Hellobee Boards

I use YNAB too and I have a line called "fun money". So on a month where we'd suddenly do a more costly activity, it's usually covered from leftovers from other months. But that to me isn't an activtiy; that's a vacation lol!

@looch: JUst saw this now. I do a monthly line in my budget for events/gifts. I use it when we are going to some party with an expensive gift, eating out at restaurants (recently reserved for celebrations to honor family members) or going someplace awesome that requires admission. CHristmas gifts, vacations and souvenirs are NOT included in this.

I feel like your'e sort of talking about two different things. We do bigger things in terms of effort/unusualness (zoo, holiday lights, pumpkin picking, apple picking). But none of that is expensive. We basically never do things that cost $500. But also my daughter is only 3. Maybe when she's older.

@looch: We do budget for our "bigger" activities, although they are much smaller. A bigger thing for us would be, say, a morning at the farmer's market ($30-40). We try to keep it at $80-$100 a month. There are a ton of amazing free or low-budget activities available locally, so I don't feel like I'm depriving the family of fun by not budgeting more.

@looch: I follow a bunch of local mom and city blogs (Twitter helps!) and regularly Google "things to do this weekend in...". It takes a little bit of effort but you might be surprised at what you can find!

@looch: Ah, I might have an advantage there--I have two girls, a 3 yo and 5 month old. The 3 yo still gets excited about everything and obviously the 5 month old can't voice any objections. My husband doesn't take the initiative to find activities, so that pretty much cancels out any veto power he might have, ha! I am sure it will get much more challenging/expensive as they get older (but, less money into daycare means a bigger budget!).

@looch: do you have to stay in a hotel? We do lots of things but always come home after even if its a long day!

I would just add a $100 line item to your budget for "fun experiences" and then re-evaluate in 6 months to see if its an appropriate number.

For us, we don't budget separately for unexpected things, even if it ends up being like $100 for the day, but we keep a $2000 cushion in our checking account for any unexpected overages across the board and tighten back up to replenish it the following month(s). However, I may pull from multiple sources in our budget to cover a random day out before hitting the cushion. For example, for an apple picking day, we have to drive 1.5 hours each way (so gas), then we spend money on lunch, cider donuts, apple cider, all the rides, fudge, pies, apples, and then possibly eat out again on the way home depending on timing. So that day easily is going to cost our family of four $100. I would probably take half of the money from our food budget (at the moment we combine eating out and groceries), not eat out or order take-out for the following week or two (we usually eat out once a week), and then cover the rest with my pocket money. If it were even more than that (say an overnight at a hotel was involved), we would probably take the $200 in hotel costs from our overage pad and then pay it back the following month.