I decided to build Budget Buddy because I was looking to expand my understanding of SQL, Python, and database systems. Rather than focusing on courses I decided to build something real — that is where Budget Buddy came along. The project grew from a simple transaction tracker into a full production web application with a custom domain, HTTPS, and automated deployments.

With Budget Buddy and the status monitor already running on my Droplet, I wanted to get more reps deploying and operating self-hosted services. Mealie scratched a real itch — a single place for our recipes, weekly meal plans, and shopping lists — so I deployed it on the same box behind Nginx and SSL, backed by its own PostgreSQL database rather than the default SQLite.

After deploying Budget Buddy to production I wanted real visibility into whether my services were actually up. Rather than relying on a third-party SaaS, I self-hosted Uptime Kuma on the same DigitalOcean Droplet — adding a public status page, per-service response-time graphs, and push notifications when something goes down.