I am the banking queen in my family! Get yourself "Quicken" software, STAT. It is much easier if you start from day one if you are opening a new account. Although I did once enter 18 months of checking just to keep mine up to date...
Anyway, Quicken is something you can order online, I even downloaded mine so I had it instantly vs waiting for the CD to come so I could install it. It is a way to track your banking, you enter all credits and debits just as you would in a check register. However each transaction is coded with various categories--"housing", "personal care"--ie massages!, "clothing", "groceries", "dining", you get the idea.
That way at any given time you can pull up charts/graphs that show you where your money is going. You can also set up a budget and then Quicken will tell you if you spent more/less than you planned to on any given area during a month...
Sounds boring but I love it! Plus at the end of the year you have easy printouts for tax time of what you spent on childcare, charitable giving, medical, etc.
Three days out of town? Interesting... I like road trips.
I like road trips.
