Part 1: Account Cleanup (May 2026)
Problem: I was getting charged ~$13–$14/month on a “Zero-Spend Budget” even with no running instances.
What I found:
- One stopped EC2 instance (ai-chatbot-new, t2.micro)
- Charges mainly from attached EBS volume + VPC
Actions Taken:
- Increased budget from $1 → $20/month with proper alerts ($5 and $15 thresholds)
- Disabled termination protection
- Terminated the instance + deleted the EBS volume
- Confirmed: No remaining volumes or snapshots
Result: Monthly spend should now be near $0 (Free Tier).
Part 2: AWS Certified Developer – Associate (DVA-C02) Study Plan
Exam Focus: Building and deploying applications on AWS (especially serverless).
Recommended 4-Week Study Plan
| Week | Focus | Key Services |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Foundations | IAM, EC2, VPC, S3, CloudWatch |
| 2 | Serverless & Databases | Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3 (advanced) |
| 3 | Deployment & CI/CD | CloudFormation, CodePipeline, ECS, Beanstalk |
| 4 | Integration & Security | SQS, SNS, Cognito, X-Ray, Step Functions |
Best Resources:
- AWS Skill Builder (official free courses)
- Stephane Maarek + Adrian Cantrill (Udemy)
- Tutorials Dojo – Best practice exams
- AWS Free Tier + CloudQuest for hands-on
Key Rule: Always terminate resources after practice. Use small instance types and your $20 budget as a safety net.
Current Status (May 1, 2026):
- AWS account cleaned up
- Budget properly configured
- Ready to study for Developer Associate without unexpected bills