Today marks 23 weeks for Baby Girl. According to what I looked up on the internet, she should weigh just over a pound and be a little more than 11 inches long. Apparently that's the size of a large mango. She's a mover and a shaker just like her big sister was - in the evenings she really gets to moving around. I've been able to see my stomach move a few times, and Luke was able to feel her kick at about 21 weeks. Raegan always asks to feel her kick, but it's always during a time when she's still, so we've only had luck with that once so far. She pulled her hand away real quick and looked at me like it was the craziest thing ever. :)
I'm doing really well, although I'm definitely a lot more tired with this pregnancy than I remember being with Raegan. So far my feet have only swollen up twice, and both evenings were after I had to sit at inservice training all day long. I've had a couple bouts of heartburn (a little earlier this time than with Raegan - boo!) but I think I've identified the trigger as chocolate (double boo!). Last time it was peanut butter that always bothered me the most. Apparently I have super weird heartburn triggers. My cravings right now are All The Melty Cheeses and Special K. I would add Mexican food to the list, but I always want Mexican food pregnant or not, so I feel like it doesn't really even count.
I've had some luck in gathering up baby things. A gal I used to work with sold me her changing table, swing and activity mat, so we have some basic baby furniture and gear. (We still had the crib and high chair from Raegan, so there's that too.) A girl I went to high school with had a garage sale and I was able to snag enough 3-6 month clothing that I really shouldn't need anything else in those sizes. I also bought 6 cloth diapers off of her, and 6 more at a huge sale at our local cloth diaper store, so I'm well on my way to a good stockpile. I'm not really worried about newborn or 0-3 month clothing, because that's what people always get you at your baby shower. So really at this point my main focuses are the carseat, stroller, breastpump, and finishing up my diaper stash. Everything I've read says I should plan on at least 20 diapers to be able to do laundry every other day. I want to get a few more soon, but then I really want to wait and see what works best out of what I have then buy more of those. I've gone with either All In Ones or the kind you stuff with an insert (why can I never remember what those are called?!) just to make life easier for my daycare provider. I'm excited to use cloth this time and I'm really hoping that they save us as much money as I'm planning on.
Insurance company has been called and I got the lowdown on how much our out of pocket on the birth should be. Last time all we had was a super minimal hospital bill because I had my own insurance plus my husbands (we had gone that route because of the fertility treatment I was doing, to try to minimize those costs). So I definitely wanted to get an idea of what it was going to run us this time. We already have it covered by the savings that I've been doing, but I'm going to go ahead and keep socking as much as possible away every month to help buy some of our "big ticket" purchases still. As long as the Affordable Health Care Act doesn't ruin my insurance in January, then we should be good to go as far as the hospital bill. And I'm slowly siphoning out more and more money every two weeks when my husband gets paid to get us used to not having all that money going to daycare. At least we won't have to start paying daycare for two kids until July. Give us a little more time to get used to that punch in the gut. :)
So all is well with Mommy and Baby. Hoping the rest of the pregnancy continues to be as low key and easy as this one has been so far.
Showing posts with label money. Show all posts
Showing posts with label money. Show all posts
Monday, November 4, 2013
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Go Me!
I don't know if you all remember my plan that I posted about in here last month. I just wanted to update, because I'm so totally pleased with my self control with my credit card! :)
I've been using my Old Navy card to get gift certificates to use in store. The deal was that you had to buy groceries, gas or dining out to get the triple points. Every!single!time I've used my card for one of those things, I've instantly gone to the ATM and pulled out cash to put in an envelope to go towards the credit card bill. We just got the bill yesterday, and it was insanely big. Like, I would never have that much on a store credit card. Ever. But I had every single penny of it covered with the money I had been setting into the envelope. AND, we got a $10 gift certificate with the bill, thanks to how many points we racked up with our purchases. Pretty sweet.
The triple points deal continues through the end of the month, so I'm hoping to get at least $5 more in gift certificates before it's over. Now that I've proven to myself that I can handle a rewards credit card responsibly, I'm contemplating signing up for the rewards card that gives you an extra 5 cents off per gallon at Kwik Shop gas pumps. I already get pretty good savings by using my Dillon's plus card, but who doesn't want to save as much as possible on gas these days? :)
I've been using my Old Navy card to get gift certificates to use in store. The deal was that you had to buy groceries, gas or dining out to get the triple points. Every!single!time I've used my card for one of those things, I've instantly gone to the ATM and pulled out cash to put in an envelope to go towards the credit card bill. We just got the bill yesterday, and it was insanely big. Like, I would never have that much on a store credit card. Ever. But I had every single penny of it covered with the money I had been setting into the envelope. AND, we got a $10 gift certificate with the bill, thanks to how many points we racked up with our purchases. Pretty sweet.
The triple points deal continues through the end of the month, so I'm hoping to get at least $5 more in gift certificates before it's over. Now that I've proven to myself that I can handle a rewards credit card responsibly, I'm contemplating signing up for the rewards card that gives you an extra 5 cents off per gallon at Kwik Shop gas pumps. I already get pretty good savings by using my Dillon's plus card, but who doesn't want to save as much as possible on gas these days? :)
Saturday, August 13, 2011
I have a plan!
I have a friend who recently told me that her and her husband have a credit card that gives them airline miles whenever they use it. She said that her flight for her trip out to California this summer to visit a family member was free because of all the miles they've earned from the credit card. I've been thinking about this, debating whether or not I want to do something similar ever since she told me about it.
Now, Dave Ramsey would be very disappointed in me if he knew that we were thinking about going this route. When I took Financial Peace earlier this year, I learned that credit cards that offer cash back or airline miles incentives are usually not a good idea, because the interest you pay on the credit card negates any good the freebies do for you. What my friend does is set aside the money that they would spend on whatever, and then pay the credit card bill in full every month when it shows up. I've questioned whether I would be able to do that well or not, so I haven't looked into a airline miles credit card yet.
Yesterday in the mail we got a flyer from Old Navy. (I have an Old Navy credit card. It's paid off and has been for months. I'm pretty proud of that!) It says that from August 15 to September 30 they will be giving triple points when you use your Old Navy Visa at gas stations, grocery stores and restaurants. For every 500 points you earn, you get a $5 gift certificate to Old Navy. I think I'm going to give this a try, to kind of see on a small scale how well I do with paying the card off in full every month. I always buy Raegan's jeans at Old Navy because they're good quality and fairly decently priced if you hit the sales, and they always have fun shirts that Zane likes. I already pull out cash every two weeks for groceries and eating out (per Dave Ramsey's Envelope System) so that should be easy to pay off, and why not just do the same thing for gas too? I figure it should be pretty easy now that I've got the hang of budgeting, and we may get the kids some free (or at least really cheap clothing) out of the whole experiment. And if I'm really good at it, we may try a credit card with airline miles.
I'll keep you all posted!
Now, Dave Ramsey would be very disappointed in me if he knew that we were thinking about going this route. When I took Financial Peace earlier this year, I learned that credit cards that offer cash back or airline miles incentives are usually not a good idea, because the interest you pay on the credit card negates any good the freebies do for you. What my friend does is set aside the money that they would spend on whatever, and then pay the credit card bill in full every month when it shows up. I've questioned whether I would be able to do that well or not, so I haven't looked into a airline miles credit card yet.
Yesterday in the mail we got a flyer from Old Navy. (I have an Old Navy credit card. It's paid off and has been for months. I'm pretty proud of that!) It says that from August 15 to September 30 they will be giving triple points when you use your Old Navy Visa at gas stations, grocery stores and restaurants. For every 500 points you earn, you get a $5 gift certificate to Old Navy. I think I'm going to give this a try, to kind of see on a small scale how well I do with paying the card off in full every month. I always buy Raegan's jeans at Old Navy because they're good quality and fairly decently priced if you hit the sales, and they always have fun shirts that Zane likes. I already pull out cash every two weeks for groceries and eating out (per Dave Ramsey's Envelope System) so that should be easy to pay off, and why not just do the same thing for gas too? I figure it should be pretty easy now that I've got the hang of budgeting, and we may get the kids some free (or at least really cheap clothing) out of the whole experiment. And if I'm really good at it, we may try a credit card with airline miles.
I'll keep you all posted!
Friday, April 1, 2011
Geek
Okay, this might seem kind of silly, but I'm still excited about it.
I found the USDA's Cost of Food at Home chart through one of the blogs I read. Basically, you can look at what the average cost for a week or month of food to feed a family of 2 or 4 is currently (well, as of February of this year). You can also look at the average individual costs for each family member by age. It divides the figures into "Thrifty Plan", "Low Cost Plan", "Moderate Cost Plan" and "Liberal Plan" so that you can see where your average grocery spending falls. I would take it to mean the cost of groceries (minus household supplies) plus eating out. You can check it the February 2011 chart here if you are interested.
So for my family, if we stick to our monthly budget (which we have been for almost two months now, some weeks with money to spare), we only spend $27 more a month than the "Thrifty Plan". It might be silly, but I'm pretty pleased about that. It's nice to see that all of my hard work is for something, you know. :)
Also interesting to me was looking at home much the cost of food has risen over the last ten years. Ten years ago, the "Thrifty Plan" for a family of four (in the older child category) was $445.40 a month. Today, in that same category, it's $603.10. Even just going back five years, the cost for a family of four then was $519.00. Yeesh.
***Edited to add: Well, in looking at one of the older charts, apparently this chart covers food that is "purchased at stores and prepared at home". So basically, we go waaaaaaaaaay under the monthly amount for the specific ages of our family members, because my figure included our fast food/restaurant money. Even better!
I found the USDA's Cost of Food at Home chart through one of the blogs I read. Basically, you can look at what the average cost for a week or month of food to feed a family of 2 or 4 is currently (well, as of February of this year). You can also look at the average individual costs for each family member by age. It divides the figures into "Thrifty Plan", "Low Cost Plan", "Moderate Cost Plan" and "Liberal Plan" so that you can see where your average grocery spending falls. I would take it to mean the cost of groceries (minus household supplies) plus eating out. You can check it the February 2011 chart here if you are interested.
So for my family, if we stick to our monthly budget (which we have been for almost two months now, some weeks with money to spare), we only spend $27 more a month than the "Thrifty Plan". It might be silly, but I'm pretty pleased about that. It's nice to see that all of my hard work is for something, you know. :)
Also interesting to me was looking at home much the cost of food has risen over the last ten years. Ten years ago, the "Thrifty Plan" for a family of four (in the older child category) was $445.40 a month. Today, in that same category, it's $603.10. Even just going back five years, the cost for a family of four then was $519.00. Yeesh.
***Edited to add: Well, in looking at one of the older charts, apparently this chart covers food that is "purchased at stores and prepared at home". So basically, we go waaaaaaaaaay under the monthly amount for the specific ages of our family members, because my figure included our fast food/restaurant money. Even better!
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Week 2 of shopping with coupons
So last week I was excited to lower my grocery bill by shopping sales and using coupons, and was looking forward to doing the same again this week. I ended up making a food purchase on Tuesday that bumped my total from $76 to $84, but that's still quite a bit less than the $100-$125 I usually spend, so I'm still pretty please with that.
This week I ended up spending $92. $8 more than last week, but still less than my average, so I'm still okay with it. I had a couple expenses this week that brought my total up: a refill for the Diaper Genie ($7.35 after tax!), and Pepsi and Dr. Pepper products were on sale at Dillon's again, so I stocked up on those. (Luke goes through a LOT of pop, and I mean a L-O-T, so if pop is really on sale I will always buy it!) Walgreen's had Ajax dish soap on sale for 79 cents for a 16 ounce bottle, so I bought four of those, which means we won't need dish soap for awhile. I also spent $5 on a South High sweatshirt that was on clearance at Walgreen's, because hello super cheap hoodie sweatshirt. Can't pass that up! So really, if you take out the two extra expenses of the Genie refill and the sweatshirt, I actually spent LESS on groceries and household supplies than last week ($81 vs. $86). So yay me!
I found some really good coupons in the newspaper insert for today, and hopefully my coupon booklet from P&G gets gere pretty soon. My goal is to be regularly spending only $75 a week on groceries and household supplies by March. It's kind of like a game for me (can I beat my high score from last week?!) so I bet I'll bet able to meet my goal.
I also discovered that I can save money on those dang Genie refills by ordering them through Amazon with my Subscribe & Save discount. If I order them in three packs, I'll only be paying $5.98 per refill. I'm also going to be keeping an eye on Walgreens because I have a coupon that I picked up at Walgreens today that's good for $1 off 2 Playtex products (which is what a refill is). I might be able to get a good deal if they have a sale or Register Rewards at some point.
The other cool thing that I realized just the other day when browsing Amazon (because someday I would really like to have a Kindle) is that I can use my 15% off and 2 day shipping with anything** I order off of Amazon. I only get the 30% on select diapers and wipes, but that 15% and free shipping is good for anything and everything on Amazon. Awesome!
**Well, anything that can needs to be replenished once every month or two. Obviously I'm not going to be ordering a Kindle with Subscribe and Save. Yes, please send me a new Kindle every two months. lol
This week I ended up spending $92. $8 more than last week, but still less than my average, so I'm still okay with it. I had a couple expenses this week that brought my total up: a refill for the Diaper Genie ($7.35 after tax!), and Pepsi and Dr. Pepper products were on sale at Dillon's again, so I stocked up on those. (Luke goes through a LOT of pop, and I mean a L-O-T, so if pop is really on sale I will always buy it!) Walgreen's had Ajax dish soap on sale for 79 cents for a 16 ounce bottle, so I bought four of those, which means we won't need dish soap for awhile. I also spent $5 on a South High sweatshirt that was on clearance at Walgreen's, because hello super cheap hoodie sweatshirt. Can't pass that up! So really, if you take out the two extra expenses of the Genie refill and the sweatshirt, I actually spent LESS on groceries and household supplies than last week ($81 vs. $86). So yay me!
I found some really good coupons in the newspaper insert for today, and hopefully my coupon booklet from P&G gets gere pretty soon. My goal is to be regularly spending only $75 a week on groceries and household supplies by March. It's kind of like a game for me (can I beat my high score from last week?!) so I bet I'll bet able to meet my goal.
I also discovered that I can save money on those dang Genie refills by ordering them through Amazon with my Subscribe & Save discount. If I order them in three packs, I'll only be paying $5.98 per refill. I'm also going to be keeping an eye on Walgreens because I have a coupon that I picked up at Walgreens today that's good for $1 off 2 Playtex products (which is what a refill is). I might be able to get a good deal if they have a sale or Register Rewards at some point.
The other cool thing that I realized just the other day when browsing Amazon (because someday I would really like to have a Kindle) is that I can use my 15% off and 2 day shipping with anything** I order off of Amazon. I only get the 30% on select diapers and wipes, but that 15% and free shipping is good for anything and everything on Amazon. Awesome!
**Well, anything that can needs to be replenished once every month or two. Obviously I'm not going to be ordering a Kindle with Subscribe and Save. Yes, please send me a new Kindle every two months. lol
Friday, February 11, 2011
Debt Payoff Calculator
I found this super handy Accelerated Debt Payoff Calculator last night, and I HIGHLY recommend that you check it out. It's very encouraging if you are trying to pay off debt quicker by adding more to your minimum monthly payment. If you plug in the principal balance, interest rate, and monthly payment amount into the calculator, it will show you how much longer you have until the debt is paid off and how much interest you will be paying over the life of the debt. Then at the bottom, you can plug in an amount that you would hypothetically add to your debt payoff plan - what you might choose to pay above what you have to pay. Hit calculate results, and it will show you how soon your debt would be paid off by paying that dollar amount more per month. It will also tell you how much interest you will save by paying off sooner, and how many months you have saved in paying on that loan.
I plugged in my undergrad student loans. Just the undergrad loans. I have grad school loans through a different loan provider, and the total amount is just depressing, folks. If I follow Dave Ramsey's debt snowball, then I want to start applying extra money to our smallest debt first. I guess I should consider it a blessing that as soon as I pay off the small balance on Luke's credit card by the end of this month, our next smallest debt is my undergrad student loans. Really, we don't have debt in a lot of different places. We have my undergrad student loans, the payment on the Mountaineer, my grad school student loans, and our mortgage. It's just a LOT of debt in those four payments.
So back to the calculator. I plugged in the information from my student loans, and found that if I keep paying at the rate I am now, it won't be paid off until 11 years and 7 months from now, and we'll pay $1855.11 in interest during the payoff. (Lucky me, I have a really low interest rate on this loan!) BUT, if we start paying an extra $100 a month on top of what we already pay, the loan will be paid off in 4 years and 6 months, and we will pay $702.71 in interest. For a savings of $1,152.39, along with 7 years and 1 month of being in debt to this loan.
Just seeing it all spelled out like that makes me feel like, "Yeah, I can manage to find an extra $100 a month to get that bad boy paid off THAT much sooner. That's huge. Like, Raegan would be in kindergarten instead of middle school when we got that loan paid off. Like, Zane would be in high school instead of getting ready to graduate from college. And if I could manage to scrounge up some extra money on some months, we could get it paid off all that much sooner.
So check out that calculator I linked to, plug in your numbers and see what you get. I hope it's encouraging for you like it was for me!
I plugged in my undergrad student loans. Just the undergrad loans. I have grad school loans through a different loan provider, and the total amount is just depressing, folks. If I follow Dave Ramsey's debt snowball, then I want to start applying extra money to our smallest debt first. I guess I should consider it a blessing that as soon as I pay off the small balance on Luke's credit card by the end of this month, our next smallest debt is my undergrad student loans. Really, we don't have debt in a lot of different places. We have my undergrad student loans, the payment on the Mountaineer, my grad school student loans, and our mortgage. It's just a LOT of debt in those four payments.
So back to the calculator. I plugged in the information from my student loans, and found that if I keep paying at the rate I am now, it won't be paid off until 11 years and 7 months from now, and we'll pay $1855.11 in interest during the payoff. (Lucky me, I have a really low interest rate on this loan!) BUT, if we start paying an extra $100 a month on top of what we already pay, the loan will be paid off in 4 years and 6 months, and we will pay $702.71 in interest. For a savings of $1,152.39, along with 7 years and 1 month of being in debt to this loan.
Just seeing it all spelled out like that makes me feel like, "Yeah, I can manage to find an extra $100 a month to get that bad boy paid off THAT much sooner. That's huge. Like, Raegan would be in kindergarten instead of middle school when we got that loan paid off. Like, Zane would be in high school instead of getting ready to graduate from college. And if I could manage to scrounge up some extra money on some months, we could get it paid off all that much sooner.
So check out that calculator I linked to, plug in your numbers and see what you get. I hope it's encouraging for you like it was for me!
Monday, February 7, 2011
Great Deals!
So in my quest to start eliminating debt, I've started clipping coupons and checking out various blogs for ideas on how to save money. I thought I would just share a couple of the gems I've come across in the last few days.
First of all, if you go to P&G's Facebook page and "like" their page, then click on the Special Offer tab at the top, you can sign up to receive a coupon booklet for over $110 in coupons for P&G products. P&G products include Bounce, Charmin, Pringles, Crest, Pampers and Luvs, to name a few, so I'm pretty excited for my booklet to come in the mail. Surely there will be a few coupons that I'm going to use in there, right? Apparently the website is running a little slow because of all of the interest in the offer, but if you persevere, you should be able to sign up eventually. I actually got through with no problem, and after I signed up as a member for P&G and filled in my address, they said my booklet would come in 5-10 days. I'll let you all know what I end up with.
My second find in the last week (and I am SUPER!!!! excited about this one) is Amazon Mom. If you click the link, it will direct you to the page that explains the whole process, but let me sum it up a little for you here. Basically, you sign up for this completely free program. (And I went over the whole thing with a fine tooth comb - it is 100% free.) You get three free months of Amazon Prime (which means that you get free two day shipping). For every $25 you spend at one time in the Baby Store, your free membership in Amazon Prime is extended for another month. THEN, you sign up for Subscribe and Save (which means that you are just setting up what you've ordered to be delivered to you on an ongoing schedule) and you will save 30% on whatever you've ordered. If you decide you don't want to do the Subscribe and Save bit anymore, you can unsubsribe at any time at no penalty. At that point you will only save 15% on what you order because of your Amazon Mom membership. So as long as you spend more than $25 a month (and that's $25 before your discount), your free two day shipping will continue for a whole year.
So here's what I'm ordering: diapers. Gonna need 'em, right? With this fabulous deal, I'm able to get a box of 204 Luvs diapers for only $24.18. After tax, $26.16, which comes out to about 13 cents a diaper. Before I found this deal, I was buying a box of 96 diapers for $15.97 which is almost 17 cents a diaper. Biiiiig difference. I'm pretty sure that 204 diapers isn't going to cover a whole month, but it should come pretty close, and if I buy a box of 96 at Wal-mart, it should last me several months with only having to take some out to supplement the big box from Amazon. Granted, the amount of diapers I get will go down when Raegan goes up to a size four, but it would go down in the box I would get from Wal-mart too, so I anticipate this continuing to be a money saver. I priced Diaper Genie refills, another necessity in our house, and we would save money by ordering a three pack through Amazon with the 30% discount, so I'm going to start that subscription for awhile also. If you don't use disposable diapers, I saw that Amazon also sells all forms of cloth diapers. I don't know enough about cloth diapering to know if you are saving any money by going this route, but it wouldn't hurt to check it out, right?
I feel kind of silly to say this, but you cannot imagine how freakin' excited I am for my huge box of diapers to show up on Wednesday. :)
In other savings news, I took some advice from Penny Pinchin' Mom before I went grocery shopping. I looked at the sale ad for Dillons (and compared them to what I knew some of those items cost at Walmart - Walmart is usually cheaper, but not always with a good sale!), organized my coupons, and figured out what I already had in my cupboards and freezer. With a little planning around what was on sale this week, I managed to get away with only spending $76 on groceries (plus paper towels, shampoo and a couple other non-food items). Normally I spend about $100-$125 a week, so this was pretty big. I know we won't be able to save that much on groceries every week, but it was a nice start to keep me motivated.
So to anyone reading this blog: What websites do you read with advice for saving money? Or what strategies do you use that have worked? Leave me a comment and let me know!
Sunday, January 30, 2011
No New Years Resolutions
We all know that most people break their New Years resolutions. I always do. Mine are always the same vague resolutions every year - I'm going to lose x number of pounds, I'm going to organize this room and that, so on and so forth. So I decided this year instead of making big sweeping goals, I was going to set smaller, monthly goals. My goals for last month were:
January's Goals
* Start Zane's college account
* Look into refinancing my student loans
* Put $x in our vacation fund
* Start going through basement closet
* Go through Raegan's clothes and sort out items that are too small
* Give clothes back to Olivia
* Change out the picture frame in the living room
I'm happy to note that there's one day left in the month of January, and I have accomplished every one of the goals I set for myself this month. Zane has a college account, and we have a plan for putting aside money for it monthly. I looked into refinancing my student loans, and decided that I didn't want to stretch my loan out even longer, so I'm going to stay with the one I have. I transfered money into our savings account specifically for our vacation this summer. I started going through the basement closet. It's not finished but I consolidated several boxes and only have a few more to go through. I cleaned out Raegan's drawers, and gave my mom the bag of clothes to get back to Olivia. (Thanks again Olivia - you saved us a TON of money last year!) And just today I picked up pictures at Wal-mart and put them into our big frame in the living room. So with all of this success, I decided to make myself another list for the month of February. All things that need to be done, but not too many so that I (hopefully) won't feel overwhelmed.
February's Goals
* Put $x in our vacation fund
* Switch car loan over to GPFCU (for a lower interest rate)
*Pay off Luke's credit card
* File our tax return
*Clean out Zane's drawers and closet and get rid of all clothing that's too small
*Mail Zane's registration for Salina Soccer Club
*Make my eye doctor appointment
*Clean out and straighten up my cookbook drawer in the kitchen
*Go to the gym/do a real workout on the Wii Fit four times a week
The last goal is something that I just kind of said outloud to myself over Christmas Break that I would like to get in the habit of. I didn't formally commit it to paper last month, but I managed to get to the gym four (and sometimes five!) times a week all month, except for last week, when I went three times and did the Wii Fit for 30 minutes one other day.
So I'll check back in at the end of February and let you know how I did. Some of them are easy (mail Zane's soccer registration - I'm just waiting on Luke to get it notarized) and doing our tax return is a given. It's just a matter of cracking down and doing it - taking five minutes away from everything else I have going on to get some important things done. Wish me luck!
January's Goals
* Start Zane's college account
* Look into refinancing my student loans
* Put $x in our vacation fund
* Start going through basement closet
* Go through Raegan's clothes and sort out items that are too small
* Give clothes back to Olivia
* Change out the picture frame in the living room
I'm happy to note that there's one day left in the month of January, and I have accomplished every one of the goals I set for myself this month. Zane has a college account, and we have a plan for putting aside money for it monthly. I looked into refinancing my student loans, and decided that I didn't want to stretch my loan out even longer, so I'm going to stay with the one I have. I transfered money into our savings account specifically for our vacation this summer. I started going through the basement closet. It's not finished but I consolidated several boxes and only have a few more to go through. I cleaned out Raegan's drawers, and gave my mom the bag of clothes to get back to Olivia. (Thanks again Olivia - you saved us a TON of money last year!) And just today I picked up pictures at Wal-mart and put them into our big frame in the living room. So with all of this success, I decided to make myself another list for the month of February. All things that need to be done, but not too many so that I (hopefully) won't feel overwhelmed.
February's Goals
* Put $x in our vacation fund
* Switch car loan over to GPFCU (for a lower interest rate)
*Pay off Luke's credit card
* File our tax return
*Clean out Zane's drawers and closet and get rid of all clothing that's too small
*Mail Zane's registration for Salina Soccer Club
*Make my eye doctor appointment
*Clean out and straighten up my cookbook drawer in the kitchen
*Go to the gym/do a real workout on the Wii Fit four times a week
The last goal is something that I just kind of said outloud to myself over Christmas Break that I would like to get in the habit of. I didn't formally commit it to paper last month, but I managed to get to the gym four (and sometimes five!) times a week all month, except for last week, when I went three times and did the Wii Fit for 30 minutes one other day.
So I'll check back in at the end of February and let you know how I did. Some of them are easy (mail Zane's soccer registration - I'm just waiting on Luke to get it notarized) and doing our tax return is a given. It's just a matter of cracking down and doing it - taking five minutes away from everything else I have going on to get some important things done. Wish me luck!
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Financial Peace
I've mentioned on here a few times that I would really like to get out of some of the debt we've accumulated and start saving. I was so excited a few weeks back when I got an email at work saying that because not enough parents had enrolled in the Financial Peace class we offer on Tuesday evenings, it would be opened up to employees also. I've been saying for a while now that I would like to take that class, but that I think it's kind of silly to pay to learn how to reduce your debt. But for free? I'm on board!
The website says that the average family pays off $5,300 in debt over the course of the 90 day class. Wouldn't that just be fantastic? Because I'm taking the class, I get a code so that I can access all of these hints and calculators. So instead of blogging, I think I'm going to go check that out now. :) I'll be updatng as we start cutting debt out of our lives!
Friday, January 14, 2011
Saving money
I mentioned in an earlier post that I would like to start saving more money and becoming more financial secure. One of the simple little ways I'm trying to save money is by running our thermostat a little lower this winter. The last couple years our gas bill has been outrageous in the winter, and my hope this year was to be able to use that money in other better needed places. It helped that we had a very mild fall, and that I didn't even need to turn on the heat until the first week in November. I pretty much just didn't turn up the heat right from the start, so that we could hopefully just be accustomed to the cooler temperature. Right now we have the house set at 64 or 65 when we're at home, and 61 when we're away. I'm sure my mom is partially glad that she's not watching Raegan at our house this year! :) I'll probably continue to do it for the rest of the winter however, because our gas bill came last week and it was about half of what it was this time last year. Pass the blankets, I say!
I found a couple different websites here, here and here that have good information about how to turn down your thermostat, if you're interested. I liked that many websites said that it's a myth that your furnace will have to work extra hard to get back up to a higher heat if you turn it down during the day while you're gone. I'm not so sure about turning it down to 55 while we're gone, but I also don't turn it up to 68 when we get home, so there's that. I hope that someday we'll be able to get one of those really nice space heaterslike my parents and grandma and grandpa have, but in the mean time, blankets and sweatshirts are our friends in the Jones house!
I found a couple different websites here, here and here that have good information about how to turn down your thermostat, if you're interested. I liked that many websites said that it's a myth that your furnace will have to work extra hard to get back up to a higher heat if you turn it down during the day while you're gone. I'm not so sure about turning it down to 55 while we're gone, but I also don't turn it up to 68 when we get home, so there's that. I hope that someday we'll be able to get one of those really nice space heaterslike my parents and grandma and grandpa have, but in the mean time, blankets and sweatshirts are our friends in the Jones house!
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