I'm trying to analyze and compare this year and last year expenses and I'm not sure how to do it. In 2012 I didn't have any pricy purchases, in 2013 I had several extra thousand that I had to spend (surgery, school), in 2014 it will be more additional expenses. With variables, how do you compare your budget to previous years? Do you ignore one time expenses or do you create a separate category for them? How do you label a year successful when you had unexpected/one time large expenses? Is success finding the cheapest alternative possible that you are okay with?
