Many families do not follow through on an annual budget, they start for a month or two and gradually let their budget slide or drop it like a hot potato. I would like to suggest you and your family try a single monthly budget for January and in late January prepare a single monthly budget for February.

We will call this the envelope method, which is very simple method. First you need to determine your monthly income , put your pay stubs and advices involving income in a regular mailing envelope and summarize on the front the total expected income. You could print on your computer a small sheet that has boxes to put the individual amount and total your income and staple or tape it to the front of the envelope.

Then as an example for the expenses. Use the regular mailing envelope for each expense item and write the name of the expense on the front and assign each envelope a number. would suggest printing a small sheet to staple or tape to the front of the envelope with lines and boxes (Use Excel to produce the sheet, it has little boxes at the top of the screen that can be selected). Each time you spend money on an item select the envelope for that expense, put the receipt or a written description of each expenditure in the envelope and write the date and charge on the front of the envelope on the little form. For example groceries, bring the receipt home , write the total on the front of the envelope and put the receipt in the envelope. Use a running total on the items in the envelope so you can see how much you have spend month to date. Write at the bottom of the small form the total you are budgeting for groceries. Then compare the total to date to the total on the envelope to see how you are dong month to date. House payments envelope may only have one item , in that case, just write the total budgeted at the bottom of the envelope and the total paid for the month above it, no form would be needed for expense items that only have one or two entries.

In essence you are preparing mini budgets for your expense items. Look at the expense items individually at the end of the month and see what items you need to adjust for a February budget using the same procedure to keep track of how much has been spent.

Get a small box at the dollar store or Walmart to put the envelopes in for the current month. At the end of the month put all of the envelopes for each income and expense item and of course an envelope for savings or contingencies for the money you did not spend, in a 10″ X 14″ brown envelope and put January 2019 Budget on the front.

THE ENVELOPE BUDGET METHOD PROVIDES A SIMPLE AND FLEXIBLE BUDGET METHOD AND IS NOT AS DIFFICULT TO MAINTAIN AS AN ANNUAL BUDGET. THE BEST PART IS THAT IS A MORE FLEXIBLE SYSTEM THAT ALLOWS YOU TO ADJUST THE BUDGET WHEN A FAMILY SEES THE CURRENT MONTH HAS SOME PROBLEMS. GOOD LUCK AND GIVE IT A TRY. HAPPY HOLIDAY SEASON AND HAPPY NEW YEAR 2020.