Reading and writing are timeless pursuits that improve the mind and don’t require credit cards — just a trip to the library and a little imagination.

But with all the flashy computer games and expensive toys out there, how can we get our kids to fall in love with good, old-fashioned words?  Shelley Harwayne, educator, literacy expert, and author of Look Who’s Learning to Read: 50 Fun Ways to Instill a Love of Reading in Young Children, is full of ideas, and she shared them at our last PTA meeting at P.S. 183 in Manhattan.

Here are just a few of Shelley’s fun and inexpensive ways to fuel a child’s love of reading and writing.

1. Read aloud to your child.

Easy, huh?  Child development experts agree with Shelley that simply reading to your child is the single most important way to feed your child’s interest in the written word.

Here are some tips to make the experience playful and joyous:

• Create a sense of excitement and wonder around a new book
• Read the first page in the most inviting way you can, “as if you were revealing a secret, making an amazing announcement, or extending an important invitation”
• Point out the name of the author and illustrator, and read their dedications, so children can identify with people who create books
• Use different voices for the various characters
• Make endings sound like endings, choosing the right kind of “pacing, emotion or pizzazz” that feels right to you

2. Expose your children to great stories.

“Be fussy about the stories you read to your children,” say Harwayne.  “When you take the time to carefully select literature for your kids, you are showing them respect and empathy.”

Great children’s literature can also provide cultural referents for an entire generation. Just think of:

• Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst
• Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
• The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss

Others, like classic Hans Christian Andersen tales, supply analogies and symbolism that children will use far into adulthood:

• The Emperor’s New Clothes
• The Princess and the Pea
• The Ugly Duckling

Here are some resources Shelly suggests for selecting high-quality books for children:

• Scholastic’s Teach with Caldecott Medal Winners
• Notable Children’s Books collected by the American Library Association

3. Let your kids get obsessed.

About horses, beads, bridges, trucks, queens, beetles, whatever.  “When people get deep into something, real learning and thinking takes place,” says Harwayne.

4. Give your children rich life experiences.

Take them to free festivals and concerts, farms and cities, museums, and art galleries.  Go kite-flying, river-walking, bird-watching.  These memories will feed their writing, their reading, and their love of storytelling.

5. Play games with storytelling.

Fortunately, Unfortunately. In this game, one person begins a story and then says “unfortunately…”  Another person continues and then adds “fortunately…” and so on.

Whisper a Word. One child whispers a word in your ear and another child in your other ear.  You make up a story with the words and then let the children guess which words were whispered.

Storytelling Jar. This game also helps you find a place for all those plastic party favors and random doo-dads that your kids are always bringing home.

Fill a jug or box with said small toys and use it as fodder for stories.  Pull a couple of toys out and make up a story incorporating the objects.  Shelley suggests beginning with “Once upon a time…” and then introducing a problem to be solved with “One day…”

6. Celebrate your children’s questions.

Write them down, look them up, start a Question Book.  Shelley believes that, “kids should know that we think they are smart when they ask questions, not just when they answer them.”

Here are some books she recommends to encourage children to ask questions:

• Why Do Kittens Purr? by Marion Dane Bauer
• Do Kangaroos Wear Seatbelts? by Jane Kurtz
• Why Is the Sky Blue? by Sally Grindley

7. Allow children time to play.

“There is no rush to read,” says Harwayne.  Because of the pressure to get children to read younger and younger, kindergarten classrooms have become too serious, Shelley believes, and “some kids are not getting the time they need to play.” If we wait longer, reading will “come more naturally.”  (For more on these ideas, see the Alliance for Childhood’s work on restoring play.)

8.  Praise children for working hard.

“Sometimes when children are told over and over again that they are smart, they begin to fear not looking smart and therefore take fewer risks, accept fewer challenges,” Shelley says in an interview with A Year of Reading.

For more on the recent rethinking of praise as it relates to education, see these articles at NPR and New York Magazine about the book NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children.

9. Get silly with language.

“Kids need to laugh every day,” says Shelley, “and their silly sense of humor often differs from ours.”  Notice and make up word plays, puns, jokes, rhymes, double meanings, riddles, songs, and smushed-together words (like brunch and spork).

Have fun at mealtimes by asking your child if he’d like some “slaghetti and beetballs” for dinner or creating rhymes like, “It doesn’t tickle, eat a pickle.”

10. Be adventurous in choosing books.

Some of the most memorable and unusual stories are ones that might not jump off the shelves at you.

Shelley showed us an out-of-print, dog-eared copy of The Fence, a Mexican folktale where a rich man takes a poor man to court because his children were “stealing” the smells of baking bread wafting from his windows.  The poor man paid him back with the sound of coins jingling in his pocket.

There is something so deep and poetic about ethnic folktales. Some of our family’s favorites are How the Stars Fell into the Sky, Tiki Tiki Tembo, The Story About Ping, and My Pig Amarillo. What are yours?

11. Start family rituals around reading and writing.

“Children love rituals,” says Shelley, “ways of living that are repeated over and over again.”  The predictability of family life can provide structure and comfort in an often confusing world.

Shelley suggests creating rituals to go with the nightly read-aloud, like “sitting in a favorite chair, turning on a special lamp, reading a set number of books.”  Here are some more ideas:

• Game Night. Play games every Friday after dinner. (Break out the Scrabble Junior, Whoonu, Boggle Jr, Zingo, Pictionary Jr, Guess Who.)
• Family Journal. Start a family diary or free blog where you sit with each of your children once a week and write down what is going on in their lives, what is important to them, what makes them laugh.
• Letter writing. This idea helps you find a home for all your child’s art that you can’t store but you can’t bear to throw away. Write a letter to your child’s grandparents every Sunday and enclose some artwork.

For more ideas, tips, games, and book lists, see Shelley’s latest book Look Who’s Learning to Read: 50 Fun Ways to Instill a Love of Reading in Young Children. In her thirty-year career, Harwayne was also a superintendent of New York City public schools, a founding principal, teacher, co-director of Columbia University’s Teachers College Writing Project, and is the author of many books for educators, parents and children.

The first clothing swap I attended was held in a loft space in Chelsea’s shopping district in New York.  White leather couches, gauzy drapes, and pop music bouncing from the rafters made it a spectacularly frugal event.  It was also a first for Clothing Swap founder, Suzanne Agasi, who flew in from California to apply her women’s fashion concept to the stroller set.

The Clothing Swap idea is about dressing up just as much as it’s about saving money, recycling, and decluttering. Created by Agasi, the queen of “green glam,” Clothing Swap was designed as a girl’s night out, where swappers enjoy spa treatments, hair and make-up styling, DJ music, and cocktails while the clothes are being sorted.

Normally swappers pay $20 to 30, which covers the (often upscale) location and entertainment. Thanks to Green Works (who was showcasing its new line of natural laundry products), this event was free.

My own kids were misbehaving that morning, so I decided to leave them at home.  Too bad because there was a huge spread of food and drinks for the kids, and no lines for face-painting.  Oh well, I got to get a massage instead.  Even though the swap was definitely kid-welcoming, it was kind of fun to soak up the glamorous atmosphere without having to chase down a toddler.

Plus I got to meet Josh Dorfman, the Lazy Environmentalist, who was filming an episode for his show on the Sundance Channel. (See a one-minute snippet.)  Later I interviewed him about how families can be green on a budget.

How Does a Clothing Swap Work?

• Generally, swaps last about two to three hours. During the first hour and a half, people bring in at least ten items of kids clothing — laundered and in good condition.
• Volunteers sort the clothing (according to gender, type, or size), while swappers socialize. Food, drinks and entertainment are usually provided.
• At a set time, swapping begins. There is no limit to how many pieces you take home, but as the Clothing Swap saying goes,

“Bring what you have, take what you love.”

Organize Your Own Clothing Swap

The most unique aspect of Clothing Swap is the party atmosphere.  You can keep it simple by making it a potluck and hosting at someone’s house.  When I talked to Agasi, one of her pieces of advice was:  the person with the biggest house should host.  However, I know small spaces can work too, since Agasi herself started hosting swaps in her San Francisco studio apartment.

Here’s how, step-by-step:

1. Decide whose clothes you are going to swap: women’s or kids’.  Also, will you do accessories too, like shoes, handbags, and costume jewelry?
2. Invite about 12 to 15 people, which will ensure a wide selection of clothing to swap. 
3. Ask each person to bring at least 10 items of clean clothing in good condition, plus a dish and beverage to share. (If you’re holding it in the evening, a dessert-and-drinks theme is simple yet decadent.)
4. Label empty boxes or sections of your house with categories like gender, size, or type of clothing.
5. Allow an hour and a half for guests to arrive and clothes to be sorted before swapping begins. Either recruit a few friends to sort clothes or ask guests to sort their own as they arrive.
6. Swapping begins at a set time and usually lasts about 30 minutes to one hour. Guests may take home as many items as they need.
7. Celebrate afterwards with more mingling and munching — and comparing of loot!  
8. Donate the leftovers to a good cause (or arrange for a donation pickup with charities like Vietnam Vets of America, National Lupus Foundation, or the National Children’s Center).

Clothing swaps are a great way to combat wardrobe fatigue and get together with friends.  Of course, swapping saves money, resources, and even time, so it’s a positive concept any way you slice it.

Top photo via Creative Commons

Photo: Clearly Ambiguous

We’ve all seen the segments where a skilled shopper gets her entire cart of groceries for $7 thanks to the complicated matching of coupons with store sales and triple coupon days. And we’ve all felt that emotional high when we feel as if we’ve gotten a great deal or scored something for free.

Unless coupons make the difference between eating and not, then I think the costs of using them outweigh the benefits.

Ever Seen a Coupon for an Eggplant?

The most common complaint against the heavy use of coupons is that most are good for highly-processed food or new-fangled versions of products that we don’t need. In addition, the products are often more expensive than lesser-known brands, even with the discount.

Coupons Don’t Beat the System — They Are the System

Coupons make it seem as though we’re getting away with something – that’s why companies keep issuing them. Coupons are a legitimate way to get us to try a product in hopes that we will like it and buy it again in the future.  But even if we have no brand loyalty, we are still playing by their rules.

Extreme couponers are able to game the system so that they get stuff completely free, but their efforts are equal to a part-time job, and they get burned-out from the constant pressure to buy what someone else wants them to buy.

Coupons Create Mental Clutter

It’s hard to do coupons just a little.  In fact, expert couponers say the casual use of coupons is not worth the effort of:

• collecting and organizing
• keeping track of expiration dates
• timing shopping trips with sales
• customizing grocery lists
• bringing the right coupons to the store
• dealing with problems at the register

Unless couponing is treated like a job, it can take away from family time, home cooking, community building, and earning power.

Kids and Coupons Don’t Mix

If you’re like me, you have very limited shopping time before your kids start climbing out of the cart and tackling pyramids of cereal boxes.  I realized I just didn’t have the time for:

• checking the list for detailed product specifications
• finding the right product on the shelf in the right size (the coupon never works unless I get the 8.7 oz tube of Colgate whitening gel with flouride and tartar control)
• tracking down a manager when the product is out to ask for a substitute (because by then I’m already invested), and finally,
• remembering to give the dang coupons to the cashier

But Coupons Are Kind-of Fun

Saving money with coupons, rebates, and freebies is a game.  Maybe it’s just my addictive personality, but I find that games like this can quickly lead to an obsession.

I feel empowered when I spend less time shopping and thinking about shopping. The corporations that bombard me with advertisements, sales, and coupons are smart.  It’s hard to fight them – but much easier if I opt out.

When I took the focus off of spending as a new mother, I threw myself into saving money through volunteering and community building.  I worked to make our public school better; I participated in clothing swaps; I started a childcare co-operative.

Besides the fact that I was saving more money than I could with coupons, connecting with others and feeling like I was making a contribution made me feel better inside, and helped me in the long run too.  The jobs I did fit nicely on my resumé.

7 Ways to Save on Your Grocery Bills

1.  Be faithful to your supermarket.  

Worrying about who has better deals on ham hocks, driving across town, and learning a new store’s layout is very time-consuming.  The grocery business is competitive with a very low profit margin. Some stores have cheaper yogurt, but more expensive bread.  It all probably comes out in the wash.

2.  Watch out for good sales.  

Shopping store sales is a good alternative to using coupons.  You still feel as if you’re getting a deal, but you’re not having to jump through hoops.  (Keep your eye on the cash register while your stuff is being rung up, since sale prices don’t always show up.  Asking the cashier to honor the sale price can be a pain in the neck, but it’s better than feeling cheated or returning to the store with your receipt to get the discount.

3.  Use lists.

Planning ahead is probably the single most important way to save money.  A grocery list can keep you focused and cut down on impulse buying or extra return trips.  Plan your meals based on what is on sale (from that week’s circular, online or in the paper) and watch your savings soar.

4.  Pay attention to how much things cost.

You’ll know a good deal when you see it.  Sometimes it’s hard to find things that are not on sale, because stores know people look for those little yellow tags.  If you know that you can get grapes for $2 per pound, you won’t fall for the $2.99 sale.

5.  Try not to buy produce if it’s over $2 per pound.

The cheapest fruit? Bananas. The cheapest vegetable? Cabbage. Lean toward naturally inexpensive foods and find recipes that your family loves to incorporate them.  Have you tried our butter-braised cabbage recipe?

6.  Buy the store brand.

I always give it a shot first.  If it’s not up to my standards, I move a little up.  For more on how store brands measure up favorably to name brands, and how much you can save, see Slash Your Grocery Bill with Store-Brand Products from the Get Rich Slowly blog.

7.  Seek alternative sources for gourmet food.  

International, organic, and healthy food can really throw off a grocery budget.  Here are some ideas for finding little luxuries for less:

• Trader Joe’s
• Whole Foods’ store brand (365 Everyday Value)
• Amazon (for coffee, tea, tuna in olive oil, chocolate, etc.)
• ethnic aisle of your grocery store
• Check out the winners of the blind taste tests at Cook’s Illustrated.  Sometimes ordinary products are better-tasting than pricey European brands.
• Try some of our family’s favorite recipes.  We never buy gourmet pasta sauces or pizza, for example, because we can make it faster and better at home.

p.s. I’m not totally against coupons. Of course, we all love the ease of online coupon codes, and in this post, I talk about a another kind of coupon and why it’s worth it.

Impress your family with a delicious home-made meal, with ridiculously little effort on your part. Each of these pasta sauces requires no chopping, has no more than three ingredients and costs less than $1.25 per serving.

Not only are they easy, they are authentic.  My husband is Italian, and these recipes have also been tried by his friends and family and given the tummy rub of approval.

Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter

(adapted from Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Italian Cooking)

This recipe wins first place for its combination of ease and yumminess.  For the most intense and sweet tomato taste, canned whole tomatoes in juice work best (crushed by hand or in a food processor).  But in the interest of “fast,” Redpack crushed tomatoes are a good substitute.

Serves 4-6

• 1 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes (Redpack — see “Canned Tomatoes” below)
• 6 tablespoons butter
• 1 onion, peeled and cut in half
• salt

Cook all ingredients in an uncovered saucepan at a very slow simmer for about 45 minutes, or until the fat floats free from the tomato.  Stir from time to time.  Taste and correct for salt.  Discard the onion before tossing the sauce with 1 lb. cooked pasta.

Serve with grated parmesan.

Cost:  $5.30 or $1.06 per serving.

Tuna Pasta

Keep pasta and tuna on hand and you’ll never have to order pizza again.  We like to use spaghetti with this recipe, but any shape pasta works.

Serves 4-6

• 2 5-oz. cans of tuna in olive oil (Genova, Cento, or Progresso brand — see below)
• 2 tablespoons capers (optional)

Reserve a cup of pasta cooking water before draining the pasta.  Toss the tuna (with its oil) and capers with 1 lb. cooked pasta.  If the pasta seems dry, add a bit of the pasta water.

A note on the tuna:  In comparison to the rich, savory tuna you find in Europe, canned tuna in the U.S. tastes washed out and woody.  It pays to use Italian-style tuna packed in olive oil like Genova Tonno (by Chicken of the Sea), Cento, or Progresso tuna in olive oil.  If you can’t find any of these brands at your supermarket, you can usually buy them by the case on Amazon.

Cost:  $4.97 or $1.24 per serving.

True Fettuccine Alfredo

(adapted from The Splendid Table by Lynn Rossetto Kasper and Sally Swift)

This recipe wins the prize for its mild and rich* ingredients:  have you ever heard a kid say she didn’t like white pasta?

Serves 4

• 6 tablespoons butter, melted
• 1 cup heavy whipping cream
• 1 1/2 cups fresh-grated parmesan cheese
• salt and fresh-ground pepper

Boil 1 lb. of fettuccine in salted water until pasta is slightly undercooked.  Drain quickly and return to the pot.  Turn heat to medium.  Add the butter and the cream and toss (2-3 minutes) to permeate the noodles.  There should be very little cream left in the pan.

Sprinkle in the cheese, mix throughly, and season with salt and pepper.  Serve immediately.

Cost: $5.79 or $1.16 per serving.

What Brand of Canned Tomatoes Tastes Best?

Cooks Illustrated, a cooking magazine and website that does not accept advertisements, does some excellent unbiased taste tests and equipment reviews.  For tomato sauces they recommend tomatoes packed in juice not puree, which is long-cooked and ruins the bright, fresh taste of the uncooked tomatoes.  While some canned tomatoes can have a bitter, metallic taste, they liked Muir Glen, S&W, and Redpack diced tomatoes, and Hunt’s whole tomatoes.

Because the recipe above should have more of a velvety texture, I listed Cook’s recommendation for crushed tomatoes — even though it includes puree — because the focus here is on fast.  Crushing whole or diced tomatoes in a food processor would mean an extra step, but if you can manage, the pure and sweet tomato taste is worth it.

Can You Save Money on Pasta?

Yes!  Who would have thought that American pasta would have won a Cooks Illustrated blind taste test?  Good news for budget-minded cooks:  the lower-cost Ronzoni brand won over tasters for its firm texture and its “nutty,” “buttery,” “classic” flavor and Mueller’s for it’s firm texture and “clean” and “wheaty” flavor.

You also can’t go wrong with the Italian Barilla (but it doesn’t make sense to pay for De Cecco and other pricey imported brands).

How Much Water and How Much Salt?

Pasta needs a lot of water around it or else the starches released during cooking will make it stick together and the water will become a slushy mess.  Recipes say 6 quarts, but who wants to measure that?  I fill up my medium sized pot 3/4 full of water, and my large stock pot 1/2 full.  Regarding salt:  2 teaspoons is about right for one box of pasta.

What is Al Dente?

Al dente (or “to the tooth”) means pasta that has just passed the point where you can feel a crunchy hardness inside.  If you cook it much longer, you get soggy, floppy pasta that falls apart.  Pasta should be firm, but not crunchy.  Check the package for a time estimate – I’m always surprised that different-shaped pasta has quite different cooking times.  Start tasting the pasta 5 minutes before it’s supposed to be done.

Don’t Pour: Toss

When I went to Italy for the first time, I looked on in disbelief to see that Italians do not serve pasta with the sauce in a dollop on top.  Instead, before serving, they toss the pasta and sauce together in the pot until the pasta is entirely coated.  Whoa, that was a revelation!

* But These Sauces are Too Fattening!

I’m no expert on diet but I do know that when I married an Italian and learned how to cook in Italy, I forgot all about “low-fat” this and “fat-free” that.  I cooked with all sorts of oil, butter, and cream.  Ironically I found it was easier to stay thin – in fact the effort disappeared.

I’m not saying the diet was the only thing, because you need to look at the whole picture – having a husband to cook for and eat with was huge.  But I still believe that delicious home-made food with a healthy proportion of fat gives you a sense of well-being and satisfaction – and does not make you gain weight.  (Just as carbohydrates like pasta don’t make you fat.)

Italians eat (moderate portions of) this stuff all the time and they don’t have the problems with obesity that we have in the U.S.  A great book to read more on nutrition, whole food, and eating like Italians is In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan.  For an excellent summary, see this article in the New York Times called Unhappy Meals.

Photo credit

Experts are always telling us that to get a handle on our spending we must our record our expenses.  But who wants to fiddle with devising a system or learning complicated software?

With this low-tech but high-functioning chart, all you have to do is click print.

I created a version of this chart in my first months of marriage when it seemed as if our money was being sucked into a black hole. We’ve been using it every month since.

When we first started, I had to keep reminding my husband to write down anything he spent — from cappuccino to bus fare.  But he got used to it, and now he reminds me!

We have been tracking our daily spending for ten twelve years.  It’s fascinating to see our pennies roll into the little compartments, and it has changed the way we think and behave about spending.

How the Daily Spending Sheet Works

• Print several sheets.
• Hang one each month in a central place, like your fridge.
• Every day when you get home, write down anything you’ve spent.
• Figure out where you stand in the Summary table:  earnings – spending = balance. (Carry over last month’s balance if you want.)

Why Paper?

It’s fun to fill in the boxes. I guess writing in those tiny numbers satisfies a craving for organization. Or the need to make life understandable. Even adding everything up with a calculator at the end of the month is an exciting little moment: how much did we spend?

You can buy software or subscribe to online budgeting programs, but I think there is a lot to love about this simple pencil-and-paper method:

• Get started immediately, without having to wade through and learn a bunch of software options
• No procrastinating — all you have to do is jot down a number or two
• Reduce clutter, since you don’t have to go through receipts or get distracted by windows popping up on your computer
• Remember to do it, because your chart is posted in a prominent place
• See the whole month at a glance without scrolling through confusing screens of graphs and tables

Even personal finance experts, like Judy Lawrence of The Budget Kit, agree that the manual approach is part of the learning experience:

“As you physically write down the numbers and visually note them and the surrounding information, there is a special sensory awareness and understanding that occurs.”

Once you experience the overall concept and understand how day-to-day spending fits into the big picture, then transitioning to an electronic system is fine if you want to. But I’ve tried digital programs like the free Mint.com, and even though I like the colorful pie charts, categorizing expenses is clunky and onerous.  Paper is instant and simple.

How to Use the Chart, Category by Category

This printable chart has enough categories to encompass most any expense, yet not too many to make it overwhelming.

When my husband and I need to get more specific about an expense, we just scribble a key word next to the cost like “school donation” or “new glasses.”  This helps us remember larger expenses at the end-of-the-month reckoning.

Here is how you can use the categories to record your expenses:

Savings:  At the top, because if you pay yourself first, you won’t be left at the end of the month with nothing for your long-term goals. Consider a monthly automatic transfer to a targeted savings account.

Mortgage/Rent:  Ours also includes homeowners/renters insurance as well as property taxes, but you could separate these out to Taxes and Insurance if you want.

Household: Anything you need for your house (from furniture to cleaning supplies to repairs).

Utilities:  Electric, gas, oil, water, garbage, sewer, etc. (Jot down the specific expense next to the number if you want.)

Grocery: If you’re really serious about this, you can separate out non-food items into other categories like Personal Care or Household.

Meals Out: Everything from Starbucks to the ice cream man.

Auto/Transit: Car expenses (gas, repairs, insurance) or public transportation costs.

Child/Eldercare: Babysitters, daycare, preschool, summer camp; or any costs associated with caring for elders.

Pets: Food, supplies, vets, daycare, kennel, walkers, etc.

Education: Classes, student loan debt, tuition, kids’ school, professional development, educational books, association dues.

Office: Office supplies, computer stuff, and postage. You could also include business expenses here.

Telecom: Internet access, landline, mobile phone. If you want to separate, you could include cable under Recreation.

Medical: Doctor and dentist visits, medications, healthcare insurance.

Personal Care:  Everyday stuff like toothpaste and soap to occasional expenses like hair, makeup, and spa visits.

Clothes: Plus shoes, coats, and accessories like jewelry, as well as dry cleaning and tailoring costs.

Toys/Gear:  Can also include hobbies and sports equipment.

Recreation: From zoo passes to movie tickets, magazine subscriptions to pool membership.

Trips: Vacations, business travel, airline tickets.

Gifts/Donations: Presents and cards, as well as charitable giving.

Insurance: Life and disability. Car, health, and home insurance can also go here if you want to separate them out.

Bank Fees: Interest charges and any other banking fees.

Taxes: Income, property, vehicle, and any weird taxes I haven’t thought of.

Other: You should rarely have anything that doesn’t fit in the above categories, but just in case.

A note on credit cards and debt:

If you use credit cards to pay for stuff, write down each purchase as you go along and record interest fees once a month.

If you have old credit card debt, you can record repayment in several ways:

• change the “other” category to “debts” and enter it there;
• enter it into the “bank fees” category (even though it’s not only interest); or
• enter it into “savings” at the top of the chart.

I like this last option best because, even though debts are not savings, it is generally agreed that paying off debts is the first step toward saving and building wealth.

What Can You Learn?

Besides being able to explain how your paycheck flies out the door, you’ll also see if you are spending on what’s important to you. Or what’s just convenient or fun. Once you have figured out what you really want out of life (your long-term financial goals), then you’ll be able to make sure more money goes to that, and less to unimportant things.

Here are just a few of the benefits of keeping a daily budget:

Nothing Brushed Under the Rug. It’s not so easy to “forget” incidental spending or blow off small expenses when you know you’ll have to expose them to the florescent light of your kitchen when you get home.

Accountability & Teamwork. With a shared family budget, you can’t sneak a forbidden purchase (without having to lie about it).  Since your partner is held to the same standards, you increase the sense of being on the journey together.

Your Family’s Operating Costs. After three to six months, you’ll have an idea of what you spend on-average per month.  This is really useful if you are wondering about changing jobs, moving to a new city, or how much you need to save for an emergency fund.

Expect the Unexpected. We found that, even if we were doing well in day-to-day spending, we were hit by a large irregular expense almost every month:  a trip, a broken dishwasher, an after-school class.  It’s a bummer, but it’s life. Now we expect unusual expenses, instead of being surprised by them.

How Much to Cut Down. If you are in the red every month, you’ll know how much you need to reduce to break even.  If you are ready to put money toward a goal, you’ll know how much you can set aside and how long it will take you to reach your savings goal.

Where You Can Trim Fat. Knowing where your money goes makes it easier to pinpoint areas to streamline.  You can save huge amounts of money — and have fun doing it — if you treat saving money as a challenge. Keeping your long-term goals in mind, as well as not completely depriving yourself, will help you stay on track and enjoy the process.

What Next?

The beauty of budgeting is that, once you have started to cut down, you can see your savings in black and white.

Keep your completed monthly budgets in a file folder.  At the end of the year, total up your monthly spending to find out how much you spend per year, how much you earn, and how much your yearly expenses are by category.

We have a thick manila folder in our file cabinet called Budget, with ten years of stapled monthly sheets.

I love seeing that fat folder: there’s something sentimental about it in a way that a computer file could never be. It’s a great economic history of our family –  and a window into where we’ve been and where we’re going.

Download the Daily Spending chart now, and let me know how you do!