrier | £11 | See below |
| Baby Clothes | £7 | See below |
| Total | £622 |
Birth Certificates
He’s officially a person now! We got 2 copies to be on the safe side.
Baby Carrier
We love carrying Baby Way rather than using a pram. We bought a new one which came with a waterproof cover for the coming rain. Of course, it was second hand!
Baby Clothes
A waterproof now the rain has started! Second hand, of course!
See you next month!
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