Lucky Robin's Personal Finance Blog

I went up to Walgreen's after school with DD to see if they had that Organix Renpure shampoo that some of you were talking about that was buy one, get one with a rebate attached. My daughter was out of shampoo and she can't use mine because it is for oily hair only (and I'm very possessive of it, because it is super hard to find unless I order it online and incur shipping costs). Her dad's shampoo is too harsh for her hair and smells very masculine, and her brother's special chemical free, fragrant free, allergen free stuff is too expensive for anyone else to use.

She's good about using whatever I buy, but it has to be available. Usually I just get the 99 cent bottle of VO5 in strawberry, but this works, too. Two bottles of shampoo for the eventual cost of just a stamp, envelope, and sales tax sounds good to me.

I ended up spending a total of $38.12 there, $6.99 of which will be reimbursed. They had the VO5 conditioner on for 79 cents on sale in Freesia, which she likes the smell of. Also got cheap hairspray, a package of headbands for DD because her head is too big for the ones she's had for years, 100 count Excedrin PM, and a thing of Vick's Sinex because I ran out. That nasal spray is expensive and I never see coupons for it. The register printed out a coupon for a free bottle of Afrin nasal spray or up to $7 off, so I will use that the next time I go. I prefer Sinex, but Afrin is one of the few other types that works on me.

I set up a spreadsheet when we got home to track rebates and filled out the form and got it ready in an envelope to send off tomorrow. Rebating only works if you remember to do it! I'm not sure that I'll get into it too much, but doing it once in a while when I find out about it and it takes no effort on my part, then I will.

DD and I also had a talk about why we are pinching so tight right now in some areas, like eating out, so we can finish getting out of debt and save up for a new house. I find it helps to talk to her periodically about it, because sometimes she forgets and thinks she can't have anything she wants so doesn't ask for it at all. She does get what I think is a quite adequate allowance of $10 a week so she has plenty of her own spending money. She does a lot for it, including making dinner a couple nights a week on her own, and helps me almost every other night unless she has a ton of homework.

And if she babysits her brother for any serious length of time (more than an hour) she gets paid for that, too. There was nothing my sisters resented more when I was growing up than being forced to babysit me for free when they could have been babysitting the neighbor kids for a profit. It isn't much, just $3 an hour, and it's pretty rare, maybe once a month that it happens.

I found a recipe online today for pita bread. I looked through several until I found one that looked easy and still made pockets. Most of the easy ones were flat and didn't puff. It is more simple than making English muffins which I've done before. We're getting bored with buns all the time for sandwiches so I thought I'd change it up. It'll be cheaper than the bun recipe to make, even accounting for the fact that it only makes 8 servings, so I'd have to make two batches in a week. If it works well I will post the recipe.

I called the old homeowner's association to make sure that they received the dues since they still haven't cashed the check we left on 1/31 or sent out a receipt. The girl at the desk said that yes, they'd received it, so now I just have to wait for them to deposit it.

I paid the mortgage payment today of $386.14.

The propane bill for the old house came today and ouch. It was just over $400. This is the first fill up we've done since July. I'm going out to the house Sunday to finish packing up the laundry room and the one kitchen cupboard, maybe finish the living room, and put out the rubbish bin. We've been keeping the temp at 60 so the pipes don't freeze, but it's been around 45 outside for the past month, with no snow since mid-January, so I am going to drop it down to 50. The house is pretty energy efficient and the thermostat may not even kick on unless it drops below freezing outside. Come the end of March we can turn it off altogether.

I haven't been setting money aside for propane but that will change with the next paycycle. I'll start putting aside $80 a month. We may not need to use it but at least it will be set aside. I used to do that, budget for bills that weren't monthly, but I got out of the habit. I've set up a new spreadsheet for the budget that goes into effect on the 18th. It has categories for these non-monthly payments.

Okay, now food today:

Breakfast:
Eggs (free from chickens)
Hashbrowns ($1)
Milk ($1.50)
Total: $2.50)

Lunch:
2 kids
Orangic deli meat sandwiches on homemade buns ($3.25)
orange (.50)
apple (.50)
baggies of plain potato chips (.50)
water

Me
Leftover bowl of TJ's chicken noodle soup (free)
Chicken leg (.50)
salad (.25)
water
Total: $5.50

Dinner:
Homemade pizza:
dough ($1)
cheese ($2)
sauce (leftover from homemade spaghetti sauce, so free)
herbs (.25)
2 ounces pepperoni (.75)
2 ounces salami (.75)
4 ounces ground beef with sausage seasoning (.60)
1/4 chopped yellow onion (.15)
Homemade breadsticks:
Dough ($1)
Parmesan cheese (.25)
Can of Pineapple ($1)
Can of green beans ($1)
Milk ($1.50)
Total: $10.25

There will be an extra ball of dough for a future pizza out of this as well as leftover pizza and breadsticks so that will make a future meal or two this week, especially with DH gone and not eating it. With that in mind the $10.25 is not as expensive as it first appears.

Total $18.25 for the day, so under the goal of $20 a day.

The wind is blowing like crazy today so I made sure we had our flashlights located and found a supply of fresh batteries I knew we had in case of power failure tonight. We've also got those rechargable things that plug into outlets and when it gets dark or there is a power failure they come on, so we are set.

Added $1.91 in coins to the change jar.

I hate it when I don't sleep well at night. It just throws me off for the whole day. Especially when I have a cold. I was just starting to feel halfway decent and today I've been sneezing and having a runny nose like I was three days ago. I'm taking something to make sure I sleep tonight so that I don't go back downhill. I really don't want to have to buy another box of cold medicine to manage my symptoms. It is getting expensive to buy and I don't have any coupons.

Today was a busy day. I had my physical therapy appointment today so that was $90. I will be so glad when my deductible kicks in, but they raised it this year to a ridiculously high $1,250 per person or $2500 per family. Well, I'll definitely make up the bulk of that. The kids have each been to the doctor once this year, but probably won't need to go again this cold season. They will have to get physicals before camp. But mostly it's going to be me.

They did start an HSA though so DH is going to start having them take out $300 a month pretax for that since we easily spend that much on my medical alone and I am likely going to have to have another surgery in the next couple of months. I see a specialist on the 15th. Our out of pocket for the surgery, if I need it, will be about $2000, since it's just a laproscopy and will be done in office as an outpatient. Glad I decided to keep a decent sized EF. We'll try to swing it without touching it, but it's nice to know it's there.

Just once I'd like to go more than a year and a half without a visit to the slice and dice boys. My last surgery was 12/07/09. This has been going on more or less since I was 33. I'm turning 41. That is a lot of surgeries to have. On the bright side I might get my jury duty postponed again, which would be nice, as it's scheduled for a time when DH is supposed be gone for most of it. If I could postpone it for two weeks it would be perfect since he doesn't work when he is home.

We got gas for the car, so that was $38.02. It was running on fumes. It's a twelve gallon tank and it took 11.89 gallons so definitely don't want to cut it so close again. DH has been doing a lot of running around without me this week so I hadn't kept as close of an eye on it as usual and DH doesn't pay much attention to it.

I paid $4.46 on BoA MC #1, the one we paid off, but the last bit of interest came through. I also transferred off the autopayment for our credit monitoring service to the other card so nothing more will be put on that card. It has been put away. Once the second MC is paid off we will cancel it entirely.

DH called today to get a refund of the $218.18 we overpaid on the Gold Star Loan that we paid off last month. They said it will be in our bank account by Friday and to call them back when we get it and they will officially close out that line of credit and will report to the credit bureaus that it has been paid in full and the account closed by us.

I'm trying to get our available lines of credit down lower well before we are ready to buy a new house. Our credit score is at 780, but it says because we have so much available credit it will not go above 800 until we get rid of some of it. I know it'll take a dip first, closing accounts always does, but that is why we are doing it so far in advance of buying a house, to give it time to bounce back up again. The loan line of credit is $41,000 available and the MC is $3000. I think I might have them lower my AMEX limit, too, since it is $15,000 and we never use more than $2000 at a given time with it and we pay it off in full each month. So maybe get them to lower it to $7000 or something.

I spent $35.79 at the grocery store today on organic milk and orange juice (very much a luxury but I like it when I am sick), veggies, some organic deli meat, and the giant jar of peanut butter that's the size of a tub of Crisco.

I took DH to the airport as he flies back to Alaska for work. I won't see him again until the 2nd or 3rd, I believe. I don't remember if he comes home on Tuesdays or Wednesday now. Which means he misses my birthday on Saturday, but then he usually does. He will be home on both my son's birthday and our 16th wedding anniversary in March so that is much more important to me. I will go this week and pick up my two birthday presents on my own, a giant coffee table sized cook book (that I got my niece for Christmas and coveted greatly) from B&N and season 4 of Lost. I have the money set aside. At first I was tempted to just add it to my laptop fund, but decided I really want to have something this year.

Meal planning for today:

Breakfast:
TJ's Crisped Rice cereal ($1)
Milk ($2)
Bacon ($2)
Total: $5

Lunch:
2 Kids
PB&J sandwich (.50) (free homemade jelly from aunt)
PB&H sandwich (.50) (free honey from Mom's bees)
apple (.50)
banana (.25)
hard pretzles (.50)
water
$2.50

DH
Leftover pot roast (free)
Leftover potatoes and gravy (free)
Leftover green beans

Me
Leftover spaghetti (free)
Orange juice ($1)

Total: $3.50

Dinner:
Me and kids
1 can of TJ's chili ($1.50)
1 can of TJ's chicken noodle soup ($1.29)
Can of Green beans ($1)
Oranges ($1.50)
Milk ($1.50)
Homemade cookies ($1)
Total: $8.79

DH will eat at the airport. That is part of his work travelling budget and does not come out of the grocery budget.

$14.29 for the day and there is a bowl of leftover chicken noodle soup so I will have that tomorrow for part of my lunch. With DH gone and work providing all of his meals for the the next 22 days, our meals should cost much less. We should easily be able to hit the goal of keeping it under $20 a day. Probably under $15.

So in my quest to save money on food by meal planning I put several books on hold at the library. Another one came in on Friday and I just had a chance to finish it up today. It's called How to Feed Your Whole Family a Healthy, Balanced Diet with Very Little Money...and Hardly Any Time, Even if You Have a Tiny Kitchen, Only Three Saucepans (One with an Ill-fitting Lid), and No Fancy Gadgets--Unless You Count the Garlic Crusher.... Well, with a title like that you have to read it, don't you?

It's by Gill Holcombe, who is English, but the book is written in American (no extra u's or re's), only they forgot to translate for dollars so stuff is still in pounds. And there are a few foods mentioned that I'm not sure they even have here, and a couple of things I had to look up on

www.britsfood.com. Might as well have kept in the u's and re's then, silly publishers, thinking we can't read British English or something.

The author has a great sense of humor as you might recognize from the title. The organiztion of the book leaves a lot to be desired since the recipes are scattered throughout the very wordy (but funny) chapters instead of neatly organized and there are no photos (I do like photos in a cookbook), but I did find a few promising recipes. One for hashbrowns and one for making a small amount of tomato ketchup if you happen to run out of it and need some in a pinch. It's 3 tbsp tomato paste, 2 tsp vinegar, 1 tsp brown sugar, and 2/3 cup of boiling water. It's all stuff I keep on hand and I am tempted to try making it anyway since ketchup has gotten so expensive and we can't use the brands with corn syrup in them. Tomato paste is still relatively cheap. If we like it I can make it up and just pour it into an old ketchup bottle in the fridge.

It also had a recipe for Lancashire Hot Pot which is a lamb dish that looks so good. It's meant to be cooked in the oven as a sort of layered casserole but I think it could very easily be adapted to the crockpot. Lamb is forever being marked down here. The stores carry it, but never seem to sell enough of it that there isn't always some in the discount bin that needs to be used or frozen that day. So I will make that if I find some marked down lamb and let you know if it's any good. Also will make the hashbrowns and report back on them.

I found a few recipes for cakes and a simple fudge that I am going to write down and try later on. I don't like to make those unless there is a birthday or something, but we've got two coming up in the next six weeks. The recipe for ginger beer (ale) looks promising and would be simple to make the next time I have a stomachache and don't feel like running to the store for ginger ale (the kind without corn syrup). Though I have six bottles at the moment so that might actually be a while.

I haven't gotten around to roasting that chicken yet and using the extra for enchiladas and the carcass for soup stock. Maybe Tuesday. The chicken is still frozen. Yesterday was eggs and pancakes for breakfast, leftover spaghetti for lunch, and tacos for dinner.

Today's meals are--

Breakfast:
Blueberry pancakes made from Jiffy muffin mix (.79)
Eggs (free from chickens)
Milk ($2)
Total: $2.79

Lunch:
Leftover spaghetti with leftover sauce (price already taken out the day I made it, so free)
Hamburger ($2.29)
Bananas ($2)
Salad (.50)
Total: $4.79

Dinner:
Beef pot roast ($5.69)
Mashed potatoes ($1)
Green beans ($1)
Homemade gravy (.50)
Biscuits (.50)
Milk ($2)
Total: $10.69

It's a pretty large pot roast and there will be leftovers of it and the potatoes and gravy so there will be at least most of another meal out of this for 2 of us, probably Monday's lunch for me and DH. Maybe more, but it depends on how hungry everyone is tonight at dinner. Mom will be eating with us tonight so this will feed five people instead of four. Mom drinks her own milk that she buys herself so I never count that in our food costs.

Even though dinner is pricier than usual, lunch and breakfast are lower than usual and I still came in under $20 a day which is what I'm aiming for at the moment. If I can get to $16.50 per day as an average I'll get the monthly grocery budget down to $500. If I can get it down to $15 a day it'll be $450. But those are goals for later months. $13 would put me just under $400 by ten bucks, which is the ultimate goal. Right now just keeping it under $20 is good for February.

After lunch we dumped the kids off with DH's parents and borrowed their truck, put $30 worth of gas into it and took it out to our old house. We managed to get almost everything packed up. There are two cupboards left to clean out in the laundry room and kitchen and then the sorting area in the living room and the cupboard under the bathroom sink in the kids' bathroom. Then from there on out it's just cleaning the inside of the house up.

We still have to clean off the clutter trap that is the front porch so I can call the piano movers and get the piano moved to town. Not sure how much that's going to cost but it was $75 five years ago when we moved it in so I'm figuring with inflation and the cost of gas these days it'll be closer to $100, though we won't be moving it quite as far as before, 25 miles as opposed to 40.

We also have to finish cleaning out the shed. Everything is boxed and ready to go to storage and it will take at least two runs with the truck. Altogether I think we have about three runs left to completely empty everything out of both buildings. Then we will have one, if not, two dump runs to make and have to call someone to come take away the old chest freezer for recycling.

I found 70 cents while cleaning and added it to the coin jar.

Well, on the new count we are five days without eating out, with no plans to do so before the 18th. My goal is to make it to the 20th without eating out because that will be 3 full weeks. The way I am going with meal planning and homecooking, I honestly think I'm going to be able to cut my food budget from $700 a month to $500 a month, without sacrificing quality or cutting back on organics. I would like to get it down to $400, but I don't want to push too much at first and with DS's allergies there are just some things we cannot buy cheaper.

DS was begging for nuggets today so I thought I'd change the meal plan which had called for roasting a whole chicken and I thawed out some boneless, skinless chicken thighs instead. I cut them up, saving the pieces that were too little and throwing them in the stir-fry baggy in the freezer. I try to make the nuggets a uniform size and shape so that they'll cook evenly, so there are invariably little bits leftover. The baggy is finally full enough I can make stir-fry with it next week.

I love making nuggets at home. It's so easy and they taste so much better than McD's. Plus I can make enough to feed five people for around $4. The same amount would take $12 at McD's. Here's my recipe:

1.5 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1/2 cup flour
1/2 TBSP corn starch
2 beaten eggs
1 TBSP water
2 cups panko (I use Ian's organic, plain one)
Salt and pepper

Cut chicken into nugget size pieces. Mix corn starch and flour in one bowl. Mix eggs and water in a second bowl. Put the panko in a third bowl. Dip chicken in flour mixture, then egg mixture (letting excess drip off or it can get really thick and gummy and not cook enough), then panko. Place on a plate and add freshly ground sea salt and pepper. (You don't need to season both sides).

Heat canola oil in a wok until very hot (or use a deep fat fryer). Fry nuggets for three minutes. This amount usually takes us two batches.

I use the same breading recipe to make homemade fish and chips style cod fish pieces or fish sticks. And also homemade deep fried mozzarella sticks (except in that case I use the panko with Italian seasoning or if I only have plain add a couple TBSP of Italian seasoning to the panko).

I'll roast the chicken tomorrow for lunch. Whatever is left will be picked off mostly for enchiladas with half a cup being saved for chicken fried rice and the carcass will go to make chicken broth. I found what looks like a great recipe for egg drop soup so I will use the broth to make that on the same day we have the egg fried rice. I love it when I can get three meals out of one thing like that. Even better is it's the chicken I got for free with the gift card from DH's work. Since the chicken is free, and the eggs from Mom's chickens are free, that soup is going to be dirt cheap, just the cost of ginger, salt, pepper, which I have on hand, and scallions and peas and carrots (the latter two I have on hand) which will also go in the rice.

So I just read another blog urging me not to forget to buy stuff for Valentine's Day for my sweetie and my first thought was, "Umm...no." In my mind, this holiday is just a major waste of money, not just that of the lovebirds but of all the companies who are advertising. It goes into high gear right now. And I don't say this as someone who is down on love, but as someone who has been firmly in a committed relationship for twenty years.

I don't feel like I have to prove my love by buying overpriced waxy chocolates, overpriced out of season roses, eight dollar fancy singing cards encrusted with enough glitter to keep a classroom of six year olds supplied for a year, or expensive gadgets, nor do I expect $1000 jewel encrusted bracelets or necklaces and cutesy stuffed animals in return.

DH will get a free e-card. I will get one from him. We will try to out cute each other and be the sappiest. Since he will be away that day we will talk on the phone. If he were home we'd probably shunt the kids off somewhere and have a cozy dinner at home that we prepare together, followed by a snuggle in front of a romantic DVD.

The best way I've ever found of telling someone you love them isn't buying them something, it's saying the words, "I love you," and showing it in your daily behavior. What more do you really need?

I forgot to do today's menu on my other post so here it is. I made a batch of Jiffy Blueberry Muffins this morning (.79). It's a safe brand for my son's allergies.

Breakfast:
Scrambled Eggs (free from chickens)
Blueberry Muffins (.40)
Bacon ($4)
Milk ($2)
Total: $6.40

Lunch:
2 kids
Organic Deli meat sandwiches on homemade rolls ($3.25)
Orange (.50)
Banana (.25)
Hard pretzles (.50)
water
$4.50

DH
Tuna fish sandwiches on homemade rolls ($2)
water

Me (I took a nap and slept through lunch)
Snack of blueberry muffin (.10)

Dinner:
Spaghetti ($1)
Homemade Sauce:
Onion (.40)
2 cans tomato sauce ($2)
1 can diced tomatoes ($1)
Garlic (.25)
Basil, oregano, marjoram, thyme, salt and pepper (.50)
Milk ($2)
Total: $7.15

True the homemade sauce is more expensive than a couple jars of Ragu, but we can't just use regular brand names due to DS's allergies. So we'd be looking more at a couple of jars of Muir Glen Organics, in which case the homemade sauce is cheaper.

No, I didn't use some kind of magical couponing/rebating system. I had exactly one coupon for $1.50 off TP. DH and I simply used the $40 gift card he got to a local grocery store from his work for Christmas. But to make it stretch as far as possible, I waited until meat went on sale to use it. So we ended up with 4 beef pot roasts, 1 whole chicken, a 24 pack of Charmin toilet paper (son's allergies dictate this is about the only brand we can buy), six apples, six oranges, six bananas, 2 shampoos and a bodywash.

So now I have enough crockpot meat for the next five Sundays and enough fruit for a week.

We also signed up for their club card for greater discounts. It has the added benefit of giving you Alaska Airlines (the carrier he uses to go back and forth to work) miles for every $250 you spend. Now, I doubt very much we will be going back to that store any time in the near future because it is across the county and generally more expensive on a regular basis than the stores we normally shop. But if on the off chance we do go back there, his miles will build up.

We also picked up some milk on a rain check at our usual store. It was on sale Tuesday for $1.98 a gallon but they were sold out so DH got a rain check. We used it yesterday to get 2 gallons at $3.96. The price was back up to $3.29 a gallon, so it would have been $6.58 for the same amount, a savings of $2.62.

I am feeling somewhat better now. My nose has mostly unclogged and I can breathe out of both nostrils again so that is a positive step forward. I still feel a bit dizzy and a little weak but I should be able to start cooking again. Today was a rough it day again, with DH muddling through. We had the other box of gluten free frozen waffles we found when we did our freezer inventory last month and scrambled eggs for breakfast.

Breakfast:
Waffles ($4)
Powdered sugar (.10)
Scrambled eggs (free from chickens)
Milk ($2)
Total $6.50

Lunch:

2 kids
PB&J sandiches ($1)
Apple ($1)
Orange (.50)
baggy potato chips (.50)
baggy natural Cheetos (.50)
water
$3.50

DH
TJ's brand spaghettio's ($1.50)
2 hot dogs ($1)

Me
Can of TJ's chicken noodle soup ($1)
Salad with dressing (.50)
Glass of orange juice ($1)

Total Lunch $8.50

Dinner:
Tacos
Box of shells ($1.29)
Ground Beef ($2.29)
Homemade taco seasoning (.50)
Cheddar Cheese ($1)
Lettuce (.50)
Milk ($2)
Quart of homemade canned peaches from aunt (free)
Total: $7.58

DD has the assignment of writing down and cooking a recipe for her cooking and nutrition class on Friday so she will make dinner tomorrow night but I will be there to talk her through it. We will make spaghetti with my special sauce. I've got an onion that needs to be used so it'll be perfect.

I sent $100 off to ING today to add to the Emergency fund.

$6031.35 ING account
+0100.00 Transfer amount
--------
$6131.35 Total ING amount
$2068.65 Safety Net at local CU
--------
$8200.00 Total Emergency Fund

I probably ought to transfer that $68.65 of the Safety Net over to ING since it makes more in interest there, and I feel comfy with only having $2000 in the safety net, but I wasn't thinking about that when I made the transfer. I'll do it next time I make a transfer.

Made a mini-payment to BoA of $86.16, just to chip away a little bit more at what we owe. We won't get paid again until February 18th. I have $800 left for six days. $450 is set aside for bills that come due between now and then (cell, insurances, storage). $200 is set aside for groceries. $150 is for miscellaneous expenses, like gas or anything I forgot about. Anything left over when payday hits will go to the laptop fund and the EF depending on how much there is.

I should only need to buy milk, fresh fruit and veg. We still have plenty of meat in our freezer, but we will be using the $40 gift card to Safeway to buy meat. Either whole chickens or beef potroasts (or if they aren't too expensive picnic hams). I need something for Sundays for the crockpot.

I didn't feel good enough on Monday to do my usual baking. I didn't really feel good enough to do it today either, but DH is home until the 8th so he did most of the work under my directions. He's good like that. I'm probably too contagious to really be touching the food anyway.

We made two batches of hamburger buns today because we decided to make up a bunch of cheeseburgers to freeze. We had gotten into a habit of buying 20 of the cheap double cheeseburgers at a time from McD's and freezing them for days when things were just crazy. Each one costs $1.29 with tax for a total cost of $25.80. I figured we could do them cheaper from scratch, but the other way was just more convenient. Well, today DH grilled up 20 hamburger patties and then we assmebled 20 cheeseburgers for the freezer, wrapped them in plastic wrap and then into two large tupperware container made for transporting cakes. Total cost was $12 (including wrap), so a savings of $13.50.

Normally a batch of hamburger buns is twelve, but we made smaller dough balls this time on two of the batches and just let them rise for 3 hours instead of 2. So each batch made 18 instead of twelve. This left us with the usual twelve leftover to use for the next several days worth of sandwiches and rolls.

Then DH made up two batches of biscuits. To one batch we added garlic powder, parsley, and a handful of cheddar cheese and brushed the tops with butter and they taste pretty close to the Cheddar Bay Biscuits that Red Lobster makes. DS loves them and I figured they'd be pretty cheap to make at home. We froze half of each batch for later in the week.

When DD got home from school today she made a batch of her sugar cookies so we will have some sweets this week. I like having sweets when I'm sick, though I tend to limit it to one serving per day.

Meal planning is really hard to do when I am this sick, mostly because I can't cook and DH is so limited in what he can cook. So I have to tailor it around what he can do.

Breakfast:
French Toast with real maple syrup ($2.50)
Milk ($2)

Lunch:
2 kids
PB&J sandiches ($1)
Apple ($1)
Orange (.50)
baggy potato chips (.50)
baggy natural Cheetos (.50)
water
$3.50

2 adults
Chicken and vegetable soup ($2)
Grilled ham and cheese ($2)
water
$4

Total Lunch: $7.50

Dinner:

Beef stir-fry
-beef ($3.50)
-1 pound bag of mixed veggies ($2)
Can of pineapple ($1)
Biscuits (.50)
Milk ($2)
$8 total

I checked my savings account at ING today. I made a whopping $0.93 in interest this month. I only transferred most of the EF there ten days ago, and it's only counted as being in the account for 7 so I imagine next month it'll be over triple that. I keep $2000 of the EF in an easily accessible account at a local branch, but not the one I normally use on a day to day basis. If a true emergency hit and I didn't have access to anything for three days that would be kind of a mess.

I also found a penny in the parking lot of the chiropractor. It went in the coin jar towards the new laptop fund.

Spent $100 on dues today for our old homeowner's association and while my husband was out there paying it, our old neighbor asked him what he was planning to do with the house. His nephew was with him and is looking to buy and is handy and we wouldn't even need to fix it up, just sell it as is. DH gave them a tour and he really liked it. Which would be really, really nice, but...he wants us to carry the contract and I don't want to do that. I want the house completely gone and out of our name.

I told DH to find out why he wants to carry a contract, if it's a question of downpayment, we'll be selling the house for less than it's worth and it should easily qualify for a mortgage with the extra value. Other people are looking to rent it but I don't want the hassle involved with being a landlord. And I'm not sure what the legalities are involved in something like that.

Today was definitely a spendy day. We spent $40 for the Harry Potter exhibit at the science center. We spent $90 at Red Lobster, but will each get a second meal out of it and this was only one out of two meals out for the six week pay cycle. And my daughter got two pairs of jeans and a really nice set of boots. I hadn't planned on the boots but they were on sale marked down to $19.96 from $49.50 and since she has no dress shoes and they were in her size, 13W, it felt like a really good choice to make. She needed new jeans in a smaller size because she's lost some weight and her old ones were literally falling down. In total we spent $81 on her clothes.

Also a tank of gas to drive to Seattle and back so that was $28.09. Will have to fill it up again tomorrow.

For the new pay cycle my goal is to eat out only twice during the six weeks, but have the amount spent be $60 which will be half of this pay cycle's amount.

I still feel pretty awful today. I don't think this cold is going anywhere fast and that's annoying because we are going to Seattle on Sunday to the Pacific Science Center to see the Harry Potter exhibit. It leaves on the 31st (I think) and we had to reserve a time and everything, plus pay $10 per person ($40) total. It would be more if we weren't members.

I don't really care all that much for HP. I mean, I liked the books and everything and the movies are okay considering how much they leave out, I guess, but I'm one of these people that read each book once, watched eash movie once, at least up through five, and then let it go.

My family on the other hand is obsessed. So mostly I'm just going for them. I'm much more interested in the upcoming King Tut exhibit. I saw that as a child on a field trip and it made such an impression on me that I want my kids to see it, too. That'll be around sometime in the spring. We are eating breakfast at home, packing a lunch for the road, and having our one fancy meal out this pay cycle (six weeks) at Red Lobster.

I did yield to temptation yesterday and order a pizza but I had DH go pick it up instead of having it delivered, so $27.11, no delivery surcharge, no tip. We made it 17 days without eating out, which is pretty darn good for us. We ate the leftovers for lunch today, including sending cold pizza in lunchboxes to school. Both kids had yogurts ($2).

DH made French toast with real maple syrup and milk for breakfast so that was $4.50.

Dinner tonight is leftover homemade chicken noodle soup which I already put the cost in for the day I made it so basically free this time around. DH is making a two pound meatloaf ($6) and we will have a can of pineapple for fruit ($1) and milk ($2), so $8 for dinner.

We found a couple boxes of toaster waffles when we did our inventory earlier this week so that will be for tomorrow's breakfast. We get a gluten free one from TJ's (not because we have gluten allergies, just because it's the one type that doesn't have other ingredients in it that my son is allergic, too). We'll eat a whole box of eight so that will be $4. We'll have it with apricot jelly (free from my aunt) and powdered sugar (I dunno, 10 cents worth, maybe), and milk ($2). I also have some sausage patties that need using up. ($1). Total $7.50.

Lunch will be homemade cheeseburgers because we have four buns that need using up.
Homemade buns (.50)
1 pound organic hamburger (2.49)
4 slices Tillamook cheddar (.50)
Chopped onion (.05)
Condiments (.25)
Baked french fries ($2)
Pickles ($1)
Water
Total: $5.79

Dinner will be leftover meatloaf (free)
Potatoes($1)
Carrots ($1)
Broccoli (1.69)
Milk ($2)
Oranges ($2)
Total: $7.69

DD was talking about making a batch of homemade brownies which generally costs about 75 cents if she makes it with cocoa or $1.50 if she makes it with Baker's chocolate. We don't tend to eat sweets more than once a week (unless we're sick and needing ice cream). We also don't tend to snack much. If we do it's on things like air-popped popcorn sprinkled with organic cheese powder, and comes in at around 50 cents.

I signed back up with Global Test Market. When I was doing them before I was making about $50 every six weeks. I don't know how well I'm going to do now that I'm 40, though. I seemed to screen out of everything, when before when I was 37 and 38, I did almost everyone. Guess I'm not in the market they want anymore. Oh, well. I'm going to look into that watching videos for money thing Laura was talking about the other day. I'd like to add to my new laptop fund a little faster.

I am Mrs. Crankypants today because I am still horribly sick with this cold and I had to go and be a GOOD MOM because my youngest had a large speaking role in the assembly at his school. Do not even ask me why they are celebrating Martin Luther King, Jr. Day now instead of two weeks ago. I do not know. And since I missed the Veteran's Day assembly because I couldn't walk at the time, I really didn't feel like I could miss this one, too, (even though all he did in that one was sing and his dad and grandma both went). All I wanted to do was stay curled up in bed with a bowl of ice cream and a nice cuddly blanket, but I've been able to do so little with my kids lately I wanted to do this for him, despite feeling so awful. And he was so happy his dad and I both made it.

Why is it that there is always one person who thinks they need to douse themselves in an entire bottle of perfume before going to a public event? Or smoke an entire pack of cigarettes? Do they not realize how much they stink, how bad it is for the people around them to have to breathe that in, especially if they have allergies? There are at least 30 kids at my son's school who have asthma. And if you can't make it through a 45 minute children's assembly without taking a smoke break, there is seriously something wrong with you beyond addiction. End rant.

Someone tell me why it is not a good idea for me to order a pizza delivered? My willpower is very low and I am more than tempted to pay the $27 for a Montague's All Meat Marvel from RT, plus tip. Normally that is enough of a reason not to do it, but it would just make everything so much easier.

So far the only money spent today was on a nasal syringe. $6.29.

I am terribly annoyed with The Evil Empire (BoA) today. On Jan 21st I made an online electronic payment to them to pay off the last of the loan interest that came in after I had "supposedly" paid off the entirety of the loan with their "payoff amount." It was supposed to be credited that day, but it never posted and it showed no record of payment pending. Then after that I couldn't even get into the account again for the next couple of days. It kept taking me to the VISA instead.

Finally I was able to get in there and it still showed us as owing that $218.18, so I sent DH to the bank with a paper check to pay it off. He asked them to look it up there and make sure there was no electronic payment pending first, so that we didn't end up with a double payment. There wasn't so he went ahead and paid it. Guess what just showed up today? The electronic payment that should have been credited on the 21st like the website claimed it would be! So now I'm down an extra $218.18 in the checking account. And who knows how long it'll take them to send the refund check. I am beyond irritated.

It's not like I need that extra money at the moment, I've got plenty of cushion in the account, but it's the principle of the thing. Can't these people just do their jobs right in the first place and keep a functional website and have their tellers know what they are doing?

So I still feel like death warmed over so meals for today looked like this:

Breakfast:
Joe's O's cereal for 4 ($2)
Boiled Eggs (free, from chickens)
Milk($2)
Total: $4

Lunch:
2 Kids--
PB&J sandwiches ($1)
Apple (.50)
Orange (.50)
Pretzels (homemade) (.25)
water

DH--
1 can of chili ($1.29)
2 biscuits (.30)
Leftover homemade chicken nuggets (amount taken out earlier in the week)
water

Me--
1 bowl of ice cream ($1)
1 glass pineapple juice ($.50)

Total: $5.34

Dinner:
Homemade chicken noodle soup
--onion (.75)
--2 carrots (.50)
--2 celery stalks (.50)
--parsley (free from plant in yard)
--salt and pepper (.02)
--garlic (.25)
--chicken broth ($1.25)
--half package egg noodles (.50)
Milk ($2)
Leftover chicken (amount taken out previously)
Total: $5.77

Hopefully tomorrow I will feel better and make better food for the family. DH cut up everything for me for the soup and followed my directions for putting it all in the crockpot and it turned out great. We only ate half of it despite everyone having two bowls but me so plenty leftover. Still, it was a pretty cheap food day all in all.

I am tentatiely planning better food for tomorrow but I think I'll wait until then and see how I feel and then post it for the day. I've got two written out, one for if I feel better and one for if I don't.

DH spent $5 on a box of Campfire Girl Mints. I told him they have to last for two weeks at that price. I also bought several vitamin supplements today for my immune system and because of muscle cramps in my calves. Magnesium, potassium, golden seal, echinacea, vitamin C, and fish oil. Spent around $75. I'm rounding because I don't feel like getting up and checking the receipt.

I've managed to catch a cold on top of my kidney infection. It's that awful sort of full head, dripping nose, sore throat, don't want to do anything productive cold. So my meal planning kind of went out the window. We did not get takeaway though, no matter how sorely I was tempted. This makes...16 days I think with no eating out.

Instead I opened the cupboard doors and pulled out chili for the boys and beef stew for the girls. I don't like to do that sort of thing often. I'm not a big fan of processed foods but the chili was from Trader Joe's and the stew doesn't have additives or preservatives so in a pinch it'll do. That was about $7. I also ate ice cream twice today. Not something I normally do, but my throat hurt so much I just didn't care. It's $4 a quart and I ate half of it. Yikes. Oh, well. I hope I feel better tomorrow.

DH spent $25 on a plumber's snake today and used it to clean out the dryer hose. The dryer hasn't been drying properly in ages and after going through three cycles on high heat with one load he figured out it was jammed up. It's twenty feet from the dryer to the outside vent so he bought a 25 foot snake. He got out enough lint to make a cat with. Now it's drying nicely. One thing to look for when we buy a new house is a dryer connection on the outside wall of the house. It was so easy at our old house, you just reached in from the outside and pulled out anything that was there. This house was badly designed when it comes to accessing things.

The final interest payment on the loan posted today so it is officially paid off, unless they pull something like interest on the interest. Darn evil empire(BoA).

My meal plan for Wednesday is basically Joe's O's (like Cheerios, but organic and from TJ's) cereal for breakfast and whatever DH packs the kids for lunch and chicken noodle soup for dinner. I've got onions, carrots, celery, parsley, chicken broth, some leftover chicken, and noodles and they can just go in the crockpot and simmer away for four hours.

I rolled up the rest of the coins in my coin jar, at least until I ran out of penny wrappers. I think there are at least 200 pennies left to do. DH went ahead and took the rolled coin to the CU. It was the wrong CU, but oh, well, I'll get it back tomorrow in dollars and take it over to the right CU, along with the $45 I've squirreled away for my new laptop fund. Come to think of it, there is money in the checking account over there, too. I think I'll add that to my fund as well.

$42.47 opening balance
$63.00 rolled coin
$45.00 squirreled money
$63.47 checking money
-------
$218.94 total laptop fund

I'm about 1/4 of the way there. Yay!

The payment I made online last week for the interest that came through after we paid off the big loan didn't go through and now it's not letting me access it. Every time I click on the link it takes me to our VISA instead. Fortunately the statement came in the mail today so I just wrote out the check and DH took it down to the bank when he picked up DD from high school, so that is taken care of. That was $218.18. So that should see the last of the loan. If they try to slap us with anymore interest charges I will be annoyed. The previous amount was supposed to be the payoff amount so that this wouldn't happen in the first place.

Other than that we spent no money today, although we did spend $133 last night on new clothes for the kids. My son has grown two inches since school started and my daughter has lost enough weight that all of her clothes are super baggy on her and she was constantly hiking her jeans back up. Not too bad for ten articles of clothing.

Meal planning for tomorrow:

Oatmeal ($1)
Eggs (free, chickens)
Milk ($2)
Canned peaches ($1)
Total: $4

Lunch:
2 Kids--school
PB&J sandwiches (homemade bread, homemade jelly) ($1)
Carrots (.50)
Baggy potato chips (.50)
Baggy Natural Cheetos (.50)
Yogurt ($2)
Water

2 Adults--home
1/2 a leftover cheeseburger (free)
2 leftover chicken legs (free)
oranges ($1)
leftover potatoes (free)
Yogurt ($2)
Water

Total: $7.50

Dinner:
Spaghetti ($1)
Homemade sauce consisting of one onion (.75), 2 cans tomato sauce ($1.50), 1 6 oz can tomato paste (.50), 1 can diced tomatoes ($1), garlic (.25), and herbs (.50)
Homemade Texas Toast ($1)
Milk ($2)
Dinner: $7.50

$19 for the tomorrow's food, not bad. Probably the best since I started keeping track.

Oh, my gosh, going through the freezers was a pain in the neck (and back), but it's done. I am wincing at how much we had to throw away due to freezer burn. Some of those items from the bottom of the freezer were from before we moved here in January of 2010. Yes, a year old! Ugh. I estimate we threw out $200 worth of food. And an additional amount of frozen garden produce that if purchased probably would be about $50. We will have to pay for an extra garbage can pick up because of it. *sighs*

We took an inventory of what was left and I made a spreadsheet of it. Remember my estimate of being able to go three weeks without buying any new meat? Way off. I think we will definitely be able to go three months without buying any new meat. Maybe even four. It's almost ridiculous. We live near a grocery store now. We don't need this kind of a stockpile. Even for serious carnivores like us.

I am going to have to come up with some new ways of cooking boneless skinless chicken thighs (25 pounds!) other than grilled on the George or made into homemade nuggets or we will all go crazy. I am currently watching a cooking show called Chinese Cooking Made Easy put out by BBC2. I'm hoping she'll do something with chicken soon so that I'll have something new and interesting to cook. Most of what she's made so far I'd have to buy ingredients for, although I did have some langastino in the freezer and she made that.

I plan to go through the cupboards this week as well and sort out what we've got in the way of canned and boxed goods and make another spreadsheet for that. That will help immensely with the meal planning. In the meanwhile, my plan for tomorrow:

Breakfast:
Waffles with homemade blueberry jam ($1)
Eggs (free, chickens)
Bacon ($2)
Milk ($2)
Total: $5

Lunch:
2 Kids--
Nitrate free Deli Meat and cheese sandwiches ($2)
Apple and an orange ($2)
Baggy Natural Cheetos (.50)
Baggy plain potato chips (.50)
Water (free)

2 Adults--
Tacos ($3)
Can of Pineapple ($1)
Water

Total: $9

Dinner:
Egg fried veggie rice ($1)
Homemade chicken nuggets ($3)
Milk ($2)
Broccoli ($2)
Ketchup (.50)

Total: $7.50

I rolled up the coins in my coin jar and ended up with $53.50. And then my son asked, "What about the other coin jar?" and pointed to one on a different shelf. It was a mayo jar and it was half full. I wasn't about to count up any more coins at that point though, so hopefully I'll get to later tomorrow (well, technically today). That all goes to the laptop fund.

Made it through another day of no eating out. Meal planning is really working for us. So Sunday's meal plan for the four of us will be:

Breakfast:
Chicken sausages with sundried tomatoes and provolone ($4) and homemade biscuits (.50), sausage gravy (.25) and milk ($2), so $6.75 total

Lunch:
Club sandwiches (homemade whole wheat bread (.25), tomato (.90), lettuce (.30), bacon ($2), roast beef ($2), ham ($2), turkey ($2), condiments (.25)
Cucumbers ($2)
Oranges ($2)
$13.70 total

Dinner:
Pork Chops ($4)
Potatoes ($1)
Green beans ($1)
Carrots ($1)
Milk ($2)
$9.00 total

Lunch is a little pricier than normal since the meat is all nitrate free, but it's also something we can make easily with a toaster and microwave. On Sundays we can't use the stove to cook at lunchtime because Mom has a Bible study meeting in the kitchen during that time (started when she couldn't get out to go to church due to her fall and she just continued it afterwards because it was easier) and our wing of the house doesn't have a stove. Usually I put something in my crockpot and make instant potatoes and veg in the micro, but we are out of pot roasts and picnic hams. Still, it's far cheaper than the old option which was grabbing meals at McD's ($25 for four of us) or Olive Garden ($75).

I have enough lunch meat to make it through the next three weeks of school sandwiches in the freezer, so my goal for the next 3 weeks is to not buy any new meat. We have all kinds of chicken, hamburger, beef stew meat, steaks, lamb, and a turkey in the freezers so we are going to work on getting that down. For all I know there are some pot roasts buried in the bottom of the chest freezer. I even have three bags of shredded turkey leftover from Thanksgiving that could go in enchiladas. Maybe DH and I should make an inventory of what we have in the freezers. Maybe in the cupboards, too. I'm forever buying stuff and coming home to put it away only to realize I already had some.

If all I have to buy in the next few weeks is milk and fruit and veg, it should give me substantial grocery savings to bank. Quite frankly, we could probably go six weeks without buying any meat, but I like having a bit shorter goals than that. I can always add on to the end of it.

Miz Pat wanted to know how I make homemade hamburger buns so I'm posting the recipe. It costs about 50 cents for me to make these and the cheapest I can find them during the winter is $1.29 for eight, and that's not the additive free kind my son needs for his diet which is around $2.49 for eight. Recipe makes twelve. I make the dough in the bread machine, but you could use a stand mixer with a dough hook, or I suppose mix it by hand, but that's a lot of work.

2 1/4 tsp yeast (1 pkg)
1 1/4 cup warm water
3/8 cup butter, melted
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg, well beaten
4 1/4 cups flour
1 1/4 teaspoon salt

Put in wet ingredients first, then yeast, then sugar, then flour. Mix in bread machine. Let rise one hour (or covered overnight in the fridge, will keep for four days). Pinch off into balls, place on cookie sheet, and flatten a bit with your hand so they are the shape of hamburger buns. I usually do twelve. You can make them oblong if you want hot dog buns, or you can make three smaller balls per each and put them into a muffin tin cup and make cloverleaf rolls. But I generally just make them round in the shape of hamburger buns. Let rise in a warm place at least one hour, two if you want bigger buns. Bake at 375 degrees F for 25 to 30 minutes. Optional: Brush tops with melted butter.

Last night DH found a Verizon rebate card that we'd misplaced several months ago and it's valid until 8/11. It is for $50 and we can go online and have it direct deposited to our account, so that is going into my new laptop fund. I also emptied my purse on Friday before going to the CU to get this week's money out. I have a new rule that anything less than a $20 goes into the laptop fund. I had $13 and some change. I also pilfer ones through out the week. Monday I will go and make a deposit. Right now I am just stuffing the money in an envelope and the coin jar. I've got quite a lot of change I need to put through the CU's change counter.

DH opened his mail finally and found that his new work had sent him a $40 gift card for Christmas. The only place it is good for around here is Safeway, which is a 30 minute drive away, but none of the other stores even exist in this part of the state. So we'll swing out to Lynden the next time we visit his parents. Even if they don't have anything we want (son's diet makes it difficult to shop without reading every label in the store), we can at least buy fruit, veg, flour, sugar, yeast, honey, molasses, and other baking supplies. I normally buy the 25 pound bag of flour from Costco as it's cheapest, but I could get two ten pound bags this time instead. I don't think I'd buy meat there as I'm not sure about their policy on antibiotics and growth hormones and injecting meat with flavor enhancers or BPA packaging and I don't want to take the time to find out.

DH also has a $75 gift card from his previous employer that he needs to use, but it's on him how he spends it. I told him if the places it is good for don't have anything he wants we can always give him $75 cash and I'll use the gift card at one of the stores to buy clothes for the kids. The one thing he wants is $35, so the extra may just end up in his savings fund. He wants an electronic book reader of some sort.

Last night I made pizza for dinner. It was so good. The crust was perfection. It cost about $8 for all the ingredients and we topped it with cheese, Canadian bacon, pepperoni and leftover hamburger from spaghetti night. A pizza that size with that many toppings would cost $25 at our favorite pizza place. There was enough left over for lunch today.

Tonight's dinner is cheeseburgers with homemade buns and baked french fries. We will open a can of pineapple for fruit and have cucumbers for veg. With milk and condiments that'll come to $7.50. We've almost made it through two weeks without eating out. What a difference that makes to the food budget.

I paid Mom $1000 on the medical loan I took from her today. I paid off the AMEX today ($1000 out of the paycheck and $500 out of the EF, leaving EF at $7,600) and the last bit of interest on the loan I paid off earlier this month hit our account so that was $218.18, which I also went ahead and paid so we should now be able to close that account down and have it marked as closed and current on our credit report. Yay.

That leaves us with $21,021.22 on the VISA and $4540.42 on the MC and that's it for our unsecured interesting bearing debt. That's a total of $25,561.64 left to pay. If we can manage $2500 a month in payments (which should be no problem) we can have it paid off by the end of the year. I think the MC will be paid off by the end of April. Wow, that light at the end of the tunnel just keeps getting brighter and brighter.

So this leaves us at:

$92,000.00 (no interest loan to Mom)
$25,561.64 (VISA 11.4% and MC 12%)
$22,053.10 (Mortgage 5.5%)
-----------
$139,614.74 Total

I looked up how much was left on the car after Wednesday's payment went through and it is $16,640.84. At the current rate of payments it'll be paid off 7/21/14, but once we get the credit cards paid off we will be doubling the car payments so I'm thinking more towards the end of 2012, probably.

I didn't make it to the pharmacy before it closed yesterday, so went today and paid $19.59 for 2 RX and then we went to WalMart to get non-prescription meds at $56.68. 4 boxes of nasal spray, 2 big bottles of antacids, and 2 mega packs of Dayquil/Nyquil gelcaps. Hopefully that will get us through the rest of the winter. I'll have to pick up more Sudafed at some point, but that can't be bought in bulk without a doctor's note so that comes a bit at a time.

DD is home from school and the first thing out of her mouth was, "Can we go out to eat?" *sighs* I told her no and she was all, "But we always go out to eat when Dad comes home." My response was not anymore. I think I'll have to sit down with her and talk about it and explain why. That we are pushing hard to get out of debt and then to save up a downpayment for a new house to add to whatever we get for the old house. And that the sooner we get the money saved the sooner we'll be out of here. She really doesn't like living here very much and now that Mom needs minimal attention on a daily basis we don't technically need to still be living in the same house with her, so the sooner we are in a position to really save, the better. She loves her grandma, but they are too alike to get along very well and really, a house nearby is much better than sharing living quarters, even in a house this large. Buying a new house before the old one sells just isn't an option, though.

We are going to go down to the Science Center some time in the next three weeks (we are members), so we will pack a lunch and snacks, but we will have one planned dinner out and it will be our only fancy restaurant meal this pay cycle. Well, I say fancy. I mean Red Lobster. *laughs* We'll stick with our water only drinking rule and no desserts. And since we will have the cooler with us it will be easy to take all the leftovers home for additional meals. We can usually get 3 meals each out of one of their feast type meals. Well, DH gets two, but the rest of us can get three.

I went to the doctor today and am still infected, so $20 copay, 2 new prescriptions, and a referral to a specialist, oh, joy. I've an appointment with the specialist on 2/15, soonest I can get in. Bummer. I hope this doesn't mean yet another surgery. I am sick to death of being cut open, thank you very much. Plus it'll be another $2000 or so out of pocket and put debt repayment back a couple of months. Still I can't go on like this. I have jury duty in April so I would have to plan around that or at least defer it. I've already deferred it once when recovering from knee surgery/issues so I don't know how cooperative they will be at the court house if I try to do it again.

I haven't gone to pick up the medications yet, so will probably just come back and edit this post later with those expenses. They are both generics, so it shouldn't be too bad. While I was at the doctor DH went around the corner to make a payment at the dentist office. $182.60. Ouch. Our medical may be good, but our dental sucks.

Well, DH and I talked it over and we decided to go ahead and pay off the AMEX card on Friday. I'm still getting the hang of the new budget and the higher income, but it looks like I'll be able to come up with $1000 of the payment just out of the paycheck and only have to dip into the emergency fund for the just under $500 of the remainder. I feel a lot better about that. I really didn't want to take the whole amount out of the EF. It'll be a little tight doing it this way, but I'm used to living on tight. And anyway, it'll make things less tight from the end of February onward.

The car payment came out of checking today so that was $490.70 for that and then I bought some groceries today at $37.47. We also filled up the gas tank for $37.09. There was no other spending today.

We are on day ten of no eating out. Today was the first day that the kids really fussed at me about it. Their dad came home today and in the past we have usually gone out on that day. Instead we made spaghetti and hamburger for dinner. We had a little leftover hamburger from last night and then did up another pound. Between the milk, spaghetti noodles, the tomato sauce, the herbs, and the hamburger it cost about $8 to feed the four of us. Going out to Olive Garden like the kids wanted, even with drinking only water and having no dessert, would have cost us between $65 and $100 with the tip. Pretty darn good savings, methinks.

I made homemade blueberry jelly with my mother yesterday. We took frozen berries from the freezer. The berries were free since they came off her bushes this summer. So just a bit of money for the sugar.

Planning for tomorrow, breakfast will be eggs, milk, toast with jelly, and bacon. Eggs are free-ish from the chickens and toast is pennies because I made the bread myself. Bacon is $3.99 a pound for the nitrate free kind and we will go through half a package. So breakfast will be about $4 with the cost of the milk. Not bad. We're really starting to get the cost of breakfast down.

Lunch will be club sandwiches all around to use up the rest of the bacon and the nitrate free lunch meat that has one day left on it. Plus we've got 3/4 of a tomato that needs using up and a bit of lettuce. The kids don't mind eating them cold in their lunches, but DH's and mine will be delightfully warm. I use Dijon mustard on mine instead of mayo for a bit of a kick. We've got some carrots that need using up so will add that and some bananas that have just ripened for fruit. We drink water at lunch. Not quite sure on the price range for that, I haven't sat down and done the calculations yet.

Dinner will be baked chicken ($4.29), green beans ($1.50), potatoes and gravy ($1.00), corn bread (.79 Jiffy mix) and oranges ($2.00) and milk ($2.00). Mom will be eating with us so that will feed five and we should have two pieces of chicken and some potatoes and gravy leftover for later meals. Possibly some cornbread but probably not. So $11.58 plus leftovers, not too bad.

Tomorrow is my second baking day of the week so I will make buns, biscuits, cornbread and possibly pumpkin bread if I still have the ingredients and the time (I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow so may not have as much time as usual). I think I saw a can of pumpkin kicking around last time I went through the cupboards. I think I'll try to talk DD into making sugar cookies tomorrow after school if she doesn't have too much homework. She's got it down pat and they are so good.

I keep going back and forth on whether or not I should take some money out of the EF and pay off the AMEX card or not. It's currently got a balance on it of $1,475.68 and the EF is at $8,100, so if I did, that would drop the EF to $6624.32. The EF is only earning 1.1% or whatever ING is at the moment and the credit card is at 15.24%.

In the past the interest rate never mattered because I never had a balance on it. We only used it for gas at Costco and paid it in full each month. When DH got laid off and then hired by another company, we had to go several weeks without a paycheck (even though we knew one was coming and we'd be okay in the long run) so we put about $2000 worth of expenses on it. We've been carrying a balance on it since November and it's been driving me crazy.

I think the problem with taking money out of the EF for me is that it finally has one month's income in it. I don't ever think I've had it at one month's income before. (This is not, by the way, the same as one month's expenses). That was something I tried so hard for in the past, but something always came up. And logically, I know we'll have the AMEX paid off by the end of March without dipping into the EF, but my brain keeps going pay it off, pay it off, pay it off NOW.

Conversely, I know that if I do pay off the AMEX now, we can get the EF back up to $8,100 by the end of March and save ourselves two month's worth of interest payments. This really should be a no brainer. If I do it, we'd be down to only having two credit cards left to pay off and it would make payments and budgeting a lot easier come next month. It would leave us with one card to aggressively pay down and one card that was slowly going down until the other was paid off.

I feel like I'm on a merry-go-round.

Bills paid today:

Water bill (4 months)--$302
Physical Therapy--Medical--$90

Was very tempted to pick up a double cheeseburger after PT today. I did not, though it was touch and go there for a bit. It helps that they've changed the road there so you can't easily get to the McD's without making a huge, inconvenient loop several blocks out of your way. We ate up all our leftovers for breakfast, lunch, and dinner today, as planned. I need to sit down and figure out what dinner is going to be tomorrow. Maybe chicken.

My goal for the week was to make it through without any meals out, via planning my meals well, and we did it. I'm rather proud of myself considering eating out is generally caused by personal laziness on my part and not a planned thing. I want to make it through this week, too, without eating out, but it will be harder because DH comes home on Wednesday and it is always harder when he is home because he loves eating out. Still, the kids and I are getting into a routine now and the great thing about DH is that even if he wants to go out, he won't grump about it in front of the kids. He'll grump about it privately to me, but he won't make it so that the kids start whining about it, too.

We've had some talks this month about our goals and he really wants to get the credit card debt gone by the end of the year so he has agreed "in theory" to eat out far less. Maybe one nice meal out a month and possibly go get a bag of the cheapy double cheeseburgers and freeze them for "emergency" purposes. I am hoping to eliminate it altogether, but realize that is probably highly unlikely. And what he agrees to abide by when he is 3000 miles away and having all his meals provided for him by work and what he agrees to abide by when he is at home and might have to cook for himself may not be entirely the same thing.

I used the last of the frozen beef pot roasts I got on sale a couple months ago for $1.99 a pound today. I'll have to be on the lookout for another good sale. Threw it in the crockpot and it got nice and tender. We had that with leftover potatoes and gravy from yesterday which we used up but for a little gravy, green beans (will have what's left tomorrow), some leftover biscuits from earlier in the week, and my little splurge of fresh dark red cherries for desert. We each got twelve. So delicious. Mom ate with us tonight.

There was enough pot roast left for another meal, but my kids don't like warmed up pot roast and neither do I unless I can make some sort of hash from it, so I put it into a baggy and froze it for when DH comes home. He loves making sandwiches with leftover potroast.

Tomorrow is going to be an odds and ends day for lunch and dinner since it is a school holiday. I actually got the kids to agree to it. We'll use up the green beans and the leftover broccoli and corn from earlier in the week. There are 3 pieces of chicken left, 2 biscuits, 3/4 cup of gravy, 1 pancake, 1 cut up orange, half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, half a can of chili, 1 slice of frozen pizza, salad fixings, and a cup of macaroni and tomato sauce. This will actually be the first time in ages we won't have thrown out any food in a week. Let's hear it for leftover management.

I added $20 to my new laptop fund to reward myself for not eating out all week. That's about a third of what we would have spent if we'd gone out this week as much as had become normal. The rest went to the grocery budget and whatever is left at the end of the paycycle will be saved.

I just signed in, spent almost half an hour composing a long and detailed blog entry, went to post it and got a notice saying I am already signed in as me. Yeah, duh, I know, what's your point? Give me back my entry. Of course it's gone into the ether. Between that and having to sign in every single time I come here this week instead of it saving it like it's supposed to when you hit remember me, it's getting really frustrating. I don't even have the energy now to recompose the whole thing. Too bad, for it was light and witty and would have changed your world. *snerks*

So the basics for yesterday:

Medical--$20 co-pay doctor visit
Medical--$11.81 prescription for kidney infection
Allowance (six weeks) kid #1--$60 @ $10 per week
Allowance (six weeks) kid #2--$30 @ $5 per week
Utilities for my mother--$300
EF deposit--$100, bringing total to $8,100.00
Parking meter at library--$0.25

Added all the ones in my purse to the coin jar for the computer fund and dumped out all my change save a quarter for the meter.

Got another hold from the library yesterday. This one is significantly more useful. It's called $3 Meals by Ellen Brown. A more appropriate title would be $3 per serving Meals, but otherwise I'm quite happy with it. I think I might be able to cut out about $50 a month from my grocery budget using her strategies. It was published 2009, too, so it's not terribly outmoded when it comes to how much stuff actually costs. I just wish it didn't rely so much on some of the things we're allergic to here like vinegar (allergic to grapes and apples so wine and cider based vinegars are out) and mushrooms. Still it's not all beans, rice and lentils. It actually has meat, poultry, and fish, so yay. We'll see how it goes.

I have more bills to pay out of this paycheck but will do that tomorrow or Monday.

I had planned on coming back on here to blog last night but never got around to it. After I went to the doctor ($20.00 co-pay), I was diagnosed with a kidney infection, which explains a lot of why I've been so tired and draggy lately. I had to go to the pharmacy and pick up a prescription ($11.81) and while I was there I also got a frozen pizza for dinner. Lovely health benefits in those frozen pizzas. *snerks* So paid $3.99 for that. At least I didn't give in to the lure of the drive-thru. My mom's making dinner tonight since she's eaten with us three times this week, so I don't have to cook. It'll be ribs and potatoes and some veg or other. I know I have some leftover broccoli that needs to be eaten up.

I finished reading through the book The Healthy Family and while I do like a lot of the recipes and think some of them would be cheap to make, I'm still bothered by the reliance on cream of something soups. So I'll have to be very picky on what I make from there.

I got a call from the library's computer yesterday saying I had another hold in, so I picked that up yesterday since my daughter's high school is only a few blocks away. I combined it with picking her up. So that was another 25 cents for the parking meter since not only were both of the five minute drop off slots full again, a specialized transportation bus was double parked behind them letting off someone in a wheel chair, since all the handicapped slots were filled, too. So even if the drop off slots had been empty I would never have gotten near them.

Anyway, I spent last night reading the book I checked out which is called $3 Meals by Ellen Brown. It would be more appropriately titled $3 per Serving Meals, but otherwise I really liked what she had to say. She shares my opinion about cream of something soups, too. Even calls it the same thing.

It's divided up by categories like shopping (peruse your own pantry before shopping to see what you have so you don't buy duplicates, telling you the cheapest cuts of meat to look for and how to shop the store against its set up) and cooking strategies, the basics of making your own stocks, sauces, dressings (not just the easy vinegar and oil ones, but things like 1000 Island and peanut sauce) and such, soups, fish, poultry, meat, vegetarian, and baking. It was a breath of fresh air not to see another cookbook that could supposedly save you money and then all they serve is lentils and beans.

My only real complaint is my usual one with most cookbooks, the reliance on vinegar (my son is allergic to grapes and apples, so no wine based vinegar or apple cider vinegar) and mushrooms which I am allergic to. It is easy enough to leave mushrooms out, but it is harder to leave out the vinegars and I'm not sure what I'd replace them with. Wine I always replace with broth, but vinegar is an acid. I'd think lemon juice maybe, but the amount couldn't possibly be the same.

Aside from that there were plenty of inexpensive recipes I can try for keeping the grocery budget down. I think I might be able to trim at least $50 a month using some of her ideas. Maybe more, but I'm keeping my estimate conservative for now. Definitely a book well worth the read.

Other money spent yesterday was a check I wrote for $300 to help my mother with her utilities. I still have a few bills to write out but probably won't do that until tomorrow. I added $100 to the EF fund and emptied all the ones in my wallet into the coin jar. They will go to the computer fund. I also paid the kids six weeks worth of allowance (we are on a six week pay cycle), so that was $60 for my daughter who makes $10 a week and $30 for my son who makes $5 a week.

They both do a significant amount of chores. They both help with meal prep including dividing up meat for the freezer, chopping veggies for the week, peeling potatoes or carrots for dinner, making the salad (or when we make homemade fish or homemade cheese sticks breading the fish or cheese. My daughter even does the cooking twice a week on her own, now she's fourteen. I've even found her putting the ingredients for bread dough into the bread machine before she leaves for school if she has extra time in the morning without being asked.

Both kids make their own lunches for school and keep their rooms clean. My daughter does laundry and my son helps fold. Daughter takes out the trash and my son is in charge of the recycling. My son vacuums the floors and scrubs the bathtub while my daughter scrubs the shower stall and higher parts. I still can't convince either one of them to scrub the toilet though!

They both also help my mother with whatever she needs done in the house and in the chicken yard. Usually that means mucking out the coop and replacing it with fresh hay.

And my daughter babysits her brother at least two hours a week when otherwise I would have to hire someone, so I won't skimp on allowance when we have the money to afford it. They also know not to ask me for anything. Whatever they want (that isn't a basic) has to come out of their allowance. My son bought his own DSI this way, even though it took him several months. He treats it better having earned it himself. Sometimes I think I don't give them enough, but my mother thinks I give them too much, so...eh. It's probably just right.

My son has his own recycling business as well. He goes around to all the neighbor houses with my mom for company and collects their aluminum cans once a week. He can usually earn about $20 to $30 every six weeks or so doing this and he only has thirty houses on his route. People use a lot of soda pop and beer around here. He wants to expand his route this summer to add another block but he would need a cart of something to do it. I'll be on the lookout come spring for one at a garage sale.

So I sent off $1,438.00 electronically to pay off Master Card #1 in full. I also paid $300 on Master Card #2. I set it up last night so that it would come out today and I'm glad I did now since the BoA website seems to be down but good. It's payday so I will be paying some other bills today, but that will be later after I go to the doctor ($20 co-pay). For now I'm just excited to have a card paid off.

$144,460.08 Debt
-001,438.00 MC#1 payoff
-----------
$143,022.08 Debt Left

I won't adjust for the other credit card or the mortgage I paid a couple days ago until new totals have been posted to those accounts.