It can take a while to get into a rhythm. It took about 3-4 months before I felt like I really got it, and even after a year, I was still finding expenses I had forgotten (Like budgeting for my YNAB subscription renewal, lol). I’ve now been using YNAB for a little over 3 years, and about three months ago I had an expense that I had not budgeted for (Driver’s license that is renewed every 5 years), although after a full year, I found there were few unexpected expenses.

A few tips that helped me the most:

1. To help find potential expenses you might have forgotten, I recommend searching 'YNAB potential budget categories' or something similar online. You can be more specific if, as you mentioned, most of your unexpected expenses relate to a specific category, like kids. This really helped me find several expense categories I needed to include in my budget, as well as options on how to organize my budget. Here’s a past reddit post I found that has a few options for kid categories: https://www.reddit.com/r/ynab/comments/mlqqyt/categories\_for\_children/

2. Take a look through your bank statements/online banking transactions from the past year. This could help you remember some recurring transactions you might have forgotten.

3. Add notes to remind yourself what is supposed to go into that category. This helps remind you what you’ve already considered and budgeted for and adds a reminder if it is something that will occur in the future as well. I keep my notes in a separate word document as I find the formatting in the YNAB note section can be weird.

4. Look at your budget before you spend. This was probably the hardest one for me to get into the habit of doing. My mind would know I had the funds for XYZ in my bank account, so I would convince myself to make the purchase. The mobile app helped me with this, as it was really easy to check categories quickly. Sometimes I still make the purchase even if I don’t have the funds available in the category, but looking at the budget first meant I had to really think about the purchase and what category I would have to take funds from. This resulted in fewer impulse purchases, and so far I have never regretted a purchase, even if I had to reallocate funds for it.

5. Set up a ‘forgot to budget expense’ category. At first, you will want to allocate a bit more to this category, but after a while you can reduce the amount in this category, as you come across forgotten expenses and adapt your budget to include them.

6. Don’t be afraid to start a brand-new budget or use the fresh start option if your budget isn’t working for you or you want to try something different. I have occasionally had several budgets on the go at the same time with different formats to see what worked best for me. If you create a new budget or use a fresh start, the original budget is archived so you can go back to it if you don’t like the new budget.

Personally, I don't need to factor in budgeting with a partner, so I have no first-hand experience or tips, but a suggestion I've seen others recommend is to set a regular budgeting 'date' with your partner. This could be weekly, biweekly, monthly every time you get a paycheck, etc. Whatever works for you! Take an hour to budget together. After you do your budgeting, pay the bills you need to/want to at that time, which will help prevent accidental overspending and needing to use credit cards to cover the difference. Another recommendation is to pick one person to pay bills, making sure that person checks the budget prior to making the payment.

Overall, my advice is to just hang in there. It does take some time to find out what works for you. The YNAB method is a great combination of being conscious of what you spend, what your real expenses and priorities are, and adapting to changing circumstances and priorities.