<prompt> Human: Warning: this will be somewhat long.Hey everyone! Ive followed rpersonalfinance for a while now, but am doing this from a throwaway since Im not entirely comfortable with having this level of personal and financial information out under my username which is used on other sites.Ive heard about lifestyle creep and always thought that I had more self-control than that. And on the typical median month, it looks like Im doing great! However, I have been frustrated with my lack of financial progress and decided to take a detailed look at where my money goes on average, taking into account larger, less frequent expenses that throw off my intuition on normal months.TLDR: My income has been steadily increasing since I graduated from college 4 years ago, but Im experiencing lifestyle creep and dont know where to cut back. I would appreciate help from this community in pointing out any blind spots I may have when it comes to my familys average spending. Some backgroundIll start with some general information about our life and financial situation.I am 26, married, with 2 kids 2.5 and 1. My wife and I live about an hour away from the city, which is relatively low cost-of-living. We both graduated from our undergrad in 2014. I work as a software developer I majored in computer science, and she is a stay-at-home mom and professional musician.We are both in grad school currently. My degree is online part-time, and Im taking one class at a time. Ill be done after summer 2019. My wifes degree is on-campus, and has her commuting about an hour each way during the fall and spring semesters. Shell be done after fall 2019. During the school year, we pay her mom in combination with someone we trust from our church to watch our kids for the times during the week that my wife is not home. My job is fairly flexible, so Im able to work from home about half the time as needed to cover times when those arrangements fall through. IncomeI have seen my income rise significantly since I started. My first job out of college in 2014 had a salary of 71k, with around 11k of other benefits bonus, FSA, 401k match, minus healthcare. My current job which I just started in March is more salary-heavy with a base of 130k but no other benefits besides healthcare. The only components of my compensation are the salary minus around 800month for healthcare premiums. I recognize and appreciate that I am very blessed to be in the position I am in, and am amazed by the opportunities Ive been given. After taxes and everything, this adds up to exactly 8000month.My wifes income is very irregular, as its usually playing for schools, churches, and local groups, plus a bit from teaching private lessons. On average throughout the year, its about 300month sometimes nothing, sometimes up to 800. Inflow Source ---:--- 8,000 My income 300 Wifes income DebtWe are very fortunate not to have student loans. I had college paid for by scholarships and being an RA, and my wifes family had saved up enough to send her.The only debt we have is a car loan, a balance at the orthodontist my wife got braces in November, and a mortgage on a home worth 300,000 that we bought almost a year ago and are planning on staying in for a very long time. Debt Rate Source ---:------ 247,000 3.99 Mortgage 6,400 4.59 Car loan 1,629 0.00 Orthodontics Typical monthLike I mentioned at the beginning, Ive seen our expenses creep up over the past few years. Individual months arent always bad, but the larger expenses always sneak up on us. Luckily we can always cover whatever comes up, but its disheartening to see what I had planned on savinginvesting get used up.We use YNAB for budgeting, and have since we got married 4 years ago. As a result, I have a pretty detailed view into where our money goes. The problem is, I find myself able to justify nearly everything we spend. Id like some help seeing where Im spending too much and should cut back. My goal is to live on around 6500 per month, and have the rest available for savinginvesting.As a preface, we do give 1037; of our income to our church. This is something we feel is important and are not interested in changing. Ive seen other similar advice threads devolve into admonitions about throwing money away and paying yourself first, and Im not interested in seeing this one do the same. If it helps, subtract that out of our income and pretend it isnt there.Here is what Ive come up with for a typical month. As I mentioned, not everything here is actually a monthly expense; its averaged for what we spend over the whole year. Ive split it into major categories and added up totalspercents in bold, with the breakdown of each major category non-bold below. Its ordered roughly in order of importance. of income Amount Category Notes ---:---:------ 11.08 920 Giving 830 Tithe to church Not negotiable for us, see above : 90 Other charitable giving Sponsoring two children through Compassion International 22.34 1,854 Housing 1,440 Mortgage PI and escrow 322 Required home things Electricity, natural gas, trash, watersewer, yearly HOA payment 92 Optional home things Pest control, termites, lawn care 10.12 840 Food 490 Groceries Any food from the grocery store, not including other things we buy there 350 Eating out Any food from a restaurant 9.18 762 Transportation 380 Car payment Only on one car, the other is paid off. See above for loan details. 205 Gas 102 Car insurance Two cars 75 Car maintenance 17.57 1,458 Important things 450 Medical Doctor visits, vision, dental, orthodontics my wife is in braces, chiropractor my wife has back problems, random sicknessinjuries 400 Kids Diaperswipes, clothes, childproofing, books, toys, activities 185 Visiting family My family lives out-of-state, and we visit twiceyear. It cost us 1,110 total last time we visited them gas, hotel, food, housedogsitter. 152 Cell phone plan Two phones on a 4GB shared plan from Verizon 75 Household stuff Cleaningkitchen products, toiletries 70 Life insurance We just got a life insurance policy, since we have kids and all that. 60 Puppies We have two small dogs, and this covers food, vet, and the occasional toy 56 Internet No cable, just internet 100Mbps. Since I work from home half the time, I consider it a necessary expense. It will go up in the fall by 20. 10 Gym membership I just joined Planet Fitness to get in better shape 12.77 1,060 School and career 600 Childcare Its about 800 during the spring and fall semesters, and not during summer. This averages it over the year. 310 School Tuition and expenses for both of us. Mine is 811semester three semestersyear, and she has a stipend that covers her tuition but leaves a few expenses 150 Wifes music career Instrument maintenance, reed-making, audition travel 9.82 815 Discretionary things 250 Fun travelentertainment About 2 weekend trips per year and one bigger vacation, plus a few concertseventscultural things 200 Spending money 100 for each of us. This strategy has worked really well for us in our marriage, and gives each of us something outside the budget for whatever we want. 155 Home improvement Yard work, landscaping, painting, decoration, random projects around the house 140 Miscellaneous Random one-time things and discretionary expenses 70 Gifts For friends and family. Anything for each other comes out of our spending money. 92.88 7,709 TOTAL EXPENSES 7.12 591 Left over Saving, investing, and extra payments towards debt GoalMy goal is to reduce our expenses to around 6,500. This will be further reduced after next year when we are both done with school. Where canshould we cut back? And what should we be doing with the money we do have left over? We dont have much of an emergency fund we are buffered about a months worth of expenses. My current plan is to save another months worth of expenses, then try to max out our Roth IRAs and pay off our car, then increase the emergency fund to 3 months.EDIT: formatting  <response>: You spend 22 of your income on non-essentials Schoolcareerdiscretionary and another 11 on donationstithes.So, fully 13 of your income every month is going towards personal choices you make that are unnecessary.I think youve pretty much answered your own question. 