Lucky Robin's Personal Finance Blog

I am still exhausted, but DS and I had enough stamina to get dishes done today. We got 4 loads done. Everyone was sick for the past week, even DH, though no one as bad as me. I took it in fits and starts, though. It is the first productive thing I have done, besides make dinner, in a while. Tomorrow I will try to tackle laundry. There are at least 3 loads of towels to fold (DH did manage that much) and I need to put away the pile of clean clothes on my bed. I am done with the prednisone but I never got the energy rush of the previous times. That's a bummer because I have been only getting a few hours of sleep due to it. It would have been better to be productive, but Oh well. I just have 4 days left on the antibiotics. I hope that kicks it.

DD has been off wheat for 6 days now and continues to improve. DS's acne is clearing up. Neither one is having stomach issues at all and DD has not felt the constant nausea she's had for the past couple years, either. Can it really be so simple that this was what made her digest so slowly and painfully and bloat to a rock hard stomach? She doesn't have celiac at all, they tested for it, but obviously she does have an issue with wheat, otherwise stopping it would not have been so positive for her. If this is all it takes to stay out of the ER and stop spending so much of our medical budget on it, that's a miracle in itself.

Speaking of medical, it's weird to start having to spend for it again. We maxed out in July, I think it was, and everything had been free since. I know a few months of DD's physical therapy, which she starts on Wednesday will eat up a large portion of the deductible. Our HSA card is not working as they said it would. They said we could start using it on January 1st, up to the full amount of the yearly draw, but when DH tried to use it for 2 prescriptions, less than $25 total, but it didn't go through. He's going to try to get that sorted out tomorrow. We may just end up submitting everything each month, which will be a pain, but whatever.

Once I see what the exact new amount is of the Friday's paycheck on Thursday (things will change a bit due to the HSA withdrawals), I can complete my 2020 budget template and my January budget. They are pretty much the same, I will just be adjusting a bit. I think it is around $113, but it will also affect that amount of tax taken out, so I've got it roughly, just not perfectly. I prepared that part before Christmas, I think.

Tomorrow I will catch up the Medical Fund savings account by entering it all into the spreadsheet. I've let is slide, just making sure there was a hefty balance on the things we did buy, mostly OTC meds. Nowhere near the balance of nearly $2000 (haven't transferred the other $2000 in there, still in the online account), but now I have to reconcile the account. Which is fine.

DH and I really need to get on the ball to figure out our 25th Wedding Anniversary getaway. I was too tired to look at places, but it's mid-March, so maybe tomorrow. He has done some preliminary looking. All I really know is I want to be near a view of the water.

I also want DH to take me out to dinner for my 50th birthday mid-February. It will be a week after my mother's shoulder surgery so the kids will stay home to take care of her. I want a good ribeye or prime rib, a sweet potato, and either mixed veggies or their salad. Not their broccoli, they don't cook it long enough, and no bread. I don't want to have to cook myself so we will just go to Outback one county over.

I need to try to get myself to the library tomorrow. I haven't had a book since before Christmas, not that I could focus for long, but it has still been driving me crazy. I was so out of focus, I could not even concentrate on a movie plot. Watched a lot of mindless stuff, like Say Yes to the Dress, I Didn't Know I was Pregnant, and Paternity Court on Youtube. Yesterday, I was finally able to switch to documentaries and a movie (action adventure, so straight-forward plot).

I dragged myself to the doctor on Monday and after 4 days on antibiotics and prednisone, I am starting to see a minor improvement. I had some wheezing in my upper chest, that wasn't quite bronchitis and a massive sinus infection. I waited too long to go, but I always think it is just a cold that never leaves. I am sleeping a lot, but in fits and starts. That's the prednisone. It always messes up sleep. I am starting to get a little strength back though, and my desire for real food instead of take out has come roaring back.

I did manage to make dinner two nights in a row, beef stew with gluten free flour for the gravy, and herb baked chicken, herb roasted potatoes (different herbs), and broccoli last night. Tonight's dinner is loaded baked potato soup, although I might make steaks on the side. Usually I don't, but that can be a very carb heavy meal if I just go with the bacon as the only protein source. It depends on how much energy I have. This will be my first time making it using gluten free flour in the roux. The stew gravy went well, though, so I can't imagine the roux will be bad.

I baked my first loaf of gluten free bread last night. It turned out pretty well despite me leaving out the sugar. I was wondering why it took so long to rise, but the yeast didn't have any sugar to eat. Next time it should rise in the allotted time frame. I didn't realize until I tasted it that I had done that, but when I thought back to it, I didn't remember putting sugar in with the warm water and yeast to proof it. It still bubbled without the sugar, so I know the yeast was active, just it would have been more active with it.

It looks like bread and it tastes like bread and is nice and soft, but I can definitely taste the eggs in it. I don't usually make egg breads. There are other recipes I will be trying to, but I will do this one again properly first. The interesting thing about gluten free bread is that if you cool it upright on a rack the top will sink, but if you cool it on it's side, rotating it occasionally, the top doesn't sink. Also, you have to wait three hours for it to cool before slicing it. Slice it sooner and it will crumble, but that goes away completely with the cooling time. I did a lot of research before starting this journey.

I will be attempting gluten free pizza dough tomorrow. I may do one with gluten free flour instead of two and do the second one with cauliflower crust. The second I know is good. On the agenda for when I feel a lot better will be learning how to make gluten free cookies, brownies, and cakes. Not often, though. Just on occasion. There is a birthday in February (mine) and March (DS's) that I want to make gluten free cakes for and I want to make sure they taste good first so I will have to experiment a bit.

DH and I need to start looking for a place to go to for our little holiday getaway for our 25th wedding anniversary in March. We don't want to go too far away, within a couple hours driving distance, but I am not sure if we want to go back to the place we were at before in March. It has quite a steep hill down to it and there is often snow on the ground still in March in that area so it might make it hard to get back up out of there and we don't have chains for the van. I do want to be by the water, though. It really recharges my batteries.

Our retirement accounts went up $565.58 since I last checked them which was on payday, I think. Just wanted to know how we closed out the year. After a year and a half of throwing 5% at the 401K to get the free matching we have done pretty well. And we'll be able to bump that to 7% in another 6 months or so, and once there that pretty much leaves us in a great place for taxes, assuming no one plays games with the tax code again or I don't finish my book and sell it this year.

$16,678.57 401K
+_9,822.00 IRA
---------------
$26,500.57 Total Retirement Balance

I guess it actually went down some Monday according to DH, but it all came back and left friends behind. I am glad we have made so much progress on building for retirement. We are so far behind, but we do need to get caught up as soon as we can manage it. That and save, save, save money.

My two main goals for 2019 were to pay down debt and to to lose weight. Unfortunately I yo-yo'd all over the place with my weight and still haven't gotten my act together. But on the debt pay down I excelled. I had planned to pay off $12,000 this year, but ended up paying off $16,000. I exceeded my goal by $4000. This is the first year in a long time that I have felt like I was making serious progress.

My goals for 2020 are:

1. Lose Weight and Go Back to the Pool.

2. Finish paying off the $9000 we owe by June. Sooner if possible.

3. Save $12,000 to the EF from July through December. That will put our EF close to three months of expenses. It will take one more month than I have in 2020 to get it there unless we get a windfall (and MIL has been giving us quite a bit).

4. Up retirement savings to 7% in July. Once the EF is met, I'd like to up it to 10%. There is also the possibility of a raise. When DH got the last one, they told him he wouldn't be up for another one before July 2020, so here's hoping he gets one even if it is just COL.

5. If I hit the EF amount before the end of this year we will be able to start saving up for a house. That will be a long process, though. We ought to be able to save $24K a year once the EF is up to snuff. The way house prices keep rising we need at least $75K for a down payment of 20%, but if we want breathing room in a mortgage payment I would want to double that. So we'd be at this for 6 years, maybe.

Used to be you could buy a house for $350,000 and now it is more like $450,000 to $650,000. This is just in the last five years. I would love to move to a low cost of living southern state once we retire. Just not one with crocodiles, snakes, and scorpions. The warmer weather would be better for my health.

Another option we might consider is to save up and buy a piece of land, then save up and put in a well, then save up again and put in a septic system. Once that is done, we could get a construction loan with the new, improved price for the land as collateral and build the house. We can still get land for about $35K for an acre in some parts of the county that are not too far from where DH works. A well is about $40K and septic is about $30K. Having it ready to go though, will increase the value of all of it from $105,000 to $150,000. Anyway it is something to think about as we get closer.

$10,500.00 Balance Forward
-_1,500.00 Payment Made
----------------
$_9,000.00 New Balance

If I pay $1500 a month going forward, this will be paid off in June. If only $1000 it will be paid off in September. If I can manage $2000 it would be paid off in May. And the real stretch would be if we could pay $2500 a month it would be paid off in April.

Now all of these are technically possible, since I had budgeted $1000 a month to the medical fund that we will no longer need to be contributing to (at least through June) due to MIL's gift. But $2500 would be with no money going to eating out or fun. $2000 would be more doable unless I decide to beef up the EF a little bit. The other option is to raise our 401K contribution to 7% and see how that shakes out. I might also open a spousal Roth IRA. In addition, I might bump the food budget up $200 a month so we can have more organic meat choices again. We will see.

As I plot the budget for 2020 these are all things I am thinking about. Also my payoff months might also be affected by by how much of a tax refund we get. Regardless of my choice here, after it does get paid off the 401K will definitely be bumped up to 7% and possibly 10%.

In 6 days our retirement has gone up $766.99. I am really glad that at least so far the impeachment vote doesn't seem to have wrecked the stock market.

$16,148.46 401K
+_9,786.13 IRA
------------
$25,934.99 Total Retirement

MIL gave us a check for $6000 and the Christmas bonus was deposited for $911.26. The bonus was $1300 before taxes. I really wish they did not tax bonuses at 25%. I mean, maybe if your bonus is in the 5 digits, or even mid to high 4 digits, but when it isn't even the amount of a paycheck? The government is irritating at times. I know we'll get a better tax refund due to them taking so much, but I'd really rather have it now and not when we get that back. I complain about this every year.

So plans for the money are to have DH get his crown, around $1000, and my chipped tooth repaired, around $300. Then we'll put $2000 into the Medical Fund. It is at a little over $1800 so this will give us enough money to cover the deductible and the out of pocket max between this and the FSA. We'll put $2000 into the Emergency Fund, save some of the money for our romantic getaway in March for our 25th wedding anniversary, and order a few things I have been putting off.

Then since we won't have to be paying anything into the Medical Fund for next year after this coming payday, we will take the money that we were paying into that to pay on debt. DH and I have an agreement that we won't use money from his mom to pay the debt to my mom. That's not what it is for and it is not why she gave it to us. She wants us to use it for medical, for vacation, and to beef our EF back up.

I'm not sure where we are going yet for our trip, maybe the same place as in September, but it won't be far from home. I think we will just buy some really good food to take with us and a good skillet (can't trust what is in the rentals to not be warped). I am thinking some ribeye steaks, some crab or shrimp or lobster, potatoes, and good vegetables for dinners, bacon, toast, and eggs for breakfasts, and sandwich fixings or burgers for lunches. We both like my cooking better than restaurants and DH helps with the chopping and peeling for dinner and makes breakfast so it doesn't all fall on me.

I am very relieved to get this money, though. It takes a lot of the stress for next year away in one fell swoop.

Retirement has popped up a lot over the last couple of days, but after the vote last night, I am waiting to see what the stock market does when I get up in the morning before I update it. I just hope it doesn't put us back under $25K, though it was almost to $26K today before the vote.

We didn't make it to Costco today, so we will try tomorrow. Instead we got our Christmas tree put up. Well, not our good Christmas tree, but one we got on clearance at Lowe's for $55.00. It was one of their floor models. It's a simple four piece tree that comes prelit with both plain bulbs and multi-colored bulbs. They are bright, but then all LED lights are. It's nice to set something up so quickly, especially since our good, big tree is in the back of the storage unit.

We used Mom's ornaments as ours are also in the back of the storage unit. Then DS set up one of his trains underneath the tree. It looks really nice through the front widow and adds to the Christmas lights in the yard from the road. I'm trying to convince Mom to put up her giant wreath above the mantle, but not sure I'm going to get her to dig it out. It's really beautiful and has a ton of decorations.

We haven't put up a big tree in several years. I have my little 2 foot tall tree that we don't even take the lights and ornaments off each year, just place it on the top shelf of the closet and then pull it down again when we need it. That's all we have been using. It's just a hassle when the space is limited. And Mom didn't want one at her end for the last couple of years, either. I wouldn't have put one up at all if she and DS hadn't decided they wanted one. It's hard to feel Christmassy in this house most years. I don't have a lot of Christmas spirit like I used to.

We need to pick up a real tree for MIL tomorrow and take it out there. I'm not even sure where to go since the stores aren't selling them this year and I haven't seen a boy scout lot either. There is a big fruit stand store that has sold them in the past so maybe there. I have seen several cars with them on top so someone is selling them. If worst comes to worst we can go pick one up at the tree farm near where we used to live. It's a bit of a drive, but I know they will have them there.

We have completed all of our Christmas shopping which is good. Everything has arrived in the mail or will arrive by Monday.

I did go and order some new bras since Lane Bryant was having a buy one get one 75% off sale on them. I paid $81.39 for 4. It would have cost 119.81 without the sale. Bras in the higher sizes are always so much more expensive for not really that much more material. Oh, well, it was a good sale with free shipping. Much better sale than the usual buy one get one half off sale.

Now all I have to do is order another set of new socks for me and DD and everyone should be set on clothes for a good while.

I am so excited to have retirement hit $25K. It has been a rollercoaster month so the fact that it got here despite all the garbage that is going on in government this week is amazing.

$15,509.10 401K
+_9,648.50 IRA
------------
$25,157.60 Total Retirement

My next happy dance moment will be when the IRA hits $10K on its own. Since we don't contribute to that one at all, it may take a while, but we'll get there.

I'll do a grocery rundown probably tomorrow after we've been to Costco, but there was a great sale at Fred Meyer today on Afrin. $4.99 a bottle. It is usually $10.99, so at this price we really stocked up. I got 10 bottles. We go through this stuff fast around here, due to allergies and colds. I know you aren't supposed to use it consistently, but my son and I are addicted to breathing so we do. None of the prescription nasal sprays work for us. Now we have a bit of a stockpile at a fantastic price.

I used some of my allowance money that I have been saving to order a tenor ocarina and a music book. I really like my bass one, and am progressing quickly, but it is a little too big for my hands, so I will probably pass that on to DH. I tried one of my son's tenor ones and it fits my hands a lot better. Although I am getting one that is less traditionally shaped, also, because it will be easier on my hands. It is shaped sort of like a spear head. It was modeled on the Adegan crystal (which I don't care about) and is hot pink. It's very pretty. This is what it looks and sounds like if you are curious about my latest musical obsession:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6_uZ9b6qFQ and my current one looks and sounds like this minus the triforce symbol: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4RUyqASPKM

I was also tempted to get the 6 hole one that is shaped like a Tardis but it is in G Major, and all the song books are written in C Major. I may still get it for my birthday in February, just because I'm a Whovian from way back, but as a collector's thing more than a music thing. Although you can play Doomsday on it, so I might just learn to play that if it doesn't break my heart and that song easily does. Smashes it to bits and washes away the pieces with my tears.

Anyway the one I did buy and the 30 lesson music book cost a total of $87. Free shipping as they are having that until the 15th. I have $63 left of Christmas money, but I may just put it in my allowance folder and save it. I'm saving up for a new computer. Not hard or anything, just so that when this one goes I can replace it immediately. I reckon I probably have about a year left on it, assuming I don't spill anything on it. The DVD drive doesn't work and hasn't for about a year, which is annoying since I like to watch DVD's on my computer better than on a TV. And the mouse pad thing has been on the fritz for about 18 months so I use a regular mouse with my laptop.

I seriously think I may get a desktop this time. They seem to last a lot longer and the keyboards hold up to the amount of typing I do much better. I can't even count how many laptops I have worn the keys out on. Never had that happen on a desktop keyboard. I do like the convenience of a laptop, though. We'll see. I have quite some time yet to figure it out.

Not too much going on on the financial front today, but I did have to run to the store and spent $10.99. I had buy some breadcrumbs for the meatloaf I made for dinner tonight as I only had 1/3 cup and I needed a cup. They have stopped carrying the brand I normally have so I had to read all the ingredients on the different ones they had. We ended up going with Kikkoman as it only has four: wheat, salt, cane sugar, and yeast. Eventually I would like to find a good gluten free breadcrumb, but the one they had had xanthum gum which is derived from soy and triggers DD's soy allergy. I also picked up some of those Simply crunchy Cheetos for DD.

I still have quite a bit left in the grocery envelope, $100, and I refill it on Friday. I think that I will just get out $300 this time and throw the extra $100 into the Medical Fund.

Oh, we did find out what the bonus will be and how much additional (it's a percentage of income) they will put into the 401K, but we aren't allowed to talk about it until it has been issued. It's not quite as good on the money as last year, but still good. I don't remember what they put into the 401K last year. I'll have to ask DH. I think most of the bonus will go into the Medical Fund, though.

We still don't know if MIL is going to give us more money this year or wait until the start of next year or at all. That's why I'm throwing so much into the Medical Fund. I just want to be ready for it since DH needs a crown. Otherwise I'd throw it at the Mom loan which I still might if we find out from MIL before we get it.

I did order all the clothes I wanted last night. It is my Christmas present from MIL. I have a lot of shirts that I have been sewing up the holes in for a couple of years. They used to just be in the seams, but now the fabric is wearing out in other places. I love these shirts otherwise I would have replaced them long ago, but now I have to give up on them. So I went ahead and ordered 5 t-shirts and 6 long sleeved t-shirts. 4 of them are on back order, but that's okay, 3 of those were short-sleeved and what I need now is long-sleeved.

On the old shirts, I will cut off the backs and make them into handkerchiefs. We get to a point in the winter when our noses are too tender for tissues due to colds and having them is a Godsend. Or my other option would be to cut them into strips for a rug, but DH has yet to build my rug loom, so I don't see the point in that, although if he did than I could use the whole t-shirts.

I'm not even sure I'd want to take on a new project right now like making a rug since I am already typing a lot each week and learning to play a new instrument, though. I probably have enough on my plate as far as hobbies go.

Well, I'm learning a new instrument. My son talked me into buying a bass ocarina. It is a plastic one, not a ceramic one, because lighter is easier on the rheumatoid arthritis. An ocarina is a type of flute. It's shaped like a sweet potato though. If you play any of the Zelda games you've seen one. I have some experience with a regular flute and a one octave wooden flute and have messed around with the Tonette which is a one octave song flute as well.

It's also treble clef which is the same as the violin, strum stick, and the right hand on the piano and organ. Aside from the bass clef for piano and organ's left hand, I also know the alto clef for the viola. But treble is easiest to pick up a new instrument in.

I've done 4 lessons so far and can play a half dozen songs. I find it funny that no matter what instrument I have learned over the years they always start with Mary Had a Little Lamb and Hot Cross Buns. I've also mastered Ode to Joy (also early in every instrument), Frere Jaques, Long Long Ago, Jingle Bells, Gently Row, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and a couple others that I can't play at tempo yet, but can muddle through. Today will be my fifth day practicing and Brahm's Lullaby is in that lesson, so grown up music is coming.

When I do my new lesson, I always do all the songs from the previous lessons first and some of the fingering exercises. It helps to cement stuff in even as I move on to new lessons. I've found it is the best way for me to learn. I kind of do immersion when learning a new instrument.

One of the things that really helps me with this time of year and fighting seasonal depression is keeping my mind active and being challenged by something. That's why I tend to work on playing music or learning French more in the winter and early spring. I also take 5000 IU of vitamin D and use a happy light.

I started taking Moringa about ten days ago and it has made a huge difference with my RA symptoms. I also seem to be sleeping better, my skin is clearing up, and I have less muscle soreness from my fibromyalgia. It's not gone, but it is there. I am waking up feeling like I slept, which is really nice. I still tire out very easily and have to pace myself, but the enervating exhaustion is gone most days. I'm feeling better than I have in a long while. They tout it as a miracle tree, and I don't know about that, but it does help along with the Embrel and the Hydroxychloroquine.

And I've felt up to making meals a lot more often, too. Which helps with the food budget a lot. Tonight we are having herb baked chicken. Spice Islands has this Garlic Herb Seasoning that comes in a big container from Costco and it is our new go to seasoning.

I don't even miss Lawry's anymore or Paprika that much, which used to be our go to seasoning before my daughter had to quit using any spice that was hot (as opposed to warming like coriander, cinnamon, nutmeg). This stuff has been fantastic on chicken, beef, and salmon. I haven't tried it yet on pork or lamb or other types of seafood, but I can't imagine it won't be good. I've been looking for a long time to find an all purpose seasoning so this makes me very happy. It's the little things in life, you know?

$15,259.56 401K
+_9,478.38 IRA
-------------
$24,737.56 Total Retirement

$262.44 let to hit $25K.

Monday:
Garlic Herb Baked Chicken
Sweet Potatoes
Green Beans
Oranges

Tuesday:
Beef Stew with potatoes, carrots, celery, and parsnips
Broccoli
Apples

Wednesday:
Chicken Stir Fry with broccoli, carrots, celery, cauliflower, cabbage
Rice
Oranges

Thursday:
Sirloin Steaks
Baked Potatoes
Zucchini and Yellow Squash
Apples

Friday:
DH's work Christmas party
Baron of Beef
Roasted Red Potatoes
Green Beans with Almonds
There are lots of other choices, but none of them appeal to me. The kids will fend for themselves.

Saturday:
Bacon Cheeseburgers
French Fries
Cole Slaw
Oranges

Sunday:
Pork Roast smothered in Onions
Butternut Squash
Green Beans
Apples

We went to WalMart tonight to pick up some outdoor Christmas decorations. MIL's treat. They didn't have much left. I guess when you start selling Christmas stuff before Halloween, expecting there to still be a decent selection on December 1st is too much?

We got icicle lights in blue and white for the house's gutter line and porch peak and some bush blanket nets, some candy canes, and 4 little decorations (a cardinal, an angel, a star, and a Santa face) that we can attach to the deck or put on stakes in the yard.. We still need to go to Lowe's and pick out some more stuff. I'd like a nativity and a wreath.

Unfortunately all our outdoor decorations were stolen from MIL's house, which is why she's buying us new stuff. The really sad thing is I'll never be able to replace my son's rope light Christmas train, they just don't make them anymore, or my seal that was balancing a package on its nose that rotated. Or my penguin with the top hat. I was very attached to those.

We also picked up a phone charger for DH and a dual phone charger for the van and little Huskies (local college football team) nutcracker ornament for MIL.

Tomorrow my son and I will work on getting the bush nets on the bushes and attaching the lower set of icicle lights to the deck. I don't know if DS can do the gutter ones or if DH will need to do those. We can also attach the small decorations to the deck as well. I might have to run to Lowes for extra large zipties, though. While there I can see which big standees I might want, take photos, and have DH pick them up later. He is on his mom's card, I'm not.

After everything is in place we can then figure out the extension cord situation and the timer. We have a bucket of extension cords so those shouldn't be a problem. We may not turn the lights on for a week or so, because I want everything to be ready at once instead of lighting up a bit at a time. Now that it is finally December I feel like getting into the Christmas spirit.

$346.83 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_500.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Fund
__61.74 Life Insurance DH
__60.46 Life Insurance Me
_100.00 Gas Money
_100.00 Adults Blow Money
_120.00 Kids Allowances
_700.00 Christmas Fund
1000.00 Monster Mom Loan
--------------
3464.03 Total Money Out

I had expected to pay $800 this payday towards the Mom loan, but I ended up paying $1000. I had forgotten that since this was a 3 payday month that the last paycheck of the month would be bigger as they don't take any medical out of it. So that extra $200 went towards this loan instead. That means a total of $1500 was paid on the loan this month. By the end of December the loan will be down to 4 digits.

$11,500.00 Balance Forward
-_1,000.00 Payment Made
-------------------
$10,500.00 New Balance

I have rejiggered the budget again and think that as long as we keep our eating out spending under control we can continue to pay $1500 a month. I just have to keep telling myself that I'd rather be out of debt than to buy a pizza. It doesn't always work, but it works more often than not. I have all the ingredients for making pizza. I do not need to buy one from a restaurant.

Plus I have started back on a diet yesterday, and eating out always makes my weight go up, so that is another incentive to stay out of restaurants and cook at home. I would like to be under a certain weight by my 50th birthday mid-February. I think I can do it if I stick to no restaurant food.

I am thinking about doing a dietbet once I am a few days into eating better again, but I don't know. I am still doing my physical therapy exercises and need to get back to walking. The weather turned beautiful but cold again, so since it isn't raining, I need to start again. Just lacking a bit of motivation.

My sister (who is 61, I'm 11 1/2 years younger) hurt herself on the job a while back and can no longer lift the elderly out of their beds or help load them into vehicles for transport. Right now she's going through a thing where the doctor evaluates her for whether or not she can resume this duty or not. Sister says not. If the doctor says she can and they make her, her condition is going to get worse. This is one of those work claim doctors, not one that you know and trust, and those always seem to be slanted towards the employer and not the employee.

If she can't do the job anymore, she'll be let go, in which case she will have to move in here. She'll be okay when she turns 62 next September and can start drawing social security, but until then, things will be difficult. Even a job at McDonald's requires you to lift 40 pounds.

So we have started cleaning out the upstairs. There are two rooms up there, plus a storage room, and two closets, and they are pretty roomy, but they are chock full of junk. The goal is to get one room cleaned out more quickly so if she suddenly can't make rent she has somewhere to go, and then work a little more slowly on the other one. They need to be cleaned out anyway. Mom has a lot of junk up there that she just doesn't need. Extra furniture and just boxes full of junk and stuff she has been storing for my niece and my nephew that should have gone to their homes long ago as they are 38 and 40 respectively.

But there's also a lot of stuff from my grandma who died when I was 27. And there's still a lot of my dad's old clothes and he's been gone for years. And by old, I don't even mean the clothes he wore, I mean clothes from when he was in high school or young adulthood (like suits) that he wouldn't have even been able to get into for a couple of decades before he died. There are also dresses my mom has from when I was a kid that she would have to lose 100 pounds to wear and are hopelessly outdated. I know where I get the pack rat gene from.

I think, honestly, that my sister might move in when she retires anyway. Which is good, because it means when we move out, Mom won't be alone. I really don't think she should be alone anymore. She says she's fine, but she's not. She's forgetful. Not dementia, yet, but sometimes she makes me wonder. She's mostly careless forgetful.

I don't know if sister will contribute to expenses or not, but I don't really care. Even if she is still working her income is not great. Above minimum wage by a few dollars. We don't mind covering that if that is what she needs. You take care of family, you know? I know they will go up if she lives here, though, because the upstairs isn't serviced by the gas furnace and she would have to use electric heat during the cold months, which are many here.

She's easy enough to get along with and she and Mom get on well, so I think it would be good for both of them if she comes.

$14,790.27 401K
+_9,427.88 IRA
------------
$24,623.04 New Balance

It's up by $595.41. $376.96 to go to hit $25K. Hopefully if things continue to do well, just our contribution and work's contribution will put it up over that on payday. So close!

Day One:
Pork chops smothered in onions
Baked potatoes
Salad

Day Two:
Carne Asada
Pico de Gallo
Stir-fried cabbage, onions, bell peppers, and carrot shreds

Day Three:
Chicken Fajitas
Leftover stir-fried veggies

Day Four:
Chili
Baked Potatoes
Broccoli

Day Five:
Beef Stew with potatoes, carrots, and parsnips
Salad

Day Six:
Homemade pizza with pepperoni, sausage, bell peppers, and onions
Salad

Day Seven:
Chicken Shawarma
Naan bread
Tzatziki
Stir-fried cabbage and onions

Last night my son helped me to inventory 3 of our freezers, the mini chest freezer, the spare fridge freezer, and the tall upright we split with my mother. We do have a massive chest freezer in the garage and our main fridge freezer we still need to go through, but the big one is mostly meat and butter and I have a rough idea what is in there, since I have it divided up in compartments, two of chicken, 1 of beef, 1 of pork,1 of lamb, 1 of vegetables, 1 butter, and 1 of fruit. The main fridge freezer is a big mess, but is mostly not meal making food. It is ice, ice cream, fruit bars, dumplings, fish nuggets, and more the quick fend for yourself foods I get for the kids. And lots of ice packs. That one really just needs to be reorganized.

I made room for turkeys by restacking and tidying up, although we did throw some stuff out. It was from 2014, 2016, and 2017 respectively, and at the bottom of the mini-chest freezer. I am going to buy 3, one for Thanksgiving, one for Christmas, and one for Passover. This is the only time of year Trader Joe's carries the organic turkeys, so I plan ahead. We can't afford the fresh off the farm ones anymore, but I still want to be sure my food isn't raised on soy or GMO corn, so I budget for the TJ turkeys which aren't as expensive, but are still much more than standard.

I also had more homemade premade meals than I thought. There was 3 mac and cheese, 6 chicken mac and cheese, 2 mini meatloaves (serves 2), 7 Alfredo chicken (no noodles), 1 baked penné (serves 2) and one pork roast dinner with potatoes and gravy. There was also a bag of cooked sausage crumbles for making breakfast burritos, skillet scrambles, and egg bakes, 1 package of seasoned shwarma chicken ready to be dumped into the crockpot or pressure cooker and 1 package of beef carnitas the same. I didn't realize I had any of those left. I need to make up more. I wish I had known because we spent a lot of money eating out the last 3 weeks and there could have been more easy at home meals if the freezers had been organized.

How much money did I waste on out to eat food, you might ask? We spent $566.97 on eating out the last 3 weeks. I was sick and I was (and am) in the middle of a flare for my two lovely autoimmune diseases, but I really still have to make the effort to cook. I feel a little better today so I am going to try to get some more freezer meals made up after we go grocery shopping. Although the shopping may wipe me out. I will get DS and DH to help with making premade meals.

Dinner tonight is already planned as sausage, peppers, and onions, all of which I found in the freezers last night. I like to do something very easy after expending so much energy shopping. I have to pace myself. It's just the way of it when you are dealing with rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia. I can't do all of what I did before, but if I pace myself and plan ahead, I can do more than I have been doing.

I did find a lot of things I was planning to buy, like bagged bell peppers and onions, roasted potatoes, and a bunch of ground meat (beef, lamb, turkey, chicken) that I was going to buy to make meatloaves and meatballs for the freezer and now I don't have to. And 3 packages of sausage links for breakfasts, too. That means there is the money to buy the 3 turkeys.

I've got my meals planned out until Sunday and then I need to sit down and do a meal plan for the next week. I don't think I posted a meal plan this week because I didn't make one.

Dinner on Saturday will be steaks, roasted potatoes, and a cabbage stir-fry. Dinner on Sunday will be onion smothered pork chops, baked potatoes, and broccoli. I do have apples if anyone wants fruit. At least I feel like the cold is mostly over and I can actually feel up to cooking again.

Okay, so I am going back to doing my payday reports. I was thinking I didn't really need to be accountable anymore, but we have spent so much on eating out the past couple of months that I think I was just fooling myself or fooling you guys, I don't know. It's more I didn't want to be accountable than that I didn't need to, so I'm back at it. I have a couple hundred dollars in checking so that is why the total amount listed below does not match with the 10% tithe if anyone is doing the math. I still have most of that to carry over for next payday, too, if I don't spend it on something stupid.

$327.28 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_400.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Envelope
_600.00 Automatic Payments (4 phones, Hulu, Netflix, Storage)
_280.00 Monthly Chiropractic Family Plan
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
_120.00 Kids' Allowances
_566.97 Citi
--------------
3369.65 Total Money Out

I was only able to make a half payment this payday, but the other half will be next payday. I usually like to do it all on one payday, but because this is a month with three paychecks and because I am fully funding the Holiday/Gift Fund for Christmas next payday, I am breaking it up. $1000 is the minimum I will pay in a month on this loan. So $500 now, but hopefully $800 next time is the plan. It will be $500 for sure, but I am going to try to squeak a little more out this month. If we keep our eating out to a minimum, than I think $800 is what we can manage.

$12,000.00 Balance Forward
-__,500.00 Payment Made
------------
$11,500.00 New Balance

Well, for once this diagnosis is not for my daughter, it is for me. I have been officially diagnosed with fibromyalgia on top of my rheumatoid arthritis. So my compromised immune system is even more compromised than they thought. I have always felt my immune system was non-existent.

She's going to have me get an MRI on my hands to check for something. To be honest, I was having a hard time focusing on what she said because of how much pain I am in today and I also have a cold so my head is just too full to think.

I have crashed and burned with NaNo. I just have so much pain in my hands I don't want to type for long periods of time. I am thinking about getting a voice to text transcriber and try writing that way, but I haven't even begun to look into the cost of those things.

After my appointment with the rheumatoligist, I went to the lab for a blood draw. They took four or five vials. She's running tests for more things and doing a repeat test the insurance likes to have done every year.

I'm so tired. I slept well last night, too, but every bit of me just wants to crawl back into bed at 4:00 in the evening and forget about doing anything else, like making dinner, for the rest of the day. I wish I could find a way to not be so exhausted all of the time. It makes me not care about money at all. Just spend it and get take out is not an attitude I like coming from myself, but it is there more and more often. Ugh.

For the last 24 hours Norton wouldn't even show me this site existed, then when it showed the website again it blocked it, calling it dangerous. I finally had to go in and turn off the safe search to not have the message come up every time I tried to go to a new page and to post. I tried to go to the forums, but it won't let me post there at all. The new topic button does nothing when I push on it.

Norton is saying the threat from here is phishing and that the owners have to do something about it before they will relist it as a safe site, but I can't even contact them because the new topic thread won't open for me, nor the contact info. Is this happening to anyone else who has Norton? It seems like many of you were able to post just fine yesterday. Can someone contact James with this info? I am hoping he will see this post, but he doesn't always see the blogs.

I forgot to post my meal plan on Monday. As usual, I am free to switch things around as the whim strikes me, but since we've already had the first 3 meals on this list I may just go in order. Who knows? I think for the rest of this month I am going to be cooking a lot from the pantry and freezers. I am hoping to stick to just buying bread, milk, lettuce, and a few other fresh veggies or fruits. I don't need any regular meat since the freezer is well stocked now.

However, the reason I want to not buy much regular food with the grocery budget this month is so I can buy several organic turkeys while Trader Joe's has them available. One for Thanksgiving, one for Christmas, and one for Easter. I also want to buy lots of potatoes while on sale for the holiday, because I'm down to only 8 pints of canned potatoes and we love making baked potato soup using canned potatoes, it is just such a major short cut for me. I'd like to can at least 120 pounds of potatoes, even though I will likely only be able to do 7 quarts per day. We will save so much money this way.

Day One:
Baked Ziti with Meatballs
Salad

Day Two:
Tacos

Day Three:
Pork Roast smothered in Candy sweet onions
Acorn Squash
Green Beans

Day Four:
Sirloin Steaks
Fried Potatoes
Broccoli

Day Five:
Beef Stew with Potatoes, Carrots, and Parsnips
Salad

Day Six:
Homemade Pizza with pepperoni, ham, sausage, bell peppers, and onions
Cole Slaw

Day Seven:
Loaded Baked Potato Soup
Cole Slaw

Since October 19th our retirement has gained $1471.64. We only put in $220 every two weeks and the company matches 100% up to a point, so only $440 was contributions and matching in that time period. That is quite a huge gain in 2.5 weeks, a little over $1000. I know some of it was the IRA, but not near as much as was the 401K.

$14,255.93 Total in 401K
+_9,367.11 Total in IRA
-----------
$23,623.04 New Balance

$25K is getting closer and closer. I cannot wait until we are out of debt and can bump this up to 10% instead of 5%.

So I started the month at 44,270 words on my novel. The goal this month is to write 50,000 words and hopefully finish or come close to finishing this book. I got off to a slow start but am picking up speed. I did do some plotting and figuring out that I needed to insert a scene to make something make more sense and add a few sentences here and there for an additional character who hadn't been in an early scene. So that took a lot of skimming around the first day and I wrote it the second. The second day was a bad rheumatoid day, but after that I am doing mostly fine.

Word counts so far:
11/1 = 0
11/2 = 266
11/3 = 2037
11/4 = 1624

I am behind schedule by 2745 words, but I think I will be able to catch up, maybe even tonight, but definitely between now and the 7nth, while staying on track daily. I did a one hour writing sprint today already, I think I probably have another one in me. If so I will update the list.

Total word count so far is 3923 and I need to be at 6668. I can catch up now that I am in the flow again, although I will probably have to ice my hands tonight.

We had the consult with the VM hepatology department for my daughter's liver tumor and it looks like we just get to play wait and see some more. Since DD is at no risk of getting pregnant in the next few years, and because her Prednisone dose is so low they do not think it will encourage tumor growth we just watch it for now. They don't generally like to operate until the tumor is 5 cm and hers is 2.7 cm. They are going to have her liver enzymes checked and in 6 months she will get another MRI and then in a year another one, just to keep monitoring it.

I'm not getting great sleep right now so I've been doing a lot of crashing during the day. I think I'm still worried, because to me a tumor has no business being in her body. And maybe it just takes me back to my own. I have lived with systemic diseases for all of my adult life and now my daughter is having to do the same thing and sometimes it is just so much to handle.

Okay, well, I've been procrastinating doing NaNo all day, so now that I've gotten this post taken care of, it is time to get to work.

This week will be a little different, since we will be eating on the road for two dinners (possibly just one). I am getting low on pork, but it is always on sale so we will be able to buy some on Friday before the scheduled Sunday dinner. I've got a good stock of chicken and chuck roasts. I'll be looking for sales on sirloin steak and pork when the ads come out tomorrow, so I can plan this payday's shopping trip accordingly.

Monday:
Spaghetti with Seasoned Ground Beef
Salad

Tuesday:
Probably Chik-fil-a since DH and DD both want to go there. I've never been so might do something else if I don't like it. I'm not a big fan of chicken sandwiches or nuggets. Maybe Taco Time so I can get a salad. Or just pack a sandwich and salad.

Wednesday:
I'm not sure if we will be home or not. So probably Taco Time/Wendy's if we are still on the road and if not we will make burgers and fries at home.

Thursday:
Baked Chicken
Roasted Potatoes
Green Beans

Friday:
Beef Stew with Potatoes and Carrots
Broccoli

Saturday:
Homemade Pizza with pepperoni, sausage, onions, bell peppers, and ham
Salad

Sunday:
Pork Shoulder Roast
Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
Broccoli