As I mentioned in my last post, I’d definitely neglected this blog over the last five months or so mostly due to pregnancy, home ownership and just falling out of habits and routine – as is evidenced by our horrific restaurant spend over the Summer and now into the Fall. September and October weren’t super eventful. I finally started to feel better in September and get my energy back. We took advantage of that by making a quick trip to H’s parents home to get his car that we haven’t used or even insured in almost two years. We also went on a short but pretty swanky staycation at a local spa resort in October. We’re also renovating our bathrooms and started to make some purchases towards that. Basically the foreseeable future is going to be spendy for us due to renovations and baby-related purchases.
What Happened This Month(s)?
For the first time since I’ve been tracking our investments, we actually saw a substantial dip in the value of our investments from August to September. Between the end of August and the end of September our portfolio was down 2%. This might not sound like much, but that’s a nearly $6,000 value. However as we’ve all been told, it’s nothing to worry about if you’re investing for the long-term. We’re going to see plenty more of these downturns and probably much greater ones over our lifetime. Other than that, we just spent a shit ton of money over these past couple of months.
Expenses Breakdown:
Food: I used to be horrified when our food costs came close to $1,000 per month. Now we blow past $1,000 each month like it’s no big deal. I blame the pregnancy. Once the baby comes I’ll blame the baby. 😉
Transportation: September was unusually high because we picked up the Husband’s car from his parents home. We took it for servicing prior to driving it home since it had been sitting stagnant for nearly two years. We also had to pay for a few month’s insurance. This vehicle is probably my least favorite part of our finances. I think I need to dedicate a blog post just to my feelings towards it.
Home Expenses: This includes our mortgage but also the 18 million different things we seem to purchase for our home each month. A good chunk of this was $$ towards our bathroom renovation including new vanities, bath tub, shower base etc etc etc. It’s like we purchased all of Home Depot honestly.
Clothing: I added this section in as this is the most clothing I’ve had to purchase in probably years. Growing a baby will do that, and it is actually terribly annoying. I am SO SO grateful to work from home every day and not have to worry about office attire or not wearing the same thing just about every day. However even just working from home I’ve had to purchase quite a few new clothes because literally nothing fits. I can’t even zip up a jacket at this point.
Vacation: As I mentioned above we had a little splurge vacation to a spa hotel in October. We got massages and ate out every single meal .
Even through this period of awful spending our Net Worth and FIRE Assets are continuing to increase.
