The cost of a little bit of sanity

Dean and I have never done a monthly budget, but it's something I keep saying I'd like to do.  It's not that I don't know what we spend....every month our credit card bill is basically the same and we do an okay job of mostly just buying things that we need.  But I have no doubt that we could cut our spending if we'd only assign every dollar to a certain category, and just stop spending when those limits are reached every month.

So last night I was going through our latest credit card bill, and started figuring out expenses by category.  The amount spent on gas: $409.  Exactly a hundred of it was Dean's (driving to work and back), which means we put over $300 in the van.  That is ten dollars per day.  Holy cow!  But I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.....I spend many hours every week just driving around.  Sometimes in the mornings, we leave the house when it's time for Molly's nap....so instead of going straight to our destination, I'll let the boys watch a part of a movie in the car so she can get a decent nap instead of sleeping for only 10 minutes (plus it gives me a little morning break from the madness!).  Or we'll end up driving around when we've been out in the morning, and we end up too far away to make it all the way home without someone falling asleep (which means they likely won't stay asleep when we get home).  So I figure I'd rather get 45 minutes to myself in the car than no time to myself at all at home! 

We are starting to think about possibilities of moving to a little bit larger house, and where we might want to move....so I usually end up exploring different neighborhoods.  I have become quite the expert on real estate in the Clear Lake/League City/Friendswood area this summer!  And as long as it's 101 degrees every day here, I really don't care how much money I spend on gas, as long as we're cool and it allows my boys to take a break from fighting for a little while!