Good to hear you are wanting to keep a budget and plan!
I do a lot of budgeting stuff with Microsoft Excel (spreadsheet software).
There are open source software packages that are free that do similar stuff (eg Apache Open Office).
I don't own any credit cards, I use a debit card (similar, but draws money that is already in an account), and all of my transactions are free to view or download from my internet banking account. (I am with one of the major Australian banks).
I also did a lot of budgeting work after reading a few books on savings and good life practices, so I can highlight some of those points with you.
In the spreadsheet, you want to start with your income - what you earn.
You then want to list the regular bills/payments that must be made.
The remaining money can be split up into a few different categories such as:
Long Term Savings
Short Term Nice Things
Buffer For Large Payments
With my internet banking, I have set up scheduled transfers the day after I am paid from work which separates the remaining money into different accounts which helps me adhere to this.
I usually keep $2000 AUD in the buffer account, so that if I have to pay car insurance, or repairs, I can do so without having to draw from long term savings.
If my buffer account balance is low, I try and spend less on short term nice things, and use some of that money to get my buffer account balance back up to $2k.
Another thing I can do is I can download all of my spending from my debit card as a CSV (comma separated variable) file, and import it into Aware.
This will show each transaction on its own line, with a date, short description, and an amount in separate columns.
I can then divide those transactions up into things like...food shopping, fuel, take away, fun stuff etc.
If I notice myself spending too much on take away, I will try and adjust my spending habits.
Finally, instead of hoarding my long term savings in a bank account which pays very little interest, I invest in shares which pay a much better dividend/have good growth. So instead of getting say, 1% interest from a bank account, I can get an average of say...10% with shares.
NOTE: Don't go and dump your money into shares! I do a huge amount of research, and talk to a lot of wise people before I choose which shares to invest in. If you do not research this properly, its no better than just gambling it on a game of chance.
Always happy to help you set up a budget or give you some tips on MS Excel!
DDD