<$Wednesday, July 23, 2008$>
Excuses. I'm full of 'em.
| Our finances--and our emotions--have been all over the place lately, with more lows than highs, and I just haven't had the heart (or the energy) to blog about it. Sorry. But here's a quick recap. Two weeks ago: my car died. Ees kaput. Deader than Elvis. The only way to "repair" it would be to replace the engine, which would cost more than the car's Blue Book value on a good day. Husband doesn't want to pay cash for a cheap beater to replace it, and we can't take out a car loan until this house buying business is over with. So for now I'm having to make due with borrowing my mom's van, and renting an economy car on days when she can't loan it to me. Meanwhile, we got Husband's truck running, but after sitting around undriven for three years (yes, really), it needs some work before it's really driveable. And before we can get the work done, we have to get it legal. So it's going to be another week or two before I can start driving it to work. Oh, the fun we're having with the car situation. And then, last week: we failed to get the house we wanted. The seller was willing to negotiate as far as contributing to down payment and closing costs, but not on the price, and even with those concessions he was asking more than the house was worth, so we walked away. The transportation sitch has kept us from being able to have another look at our second choice or check out other houses, but we'll finally get to do that this Friday. Other things happened, too, all at once, the way these things usually go. Lightning knocked out our satellite receivers and screwed up our electrical wiring; thankfully, as renters we didn't have to cover the costs to repair any of that, but it was still hella discouraging. I also finally received a bill for my ambulance ride last November, to the tune of $2,200. According to my insurance, I'm only responsible for about $700, which is a lot better than two grand, but still, that's a great big bill right there. We laughed at the absurdity of it all until we cried, and then we cried until it felt so absurd that we had to laugh. But we hung in there, and prayed, and believed that it would all work out for the best, and everything would be okay. And then, over the weekend, our prayers were answered: we got a letter from an old creditor saying that they owed me a substantial amount of money, some bit of unclaimed property from years and years ago that's been sitting there earning interest all this time. This, of course, seems a little too good to be true, so I'm not going to put any eggs in that basket until I actually see the money in my checking account. But if it is indeed a reliable basket, its holding enough money to do exactly one of the following: A) Buy a car B) Repair Husband's prosthesis and make it wearable again or... C) Completely pay off our credit cards. Oh, man. What a choice. We really, really need a car, and Husband would really, really like to walk again (and I'd really, really like him to, also). But after much deliberation, we both decided that the best thing we could do for our future was option C--getting completely rid of our nasty, evil consumer debt and freeing ourselves from indentured servitude to the credit card companies. Once that's done, we'll be in a better position to be able to afford the other things. Even if we end up having to borrow for them, paying off the card should improve our credit enough that we'd get much better rates that we would otherwise. So, things are finally looking up again. In fact, with the prospect of being debt free looming just ahead, things are looking higher than they've ever looked before, and that's great, because I really need to be on a high right now. Labels: credit cards, debt reduction, house-hunt, personal |
<$Thursday, July 3, 2008$>
House Hunt & Puppy Quest Update
| This week has been one of the most hectic weeks I've experienced in a while. Apart from work being way more busy than you'd expect on a week when a third of the company is on vacation, I've been spending all of my "free" time making phone calls and filling out paperwork and doing research for our potential house. That's right, we found a house! We found two houses, even! One that we love, that's listed at the very tip top of our budget, but that, with the exception of an extra bathroom, is everything we want in a house; and one that is less expensive, and is also everything we need, but that needs some work to update it and make it pretty, and is our backup in case we don't get the first house. As for the first house, we're meeting our agent there tomorrow to go through it once more and put together an offer. Hopefully, next week I'll be able to report that they've accepted our offer and we're in escrow limbo. Also next week, I'll do up a big post about everything we've learned about how to buy a house when you're a first time home buyer with a single income and very little savings, without getting yourself in deep, deep trouble. In other news, we're not eligible to adopt a puppy from the rescue shelter unless/until we get our cats vaccinated, which we were planning to do anyway before moving them into the city. The only reason we haven't done so yet, or at least haven't done so in a long time, is because they're totally indoor cats and are never exposed to other animals. Also, they're both pretty young and healthy, and our unhealthy, elderly dog was our priority. At any rate, they're both going to get bundled up and taken to the vet soon. That should certainly be interesting. Labels: house-hunt, personal, pets |
<$Thursday, June 26, 2008$>
I can has hows now plz?
| New real estate agent seems pretty great so far--no trouble at all getting an appointment with her on her end, she's really flexible, which is just what we need. We just had to figure out some transportation for Husband, and now we're good to go a-hunting tomorrow afternoon. I'll have to come back to work afterwards to make up the hours I'll miss, but it's worth it if it can speed this process up. We're so tired of being houseless! We're especially eager to hurry up and move since we put in an application to adopt a puppy. We didn't think we were ready yet--it's been 8 weeks since we lost Fizzgigg, but it still feels like it just happened--but we saw a report on the local news about a bunch of Bichon Frises getting rescued from a puppy mill and brought to a local rescue shelter, and it just felt like the right thing to do. The shelter told us that they only place puppy mill survivors in homes that already have an established adult dog, though. I'm not sure why, but I think it has something to do with them being freaking terrified of people because of all of the abuse and neglect and whatnot, and the other dog makes them feel more secure. So anyway, we're not eligible for one of the rescues, but they offered to process our application anyway and put us on the waiting list for a puppy, and we agreed. I still get sad thinking about another dog in Fizz's place, but at the same time, the prospect of a puppy is helping me feel a little better. I haven't had an actual puppy to raise in... oh, ever. The only family dog I can remember getting as an actual puppy was when I was six. So it's exciting, the idea of raising a dog from scratch and knowing its entire life story. Scary, considering what a little holy terror Niblet was when she was a kitten (and still is, sometimes, seven years later), and remembering that baby animals can be as irritating at times as they are cute (or maybe that just goes for kittehs). Even so, I'm looking forward to it. Even more, I'm looking forward to being able to give it its very own yard to play in. So that's the news of us for today. Hopefully, by Monday I'll be able to give you a positive update on the house hunt. Labels: house-hunt, personal, pets |
<$Monday, June 23, 2008$>
What I've Been Up To Lately
| As I mentioned last month (o.O), we've officially started our house hunt. But we didn't get very far out of the gate before we got tripped up and had to take a step back to compose ourselves. Unfortunately, the real estate agent we were going with--who is a great guy and and a very knowledgeable agent--is just too busy right now to accommodate our weird schedule. After the second time he's had to cancel an appointment on us--we had cleared Friday afternoon to go look at houses, but he got tied up in closing rigmarole with other clients and couldn't take us--we're stepping back to take a deep breath and decide whether we want to stick with this agent or try out my sister's favorite realtor. So that bit sucks. We did get to go out one afternoon a few weeks ago, and found a house we both really liked, but we were dithering on the location, and while we were doing that somebody else snatched it up. So much for that. Apart from that, I've begun revamping my web site (a redesign for this blog is next on my list), which entails re-self-teaching myself CSS and various other web languages. I also revamped my Etsy shop and added some new items, and have still more stuff to add once I get a sunny afternoon free to take pictures. And I've been writing. I think I'm only 20,000 words or so from the end of my novel. That looks like a lot, until you hold it up next to the 70,000 words (or somewhere thereabouts) that I've already written. Finally, I took a much needed vacation, in which I didn't go anywhere, slept as much as I pleased, got lots of "me" time, and discovered a thrift shop where the clothes are expensive but the price tags are so very not. We're talking brand names that I gave up thinking I'd ever wear a long time ago, and nothing over $5.99. No, I'm not telling you where it is. I don't want you snurching all the good stuff out from under me. But today, I feel stylish and cute and like I belong in a cotton commercial. It's the fabric of our lives! Labels: house-hunt, meta, personal, shopping |
Let the hiatus be ended. I come bearing links.
Hidey-ho, boys and girls! Since I've been absent for so long, I'll waste no time giving you the goods.
That's all I've got. Unless you also want excuses as to where the hay I've been for the last month. I don't really have any of those, either. I just felt a little burned out on blogging--especially on blogging-for-hire--so I put this blog on the back burner while I decided whether or not I wanted to continue it. And the decision I reached is that, indeed, I do. So although, like with my other blog, posting will remain a little sporadic while I try to finish the rough draft of my novel, I will be posting here again. And I will try my very hardest not to let it descend into all rants about our nightmare house non-hunt (which is a whole 'nother post), although as things currently stand, that certainly is tempting. It's good to be back! Labels: bargains, coupons, food problem, link roundup, meta, personal |
<$Monday, May 19, 2008$>
Bauhaushold Blahs
| The Bauhaushold has not been doing so great lately. For starters, we lost one of our own: our furbaby Fizzgigg passed away the first of this month. The rest of us have been slow in recovering from the huge wound left by the tiny guy's absence, a process not helped along by Husband and I both coming down with bronchitis last week. Since then, a whole course of antibiotics has downgraded it to a chest cold, but even so, we feel yucky. So this is why I haven't been blogging lately. I just haven't had the will, nor the energy, to keep up with all of my blogs, and this one received the brunt of my neglect. Sadly, my finances have been equally neglected all month, and that is so not good. So I need to get back to finance blogging, because that will make me feel obligated to be diligent about my finances once again. It's probably a false sense of accountability, but it's accountability nonetheless. Thankfully, Wednesday is a payday. I'll be able to start from there with a clean slate. Labels: personal |
<$Monday, March 31, 2008$>
A journey of a thousand miles, etc.
| The mortgage app is hereby submitted. All of my pertinent financial information is ready to be faxed over to the broker. Since my credit score has really improved over the last year, and we've managed to pay off such a decent amount of debt, I'm not worried too much about our chances of getting decent terms. And since we're first-time home buyers who make less than the qualifying earning threshold, I'm fairly confident about getting some FHA, etc. grants thrown into the mix, too. The procrastination is over, the bullet is bit. Now I get to look forward to a lot of paperwork, a lot of legal and real estate terms that will hurt my head to understand, a lot of disagreement with Husband over what we both want in a house versus what we can actually reasonably afford, a lot of tiring days looking at houses, but in the end, we can look forward to our very own home. And then we can maybe possibly start talking of babies, but first things first. Labels: house-hunt, personal |
<$Monday, March 10, 2008$>
Smooth Sailing Ahead: Windfalls, taxes, and a house in our future?
| Last week, Husband got his student loan check for the semester, and it was double what he expected it to be. I want to put the entire amount toward the credit cards, but he's concerned that we need a larger emergency fund, so we're going to split the difference and put half of it toward debt and half in the bank. That's still going to make a pretty significant dent in our credit debt, though. We got our taxes done last week--actually, a week ago last Friday. Between owing a small amount to Federal, getting back a slightly larger refund from state, and the tax preparer fees, we pretty much broke even, which, I'll take it. Now we're discussing what to do with our tax rebate check when it comes. Again, I want to throw it at the credit cards, but it's really hard for Husband to let go of that much money and not have access to it. So, we'll see. We're also considering using part of it to take a mini vacation to Eureka Springs, the town where we got married. Then again, we might end up putting it towards a down payment. This week is the week I'm FINALLY going to complete our mortgage application. We should qualify for first time home buyer grants that will cover our down payment and closing costs, but it won't hurt to have a few thousand that we can kick in if we need to. And even if we don't, buying a house is a scary enough prospect that having extra money in the bank in case anything goes wrong with the house will make us both feel more secure. So we've got a big credit card payment in the offing, money in the bank, money on the way, and we're on the verge of starting to build some home equity. Add to that my raise, which kicks in this pay period, and the fact that I've got enough work to justify overtime, and after a few uncomfortably lean months, we're starting to breathe easy again. The future's looking pretty rosy for the time being. I tend to believe that these things go in cycles, so we're sure to hit some choppy waters again at some point; but for now it's smooth sailing, and I intend to enjoy it while it lasts. Labels: credit cards, debt reduction, emergency fund, financial planning, goals, house-hunt, money management, personal, tax time |
<$Tuesday, February 26, 2008$>
Goodness.
| Sorry for the silence, folks. I just needed to take a break from blogging for a while, to rest my brain and catch up on other stuff. Good news abounds. If you look over at the charts on the sidebar, you'll see that my net worth is up and my debt is down. Even better, yesterday I received a job promotion along with a pretty decent raise. It's not huge, but it is enough to make up for the extra withholdings we have this year after enrolling in my health plan's Flex Spending Account and adding Husband to my dental plan. This will significantly increase my overtime pay, too, so if I can rack up some extra work hours, we'll be in a pretty good place. This Friday we're getting our taxes done. Subsequently, next week we'll be finalizing our mortgage application. ...aaaand that just put me off on a whole ADD tangent where I spent the last hour looking at home listings. Every time I check them I land on a house that, based on the photos, I think I kinda love, and that is very affordable. It's an older home, though, built in the 1930s, and it's not in the best part of town (though it's not in the worst, either; and the sad fact is that unless you're talking gated McMansion subdivisions with 24/7 security guards, there is no such thing as a safe neighborhood in Tulsa these days), both of which would be a hard sell for Husband. Sigh. ANyway. Point is, 2008 is beginning to shape up into a pretty good year for us, financially speaking. I'm starting to get excited. Labels: goals, house-hunt, net worth, personal, tax time |
<$Tuesday, February 12, 2008$>
Making money from hobbies: a little self-promotion, a lot of self-doubt
| I don't have nearly the time I'd like to be able to put into turning my knitting into some kind of job or career. This often bums me out quite a bit, because knitting is about the only thing I have as much passion for as I do for writing. That hasn't kept me from setting up an Etsy shop, though, but mine could be much, much better. I keep hoping that adding more items and improving the shop is something I'll have time for after we move and I get two extra hours back each day from not having to commute. Of course, that's what I always tell myself. I have skills--writing, web design, knitting, gift basket making, and more--that could be profitable for me. But it never happens, because I can't sell myself. More importantly, I can't sell myself to ME. For every one thing I can do that could be making me some extra money, I can always think of a dozen or more reasons why I can't, or shouldn't, even try it. I'm the queen of talking myself out of succeeding. If I don't buy myself, if I think I'm a fraud and don't believe I'm really qualified--regardless of how qualified I actually am--why should anybody else want to buy what I'm selling? I wish I could be more like my sister. She's talented. She takes gorgeous pictures. She runs her own portrait studio and wedding photography business. She also has tons more confidence than I do. I'm going to work on building my confidence in my talents. Hobbies can be a great way to make extra money, and I know I have things--marketable things--that I both enjoy and am good at. All I have to do is figure out how to make myself truly believe that. Labels: extra income, personal, self-promotion |
<$Monday, February 11, 2008$>
Weekend report
| Well, we got through the weekend without spending any money. Which isn't that much of an accomplishment, seeing as how we didn't go anywhere; but also seeing as we started out anticipating a pizza night and then decided against it, we still get to pat ourselves on the back. Tonight I've got to stop and pick a few things up for Husband, which is usual, but he kept his list really short, so he gets commended for that, too. And I'm going to eat a snack before I stop so I won't be tempted to deviate from the list. I did spend some money at woot! today (a site I normally do my best to avoid), but considering we've been wanting mp3 players forever and these were pretty decent ones going for under $10, I thought it was a justifiable splurge. I got one for each of us. Hopefully they'll arrive in time to load his up with love songs and give it to him for Valentine's day. Oh, and we also spent $90 at the vet Friday, getting Fizzgigg's thyroid tested, but that came out of the emergency fund. Hopefully, whatever's wrong with him won't be too costly to treat (we're still waiting for the test results), but whatever it is, we'll pay it. We just want our little guy well. :( |
<$Friday, February 8, 2008$>
Payday Report - First half of February '08
| I got paid this Wednesday, thank goodness. It was a longer-than-usual time between this payday and the last, and we failed at stretching the last paycheck over the whole 20 days. But the good news is that this paycheck covered a longer pay period, and one that included overtime at that, so it's one of the better ones I've gotten since I worked here. As I mentioned below, we're still working on the Food Problem. This is a constant work in progress, but I'm pretty proud of how well I did matching coupons to sale fliers and buying mostly items that were on special. Like I said earlier, we didn't spend less on this go 'round, but we did buy more for the same amount of money, and hopefully it will last longer than usual, thereby saving us money in the long run. I also shook things up a little by trying some new things and going back to some old methods when it comes to keeping track of the budget. After I finally managed to build a budget spreadsheet that actually works for me, I stopped using my desk calendar to keep track of my bills. I think that's a large part--actually, probably THE reason--I missed that Paypal payment last month. So I've reinstated the calendar. The budget spreadsheet's great for doing the math and allocating funds, but it's lousy for keeping track of due dates and whether or not I actually paid a bill. I also went back to lumping all of our grocery categories together under a single fund. Separating them all out turned out to be too much of a pain in the butt for my ADDness to be bothered with on a regular basis. Next to that, I added a "discretionary fund" to provide a cushion to draw from if we go over our grocery budget. Our goal is to NOT go over the budget, and at the end of the pay period move whatever's left in the discretionary amount over to savings. This is also the fund we'll draw from if we decide to go see a movie or go out to eat--which, given my husband's homework load, isn't likely to be happening too much during the semester. The other change I made was to take out my entire grocery budget in cash and put it in an envelope. This way I instantly know how much money we have left without having to go through the receipts and subtract our spending; and with cash I can't possibly miscalculate and overdraw my checking account. Managing money is a constant learning process for me; sometimes, it's a re-learning process, as I forget to do what works, or try to fix something that ain't broke. Usually when I do that last part, I'm the one who ends up being broke. For the time being, though, I'm pretty happy with the changes I've made, and I think they're going to get us back on the right track. |
<$Thursday, February 7, 2008$>
The food problem: still a problem
| Okay, I've tried to make peace with how much we spend on groceries by rationalizing about how we're foodies and we don't get out that much anyway, but the hard cold fact is that we still spend way more on groceries than two people should. For the last several months we've been going over our already substantial grocery budget, to the point that we spend more on food, alcohol, toiletries, supplements, pet supplies, et al each month than we spend on rent. Sure, our rent's cheap, but still: something is very, very wrong there. As of this writing, though, we're beginning to make some progress. Part of the problem is that I got lazy about hunting down bargains and clipping coupons, and that part's easily fixable. Last night I went to the store armed with a wallet full of coupons matched to advertised store specials, and while I didn't necessarily come out spending less than I normally do on the first grocery trip of the pay period, I did come out with substantially more food to show for it. That should help with the second part of our problem--making our food last longer. We've been in the bad, bad habit of stopping by the store any time we run out of something, instead of seeing what else we can eat instead until the next payday. I've been carping at Husband about how this practice really needs to stop, and he's trying his best to cooperate and eat what's on hand instead of immediately replacing something he's run out of. He's also trying to be more cost conscious when he makes his list, as am I. I think (hope) this is a pretty good recipe for finally getting our grocery budget under control. If we can learn to eat within our budget, then we'll have no trouble living beneath our means and building up our wealth. Labels: marriage, money management, personal, spending |
<$Wednesday, January 30, 2008$>
Do sacrifices alter your personal style?
| I used to love to wear jewelry. Costume jewelry, mainly--I've never been in a position to afford or be gifted with much of the real stuff. In my younger days working in retail, I usually ended up working in the jewelry department, surrounded by cute baubles that I couldn't resist. My jewelry was a big part of my personal style. The old me would have adored some of this wholesale fashion jewelry. But that was back in the days when I didn't think much about my spending, or about putting shiny things on a credit card. The new me hardly wears any jewelry. Other than my wedding ring and a necklace my husband let me pick out for my birthday last year, all I usually wear are a few pairs of inexpensive discount store earrings that I rotate, and often I don't even bother with those. I'm not sure when or why I stopped being a costume jewelry ho. It happened pretty gradually, although I'm sure lack of funds had something to do with it. Being forced into frugal habits had a major impact on my personal style, but I'm sure getting older (and busier) also had something to do with it. Where I used to love trendy outfits, now I wear more classic clothes that won't go out of style. I still have girly phases where I love to dress up and put on makeup, but for the most part I've got a pretty basic beauty routine that lets me get ready for work in fifteen minutes. These things cost less to maintain, too. A lot of jewelry just doesn't fit into that equation. Sometimes, this makes me sad, and I wish I could go back to my girly-girl days of yore. Mostly, though, I'm proud of myself for scaling down and figuring out how to look feminine and stylish while saving a lot of time and money. My new personal style fits in a lot better with my new lifestyle. There's no room here for the old, fashion-conscious, spendy me. Labels: bargains, disclosure, frugality, personal, shopping |
<$Monday, January 21, 2008$>
Payday Report - January 18
| Since today is a bank holiday, I received my direct deposit on Friday. There's not really much to tell--it's a slow time of year at the office, and between short pay periods and zero overtime, things have been a bit tight, and this half of the month is no different. I had enough to pay the bills, put a very little bit into savings, cover our usual grocery spending and give my husband and I each a small personal spending stipend, of which mine mostly went to help pay for my sister's baby shower. I now have just $20 to last me the next sixteen days. I don't think we'll have to dip into our savings to help stretch this one out, though, so that's an improvement over the last couple pay periods. I'll have some overtime on the next one, too, plus in a month I'll have blog ad revenue starting to roll in again, but that all goes straight to the credit card debt. For a while last year I started tracking my Net Worth IQ, and that was fun until it started going the wrong way. I want to start back up again this year, though, and do it consistently from month to month. Once I get time to set it up, I'll post my progress. I know I have a negative net worth right now. It will be a triumph just to get it to $0. I think by stepping up my blogging game, though, I just might be able to make that happen this year. Labels: goals, money management, personal, spending |
<$Thursday, January 17, 2008$>
Grocery guilt & weekend doings
| I'm about to head out to do my guilt-laden grocery shopping, and then I'm off for the weekend, so no new posts until Monday. I'm throwing a baby shower for my little sister this weekend, so next week I'll share some frugal shower tips. Have a good weekend, everybody. Labels: personal |
When you have to do your dont's
| Tonight I'm going to break two of my cardinal money rules: I'm going grocery shopping without creating a budget first, and I'm using my savings to do it. It's really not that big a deal. I get paid tomorrow, so I'll be able to pay the savings right back. And I can make an educated guess about how much my paycheck will be and make a tentative grocery budget off of that. I'm only shopping tonight because otherwise it will be Monday until I have time to get groceries, and we don't have enough to get us through the weekend. So this is justified. Still, it makes me uneasy, and makes me feel like I've failed at something. Perhaps I should ease up on myself. Sometimes you just do what you have to do, and there's no need to feel guilty about that. But in the back of my mind is the knowledge that easing up on myself is the edge of a slippery slope downward into financial chaos. If I'm not hard enough on myself, things could get bad fast. So tonight, I'll feel like a jerk as I hand over the ING debit card to pay for groceries without knowing exactly how much money I have in the grocery budget for the rest of the month. But tomorrow, I'll do my budget and pay that money back, and the shopping will be done, and then I'll feel better. Labels: emergency fund, money management, personal, spending |
<$Wednesday, January 9, 2008$>
It's a minor backslide. It's not an avalanche.
| Howdy, folks. Long time, no post. I have excuses, and a confession. Apart from general holiday insanity, angst, and just plain needing a break, I also didn't know what to post here because, you see, I had let a lot of things slip. I fell out of good habits. I stopped tracking my checkbook balance obsessively. I've dipped into our emergency fund to stretch our grocery budget, and failed to pay back the funds. I even resorted to using a credit card to help stretch my Christmas budget. In short, I've been feeling like a failure. And also kind of like a sinner. Thankfully, with the new year comes renewed energy and drive to do better. Also thankfully, I put my bad habits in check before they started me on a long, downward spiral into financial disaster, such as would have happened a few years ago if I'd made the mistakes I made this time around. I'm especially thankful that this time my finances were such that I had a margin for error. Our emergency fund is large enough that, despite my spending part of it, we're still pretty well covered. My checking account has been kept up well enough that when I overdrew funds, getting the overdraft fee reversed was simply a matter of asking nicely. The credit card thing really bugs me, but paying it off shouldn't be too hard. So everything is still okay. But only just. I've been treading water. I've got to start making forward progress again. I've got to get this blog going again. Blogging here keeps me honest. It gets me to think constantly about my finances, and gives me a sense of accountability, both of which I clearly need. So I'm back on the horse, or the wagon, or the bicycle, whichever metaphor you like best. I have a lot of plans and goals to report on, so I'll be getting to those soon. All in all, I'm feeling pretty optimistic about 2008. It's good to be back. Labels: money management, personal |
<$Thursday, December 13, 2007$>
The cost of living in the dark ages
| Hi, folks. Frankly, I'm just too depressed to put a lot of thought into blog posts for the time being. We were hit pretty hard by last weekend's ice storm, and our home has no power and no heat. Between having to buy an emergency supply of flashlights, batteries and canned goods and having the groceries I bought last Friday become inedible, this is turning out to be a pretty expensive blackout. If I even have any readers left at this point, I just wanted to post a note that we're okay. Cold and cranky, but okay. I'm spending most of my blogging energy right now over at my writing blog, so stop in there if you care to keep tabs on me until I get this blog going properly again. Labels: personal |
<$Friday, November 30, 2007$>
Getting back to normal
| I crossed the finish line for NaNoWriMo last night, and now I'm all written out. I spent this morning uploading a new template for and updating my writing blog, but now, except for knitting, I think I'm done being creative for the next few days. I need a weekend of sleeping and vegging and taking things in instead of putting them out, and giving my brain a chance to rest. I signed up for NaNoFiMo to help me keep my momentum and finish my other novel, but even so, starting Monday I'm going to get back to a regular posting schedule around here. Thanks for sticking with me, y'all. Labels: personal |
<$Monday, November 12, 2007$>
Score another one for the Emergency Fund
| I'm still here, y'all. There are plenty of reasons for my lack of posting lately, not the least of which is the food poisoning I got last week. Hoo boy, that really did a number on me. It took me all week to completely recover. I'm also participating in NaNoWriMo (you can follow my progress here), and between that and trying to finish knitting a sweater in time for my sister's birthday later this month, all of my free time is pretty much spoken for. I just got word that I'm about to receive a nice little $100 windfall. I was sitting here debating whether to throw it at my debt or use it for Christmas shopping when I remembered the hospital bills I'm sure to have soon. They had to call an ambulance for me for the food poisoning, and I'm not sure whether my OTHER trip to the emergency room after my fainting spell a few weeks ago (which I still haven't received hospital bills for, but my insurance statements assure me will cost me about $500) will use up the rest of my deductible for the ER. I've been trying to squirrel away money whenever I can to put towards that, so we won't have to cut too deeply into our emergency fund (though if this doesn't qualify as a justifiable emergency expense, I don't know what does). So this $100 will help towards that. I might have to put the debt reduction on hold a while so we can build our savings back up after the medical bills are paid; but the good news is that we're in a position where that won't hurt our ability to pay the rest of our bills or cut into our living expenses. And that's pretty cool. Labels: emergency fund, personal, saving+investing |
<$Monday, October 29, 2007$>
Happy Date-iversary
| Today is the third anniversary of the semi-blind date that formally introduced me to my husband. It's a strange realization... on the one hand, it's like, "Wow, we've known each other three whole years now. That sure went fast." On the other, it's like, "Wow, I can't believe we've only known each other three years. It seems like we've known each other forever." A trippy feeling, that. I wonder if it will still feel this way in thirty. |
<$Wednesday, October 17, 2007$>
Please Excuse Jean from the Blogosphere
| This blog was signed up for Blog Action Day, which was... er, two days ago. I have a good excuse for not blogging, though. See here for why I missed it. I hope to get back into a regular blogging schedule soon, but probably the rest of this week will be all about catching up. Meanwhile, I'm off to work up a financial plan to deal with the emergency room bills that are sure to arrive soon. Labels: personal |
<$Wednesday, October 10, 2007$>
The food thing, debt progress, and breathing freely once again
| Wow. I sure didn't mean to go another entire week without posting, but things got kinda hectic around here. The good news is, I've got a lot of overtime coming to me on my next paycheck, which should help us get back on top of things, so YAY! With our emergency savings fully funded again, I'm feeling much better about life, the universe and everything. Including our food spending. Between utilizing coupons and store fliers and a little restraint, I've managed to cut it back to a more respectable level, and Husband and I are finally on the same page about extra treats coming out of our personal allowances once the food fund has run dry. But I've also lightened up a bit about it all. We're foodies. Food = entertainment for us, and it's not like we spend much on other entertainment avenues--Netflix and the extremely occasional, must be seen on a big screen movie outing are pretty much our only non-food (and I count alcohol as part of the food expenses) entertainment. We really don't get out much, especially since the fall semester started. Besides that, Husband has special dietary needs, and we're both health-conscious enough to make many "cheap" food options off-limits. Realizing all of this has helped me feel better about the fact that what we spend on food for just the two of us is more than what some families of four get by on. I think we've figured out a balance between knowing what's worth shelling out for, where we can skimp, and knowing what the rules are for handling the budget that we can both be comfortable with for the time being. In debt news, applying my blog revenue to my credit card via weekly payments is proving a lot more productive at knocking down the debt than just tacking $50 or $100 on to the minimum payment was. My blogs don't really bring in that much on a weekly basis, but it's added up to reduce my debt this last month by about $100 more than it would have been reduced otherwise. So that's a method I'm liking and sticking to. All in all, things are looking up. The financial aid check was a huge help, and after several relatively small paychecks (thanks to short pay periods and a lack of overtime) in a row we've got some larger ones to look forward to again. If we can just be careful with our holiday spending, we ought to start pulling ahead for the rest of the year. After a couple of months of living paycheck-to-paycheck and treading water, it feels great to finally be making some headway again. Labels: credit cards, frugality, money management, personal, spending |
<$Wednesday, September 12, 2007$>
A Tale of Good Drive-Thru Service
| Decent customer service is rare these days, especially at drive-through windows where it seems that if the kids who man them have even HAD any customer service training, they can't be bothered to remember it any more than they can bother to say "Welcome to McCarl's King" or thank you for your order (or make sure you get what you ordered, for that matter). I'm not a huge fan of Starbucks, but this time of year, when the temperature dips below 65 in the mornings and actually stays below 90 all day and fall is so close you can practically smell it, I fall prey to the Pumpkin Spice Latte the same as anybody else. With yesterday being the first truly fall-like day of the season, I was jonesing for one by the time I got off work, so I went to Starbucks and placed my order at the drive-through. Now that I think of it, the kids at the Starbucks drive-through window usually are pretty courteous and thorough with the customer service. So score one for Starbucks Corp., that they actually care about such things in this age of entitlement enough to properly train their staff in the ways of treating customers like they matter. But I digress. Back to me at the drive-through yesterday. There was a line of cars in front of me, such that after I ordered I couldn't pull forward for a couple of minutes. After about half a minute passed, I realized that it was still warm enough that I'd prefer a Frappuccino, so I called out to the box and asked if it was too late to change my order. "No problem," said Taylor the Latte Boy, and adjusted my price accordingly. A few more minutes and I made it to the window, where were Taylor's dazzling All-American good looks not enough to make me fall for him while he rang up my order and handed me my beautiful cup of frozen pumpkiny, spicy goodness, I would most certainly have been done for when he then held up a lidded paper cup and said, "We already made your latte, do you want it too? No charge." And that's how I got to sip a re-heated free Pumpkin Spice Latte on the way to work this morning, filling me with a warm and happy buzz that has yet to wear off. Thanks, Starbucks. That kind of service at the very least deserves a mention. |
<$Monday, September 10, 2007$>
One year down; a lifetime to go.
| Friday got busy, and didn't leave me any time to do any of the financial housekeeping I was planning. Hopefully I'll be able to get to it today, or at least this week. I'll keep you posted. We had a pretty low-key, low-cost first anniversary celebration. We went out to a matinee, and had plans to go to a mid-range ethnic restaurant afterwards, but when we got there we found that the place was closed for business, and Husband was stressing about the ton of homework waiting for him back at home, so we called it a day and went home, where the next day (our actual anniversary) we opened a bottle of Korbel that I'd bought the night before our wedding and had an obligatory bite (or several) of surprisingly tasty freshly thawed year-old wedding cake along with our toast. We didn't spend a lot of money making a huge production out of it, and we didn't need to. It was a perfectly nice day spent simply enjoying each other's company. And cake. Labels: personal |
<$Thursday, September 6, 2007$>
Payday Report for September 6, 2007
| The bills are paid and the rest is budgeted. I realized that I need to spend a month tracking my expenses more thoroughly before I'm sure how much to allocate to each grocery category, so I've still got a main grocery fund, but I did separate out pet costs and supplements. I also set aside a separate restaurant/take-out budget, so that'll neither cut into our groceries nor create any resentment if either of us have to cover this out of our allowance. Our individual spending allowances shrunk, but I think it's an amount we can both live with. Now we just have to make sure we stick to our budget, remembering that if we go over, it comes out of our allowances, not out of savings, and definitely not going on credit cards. We also had some medical and automotive costs to cover, so I couldn't add anything to savings this time around; but we're still waiting for Husband's student loan check, which should more than adequately cover everything we borrowed from savings last month. So I'm not stressing about that. All in all, it could be better, but it could also be a heck of a lot worse. Now I just need to sort through my coupons and see how far I can make our grocery budget stretch for the next two weeks (and change). Labels: money management, personal, spending |
<$Wednesday, August 22, 2007$>
Married With Debt
| Speaking of vigorously attacking debts, Get Rich Slowly has an excellent guest article on When a Spender and a Saver Say "I Do". It's pretty inspirational, and also contains some good ideas for going at those debts full-throttle. Husband and I started out pretty much even in the saving/spending department, with neither of us really big on saving. It didn't take long after we got married to realize that at least one of us needed to step up and become a saver if we were ever going to make any financial headway and live a comfortable life. This is all still fairly new to me, and although I suffered a backslide in the last couple of months, I'm ready to pull ahead again. I'm doing my best to drag husband along with me. I think I might print out this article and (try to) get him to read it. Maybe it will inspire him to get in step with me and give us an opportunity to sit down and make a plan together to reach our goals. Labels: credit cards, finance+blogs, goals, money management, personal |