July 2012 Goal Update

Lets see how we did with our goals for the month of July:

Here are our 2012 Goals: (in no particular order)

1) To not eat out or at least to not pay out of pocket, with the exception of tips. If we want to treat the family to a meal out, we will make sure we have a gift card to cover all of us.
We did fabulous with this goal.  We did eat out a couple of times in July due to the power outage when we were in DC but we paid with cash and did not use our credit cards:)

2) Pay off 2 credit cards
So excited, we paid off 1 credit card on 04/16/2012
Was super excited to pay off credit card #2 in a few short months but unfortunately we had 2 surprise medical bills come up so we decided to pay off the medical bills first. Credit card #2 is going to take a little bit longer to pay off.

3) Not to use any of our credit cards for 2012. To pay cash for everything.
We did great with this and used cash for our purchases in July.

4) To lower our grocery budget. Our current grocery budget is $200 month for our family of 6. Our goal is to lower that amount and to save the remainder.
We did good last month and stayed under our grocery budget barely. We were able to set aside $12 and put towards our Sam's Club membership.

5) To create a monthly meal plan for our family, to use leftovers more efficiently and to make use of everything in our pantry and freezer.
Did great with this for July- use leftovers wisely and wasting less. With 4 boys, leftovers are not being left over as much.

6) Unclutter the house and become more organized:)
Since vacation and our travels to NC, we have put the decluttering on hold.  We hope to get back into the swing of things in August:)
7) Lose weight- I need to get motivated to lose this baby weight- my goal is to lose 20 lbs this year.
Seemed to have hit a plateau- haven't lost any more but haven't gained.  I am working on changing up my exercise habits.  If all works out, we will share them with you:)

8) Morning devotions, prayer time and more bible reading
Unfortunately, got away from this.  Need to get motivated and get back into my bible readings.  I have noticed when I start my day with prayer, devotions and bible reading, my day seems to flow much better:)

9) Monthly date night with hubby- whether we go out or stay at home, pop popcorn and rent a movie
With our vacation and travels, we were unable to do any date months this month.

10) To spend quality family time together. With everyones schedule and us running all over creation, I would love to spend more quality time together- no tv- us playing games, talking, enjoying each others company.
With the great power outage in DC, we were able to spend lots of quality time together and look forward to doing more.

11) Not to use our dryer to save on electricity and lower our electricity bill
Doing fabulous with this goal and when our electric bill came in it was $27 lower- YEA!!

12) To make a better effort to blog more regularly and to make a blogging schedule
Need to get better organized and actually make a blogging schedule and keep up with it.

13) To make much needed house repairs
Making a list of house repairs to do and hope to get started soon.

14) To fix the car that is sitting in our driveway so that whoever gets their drivers license first will have a car to drive or share if they both get their license at the same time
We are actually going to nix this goal as we are going to sell the car.  My dad sold us my mom's van, so we now have 2 mini vans.  We hope to sell the car that is just sitting in our driveway and being used as a storage unit:)

15) To do 1 project a month and blog about it
We didn't get an opportunity to do our monthly project for July.  We were supposed to make homemade frozen yogurt but someone ate all the yogurt. So, now I need to make more yogurt so that we can make homemade frozen yogurt.  It looks like we may have 2 projects to do in August.

How did you do with your goals last month?