After my deposit of coin jar money yesterday and my weekly $10 auto deposit to savings, plus today's interest at ING, my Emergency Fund is now at $3021.46. My February goal was $3200, so that was met. My goal for the month of March is to get the Emergency Fund to $3200. I am not being overly aggressive this month because we're going to Disneyland. So that will be the usual $100 transfer to the EF, plus the four weekly $10 auto transfers. That'll leave me with $38.54 to scrape up.

We received our property tax in the mail and it's gone down by almost $200 for the year. That means I only need to be budgeting $71 a month for property tax instead of $100. I am going to put the additional $29 into the college fund each month along with the $100 from the Vacation Fund I am eliminiating and the $50 from the laptop fund and the $50 from the appliance fund. So $229 a month will be going into the CF, plus any Christmas bonus DH gets this year and next year's tax refund. That should cover a year at the community college and text books.

One of the courses DD is taking next year at the high school is worth 5 college credits, so that will be one less class to pay for. She is getting pretty serious about doing the peace corp after 2 years at the community college before coming back and completing college. She'll come back from that with $7000 for school, teaching experience, intensive foreign language training, and the ability to live on a budget in a third world country, all things which should bode well for her future. I would like her to go to one of the Chinese language countries as I think Mandarin would be of most benefit to her future, but it's her decision to make.

We have made the decision to start raising rabbits this year and not next. It is a big decision, but my mother was very excited about the idea of doing it. I thought she'd be down on it, but she wants us to raise them and some meat chickens and take out her large flower garden and plant it in vegetables this year. So, I am really getting just about everything we want for our homesteading ventures.

I think part of why my mother is so on board with all of this is because the way the economy is going she doesn't think she'll be able to afford to buy food, just to grow it. I have told her that we will always make sure she is provided for, that's what you do for family, but she still worries. There is a sharp rise in prices right now and there will probably be an even sharper one in a couple of months, so I don't really blame her.

I paid out $90 for physical therapy today.

I created the March budget today and then set about "paying" the bills for the first week of March, which basically just involved me duducting all of the autopays that will come out of the checking account next week and actually writing out and mailing one check.

So bills that "went out" today are:

$153.00 Storage
__41.16 ADT security Old House
__46.63 Old House Insurance
__59.89 Car Insurance
__32.70 Life Insurance Me
__39.53 Life Insurance DH
__30.35 Electric Old House
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$403.26 Total out

I hate looking at that monthly storage bill, but what else are we going to do? Living in a space that is 1000 square feet, but having stuff for 1600 square feet does cause an imbalance. Hopefully the house will sell this summer (assuming the workmen ever get done) and we can buy something and move from here and not be paying storage fees anymore.

I will write Mom a check on the first for utilities, $300. I will have $90 go out on Friday for physical therapy. And I will pay out $25 on Friday to the kids for their allowances. Otherwise there will be no expenses due until I pay the mortgage on the 8th.

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I should not have to go to the grocery store before than, either. DH picked up milk today and I'm not drinking it so it will last longer. I was very displeased to see that Organic Valley milk is no longer coming in a full gallon size, at least at the Haggen by our house. It is 96 ounces instead of 128 ounces for 5.29 (was $5.99 for a gallon).

Why the heck would anyone want to purchase a jug with only 3 quarts in it? Half gallon or gallon for choices is much better. Honestly, I think they are trying to get away with selling less milk, but hoping people won't notice there is an entire quart missing from the jug. They've made the jug more square shaped, and redesigned the lid and the label, so I think they are hoping to pass it off as a full gallon jug for a while. I bet the price will go back up to $5.99 a jug in about a month or so, too.

It's like the switch from 16 ounce cans of fruits and veggies to 15 ounce, or when they made the big box of cereal narrower but retained the height and lowered the ounce size, hoping no one would notice. This kind of packaging jiggery-pokery does not fly with me.

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I added $1 to the coin jar today.

I went in to the dentist today to have my second crown started. This was on the other side of my mouth, but also the six year old molar. This tooth had a gigantic silver amalgam filling in it which is now gone. I am glad. I never liked having metal in my mouth and this was an old, old filling from before they talked about getting mercury poisoning from them. It feels like he gave me enough anesthetic to put down a small horse, but he still had to stop in the middle and give me another one. It is supposed to wear off somewhere around 7 or 8 p.m.

Anyway, the temporary crown is on now and I go back for the permanent one on March 7nth. Hopefully I am making sense here, as I am on a pretty powerful pain med, so if this rambles more than usual, that is why.

While I was there I finished paying off the first crown, $233.90 and I have the paper with what will likely be our portion for this one, $665.35. Not as much as the first one as we had less dental benefits left for 2012 as I had a porcelain filling to replace a cracked silver one and a sealent earlier that year. This probably uses all my dental benefits for the year (except for cleanings), but the dentist says everything is in great shape now and I shouldn't need anymore work done.

I talked to them about maybe getting the gap between my front teeth fixed. I never used to have one, but over the past five years it has gradually gotten bigger. They may be able to just fix it cosmetically with veneers or I may have to go to an orthodontist and get an appliance or something like Invisalign. I don't want to do actual metal braces. I know how much they hurt my daughter. I have a low pain threshhold in my mouth even though I have a very high one everywhere else. But the gap does bug me. I had perfectly straight teeth up until it started moving.

I'll need to have DH check and see if our insurance covers orthodontia. Otherwise I will have to save up for it. I know veneers can cost about $900 per tooth if we go that route.

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I cashed out at Swagbucks again yesterday for a $5 Amazon gift card.

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I added the AMEX cash back and my coin jar savings and the weekly $10 autotransfer I've had set up for years to the Emergency Fund, a total of $136, making the total in it now $2981.35. That leaves me with $18.65 to come up with to meet my February goal of $3000 in the EF. Next Thursday will be another $10 autotransfer, so that will leave me with $8.65 to scrounge up. I am so close.

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DH and I are still working on our meal plan for Disneyland. I think we are going to pack along a cheap crockpot. That way we can put a roast or a chicken in when we leave in the morning and have it ready for us when we come back at dinner time. Despite the condos having full kitchens they don't have crockpots, which I really think they should. It makes a lot of sense to have one in a place that caters to Disneyland goers. I will also pick up some of those crockpot bags to make it easy to clean. Usually I consider those a waste of money, but in this situation I'll splurge for them.

It sure doesn't seem like there's much to report in on now that I'm not trying to pay off a bunch of credit cards. The mortgage and the van loan are things that happen once a month.

I did go to Costco today and got my AMEX rewards coupon check cashed. I will go to the CU tomorrow and make a deposit of that and the coin jar money.

I also bought cheese, toilet paper, and a case of oranges while there. I spent $41.61. I didn't think about olive oil which I am getting low on, but I have half a bottle so I think I'm okay for another month. If not, I'll shlep myself over there.

I did price the S&W organic tomato sauce in the #10 cans. It is $2.59 for 101 ounces, so 2 cans would be 202 and $5.18. They have stopped carrying S&W tomato sauce there and have switched to their own store brand. Because of DS's allergies we have to be very careful on brands and ingredients. But if we were to buy their brand it would cost $6.99 for 12 15 ounce cans for a total of 180 ounces. So obviously the #10 can is a better deal. I hope they are not phasing it out completely and I will still be able to get the big cans for a while.

I did put up some sauce last summer, but the kids will only eat it mixed with store sauce. Next year I won't bother putting up sauce, it's not worth the labor if they won't eat it. I'll just put up diced tomatoes. It's just not cost effective, either, to do sauce. Anyway, I will be making a trip back to Costco at some point to buy several of the larger cans and then every time I open a can I am going to put what is left of it into quart or pint containers and freeze the rest. It is much more economical and I don't have to worry about the allergy issue.

I have thought of just recanning it, as well, since I've seen where people have successfully recanned the large containers of ketchup and mustard. Should be safe, though I might want to add a bit of lemon juice to each jar if I do that.

Speaking of mustard, I am getting low so I will be making a new batch soon. I am going to add some cayenne this time. I want it to have a bit of a kick. It was good last time, but a little mild for my liking and since I am the only one who eats it, I can tinker until I get it to where I like it.

Well, I suppose that's about it. Oh, I got 2 $5 gift cards from Swagbucks today. That puts my Amazon gift card amount at $100. I should have enough to cash out again tonight or tomorrow.

Today we did some major shopping. Mostly it was too replace things that are past re-mending (i.e. things that have already been mended once, often more than once).

We ended up spending $325.05 and supposedly saved $63.55 due to clearance and sale prices. DH got 3 pairs of jeans. He told quite a hilarious story of ripping out his jeans right before getting to the airport and having to mend them with duct tape because there were no sewing kits available. At least you can pass through airport x-ray machines with a duct-taped crotch. Good to know.

DS got a pair of Wellies, 2 sizes up, yikes, a pair of flip flops for vacation and summer and a new pair of tennis shoes. He also got several pairs of underwear. He's growing like a weed. He'll probably be as tall as me by the end of this year.

I got three shirts, slightly nicer than t-shirts, but not super dressy. I was happy to find one in kelly green. It is a hard color to find so when I saw it I jumped on it. There is a rather violent perdominance of neon colors in the stores right now. Painfully neon bright.

DD got a pair of flip flops, 2 pairs of sweats and a t-shirt.

Then for the household I got 6 new washcloths. I used to have 20 white ones, but my mother keeps stealing them. Just because she got the twenty pack of white ones from Wal-Mart once upon a time, she thinks all of the white ones are hers. Well, 4 turquiose, one hot pink and one bright yellow, should stop confusing her on that score.

I also bought a new sheet set for the king bed. The turquoise sheet finally gave up the ghost after a couple of sewing repairs. I plan to make linen napkins out of the side that isn't all ripped up. The replacements are a sort of bluish green sea foam color. Sheets are expensive. I got the moderately priced ones, but I still thought they were expensive for not all that much fabric.

The kids got headphones and batteries and DH got some body wash. We should not need to make any such purchases again for quite some time.

I added $3 to the coin jar today and sent $854 to the Vacation Fund. The puts it at $1119.65.

It was a very weird feeling indeed to realize that with all of the credit cards paid off, I had quite a bit of money left over today. Of course it's going into the Vacation Fund, but once the trip is over, that extra money will be going to build the EF. Over the years we've had a little extra money now and then, but usually closer to $50 or $100. Never an extra $1000 out of one payday.

I have paid everything for the month. Nothing else is due until February 1. We have one more payday this month (the short one) and that will cover everything due between now and the next payday on March 8th. I set aside $240 of the money into savings for physical therapy.

Just for reference, any credit cards shown in the bill pay section are now paid off monthly. BoA is used for DH's travel expenses (flights, hotels, travel food, and his monthly allowance expenses). It also has autopay for our cell phones, Netflix, and our gym membership. It can vary from $1200 to $1500 a month. AMEX is for gas, eating out, and the occasional grocery trip (if I forget the checkbook). But mostly for gas. I paid both of these in full today.

Bills that went out today:

$1201.69 BoA VISA in full
__314.10 AMEX in full
__225.00 Chiropractic Family Plan
___90.00 Physical Therapy
____3.78 Labcorp (Medical)
__144.00 Water/sewer at the Old House
__418.85 Propane at the Old House
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$2397.42

I had the water/sewer money already in savings as well as most of the propane money. I will be adding about $800 to $1000 to the Vacation Fund. I am waiting until after we go shopping to have the exact amount. DS needs new shoes, DD needs 2 pairs of sweat pants. I could do with a couple of new shirts (somewhere between t-shirts and blouses, nice, but not fancy).

I added $10 to the Emergency Fund. That brings it to $2845.35. I received my AMEX awards coupon in the mail today. I have to physically go to Costco to have it cashed, though. Annoys me. But it will go into the Emergency Fund. It is $85.95. So I've decided to up my EF goal for February to $3000. I have $32 in my coin jar (added $10 today leftover from the past week), so to hit $3000 by month's end, I really only need to come up with another $36.70. I think I can do that.

It feels like I'm playing in an entirely different game now. I know we still have the mortgage and the van loan. I know we still owe Mom money. I know we still need to build the EF. But despite that I no longer feel owned, like I did with the credit card debt. I feel like our lives belong to us again.

After our March vacation we will put our heads down again and work hard on everything. Meanwhile, I will take the next month to breathe. We are in the light at the end of the tunnel. We can take a few steps before we step into the next one. Not going to go crazy or anything, no eating out five times a week or going out and buying crazy things. Just taking my foot off the gas and pulling into the overlook to see how far we've come.

It is official. The tax refund hit our account this morning. I just paid off the Chase VISA. We are officially OUT of credit card debt! After 10 years of being in it, and the last 7 of working very, very hard to pay it off, we have fired our last shot at the Evil Empire and we sunk their battleship.

And now it's time to start to upgrade our rickety picket fence (baby EF) into a wall of stone. I added $1000 to the EF, put $1000 into the MacBook Fund. The other $1903 I'm not sure what we are doing with yet, we're waiting until after vacation, so I transferred it to ING with the rest of it, just so it's out of our account and can't be frittered away.

The new EF amount is $2835.35. I am adjusting my goal of $1900 by the end of February to $2900.

And cue music...

I'm walking on sunshine, woo ooo,
I'm walking on sunshine, woo ooo,
I'm walking on sunshine, woo ooo,
And don't it feel good!

I hit another 450 points today at Swagbucks, thanks in large part to a 50 point birthday award, so unexpected. So I cashed out for another $5 Amazon GC. Love it. This is really going to take a dent out of Christmas 2013 if I keep this up.

I added $2.83 to the coin jar.

The tax refund is supposed to be in the account tomorrow. Here's hoping it comes when they said it would, because if it is, in a little over 9 hours, we will be free of all credit card debt forever.

Sometimes I worry that I will be at loose ends once the credit card debt is gone. I mean we've been in it for almost ten years. And I've been working hard to get out of it since I started blogging in April of 2006. There were ups and downs along the way as we added to and subtracted from the debt, but more or less it's gone steadily down.

And in a few days it will be gone. It's just been such a big part of my life for so long. I've had this goal, this huge, challenging goal that frankly, at times, I thought I was never going to meet. But now I am about to. And it's leaving me with an unsettled feeling, like maybe I won't be firmly focused and driven anymore.

I've got other goals, of course I do. There's college and there's the Emergency Fund and there's the van loan and the mortgage. But somehow I just don't feel as pumped about those things. Take the van loan for example. It's a lot and it's got a pretty low interest rate, but it feels "okay" because when I look out the window it's sitting there. It's tangible. And it doesn't bother me in the same way credit card debt does.

Maybe that's because credit card debt is so intangible. You are paying for the past, sometimes for stuff you don't even remember you charged. Okay, and I have scars on my body that remind of each and every medical procedure I went through, but that's it. The meals out, and hotel fees, and all the things we did to help the family get by while I was recovering, I can't see those as tangible. So I hated having it, this debt that seemed like it gave us no value after the original purchase. The van does give us value still and will for many, many years to come.

Maybe I just need to adjust my focus and make that seem as big a deal as the credit cards did? It's hard though. I mean how do you change that if it's ingrained like this? And with the mortgage, well, I dislike it, and it's so close to being paid off, but when the house sells it will be paid off and then we'll start all over again with a new house and a new mortgage, so how hard, really should I try to work on it.

College is a bit easier. DD is a junior and we need to save $7000 for her first year and $7000 for her second year at the local community college. I can see that as a tangible goal now. And if she follows the plan and joins the peace corp after the first two years before coming back to finish at the local university with a $7000 scholarship, we'll have plenty of time to save up for her third and fourth years and DS's first year at CC.

Investing in their educations seems both tangible and intangible at the same time. I don't want them saddled with debt, but at the same time part of me is wishing college weren't so darn expensive. Part of me is not wanting to decide between funding retirement and starting the kids off on the best financial footing we can. I just hope jobs are more available then, because right now I don't know if they'll even be able to work to help pay for school.

The Emergency Fund is what I really need to worry about the most though. I want it at $18,000 by the time we hit 2015. I want it double that by 2017. And sooner or later, we really need to start putting money into the 401K. DH's work doesn't match at all so part of me has wondered if it is even worth it. I suppose for the pre-tax dollars, but maybe it would be better to just save on our own. I worry about the stock market crashing again just as we get back into it.

The economy worries me. They fiddle with numbers so much to try to say things are better than they are, they print money that isn't backed by anything, and they say it's getting better out there, but all I'm seeing is people that have run out of their unemployment so they are no longer counted as jobless, but they still are. The lines at the food bank stretch longer and longer every week (it's near my daughter's school so I drive by it frequently). Food prices are higher, gas prices are higher, interest rates drop lower and lower on savings. Maybe I just think too darn much.

Maybe in another week I can refocus myself, figure out which things are really the most important. All I know for sure is that I don't want to start frittering our money away.

Spent $32.41 on fast food tonight out of my miscellaneous category. Don't even ask. It was good though. At least until it hit my poor stomach. Won't be doing that again for a long, long, long time.

Say it with me..."Chicken nuggets are not food."

I added $7.59 to the coin jar.

Today was payday. I added $110 to the Emergency Fund bringing it to $1835.35.

Bills paid out today were:

$1000.00 to Mom
__100.00 to Chase
__757.82 to Van loan
__570.00 Mortgage
___25.00 Kids' allowances
___44.87 Phone old house
___72.56 Internet
__110.00 Emergency Fund
___19.00 Garbage (HT)
___72.00 Water/sewer (HT)
__100.00 Property Tax (HT)
__100.00 Propane (HT)
__100.00 Miscellaneous and Groceries
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$3071.25

I also set aside $90 for physical therapy. Both the mortgage and the van loan had extra sent to principal. When the mortgage hits it will put it just under $14K left.

I need to come up with $64.65 this month to hit my EF goal of $1900 by the end of February. I added $13.03 to the coin jar, what was left of my miscellaneous money from last week.

I also filled up the van with gas, $49.79, but that went on the AMEX which gets paid off at the start of every month now.

Other than milk, I shouldn't have to buy anything for the next week.

DS needs new tennis shoes. His feet have grown tremendously. I will inherit his current ones. They are very nice Nikes that just happen to fit my feet. Hand me ups, I guess. I will probably get shoes for him next payday, not this one.

My first mammogram went okay. I don't know what I was being such a scaredy cat about it for.

I'm thinking of inventing a new game. It's called chicken hopscotch. The rules are pretty simple, just avoid stepping on any lovely presents the birds have left behind from the driveway to the back porch. Extra points for particularly balletic moves in twilight conditions. If you drop anything you were carrying to avoid it, the chickens win the game. If not, you do. Since we put the new fence up there haven't been any of these lovely bombs. Until today. Today someone clearly got out. My money's on Georgie. She's lucky she is my second favorite.

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I added 66 cents to the coin jar today.

DH took a preliminary run at our taxes. He is only waiting for the interest from one account. He will call on Monday to get it, but since that account never has more than $500 in it at any one time, it won't be very much. Right now it looks like we will be getting back $8500. That's a couple hundred less than last year, but DH had a bigger income last year because of a higher bonus.

Now before someone says anything about adjusting our withholding so we don't get so much back and have more during the year, we can't. DH already takes the legal number of withholdings. It is not like in the old days when you could claim 47 deductions. The laws are very strict now. And also, $6150 of what we are getting back is due to maxing out and using the full amount of the HSA this year. Without that it would be $2350.

Anyway, so I need to figure out what we will do with that money besides paying off the Chase card. Chase will be at $4900 by the time we get our refund back. So that will leave us with $3600. $1000 of that will go to purchase DD a MacBook, since I wiped out the MacBook fund to pay off debt. So that just leaves $2600.

I think I will let that money sit for a while in case we go over budget while at Disneyland. I don't know if we will or not, but I don't want to have new debt built up on one of the cards. So if we use it, we'll pay it off. Mostly I'd like to put $2000 in the EF. I am aiming towards getting it to $18,000, and then more slowly to $32,000, which will take a few years, especially with college coming up.

DD has agreed to doing her first two years at the local community college and then most likely doing 2 years in the Peace Corp before coming back to do a couple more years at the local university. The community college does offer Japanese. She'll be talking her 3rd year of high school Japanese next year, so college Japanese would help to reinforce that.

I just wish they taught Mandarin. They do offer it at WWU. Actually China is one of the countries that the Peace Corp works in, and the language training is pretty intensive before they send you in. Something like 5 hours a day for three months, if I remember right. But she isn't sure about China. She's thinking more about one of the islands or Africa. I don't want to push her in any one direction, because it's her life and her choice, but learning Mandarin would pretty much guarantee her a well-paying job in certain fields.

I just worry about the future of my kids. I want them to be able to get jobs they can support themselves on in a faltering economy. I can lead them to the proper areas based on their interests, but I can't push them in. It has be something they are interested in, otherwise it is a waste of both time and money.

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I added $10 to the EF, bringing the total to $1725.35. Just $174.65 left to meet my February goal of $1900.

I am always glad to get into the month of February, not just because it is my birthday month, but because February feels like a fresh slate this year. January was for paying off BoA, December was for paying off AMEX, and now I can relax a little. Not relax so much that I let things go, but it's sort of like breathing a sigh of relief.

It's like a really bad storm. First you are anticipating it, then you are riding through it and just hoping to hold on and that your entire house doesn't flood away or blow away, and then you are coming out the other side and all that's left to do is pick up the branches and unboard the windows. That's where it feels like I am now.

I have to wait until 8 o'clock to see what the paycheck is today. It's the small one. But the amount varies based on whether they take medical out or not. I can never remember if it is that they take out medical on the 1st paycheck of the month or the first paycheck earned in the new month.

I was trying to check ING last night to get the amount of interest for the year to send to DH so he can finish the taxes and it was down. I figured they were changing over to Capital One 360 and I was right as it's all blue and red today instead of orange. I preferred the orange, but then I don't like change. Change on the internet tends to come with glitches. Feels like the end of an era. Plus .75% is barely worth keeping money there anymore. Might as well just leave it in one of the local credit unions at this rate. I'd transfer it elsewhere if I could find an interest rate that is worth it. Still can't get in to TIAA Cref.

Anyway, my amount of interest from ING earned this year is $20.92. January's interest is a whopping 85 cents. I added that to the Emergency Fund bringing the new balance in it to $1715.35. Just $184.65 left to go to meet my EF goal for the month of February.

Aside from the most important thing of paying off the BoA card this morning, I finally had time to sit down and pay out the bills for this week. It's not a lot of stuff, since the majority of the money went to one place. Both BoA and AMEX will now be paid off each month with no balance carried forward. AMEX is for gas and miscellaneous purchases I want to track, like OTC cold meds or meals out. We're down to only spending $100 a month on meals out, which generally amounts to one nice restaurant and one fast food meal a month.

Anyway, here's what it looks like:

$2675.84 BoA VISA payoff
__451.16 AMEX
___15.00 Daughter's allowance (DS will be caught up with what he owes me on 2/1)
__100.00 DH's monthly allowance
__100.00 property tax (holding tank)
__300.00 Dental
___25.00 Medical
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$3667.00 total money out

That leaves us $274.87 until Friday. I am actually going to try to only use $74.87 out of it. I got my Costco rebate check coupon thing so that should cover a case of toilet paper, butter, and a case of oranges and there is no other reason to spend money, except for milk, between now and the payday on 2/1.

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I deposited the dollars from my coin jar, a roll of pennies, and $20 I had left from last payday to my EF fund, total of $44.50. That means the new total in the Emergency Fund is now $1717.50. That also means I passed my January goal of getting the EF to $1700. My goal for February is to get it to $1900.

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I think I will have enough points by tomorrow to cash out at Swagbucks for another Amazon $5 gift card.

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The man fixing up our old house was able to work there again all day today. Maybe this thing will get done by March. Pray for rain! He can't do his normal job when it is raining outside. I almost feel like this is a sign pointing to things aligning for us to possibly get that farm house. I don't want to get my hopes up, but even my mother is on board with that house and that is saying something. She's notoriously pessimistic sometimes.

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We are left now with our 0% Chase card with $5100 on it. It is the last of the credit card debt. And it will be gone by the end of March. We have put our debt to income ratio in an excellent place for buying a house. All of the pieces are falling into place. Hopefully they will continue to do so and we will keep our heads. It is very important not to go crazy now, but to continue to do things rationally and the right way.

So today is payday and the first thing I did this morning was to pay $2609.14 to the Evil Empire. This brings the BoA VISA card down to $2000 even. All of the autopays for this month have gone through now except one that will be $120, so VISA amount payoff will actually be $2120. That brings total credit card debt down to $7100.

After my final payment of $2000 next week the BoA card will be paid off and will only be used for autopays and DH's plane tickets, hotels, and travel food.

Then the only card we will have left is the Chase VISA, with $5100 left on it and it has a 0% interest rate through the end of 2013.

Money Out this Payday:

$2609.14 BoA VISA payment
__125.00 Half year dues
___44.87 Old House phone for security system
___72.00 Water/Sewer (Old House) to the Holding Tank
___72.56 Internet
___37.68 Garbage
__100.00 Emergency Fund
__135.00 Paying Back the Mac Book Fund
___45.00 Allowances
__300.00 Farm money for meats
__100.00 Miscellaneous (toiletries, OTC medicine)
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$3641.29

The Emergency Fund now sits at $1670. I am $30 short of my January goal, but that should be no problem to meet.

Today's check was 3420.49. I already had money saved for the dues, the garbage, and the water/sewer. I also had some money left from last week.

After paying everything I will have $146.59. $90 of that will go to physical therapy on Friday, so really $56.59 until next payday.

The plan so far for next Friday is $2120 to the BoA to pay it off, $200 to the Vacation Fund, $100 to the property tax fund, $570 to the Mortgage, $100 to the propane fund and $200 to the Mac Book fund.

February 1st will be the start of the new Budget Template and I am setting up a spreadsheet for that to let me know where I'll go from there.

So today is payday and the first thing I did this morning was to pay $2609.14 to the Evil Empire. This brings the BoA VISA card down to $2000 even. All of the autopays for this month have gone through now except one that will be $120, so VISA amount payoff will actually be $2120. That brings total credit card debt down to $7100.

After my final payment of $2000 next week the BoA card will be paid off and will only be used for autopays and DH's plane tickets, hotels, and travel food.

Then the only card we will have left is the Chase VISA, with $5100 left on it and it has a 0% interest rate through the end of 2013.

Money Out this Payday:

$2609.14 BoA VISA payment
__125.00 Half year dues
___44.87 Old House phone for security system
___72.00 Water/Sewer (Old House) to the Holding Tank
___72.56 Internet
___37.68 Garbage
__100.00 Emergency Fund
__135.00 Paying Back the Mac Book Fund
___45.00 Allowances
__300.00 Farm money for meats
__100.00 Miscellaneous (toiletries, OTC medicine)
---------------
$3641.29

The Emergency Fund now sits at $1670. I am $30 short of my January goal, but that should be no problem to meet.

Today's check was 3420.49. I already had money saved for the dues, the garbage, and the water/sewer. I also had some money left from last week.

After paying everything I will have $146.59. $90 of that will go to physical therapy on Friday, so really $56.59 until next payday.

The plan so far for next Friday is $2120 to the BoA to pay it off, $200 to the Vacation Fund, $100 to the property tax fund, $570 to the Mortgage, $100 to the propane fund and $200 to the Mac Book fund.

February 1st will be the start of the new Budget Template and I am setting up a spreadsheet for that to let me know where I'll go from there.

I cleaned out my purse tonight and added 85 cents to the coin jar. I have $12 in my allowance envelope from December. I thought it was $6 or $7, but I had miscounted a five as a one.

I also added $10 to the EF, so the new EF amount is $1560.00.

I had planned to go today, but I decided to take another look through my freezers first. I am glad I did. I had thought I was out of hamburger, but I found six packages of it on the wrong shelf behind some frozen veggies.

I had thought I needed chicken, but I found 2 whole chickens. Unfortunately the chickens are frozen together so thawing in the micro is not really an option. The package is too big. I'll have to thaw it in the fridge roast it, and then divide it into portions for the freezer. I also found 2 pork chops, 1 pound of ground pork, 1 pound of ground lamb, 6 steaks and five packs of bacon.

After that I cleaned out the fridge and found a head of purple cabbage and kohlrabi in the back. These are both good keepers and were perfectly good. I have a cucumber that I will need to eat tomorrow. If I put it off much longer it'll be chicken feed, not people food. And of course I have broccoli. I am halfway through my lettuce, celery, and carrots, and I have plenty of potatoes and onions, so really, there's nothing I need to buy except dairy and fruit.

So how do I make use of that great coupon of $10 off a $50 purchase good through Monday? Well, $22 of it will be milk. And I will buy some flour and some tuna and some oranges. That should put me to the $50 point and then I won't need to set foot in the grocery store for another week, although I still need to go to Kmart for the toiletries.

I am going to make homemade sausage with the ground pork and ground lamb for breakfasts next week and make a couple of meatloaves for lunches. And the steaks will definitely make it into a couple of dinners.

I sent $100 (my January allowance) to my friend who is in desperate need right now. That'll leave me with about $100 for the week in checking after I do the shopping. I should be just fine with that. No more bills are due before next payday.

I sent for another $5 gift card from Swagbucks for Amazon. The last one hasn't come yet, should show up this weekend.

I added $5.64 to the coin jar.

I feel like I am just waiting for the days to pass until Friday arrives. I thought when we were ahead of the game like we almost are now, waiting anxiously for paydays would be a thing of the past. But no. I'm still waiting for paydays. I'm restless for them to come so I can shell out for the debt repayments this month that will finish off that darn BoA card. I am particularly wanting to see how much the extra social security tax is going to affect paychecks.

And then I will be restless for the income tax refund so that the Chase card and the rest of our credit card debt will be a thing of the past.

I imagine even after that I will be anxious to start socking away money for the emergency fund, the HSA, and college and to pay off the mortgage, so I will still be waiting for each paycheck.

Maybe one day it won't be a waiting game for me, but somehow I doubt it. I think there will always be something that I'm wanting to add to or save up for. Of course once the EF is to 3 months I imagine the waiting will take on less anxiety and be more like a simple ordering of where the money goes.

Once the credit cards are paid off I want to get the EF to $18,300. That is 3 months' expenses. If we can save $2000 a month for that starting in May, we should hit that by the end of the year. After that I'll add to it more slowly, aiming for $30,000.

Meanwhile I hope to start socking away money for college0 (DD will start in the fall of 2015) and bump up payments to the mortgage. That will be under $13K by the end of April. Also, get all the last minute fiddly things finally done and the carpet replaced in the old house so that we can get the dang thing on the market.

I have no idea if our tax refunds after this year are going to remain substantial. That depends on whether or not we max out the HSA again like we have done for the last two years. If we do, any substantial tax refund will likely be thrown at savings for college. If we have a healthy year, likely we won't need to max out the HSA again. I have a feeling we will do it again at least this coming year. I'm pretty sure I'll need another MRI done on my knee and possibly more knee surgery at some point this year the way it has been acting so I need to save up some for the HSA, too.

Not to mention that I'm paying off the rest of my crown ($525) and will be getting another one in February, so at least another $700. That's almost halfway to our deductible right there. Throw in one BP prescription and we'll be at the halfway point by the end of Feb.

So the waiting game continues. 3 more days until payday, 3 more days until I can make the next $2000 payment to BoA and the total dropping to $3,610.74. Ten more days to drop it to $1,610.74. 17 more days to drop it to $0. I am forever counting the numbers.

3 more days with $27 left in the checking account, no bills to pay, and $25 left of my December allowance. Just ticking along, waiting, waiting, waiting for the end of the month to arrive. Waiting for the future to begin. Waiting.

Got statements in the mail today from two CU's showing the interest earned there. $4.21. I added it to the Emergency Fund, which now comes to $1550.00. It's almost never at an exactly equal amount like that. I am hoping to get the EF to $1700 by the end of this month.

I am really looking forward to this being an easier year than last year. It's got to be.

So I've made a few goals for the year. I don't call them resolutions since I don't believe in them, they are just some things I'd like to get accomplished between now and 2014.

1. Pay off the last of the credit card debt, of course.

2. Rebuild the Emergency Fund.

3. Sell the house.

4. Start putting money in the college fund, at least $7000 by the end of the year. Won't start until #1 is accomplished. I'd like to have $15,000 by the fall of 2015, which should cover a year at our local university or two years at the local community college for DD.

I know #3 is not really up to me, it will either sell or not, but hopefully it will. I do have some other goals, but I will reassess after I pay off the credit card debt and the EF is up to at least $5000.

Oh, and I added $2.45 to the coin jar last night. I had $1.99 in interest hit my ING account and deposited $20. So that $21.99 went to the EF, bringing the new EF total to $1545.79.

As is our custom, my immediate family (me, DH, DD, DS and my Mom) opened our Christmas presents today around noon. It was nice and laid back, everyone got what they wanted and there were no surprises. I had a nice roast in the crockpot going for dinner and accompanied it with French fries and tater tots for the kids and some green beans. Simple, easy, and a peaceful dinner was had by all. Tomorrow we will be going out to spend the day with MIL, FIL, SIL, and 2 nieces. It will probably not be as peaceful, but the food will be more traditional.

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I've been thinking about the short-term future, about 3 months down the line. By then we should have our BoA card paid off which will just leave the Chase card. That is our 0% interest card for 18 months. We have been paying $100 a month on it while throwing everything else at AMEX and BoA. It will have $5000 left on it come March.

Our tax refund will be quite substantial again this year. Part of this is due to the fact that we will be able to claim the maxed out HSA for medical once more. The other reason why we tend to get back so much has to do with how DH works. Even though he only works 15 12 hour days straight out of every 28, each pay period is taxed as if he was getting that same paycheck every week. There is some payroll law responsible for this and there is nothing we can do about it. We've tried. It's been this way for the last sixteen years.

Anyway, so the tax refund is going to be more than enough to pay off the $5000 on the Chase card. I am just wondering if it would be wiser to do that or to dump the money into the Emergency Fund and then continue to pay off the Chase card at a rate of $1000 a month, which we will have available since the other cards will be zeroed out.

I don't really like the idea of keeping that debt until August, yet at the same time it's at 0% until 2014 and the savings account is at .75% interest. Running with a low Emergency Fund has always bothered me. DH is on contract for another 3 years in an industry that is, despite the economic depression, booming, so job security is high. I know we will be able to build the EF pretty quickly once all the debt is gone.

Still, debt is debt and I hate it. We've been under it so long. I guess I have a couple more months before I have to make a decision.

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I have finished up my course of antibiotics for the UTI and it feels like it is gone. I have been back to eating protein and vegetables at each meal with the one fruit at one meal for 3 days and I started the high cholesterol drug today. I've lost 7 pounds. I am also pushing the water. I am generally feeling better than I have since my tooth forced me to stop eating right last August, though I am still tired. The newly crowned tooth is still sensitive to cold, but it doesn't hurt to chew at all now.

Tomorrow may be a draining day for me and difficult to handle regarding food, but I am planning no fruit tomorrow and instead 1/2 cup of potatoes and gravy and 1/2 cup of stuffing with my turkey and green beans. The potatoes will be real, the gravy will be homemade, and the stuffing will be made by me, so I know exactly what is in everything. I don't care for pie so that will not be a temptation.

If there are cookies or fudge I will just need to keep firmly in mind how close I am to having diabetes and that this is not an option for me right now. Fortunately I am not a big sweets eater anyway, starch has always been my downfall. Although I do like my ice cream, but that's going to have to be a once a week treat with a balanced meal from here on out.

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Happy Christmas to everyone!

As is our custom, my immediate family (me, DH, DD, DS and my Mom) opened our Christmas presents today around noon. It was nice and laid back, everyone got what they wanted and there were no surprises. I had a nice roast in the crockpot going for dinner and accompanied it with French fries and tater tots for the kids and some green beans. Simple, easy, and a peaceful dinner was had by all. Tomorrow we will be going out to spend the day with MIL, FIL, SIL, and 2 nieces. It will probably not be as peaceful, but the food will be more traditional.

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I've been thinking about the short-term future, about 3 months down the line. By then we should have our BoA card paid off which will just leave the Chase card. That is our 0% interest card for 18 months. We have been paying $100 a month on it while throwing everything else at AMEX and BoA. It will have $5000 left on it come March.

Our tax return will be quite substantial again this year. Part of this is due to the fact that we will be able to claim the maxed out HSA for medical once more. The other reason why we tend to get back so much has to do with how DH works. Even though he only works 15 12 hour days straight out of every 28, each pay period is taxed as if he was getting that same paycheck every week. There is some payroll law responsible for this and there is nothing we can do about it. We've tried. It's been this way for the last sixteen years.

Anyway, so the tax return is going to be more than enough to pay off the $5000 on the Chase card. I am just wondering if it would be wiser to do that or to dump the money into the Emergency Fund and then continue to pay off the Chase card at a rate of $1000 a month, which we will have available since the other cards will be zeroed out.

I don't really like the idea of keeping that debt until August, yet at the same time it's at 0% until 2014 and the savings account is at .75% interest. Running with a low Emergency Fund has always bothered me. DH is on contract for another 3 years in an industry that is, despite the economic depression, booming, so job security is high. I know we will be able to build the EF pretty quickly once all the debt is gone.

Still, debt is debt and I hate it. We've been under is so long. I guess I have a couple more months before I have to make a decision.

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I have finished up my course of antibiotics for the UTI and it feels like it is gone. I have been back to eating protein and vegetables at each meal with the one fruit at one meal for 3 days and I started the high cholesterol drug today. I've lost 7 pounds. I am also pushing the water. I am generally feeling better than I have since my tooth forced me to stop eating right last August, though I am still tired. The newly crowned tooth is still sensitive to cold, but it doesn't hurt to chew at all now.

Tomorrow may be a draining day for me and difficult to handle regarding food, but I am planning no fruit tomorrow and instead 1/2 cup of potatoes and gravy and 1/2 cup of stuffing with my turkey and green beans. The potatoes will be real, the gravy will be homemade, and the stuffing will be made by me, so I know exactly what is in everything. I don't care for pie so that will not be a temptation.

If there are cookies or fudge I will just need to keep firmly in mind how close I am to having diabetes and that this is not an option for me right now. Fortunately I am not a big sweets eater anyway, starch has always been my downfall. Although I do like my ice cream, but that's going to have to be a once a week treat with a balanced meal from here on out.

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Happy Christmas to everyone!

It is a weird feeling to have an empty bill box and to have paid all of the bills to the end of the year already. I know it's been like this for the last couple of months, but I'm still not used to it. I really like it though. Instead of being paycheck to paycheck we are half a month ahead and that is wonderful. I can't wait for that to be a month ahead. And then 2 months and then 3 months, etc., as we build the Emergency Fund back up.

So the last of the bills and some miscellaneous shopping were paid out of today's payday. The breakdown is as follows:

$90.00 Physical Therapy
$41.75 Various cold medicines to replenish stock
$70.56 Internet
$44.87 Phone line Old House (for security system to work)
159.65 Propane bill Old House (was already in savings)
144.00 Water/sewer (was already in savings)
-------------
550.83

I put $2500 into short term savings. That will cover all bills between January 1 and January 11th.

I will have two more physical therapy appointments this year so I have that money set aside.

I took out $215 in cash, but $15 went to DD for her allowance. DS doesn't get an allowance again until January (he got an advance). So that $200 should last us until the end of the year for toiletries and meals out. I have $1300 left of this paycheck, but we still need to buy presents for a couple people. Whatever is left will be sent to the credit card.

Next week's paycheck will be the 2 day paycheck and that isn't earmarked for anything yet. I will need to pay the $505 for my crown whenever they send me the bill so I'll probably set that aside out of it.

I deposited my coin jar money to the Emergency Fund and have hit my goal of $1500 in there by the end of December.

1457.42 Beginning EF
+_66.38 Coin Jar Money deposited
-----------
1523.80 Ending EF

Christmas bonuses should be mailed out today and they usually get here pretty fast since there are so many flights a day between Anchorage and Seattle and then between Seattle and here. It might even be here as soon as tomorrow (last year it came the day after the Christmas party, which is today), but I'm figuring probably Monday or Tuesday.

I am trying not to be anxious about it. It's just that we are so close. Even if it is 5% of income like last year instead of the rumored 10% of income it will still wipe out the BoA card with a little leftover for the AMEX and then the AMEX will be wiped out by the extra paycheck in January. Our tax return would then wipe out the 0% Chase card with plenty leftover since we'll be getting quite a lot back due to maxing the HSA and spending it all this year on medical. And if it's the 10% then boy howdy it's all gone before the year is up.

I just want it done and gone. It's been so many years. I want that weight lifted off my shoulders forever.

Today I found what I thought was a shiny new quarter. Well, it is a twenty-five cent piece, but it's certainly not American. It's not even Canadian (which happens at least once a month, being in a border county). In fact I have a coin jar just for Canadian coins that I'll save until the next time we go to Victoria or Vancouver. It is from the Commonwealth of the Bahamas and is a very pretty coin. It has a sailboat on one side and an emblem of some sort on the other.

As for the regular coin jar, I've added $10.59 to it this week so far. Mostly in ones. I probably have enough in there to make a deposit worthwhile.

I screwed up on my food diary thing for ACOP. I entered in the first three days just fine, but then we all got sick and I forgot to enter in the fourth and final day and by the time I remembered to do it, the thing was closed. There went $8. And it probably means I won't get a good survey or product study from them for a while. It's not like I blew it off, but oh, well. What can you do?

I did get enough Swagbucks to order another $5 gift card from Amazon. Mostly because I kept the SBTV going on the side of my screen while I caught up with a week's worth of blogs, both here and in a few other places.

DS was feeling well enough today to do some schooling. We got math, science, history and vocabulary done. He had a dentist appointment today, no cavities. He has the best teeth of all of us. We think he is a throwback because his teeth are perfectly straight and don't seem to ever stain at all. His teeth are unlike anyone else in the family as far back as I have been alive to see. Lucky kiddo. And it's nice not to be worrying about starting orthodontia on him.

DD is doing better today. She didn't go to school, but she thinks she can go tomorrow. I am giving her a note so that she can use the elevator. She's still dizzy and having some minor balance issues so I don't want her climbing the stairs to the third floor. Also, I told her to call if she needs to come home. Her concussion is very mild in comparison to the one DS had in June, (I think they're starting a club or something!) but still, a concussion is a concussion. No PE for the rest of the week either.

I still need to do a payday report post. I should probably do that before the new payday on Friday. I'm not sure if I'll find the time though. I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow and will try to do a full day of schooling and maybe, hopefully, make up some of the missed lessons. We're 2 behind on Math, 2 behind on science, 1 behind on art, 2 behind on language skills and 3 behind on literature. Maybe if we just add one missed class a day tomorrow and Friday we can get the rest caught up on Saturday.

I also need to finish putting together my blog post for week 2 of the on paper food stamps challenge. And I have some thoughts about how the NJ mayor did and my own thoughts regarding nutrition and caloric requirements while living on a food stamp grocery budget that I need to finish writing up as well. I'm already seeing a couple of things that I wish I'd chosen differently on, but will take that into account when I do the 10 day menu for $40.

I haven't worked on my novel all week. Hopefully I'll get a chance to do that this weekend.

I was reconciling my savings accounts spreadsheet with the bank statements I received in the mail today and I realized that there was $252.01 that was not allocated to any category at ING. Not sure what I did there. I might have paid something out of the holding tank without actually taking it out and just using checking, but I took it off the spreadsheet. That's happened a couple of times. Regardless, I added it to the emergency fund category, so the EF now sits at $1457.42. Almost to the $1500 mark. I think I can get it there by the end of the year.

I received the propane bill for the old house today. The thermostat is set on 60 so that the pipes do not freeze. It is $159.65. That is quite a lot less than I was anticipating. I have $400 allocated for propane in the holding tank right now. So I will pay that and then leave the rest of the money ($240.35) in there and just not transfer any more money to the holding tank for propane until after the next quarterly bill comes. I can use that $100 a month elsewhere during that time.

Tomorrow is payday. I still have $297.82 in checking and $25 in cash. I added $6.48 to the coin jar. I really like this new habit of getting to the next payday with more than $5 left.

I've been saving my allowance since I started drawing one again. I have $154. I haven't decided what to do with it. Maybe I'll save it for Disneyland. I like to buy a sweatshirt or light jacket, a couple of t-shirts, and one of the Splash Mountain towels when I go and they are a bit expensive, so having the extra saved for that would be a good idea. They are so well made that they last for years. In fact I can still wear the Disneyland sweatshirt I bought in 1995 on my honeymoon and it looks great. None of the stitching has come out or anything. So I feel like they are a good investment.

DS's Christmas presents arrived today so he is all taken care of. I need to get on the ball and order DD's presents now that I have her list. I procrastinated last year and a couple of her presents didn't show up until a week after Christmas. 5 more days until DH comes home. It's been a long hitch and I will be glad to have him home.

ING added the interest today. It's a whopping $1.47. Their interest rate is now .75% APY. I so miss the days of 4% interest. I am not liking some of the minor changes they have made to the site, either. It makes it slightly harder to navigate and the major thing I've always liked about ING is how user friendly it was. I imagine the changes will just continue as it continues to be consumed by the new owners. I just hope they don't lower the interest rates even further to match other banks. If they do, I'll have no reason to keep my money there at all.

Anyway, I added the interest to my EF.

$1205.41 Begginning Balance
____1.47 Interest Added
-----------------
$1206.88 New EF Balance

I find that the closer I am to being out of credit card debt, the easier it is to pay the bills. It feels less and less like money slipping through my fingers and more and more like seeing the summit of the mountain and knowing it's not much further and just a little push will get me there.

I got to contribute $100 to the Emergency Fund this time, something I haven't done in a while. I also deposited the coin jar money to the EF as well, so that was an additional $97.05. The EF now sits at $1205.41. It is good to see it going up again.

I funded my funds, bringing the totals to $85 in the HoA Dues Fund, $200 in the Property Tax Fund, $400 in the Propane Fund, $400 in the Vacation Fund, $400 in the Mac Book Fund, and $200 in the Christmas Fund.

Expenditures for this paycheck were:

$1000.00 AMEX
__100.00 Chase VISA
__300.00 To Mom for her utilities
__100.00 EF
___21.98 Electricity for the Old House
___50.00 to the Holding Tank for garbage (not due 'til Feb)
__39.53 DH Life Insurance
__32.70 My Life Insurance
__59.89 Car Insurance
__45.63 Old House Insurance
__41.16 ADT Security for theOld House
_153.00 Storage
_100.00 Vacation Fund
__17.00 Dues Fund
_100.00 Property Tax Fund
_500.00 Mortgageon Old House ($376.14 plus extra to principal)
_100.00 Propane Fund
_100.00 Mac Book Fund
-------------
$2860.88

I also spent $56.20 to fill up the van. It was 3.39 per gallon. It's a little cheaper at Costco, but I really didn't want to go over there today and as long as it is no more than a 20 cent per gallon difference, I'd actually use more gas going over there and then waiting in the interminably long lines.

And I spent $230.41 on groceries. I stocked up on some things that my cupboards were bare on, mostly canned goods. I also restocked the flour stash and bought some oranges and milk. I am definitely starting to see the higher prices now. Even though I didn't buy any meat since we get it at the farm now, I still wanted to see what the current store prices are, and Holy Toledo are they high. I mean some of them are higher than their grass-fed, organic counterparts. I may need to up the grocery budget once we finish eating the inventory in the freezer. I'm trying to hang on to $600 a month, but half of that is spent at the farm.

I paid out DD's allowance for two weeks, $30. DS does not get an allowance until 12/14 as his was advanced to him so he could buy something on a really good sale. I also took out $200 in cash.

I bought DD a new MP3 player. She was willing to settle for the 4GB one, so it was $40. I used part of the $200 in cash for that. Since it was half what I was expecting it to be, I told her I'd just pay for it if she'd do some extra chores for her grandmother. So she's going to clean all of the bathrooms, mop the kitchen floor, vacuum, and clean out Mom's fridge. She's also going to do all of the laundry this weekend.

DD is going to stay after school one day next week to teach her English teacher how to knit using a loom. They're going to knit some hats for some charity and they need to make 26 between now and the 18th. Knitting goes much faster on a loom. I didn't get the details on what charity, but I think it was local. I find it kind of hilarious that my sixteen-year-old daughter is teaching a sixty-something-year-old woman to knit. It's like, shouldn't that be the other way around?

Speaking of knitting, I really need to get going and finish making DS's scarf so I can start on DD's. It's hard to work on his because he is with me so much since we homeschool him. I am trying to keep it a surprise. His sister has made him a hat in the same yarn.

I almost wiped out a pair of elderly jaywalkers tonight. I guess teenagers are not the only ones to dress all in black and take crazy chances walking after dark. If it hadn't been for the man's white hair and the woman's white shoe souls, I'd not have seen them in time to stop. And they were only 20 feet away from the well illuminated stoplight with it's cross walks.

14 days and counting until the bonus checks will be put in the mail...

Tomorrow is payday and I have $52.85 in cash left from last payday so that went into the coin jar. I will make a deposit into the emergency fund tomorrow. I'm not sure of all that is in there, but I'm thinking it's around $80. I ended up with $250 leftover in the checking account so that will get sent to AMEX along with the regular payment.

I am anxious for December to start. It's going to be a good money month for us, even without the Christmas bonus. It'll be a huge jump in our forward progress. You know that song from the Lion King that goes, "Oh, I just can't wait to be king?" Well, I've got that running through my head only it's going,

"Oh, I just can't wait to be free!
No one saying pay this.
No one saying pay that.
No more paying interest.
No more crazy bank debt.
My money's gonna work for me.
Oh, I just can't wait to be free!"

LOL, I can't help but be excited. It's been such a long, long, long road. This medical debt has been a weight so heavy on our shoulders for so long. Longer than I've been blogging actually. About nine years now, I think. Let's see, the first operation was in...the summer of 2003, so yeah, 9.5 years.

And I mean, we still will, of course, have the mortgage (which will be under $15,000 after tomorrow's payment) and the note on the mini-van, so yes, there actually is still interest being paid, but it's so much lower than the credit card debt. And it's secured debt which seems so much better than unsecured debt.

I'm not sure which way I am leaning after the credit card debt is gone. Part of me really wants to get the house paid off and own it in full. But since it'll be on the market sometime between now and summer, and hopefully it will sell, I don't know if it's really that worthwhile to pay it off. It probably makes more sense to work on paying down the car loan. I don't know. I guess we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

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We received a new tax assessment from the treasury. They've revalued the house at a lower amount, which means property taxes will go down, but also may effect how much we can get for the house when we sell.

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Today was one of those days where I was pretty sure that homeschooling was going to be the death of me. You know, it goes like a breeze when DS is feeling good, but when he's not he turns into a whine machine. Plus he's starting to get that tone in his voice, the one of an annoyed teenager. 12 and a half was about when that started happening with my daughter so I've been expecting it, but I am also trying to nip it in the bud.

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I have to get gas tomorrow. I was so hoping I'd make it to payday without filling up again and I did. The van claims I can drive 22 more miles before it is out of gas, but there is usually still a half a tank left at 0. Not that I am going to run it that low.

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I gave in and got takeaway today. Pineapple chicken, teryaki beef, noodles, rice, Mongolian beef and beef and broccoli. It was unplanned and probably not worth it. It was stress buying pure and simple. After dealing with the whine machine all day I just didn't want to cook and didn't have the energy to fight with myself over it. It was really good and it takes care of lunches tomorrow. $45.60 was the damage.

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I am on day...5, I think of being caffeine free. Hopefully I'll be able to stay off it this time. I am still really tired, but I think it's getting better. As for the health issues, the flu or whatever is going away. I am still a bit stuffy and still have a fever, but there was no dizziness today. And all of the other symptoms are gone, so crossing my luck that I'll hopefully finish this off without catching a new cold. I really would like to stay well for a while.