Friday was a normal payday for us, no overtime. I have started contributing to the medical fund again because we have dental and glasses to pay for and it was getting really low. After those things are paid for I need to start thinking about saving for next year's deductible. So that may end up being a priority over the Emergency Fund. All it takes is one ER visit in January and we get slammed with almost the full deductible in one go. Since January ER visits have happened the last three years running, it is best to just plan for it.

$318.52 Tithe
_500.00 Utilities
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_300.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Envelope
_115.17 Internet
_280.00 Monthly Chiropractic Family Plan
_36.00 Garbage
_100.00 Gas Money
_100.00 Spending Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances Kids
_800.00 DS's Driving Lessons
-------------
3144.69 Total Money Out

I also have enough money set aside for DS to renew his driving permit, but that wasn't budgeted for, I just knew I had extra in the checking account that could go for it.

I had a major fibromyalgia flare when we got back from Seattle followed by a cold I'm pretty sure I caught at the hospital, so I haven't been updating anything for a while. I still feel a little cruddy, but at least I am now upright. We are still on a wait and see with DD's tumor. We get another scan in 6 months. As for payday, there were a few hours of overtime on it, and here's what we did.

$337.18 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
1000.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Envelope
_753.08 Citi
__71.99 Life Insurance DH
__60.46 Life Insurance Me
_100.00 Spending Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances Kids
_100.00 Car Insurance Fund
_150.00 Gift/Christmas Fund
_100.00 Clothing Fund
_100.00 Laptop Fund
----------------
3367.71 Total Money Out

DH had some overtime on this paycheck so we had $361.93 extra in take home pay. Part of that went to keep the tithe at 10% and the rest to the medical fund since it is getting quite low. We have hit the out of pocket max now, though, so it is just a question of building it back up again. There was about $127 left in checking, just some carry over which will stay in there for next payday.

$354.86 Tithe
_500.00 Utilities
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_300.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Fund
_280.00 Chiropractor Family Plan
_115.17 Internet
__36.00 Garbage
_100.00 Car Maintenance Envelope
_100.00 Gas Money
_100.00 Spending Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances Kids
1000.00 Monster Mom Loan
-------------
3481.03 Total Money Out

The van work cost $987.33. Ouch. But the guy said there is nothing else wrong with it and that the tires were in excellent shape. They rotated them, changed the oil, changed the filters, replaced the brakes, flushed the lines, and washed the vehicle. I forgot it was supposed to be salsa red and not pollen yellow! This is the most expensive service we've had to date, which is not bad for a nine year old vehicle with less than 50,000 miles on it.

I think I am going to up my car maintenance fund to $100 a month instead of $50, though. At least until it hits $1000, then stop. While I don't think anything else that is big is going to come along, I'd like to be ready for it if it does. We were only half ready this time and I had to rob other funds.

We planted more potatoes in the garden tonight. We got in 3 rows of Yukon gold potatoes and two rows of Russets. Tomorrow we will try to get in 3 more rows of red potatoes. I may have a bit more seed potatoes than that, but will run out of prepared garden area. I might plant the rest in containers if there is any. Or garbage bags.

You can grow potatoes in garbage bags and then unfold and fill them as the plant grows. I've never done it before, but I've seen it done on youtube and it seems to work. I'd just have to figure out where to put them. Maybe the other side of the house in the narrow strip. We've grown potatoes in the ground over there so it does get enough light for that. We'll see.

Yesterday we managed to get 20 feet by 3 feet of flowerbeds weeded. Part of this was done the day before in that it was when two of the lilac bushes were dug out. Yesterday was going down about a foot and making sure all the bulbs my mother hates got out. I have to say it was a generously bulbing plant. I thought they were pretty, but I did not like how they draped themselves over the sidewalk. They had fronds with sharp edges that could cut your leg if you were wearing shorts.

We sifted all of the soil to get out the lumps and clumps and rocks, and we added some better soil from one of the raised beds we are taking down. The soil there is mostly clay so anything improves it. Then we planted it with wave petunias. It looks pretty good now, but when they spread out it will be spectacular. I love wave petunias. I got magenta, pink, hot pink, dark purple, purple black, white, and magenta with white stripes.

I also made a hanging basket with 2 leftover dark purple and two purple black petunias. While I love the big spectacular baskets the nurseries make, I can't afford a $40 to $50 basket. Well, I can. I just won't.

DH and DS are going to go prawning on Saturday, so we won't get as much done in the garden, but the payoff could be 160 spot prawns. We bought two fishing and shellfish licenses for them yesterday. It cost $128. I have to call fish and wildlife licensing to figure out what is wrong with my account. They think when it was moved from the old system into the new one someone made a typo, because something is not matching, but the licensing place can't fix it. Hopefully someone there can. They tried running it under my maiden name in case that was the problem, but it wasn't. I didn't think so, as I was pretty sure the last time I had a license was after we were married.

I wouldn't have been able to go on this trip anyway unless DS stayed home, but even then not on a Saturday as DD has physical therapy every Saturday this month. Someone has to be home to drive her there and since DS still does not have a license, it can't be him. But they sometimes go out on Sundays or Fridays or Mondays so I will get to go out, assuming whatever needs to gets sorted with the license.

We did get boards laid down over the area of weeds we want to kill. It takes about 3 weeks. We used boards taken off the old raised beds. There are some cracks that will have to be covered or it won't kill the weeds in that area. I think we should just rent a sod cutter, but if we don't get around to that, this will work. It just takes a lot longer. I want to get at least one more raised bed built, but that involves getting the last of the turkey coop torn down and then the old roof taken apart for building materials. We might get the coop done and the roof taken apart, but I doubt we will get anything built on Sunday.

There is not a ton more I can do until DH takes the pickup full of weeds to the dump or builds a new raised bed. I guess I could put down a tarp to put more on, but that is twice the work. I guess I could work on the kitchen, though. I just prefer out door work, but all of the cabinets need to be wiped down and out, the counter tops could use a deep clean and the floor really needs a good scrubbing. Or mopping. I can't get down and scrub anymore. I'd also like to totally reorganize the pantry, but that requires a trip to Lowe's and the lines there have been ridiculous since the lockdown.

Oh, we are officially in phase 2. And that does mean salons, so once they get going again I can finally get these split ends dealt with. I think I might splurge and get my hair colored, too. I haven't done that in a long time, but I am tired of the silver streaks.

I could color it myself, but that is really hard on my shoulders and I have been abusing them with all the shoveling as it is. And also, I want to support the poor hair dressers who have been out of work for ages. I plan on a large tip unless they screw up something like dying my hair bright pink instead of auburn brown. I usually give a good tip of 20% because they always do such a good job there, but want to do 25% this time. Which will be pricey, but we've had an income this whole time and they have not. It's not like I've been using my spending money on anything for months.

Well, I called the state fishing license place and what I need to do is bring my social security card into the local license place between 8:30 and 4:30 of a Monday through Friday and have them call the state place. There is a digit off so I have to have physical proof. And I lost my social security card a few years ago. I didn't need it for being self-employed and I had it memorized so I never bothered to replace it. I know it is in the house, but it has never shown up. So I went online and ordered a new one. It will take 7 to 10 business days to arrive, so I guess I can't go fishing until then. Ah, well. We have all summer.

May was a three paycheck month and so this last paycheck was a bit larger than usual. That's because they don't take medical out of a third check. I never remember that there will be a couple hundred dollars of difference on what is already an extra check, so it is always nice bonus surprise. It only happens a couple times a year, so I guess remembering that doesn't stick out in my mind.

$339.26 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
__75.00 Household Envelope
__66.55 DH Life Insurance
__60.46 Me Life Insurance
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances Kids
1000.00 Monster Mom Loan Payment
1226.11 Citi
----------------
3387.38 Total Money Out

We've been using the credit card a little more than I'd like. We've been so tight for so long that I think I loosened the purse strings a little too much this month. Oh, well, it happens. And we can pay it. I will try to get better about that, though.

$330.86 Tithe (including AdSense portion)
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
__75.00 Household Envelope
_800.00 Citi
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
1000.00 Emergency Fund
__50.00 Car Maintenance Envelope
_130.25 License Tab Renewal Van
_120.00 Allowances Kids
__50.66 Garbage
_100.00 Clothing Fund
--------------
$3156.77 Total Money Out

I made two ebay purchases today totaling $102.43. Quite a bit is shipping, but with ceramic and glass that's a given. They have to wrap it thickly and individually. I have a discontinued dinnerware pattern that I have been slowly adding to as I find semi-reasonable prices. They are never going to be completely reasonable since you can't get it anywhere but the used market, but these ones were much better prices than I've been seeing. I have been watching for about two to three years.

So I got the salt and pepper set (light wear on the bottoms) and 8 16 oz tumblers that had never been used. I have been searching for the glasses a lot longer than the salt and pepper set. I used to have four but they all got broken over the years. I would like to get 4 more after these come if I can find a decent price. They have more, but not with reasonable prices. The glasses will only be for special occasions, not for every day use. This comes out of the household budget.

I got my Costco membership 2% back certificate today. It is for $89.69. I also got an email today saying my Costco credit card rewards check was coming as well, which will be $415.54. That's a total of $505.23. The Aerogarden Farm Plus XL

https://www.aerogarden.com/farm-xl.html costs $499.95 so that will be enough to cover it without dipping into my upcoming birthday money. Since I am downsizing my outdoor garden due to my autoimmune diseases making it hard for me to do things, I will be growing lettuce and herbs and a couple cherry tomato plants inside this year. Maybe a cucumber as well or a jalapeño plant.

The outdoor garden will be down to 3 raised beds and have strawberries, green onions, my big rosemary plant, zucchini, radishes, and peppers. Maybe kohlrabi. We may grow green beans in the ground, but I am just not sure. I will still have my bee balm, yarrow, echinacea and calendula in the trash barrels. Then they are contained but still have plenty of root room. They are all spreaders so if not contained will take over. But they are my favorite for making a mixed herbal tea.

I still want to grow what I can however I can despite my limitations. Fresh veggies are so important and this way I can have them year round, too. I have had a good experience with the smaller system and the fertilizer is organic. And I can grow all the lettuce I need without worrying about recalls and food poisoning, plus have a bigger variety than what is available in the supermarket. One day all I may be able to do is grow inside from a wheelchair, but hopefully that is a long, long way off.

Yesterday was such a lazy day for me. I pretty much stayed in bed under the electric blanket and read. I still have no stamina. I wonder if I was on the antibiotics long enough?

It snowed yesterday and it is still around today, but it is not very much. Maybe 1/2 inch if that. I hope it goes away soon. The older I get, the more I hate snow. I mean, I appreciate its beauty, but nothing else about it. It just makes everything extra cold and the roads hard to drive on. I used to love it when I was a kid, but now when I see snow, I think "Get off my lawn!" as if it were a recalcitrant child and I an old fogey.

My Amazon order came yesterday, too. Well, part of it did. It is still weird having things delivered on Sunday. I got a bucket white rice flour, a bucket of tapioca flour, a bucket of potato starch, a 3 lb bag of sorghum flour, and a 3 lb bag of extra fine sweet rice flour (that's more for cakes and pastries). The latter two came in paper bags. The first four are for the master flour recipe. I already had xanthan gum.

So today I will make up the master flour recipe and put it in the stainless steel canister I also ordered for that purpose. It should hold two batches of the flour recipe based on volume. Then I will make up the master dough recipe and go from there.

I really like the little one gallon buckets some of the flours came in. They are light enough for me to manage and air tight. I think as I finish them off I will transfer the flours that don't come in buckets to those buckets and relabel them. They all stack, so they will take up less space that way, and I won't have to deal with all the plastic bags. I should go through the white rice flour fairly quickly as that is what is used in the greatest quantities.

I am still waiting on a couple of things from that order, including the bucket opener, but I can use a paint can opener on them as well. I also got some pure palm shortening for making biscuits and a stainless steel ice bin for the freezer that should come today. The bucket opener isn't slated to arrive until February 3rd! Ridiculous. Prime has spoiled me.

I spent about $202 on the entire order, but in the long run, buying in bulk is much cheaper. The ice bin was pricey and so was the canister, but you can't beat stainless steel for durability and longevity. We try to keep away from plastic (especially single use plastic) as much as we can. It is not always possible, but we do our best to use glass, ceramic, wood, and stainless steel when we can. It is definitely hard with these specialty flours, because most of them do come in plastic. And plastic does keep out bugs and larvae, generally, so it is a trade off.

I guess as long as I am mindful about is, that is the best I can do.

I ordered a couple things off Amazon last night. I bought a 4 pack of 100 ct dye free Ibuprofen. I can, on occasion, find one bottle at Walgreens. We all would prefer to have our own bottles, but that has not been the case. I don't know why they never have it in stock or keep so little in stock, but it is getting frustrating. We have four Walgreens in town. One would think they would have more than one bottle between the four of them. They all carry it.

Then I bought some lens wipes for our glasses. I have been really unhappy with the Walgreens brand of wipes lately. I've had a lot of issues with them either being completely dried out, or being drenched so much that you have to then use a dry wipe afterwards. The brand I am trying had five stars. We'll see how good it is.

I did manage to get another package of the breakfast sausage I like and pick up a couple packets of hot dogs yesterday, too, along with some milk. I spent $20.18. I almost bought grapes, too. They had a sample of these yellow grapes (technically white, but they were very yellow) and they were very sweet and at first I liked them, but then I got this weird aftertaste up in my palate that was like almost burned caramel. I asked DH if he got it, too, and he said yeah, and he didn't like it. So we put them back. I am glad they had samples. I wish more stores would put out fruit samples, especially when bringing in something new.

I did get my steps in yesterday, but I don't think I will today. I'm having a bad joint day with the shakes in my hands. They were so bad that I had DH season the roast and put it into the Instant Pot for me. I figured if I did it, we'd end up with floor flavored seasoning, not my favorite. LOL

MIL says she will cover our hotel costs and food costs for going to Virginia Mason. That will be a relief. With having to buy the dishwasher I didn't want to have to spend an additional $300 for this visit.

We are getting new medical in January. It's Regence Blue Cross/Blue Shield. Cadillac insurance. It will cost a little less, too. The deductible will be the same, $3000. And there will be a FSA of up to $2700. I'm not sure of all the details yet, but apparently you could write a check in January if you needed to for the full amount and they'd just take it out of the paycheck through the year as you go. It does have to be used up by 2 months into the following year, but I can't even remember a year when we didn't have $2700 in medical expenses so that will never be a problem.

I don't know what the out of pocket max is, or the per person deductible yet. DH is going to see if they have a .pdf or a print out so I can go over it. Dental and vision will stay the same as they are different programs. Although I am thinking about bumping up to the better dental because DH needs to get a crown and I need to repair a chipped tooth.

I wonder if the HSA can be used for dental or just medical. I'll have to have DH ask.

Yesterday I went grocery shopping. We ended up going to 7 different stores, because the stores were out of things that I wanted to buy. It was super annoying. Although I ended up with 7,356 steps yesterday, which is three miles. Usually I do about 3000 steps, which is my goal until I get stronger. So it was a lot of steps and I woke up having lost 2.1 pounds. Apparently I burned 3800 calories yesterday. I guess when you are lapping big stores and going up and down a lot of aisles, you do that.

Anyway, our first stop was at Costco. I spent $139.60 there, but $19.99 was out of the clothing budget for a pair of sweat pants for DS and $14.69 was for garbage bags which came out of the household budget. And then tax was $3.02. That tax goes with those because we don't have tax on food. So $37.30 was non-grocery spending and $101.90 was grocery spending. I bought:

3 4 pk steamer bags of organic frozen broccoli
2 Caesar salad kits
1 jar organic strawberry jam
1 8 pk of organic corn on the cob
1 package carné asada
1 bag Bibigo organic chicken potstickers
1 bag Bibigo beef mandu dumplings

After that we drove to Fred Meyer #1 $106.32. $3.14 of that was for a magazine and tax which comes out of my allowance and the actual grocery spending was $103.18. The first 3 items are for my daughter, who is sick. I bought:

1 gallon of vanilla HD ice cream
2 bags of Fritos
3 bottles of Sierra Mist sugar version
4 jars of Rao's Chicken Noodle Soup (expensive, but good and clean, no soy, no additives or preservatives)
4 2 packs of Mrs. Grass Noodle Soup
1 bunch cilantro
5 hothouse tomatoes
6 opal apples
6 jazz apples
2.5 lbs of cod fish
2 10 lb bags of ice
1 Woman's World magazine

Then we went to Fred Meyer #2 and spent $57.70. I bought:

2 loaves of Naked potato bread (on sale)
8 jars of Rao Chicken and Gnocci soup (expensive)

After that we went to Haggen #1 and spent $36.59. They were out of the sausages I wanted. I bought:

1 18 ct bag of cowboy cookies
2 loaves of pumpkin bread
1/2 gallon of Simply orange juice
1 18 ct bag of chocolate chip cookies
4 mountain rose apples (new variety, these things are pink inside, and taste like sweet tarts candy, won't be buying again)
1 big bag of red grapes

Next we stopped at the grocery outlet and spent $8.76. We went in looking for steaks, but they didn't have any good prices so left without them. I did buy:

1 organic red cabbage
2 bags of garlic croutons
5 kiwis

After that we went to Safeway. They were out of the sausages I wanted so we didn't buy much there. I spent $13.96 there. I bought:

3 packages of uncured pepperoni
1 package of beef sticks

Haggen #2 actually had my sausages, though not as many as I would have liked to buy. I spent $33.37 and bought:

1 18 ct bag of snickerdoodle cookies (yes, a lot of bags of cookies, but they are for the whole month, some went in the freezer)
3 packages of Hempler's breakfast sausage
2 acorn squash

So I spent a grand total of $355.46 out of a $400 grocery budget. I have $60 left in my grocery envelope for fill-ins and a couple more packages of sausage, because I had $10 leftover from last payday.

Now I need to make up my meal plan for the week.

I think I'm still kind of reeling from having lost so much of my blog and I know everyone else feels that, too. I've had a bit of a what's the point attitude, because I have no clue if they are actually going to start backing things up or if this can happen all over again. It's not like they communicate things to us. I always have to go asking and quite frankly I'm tired of it and still kind of angry. I think I'm just going to have to force myself through it and try to blog anyway.

But really nothing is happening. I spent 5 days in bed with the most recent version of the plague. I've gotten dressed, brushed my hair, and made food for the last two days (which was a big deal, actually) and still had a bit of a cough and a runny nose and laid down a few times, but it is on the upswing. I think. I go back and forth. Autoimmune diseases complicate the healing process. Physical therapy about killed me, but I didn't want to cancel.

I hope this is not a bad flu year as I am allergic to the flu shot. Not that it seems to work these last few years anyway. They used to seem far more effective.

I've been working my way through the Star Treks. I started with Voyager, because that is my favorite (Tom and B'lanna forever), then moved on to Next Gen and now I am on Deep Space Nine. Netflix has Enterprise and the original, so I will probably do those next. I'm less of an original fan but I did like it. Honestly, I was more of a Battlestar Galactica/Buck Rogers fan when I was little. I will probably work my way through the Next Gen movies after that, then the originals, and then the new stuff. I've seen it all, except the most recent new one, but I am enjoying immersing myself in this universe again.

I have also been watching Raising Dion. It's about a child who comes into his superhero powers. Only he's about seven or eight years old and doesn't have any control and they go wild when he can't get a handle on his emotions. The acting is very good. I especially like his mother, but the little boy is great and it has Jason Ritter, who I have a soft spot for on account of his father. I'm four episodes in. Netflix really has some great Originals.

I had a major freak out today when I thought I had lost several chapters of my book. I have eleven written and I thought I'd lost everything after halfway through chapter three. It's been so long since I looked at it and I was ready to start writing again, but wanted to reread it first. I forgot that I had renamed the file. I realized it when I went to my back up portable hard drive and found the other title, then went back to the laptop and then sure enough it was there under the other title.

I don't save to the cloud because it has been hacked so many times I don't trust it. I had forgotten for a minute that I had saved it to the hard drive, so sheer blind panic ensued.

Not much else going on. Oh, we purchased 60 pounds of Kerrygold grassfed butter ahead of the tariffs. Hopefully that will be enough to outlast them. It was $330 but we had it and since the tariff is 25% it was worth it to me to get that in my freezer.

I went ahead and used some of my allowance that I have been saving to buy a new fitbit. It cost $108.50 with tax. I ended up getting the white one since my son has a black one. It's easier to not get them mixed up if we accidentally leave them in the bathroom after a shower that way.

I really like it so far. I especially like that it tracks the heart rate since the doctor wants me tracking my heart rate since I've had some incidents of racing heart. If I can just look down at my wrist when that happens I can know immediately what is going on.

I also like that I can read my text messages on it or get buzzed when someone is calling me. I keep the volume on my phone turned off most of the time because the ringing can sometimes trigger a migraine. I've tried a ton of ring tones and there is just something about the pitch coming out of the phone that does it. I also keep it in my purse so I wouldn't feel it vibrating if I set it to that.

It's also waterproof so when I go to the pool I can keep it on. That's what I liked about my last one. I hope this one last longer. It is better constructed.

So far I have hit my steps every day since I got it. My steps aren't super high, though, since I am disabled. But I am doing more each day and have already been able to reset my step goals once.

We have finally started working on walking at physical therapy. For the first 8 weeks it was strengthening and stability exercises. At my session on Friday we started working on walking. Since I started using the proper walking technique I am doing so much better and able to walk further without a cane. My goal for this week was to walk to the end of the block and back, which is actually a typical block since our block is two blocks long.

Plus I got my new shoes and they are really nice. They cost $80, but they are 4E in width and for the first time in my life my feet don't feel jammed into the toe box. They also have a high front of the foot and Velcro(TM) fasteners which are easier on my arthritic hands.

When I get orthotics they will fit in them, too. I am hoping to be able to get them made this month. They cost $400, though, and insurance does not cover them at all. My PT, my Chiropractor, and my Podiatrist think it will make walking easier and help me to not have so much pain because I'll be in better alignment. I have been thinking about it for a couple of years now and am ready to get them.

I have a PT appointment tomorrow and I hope I will show a lot of improvement. I have been consistent with doing my exercises and I think it shows.

I don't think I'm going to try to recover any of my missing posts. I write so many blog entries in a month that finding them all would be a massive undertaking and I honestly just don't have the energy to do that at this time. Even if I did find them, I wouldn't want to just dump them back into the blog. That's okay for maybe 10 entries, but I would likely have 100 or more. So I am just going to accept them as gone and move on. At least for now.

I am going down tomorrow to meet my grand niece for the first time. It is her first birthday party. I'm not looking forward to the drive, but it will be nice to see my sister and my nephews and niece and the baby. I am not looking forward to the drive there and back, though. It is always so hard on my body to be in the car for long periods of time. I'm already in an RA flare due to the weather.

Today was payday. It's pretty much on auto pilot at this point. I don't know if there is much point in my posting my payday reports. I haven't in a while. At first it was mostly to keep me on track on the budget, but I've been doing really well with it for a year now and don't think it is really necessary anymore.

Yesterday I took DS shopping for sweat pants. It took us 4 stores to find one pair that wasn't paper thin or didn't cost $55 a pair (When did Penney's get so expensive) or wasn't unraveling at the seams. Why is it so hard to find thick sweat pants of good construction anymore? We found one pair at Kohl's that was on sale for $19.56. The selection everywhere for men's sweats is garbage. There is barely anything as compared to women's sweats and the colors are almost non-existent.

Or you'll go to Target (where I hate to shop) and their sizes are their own compared to everyone else's so nothing fits that should. When my son is a large in every store but not even the XL fits at Target, you know they are screwing with sizing. I thought they only screwed around with women's sizing. Men's used to be standard.

We are going to stop at a store in Burlington on the way back from the party and see if they have anything there. It is a store we used to have here, but our branch of it closed, and we used to have really good luck there with clothes. If not, we'll have to try some sporting goods stores to see if they have anything. I don't want to spend $55 a pair for Nike or Adidas. DS doesn't give a hoot about brand names and they are far from reasonable.

I am seriously thinking about digging out my sewing machine and learning to make clothes once and for all.

Well, mostly fantastic. The place was beautiful and the evenings were so quiet and peaceful and restful. Unfortunately there was no sleeping in as the neighbors started mowing their lawn at 9:15. Who mows their lawn at 9:15 on a Wednesday morning? Then the other neighbors started doing construction with a bulldozer around noon, but that ended at 5:30. We left the cottage to pick up dinner at 4:00 though so we missed at least an hour of it.

We spent a couple hours on the deck when we got there Tuesday afternoon. They had this lovely little seating area with a couch and two chairs with pillows around a coffee-sized picnic table that was under a covered area. The tide was in so you couldn't see the beach at all until around 1/2 an hour before dusk and then there were a couple of feet of it. But the water looked amazing.



After dinner (which was Subway, but there were limited options) on the deck we sat in the hot tub and watched the sun go down over the sea. It was one of the most relaxing things I've done in a long while.

We didn't do much on Wednesday, but we managed to get all six episodes of Good Omens watched Tuesday night and on Wednesday. But it wasn't a vacation to do much anyway, just one to refresh with. We had brought food for breakfasts and the tide was out in the morning. The beach went out quite a ways at that point.

We went and grabbed a pizza at a place called Figaro's, which wasn't anything to write home about, was a decent middle of the road pizza. They had a great salad, though. You could get up to four toppings on your salad, anything you could put on a pizza so I chose bacon, cheese, green peppers, and red onions and the greens were mixed so a lot of variety in flavor. It took me two days to eat it.

Oh, for the other meal I made T-bones. They were so big we didn't have anything else with them. After dinner we went out and sat in the hot tub again, watched the sun go most of the way down, got dressed and then sat on the deck and watched it go the rest of the way down and then watched the lights across the inlet twinkle and the clouds reflected on the water. After it was too cold to stay outside we went inside and I taught DH how to play Parcheesi.

The cottage was tiny, it had one bedroom, one bath, a kitchen, and a living room. The living room had a pull out bed. It also had a sectional couch, an ottoman, and a table, so you can imagine how little room there was. DH and I were almost tripping over each other and they say it can sleep 6 with the sectional. I don't know how you'd breathe with that many people in the house. If they were all little kids maybe and you spent all your time outside.




It was well-decorated with some old-fashioned paintings and knickknacks, but there were too many of them. Too much surface space was taken up with stuff and since it was, there was nowhere to move the stuff on the bedside tables. One table was completely taken up with a big CD player and lamp and the other had a clock and lamp with barely enough room for my C-pap machine. DH had to put some of the stuff on the floor to use his machine. It didn't really need two bedside lamps or any really, since you could reach the light switch from the bed.

I did have to unplug the Glade plug-in as soon as I figured out what was making the smell. I had thought it was cleaner at first, but when it didn't dissipate I went on the hunt. She left us flowers and cinnamon rolls on the kitchen counter.



The last morning we walked on the beach, but I kind of regretted that due to the amount of mud that left on my shoes. Thick black mud and the deep squelching kind. I still haven't gotten it all off yet and I've cleaned them twice. We saw a lot of shells washed up and even a couple dead crabs. There weren't a lot of birds, just one or two most of the time. We did see the fish leaping to eat bugs at dusk, which was cool.



The most important thing was that it relieved so much stress, it was relaxing, and my mind set improved dramatically. We are talking about going back for a couple of days in March for our 25th Wedding Anniversary.

But I am nitpicking, because the overall experience was just what I wanted. I don't think a whole week there would be a good idea for one or two nights it was great.

On the way home we stopped at Red Lobster and got the Ultimate Feast. I ate the shrimp and lobster and brought the crab home for dinner. I also had baked potato soup for my side because they make a fantastic one. I was disappointed in the broccoli, because they seasoned it with red pepper and it was too much. We had a $6 toll for the Tacoma Narrows bridge on the way home, but not on the way there.

All in all, we spent under $500 for the entire vacation. There was a $150 damage deposit but that was refunded the day after we got home. I was very pleased with the whole experience. I will try to insert a few photos.

I have been searching for five years for a new comforter in the teal to turquoise range and today I finally found it. It's teal and a Queen, not a King, but that's okay. I put it sideways on the bed anyhow and I don't tuck it because of the bed rails. I have never, not once, found a comforter for a King bed that I have liked, but I have found queen ones, so I'm used to that. They simply didn't come in the larger size. I used my allowance money as I have barely touched it for the last six months. While it could have come out of the household budget, this is a want, not a need, so I used my allowance. I still have enough left over to purchase an upgrade for my video editing software.

It was $69.95 plus tax. We found it at the Big K in Burlington. Our Kmart shut down and this is the nearest one to us. I was not overly impressed with this store. It is a larger store, but not so nicely laid out and it didn't seem to even have as much stuff as our old one did.

I also purchased some socks with the money from the clothing envelope as they have the type of socks I like that don't slip in my shoes, Athletech. I got a pack of 10, so I should be good again for a while. The socks were $8.99 plus tax.

And then I purchased a stainless steel frying pan. The copper skillet that came with the induction cooktop is already having food stick. We have been very careful to only use a sponge, too. That irritates me immensely. We had one before that did the same thing. I hate copper pans and if it hadn't come with it, I'd never have had one again.

And while I like cooking in cast iron, our big pan is quite heavy and the stainless steel is easier to lift and clean. I can still use the smaller cast iron pans easily. I got a 12 inch 5 quart saute pan with a lid. You can only use pans that a magnet will stick to on the cooktop. But now I should be good. This came out of the household envelope and cost $16.99.

Tax was $7.99, but I had some points left from before our Kmart closed down so had $1.97 taken off the final balance which was $101.99. Tax came out of the clothing budget just to make life easier. And no, I didn't make three separate purchases, I did one, but then reimbursed the envelopes that needed to be, because sometimes using cash can be a pain and I do whatever makes it work best.

So today was spending, but everything was funded, and that's the way I like it.

I raised the grocery budget this week just because we are going down to the farm on Saturday and I will be buying ground beef and bacon. I may not have actually needed to do that as I won't be buying much meat this week otherwise, but if I don't spend it I will put it back in the checking account.

I also bumped the medical fund up to $500 as we had a bill come in that we were starting to think would never arrive. It was from October. I don't think I will need to repeat that next payday, though.

$327.36 Tithe
_400.00 Utilities
_500.00 Grocery Envelope
_500.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Fund
_108.91 Internet
__36.00 Garbage Fund (every 2 month bill)
_100.00 Car Insurance Fund
__50.00 Car Maintenance Envelope
_100.00 Gas Money
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
_105.00 Allowances
_100.00 Clothing Envelope
_100.00 Computer Fund
_500.00 Monster Mom Loan Payment
-----------
3102.27 Total Money Out

DH had to pick up some pure maple syrup at Costco last night, so that cost $11.59. That seems to have gone down a good bit since the last time we bought syrup. I think it was around $15 last time, so that was a nice surprise.

The last two days were kind of painful. I think it was the storm. I am sensitive to changes in barometric pressure. I swell up when rainstorms come in. I also get headaches. It's weird. But the sun is back out today and also last night was my second shot of Enbrel and my joints are feeling better again, except my left hip, which is out and my chiropractor is on vacation. He won't be back until the 10th.

It is possible that I may be someone who has to take two shots of Enbrel a week, but I imagine it is too soon to tell. But the joint flare could also have been the medicine wearing off. I don't know. It's too soon to tell on that as well. No nausea or vomiting with this second shot, but I took some Zantac last night to try to prevent it, and it seems like it did.

Tomorrow we have another rain storm coming in, so if my joints hurt again, then I'll assume it was the pressure and not the medicine wearing off, since I just took the shot.

I have been maintaining my weight loss, but have not been very good at losing anymore. I haven't really been trying this week, but I need to get my act together, because I still have a lot to lose. We are going to get our gym membership signed up for this weekend and I can get back in the pool again. I am going to take it easy and only walk in the pool to start, not try to swim laps or use the water weights. I need to build up my stamina. Then maybe after a week or so, I might take a class.

They have Aqua Zumba one day a week and water aerobics the rest of the week days and Saturday. I will start with Aqua Zumba as it is easier on the joints and more fun. I will have to get up earlier for the water aerobics if I decide to start that, but Aqua Zumba is at 10:30. They do have two night time water aerobics classes if I just can't get up early enough. But they are at 6 p.m. and I imagine quite crowded at that time of day.

DS will be using the work out machines and weights while I am in the pool. He isn't really keen on water aerobics, though he did enjoy them when he was younger. I think he is self-conscious to be in a pool full of women, even if most of them are middle aged to old age.

I don't really know if DH or DD will use the membership or not. DD says she will to use the pool, but she is never able to get up, so I don't see it really happening unless she changes her sleeping schedule. I'm not going to drive there twice a day. It is a bad traffic situation later in the day and hard to get in and out.

I think I am going to have to accelerate savings for the computer fund. My computer keeps restarting itself. Every day, sometimes twice a day and it is getting super annoying. It keeps saying my computer has an error and has to shut down. Ugh. I am going to try a few things to see if I can't find the error, but it may not be salvageable.

This computer has quite a few things wrong with it that they never seemed to be able to fix 100% and now it no longer has a service contract, so I just can't see throwing money at it when I can throw money at a new one. I am not sure I will get a laptop this time, though. I think I may just get a desktop instead. We'll see. With my current phone, I don't really need a laptop to take with me anymore. I only write at home these days.

Although I do like taking the laptop into the bathroom while I am taking a long bath and playing a movie, so there's that. I guess I'll figure that out once I have the money saved up. I want to save instead of 18 months same as cash, but will do that if this thing goes belly up before the money is ready.

We got hit by bitter weather yesterday. Several inches of snow fell and the temperature was 19 degrees. The wind made it worse. The roads might as well have been glass in the places where the sun doesn't really hit them. We had a problem on one hill where I had to stop for someone who ran a stop sign and then couldn't get my car to go forward. I had to back down the hill a bit and move over to get some traction. I did make it up. I couldn't really blame the guy who ran his stop sign as he did try to stop. He just slid through the intersection.

I didn't know how bad it actually was when we went out yesterday or I wouldn't have gone. But out we did go and we spent all of the money in the Clothing Envelope, plus $20 in the household envelope. DS was out of his body wash, which we have to get a special type since he's allergic to so much. The stores we usually buy it out have stopped carrying it, so we had to track down one who did. So we bought 5 bottles of that and then I took DS to Penney's and bought him two pairs of jeans and two pairs of slacks. They actually had pants there that were 29 inches long. He usually has to get 30, but that's a little long, so he was very happy.

DH had taken him to get new shoes the day before and we ordered new shoes for DD. So no more clothes buying until we can refill that Clothing Envelope. I had thought I needed new shoes, but it turns out when I bought the last pair it was buy one get one and so I'd stuck the second pair in my closet for the future. DH found them for me and it is such a difference on my feet.

Today the roads are bare and it is 27 degrees, but the wind is even worse. We had to go and buy a space heater for the rabbit shed as we had so many power failures last night (they lasted about a minute each, so maybe surges is a better word) that it fried the heater out there, even though it has a surge protector on it. It was an older heater anyway. We don't heat it very high, just the lowest setting, but it keeps their water bottles from freezing. Since I had run out of money in the Household Envelope, I took it out of the Personal Care Envelope. That's the money I'd set aside to get my hair cut, but I can go another month without. I might even go until spring, since the long hair is keeping my back warm.

After that we stopped at another store and got the special hand soap my son has to use, since he was nearly out of that as well. It's fun having a kid that is allergic to nearly ever skin product out there. /sarcasm We wanted to get him what he needed before we go to Seattle Wednesday night. Usually I have a stockpile, but I really let things run down when I was so sick.

Once we get back from Seattle, I will do a grocery shop, but it will not be a massive one. I'll get breakfast meats, but not any other kinds of meat. I have quite a large stockpile now that we need to go through and eat down before I buy any meat. I've done a two week meal plan based around what we have on hand, which I will post separately. I am hoping to keep the grocery budget to half this payday.

They were having a 20% off plus free shipping deal on Vitamin Shoppe today so I went ahead and reordered my vitamins. We were out of Vitamin D (without soy) almost and we take a lot during the winter months here due to SADS. I ordered 6 bottles of it, 2 bottles of Vitamin A (without soy), 2 bottles of fish oil (that does not have polysorbate-80 in it), and a big bottle of Vitamin C (without soy). I spent $123.08 after the discount was applied. I should be set for some time on vitamins.

I started work on the novel again. I wrote about 1008 words and I plan on getting back to it when I finish posting here. I am going to try to post every day this month and I am running out of today, so thought I'd hop on and do this quick.

Still holding strong on cooking from the meal plan and not eating out.

I worked on decluttering my room a bit today. I am taking it one section at a time. I am overcoming years of packrat tendencies, but sometimes it is slow going. I am just sick of living a cluttered existence, so one of my goals for 2019 is to put an end to that. We have been working towards it for a while now.

DS will be getting some more cooking lessons this week and next. He'll be learning how to make the tater tot casserole, homemade pizza from scratch, pork carnitas, chicken shawarma and homemade pita bread, and the sausage/bell peppers/onions stir-fry dish. He is really enjoying the cooking lessons and was bummed that we had to stop in December due to my illness.

I think that about covers it.

So we got stuff from every store this time. First time I have had the energy to do so. Not all in one day. We did this in two days, Friday and Sunday. There is still a limit to what my body can tolerate even on a good day with the rheumatiod arthritis.

Our first stop was Winco where I spent $143.60 and purchased the following:

1 bag of hamburger patties (20 ct)
1 bag frozen corn on the cob (4 ct)
1 5 lb bag of French fries
1 5 lb bag of Tater Tots
1 quart of Strawberry Yogurt (Zoi Greek)
1 bag of baby spinach
2 pounds of shredded cheddar cheese
1 box Eggo Strawberry waffles
3 packages of chicken legs (14 ct per package)
1 lb of bacon
2 packages of ribeye steaks (2 ct per package)
1 8.8 lb pork shoulder roast (will cut into 3 roasts)
2 bags of Funyuns
1 party size bag of Lays Potato Chips
2 Mrs. Grass Noodle Soup (2 ct per package)
1 package Dave's Bagels (5 ct)
1 package Oroweat English Muffins (6 ct)
1 loaf Naked bread
1 quart minced garlic
2 jars Miracle Whip
12 oz granulated garlic
1 can Winco French cut green beans
1 red bell pepper
2 lbs fresh green beans
2 yellow squash
2 zucchini
1 green cabbage
2 cucumbers

The pork roast was .98/lb, but they were all 8 to 10 pounds, so I got one that was almost 9 pounds, so we will cut it up and get 3 roasts out of it. I got the canned green beans to try out. Winco brands have been about 75% hit and 25% miss for us, so I only ever get one new item of a type to try. We are almost out of what I canned this summer, so if we like these I'll get a few cases. They are only 50 cents each.

Next up was Trader Joe's where I spent $114.57 and I bought:

2 reusable grocery bags
8 bags of chicken fried rice
2 bags of roasted potatoes and peppers
6 bags of frozen chicken Alfredo Fettucine
1 bag of frozen sliced leeks
2 packages uncured beef hot dogs
1 box cod fish nuggets
1 bag organic string cheese
1 2 lb bag of organic colorful carrots
1 tube of ginger paste
1 chunk of St. Andre triple cream Brie
1 iceberg lettuce
3 lb bag of Mandarin oranges
5 lbs of organic red potatoes
8 lbs of organic gold potatoes

Next stop was Haggen, where I spent $30.55 and bought:

1 bottle of Wok Mai Hoison sauce
1 log of chevré (soft goat cheese)
1 chunk of Merlot Parmesan cheese
1 bottle of ground ginger
1 1/2 gallon of milk

Then today we went to Costco first and bought some household stuff but that comes out of the household budget, and only one food item that came to $8.49.

1 quart of Strawberry Jam

Since we were on that side of town we swung by the Food Co-op and spent $21.97. I bought:

1 8 oz jar of minced ginger
1 1/2 gallon of eggnog (only DH drinks this)
1 dozen duck eggs

The eggnog has $1.75 bottle deposit which we will get back when we return the bottle to the store. It is from a local dairy that does all of its milk, buttermilk, and cream in glass bottles. DH just likes that brand of eggnog better than anything that comes in a carton. If he hadn't been with me, I wouldn't have bought it. Duck eggs are due to me having a chicken egg allergy. They are expensive, but they are so big I generally only eat one at a time, not two.

Finally, we went to Safeway and spent $37.64 on:

2 lbs Dietz and Watson London Broil deli meat
1 lb Dietz and Watson Homestyle turkey deli meat
1 orange bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper

The deli meat is pricey, but it doesn't have additives and preservatives and it was on sale for half price. I stock up and freeze some when it goes on sale because the normal price is $13.99 a pound, so $7.99 a pound is a much preferred price. Fortunately it goes on sale about twice a month.

So that is everything I purchased and I spent a total of $348.33. That leaves me with $51.67 to buy milk, bread, lettuce, and spinach next week. Now I need to sit down and make up my meal plan.

$268.74 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
__75.00 Household Envelope
_900.00 Dental Crown
__61.74 Life Insurance DH
__60.46 Life Insurance Me
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances
_500.00 Monster Mom Loan Payment
-----------
2485.94 Total Money Out

On Sunday I woke up with a cough that progressively moved lower and lower this week until I sounded like a deep bass male. For the record I'm a contralto on a normal day. I no longer sound like a man, but my voice is in the tenor range. I am still coughing like crazy. I did write a chapter on Saturday, but haven't touched the book since. I find it better not to write when I'm taking this much cold medicine.

I have managed, barely, to make dinner the past 2 nights, thanks to the Instant Pot and a supply of beef and pork roasts. I am managing to eat one meal a day and the rest of the day I am just drinking bone broth, which thank goodness I had made on Saturday. I need to make more but the idea of it is a little overwhelming.

I've been sleeping a lot, and binge watching Say Yes to the Dress on Hulu. I don't generally like reality TV shows. Dancing with the Stars is the only one, really. I'm not terribly into fashion either. But this show is like candy. No substance, but some really beautiful creations. It's like art with fabric as the medium. Better yet it is completely mindless so I didn't have to focus on a plot at all, because honestly, I couldn't right now if I tried.

I did manage to take a shower and that's all I'm going to manage today. It wiped me out, but it was worth it. I'll have DH pick up take out tonight. Probably Polynesian so there will be some vegetables in it. All I want to do is crawl back into bed, but I'm trying to stay upright for a couple of hours until DH gets home and can change the sheets. The idea of doing it by myself is exhausting.

I hope this starts to go away soon. It hurts and I was just starting to feel really good after a week on the diet. Well, I'm still on the diet and I've lost a lot, but once my appetite comes back, I'm not sure what will happen. Currently I am .9 lbs from my dietbet goal weight and it hasn't been quite two weeks yet. I have been off the Pepsi for a week as well.

I can already see a huge difference in our grocery budget. Pepsi was starting to take a huge chunk out of it. DH is off it, too, so we aren't buying it at all. I can't believe I let myself get addicted to it again, but at least that is over.

DH's office Christmas Party is Saturday. I won't be able to go and I feel really bad about it, because we had to RSVP. It's a catered buffet. Although they are serving alcohol which usually means someone will make an idiot of themselves. I'm going to tell him to ask his mother to go. I think that she would enjoy having an evening out with her son. I was really looking forward to it, too. We haven't gone out for a night away from the kids in ages.

DH had to order a new cushion for his c-pap mask, so that was $67.95 out of the medical fund. I ordered two prescription refills today, too, but don't know the cost of that yet. Otherwise we haven't been spending. It's hard to spend when you can't leave your bed. Not impossible, Amazon exists after all, but harder.

DD has an appointment at Virginia Mason with a doctor that specializes in endometriosis on the 19th. My goal is for us to be well by then. DD has the cold, too. Although we are still going even if we aren't. I am going to get the name of the anesthesiologist who worked on her for her gall bladder surgery before we go to prove that there is one that is willing to do a laparoscopic surgery for her. Then it'll be a question of convincing the doctor.

DD doesn't care about the risks. She has no quality of life, so to her it is worth any risk to try to get this taken care of. She can't work, she can't go to school, she just exists in a pain-filled lump. I remember these symptoms well from my days with this disease. But I didn't have to fight for treatment because I was at a normal weight. Hopefully this doctor will be compassionate enough to try. None of the ones around here are, but then again, they don't specialize in this disease.

DH has made a couple of household purchases this week. He spent $20 on a cast iron heating duct cover for the bathroom floor. The heating duct in the bathroom is really close to the toilet and sometimes gets stepped on. It is really poorly placed and it should have been moved when the remodel was done a few years ago, but they didn't do it.

We have broken the last two plastic covers in a relatively short amount of time. This one is solid. You can literally stand on top of it with no issue whatsoever. Not that we will on purpose, but the fact that we can without it breaking is wonderful.

Then today he picked up a box of screws and spent $12. He needed it to assemble the desk he and DS are building. DH got two gorgeous desk top pieces about a year ago free from a store that was at the end of a close out sale and just wanted to get rid of them. They had been trying to sell them for $5 the week before, but there had been no takers.

So they built legs for it and DS sanded them and stained them a really pretty dark blue that will match the curtains and bed spread in the room. They will finish the assembly today and put it in his room. The only thing it won't have yet is a pull out keyboard drawer. DS will be purchasing that and attaching it once he has saved up the money for it. We paid for the wood to make the legs, the stain, and the screws. I told DS that if he wanted the drawer he had to pony up the money himself.

The great thing about this is they were able to cut the legs to the exact right height for DS to work comfortably at it. Sometimes when you are tall the desks are way too short. As for the other desk top, DH put it on top of an old high sewing table he'd inherited years ago for his own desk. It looks great and gives him much more surface area. He didn't even need to attach it so many out on that one at all. Not bad for free.

Well, I've successfully made it 2/3 of the way through the food holiday gamut. I did not indulge in Halloween at all and I had a very balanced plate of food on Thanksgiving (no desserts, my carbs went to stuffing and potatoes, which I'd always rather eat).

However my day to day choices have sucked this year, I'm eating poorly and I'm back on Pepsi (sugar kind, not corn syrup kind), and all my clothes are tight. The store where I usually clothes shop is going out of business soon so I wouldn't even be able to buy new clothes. And I shouldn't. I have plenty of clothes one size down, so I signed up for a $30 Dietbet.

It will hopefully give me motivation to get back on track every day of the week. It starts on the 25th. I wavered a bit on choosing the one I did and one that starts on the 26th. The one I chose has less players and a smaller pot, but that always feels more intimate than being lost in a horde.

Mine's called The End of Year Showdown with Cristinadown100 and is a 4 week Kickstarter. I need to lose 13.5 pounds in that amount of time. I should be able to do that because I'll be getting back off the soda and that is usually ten pounds of retained water right there.

Normally I don't like to do Kickstarters, I like to do the Transformers which last six months, but I don't have that amount of money in my blow money envelope. I always like to prepay the entire six months because then you get one month's discount. So the plan is to do the Kickstarters. leave the money in, and hopefully earn enough to pay for a Transformer.

Thanksgiving was okay this year. MIL bailed the night before, which was disapointing, because I'd bought a ham specifically for her. She decided to spend the evening with her daughter instead, even though they are doing a Thanksgiving for that side on Saturday and SIL will be there. I don't know. It was very hurtful. The kids and DH were not happy.

It's the same kind of favoritism she often shows towards her daughter over her son and her children over ours. I should be used to it by now, but I'm not, because it hurts my family. I am choosing to not make a fuss, though. MIL has been very generous to us financially this year. I guess it is okay if she just wants to throw money at us and not see us. I'm not sure what that means for Christmas, but I'm bracing for a repeat.

I did find MIL a lovely gift for Christmas, though. It is a beautiful blanket with a carousel horse on it. She collects carousel horses and music boxes and it has gotten harder and harder to find her one she doesn't have or that plays something other than the carousel waltz, which she has come to loathe. DS ordered the camera he wants with his Christmas money so that should be here soon. I have purchased part of my own gift which is a queen size electric blanket. The other part of my gift is season 11 of The Big Bang Theory.

DD wants to get an electric blanket like the one I got for me and a really good heating pad. DH is narrowing down what he wants and then he'll order that and Christmas shopping will be done for the year. We don't exchange gifts with my side of the family. We quit years ago. I will likely make some fudge for my mother, though. We are on budget, so I am thrilled. We might even have $50 left.

I don't think I am going to make a turkey with all the trimmings for Christmas this year. Tearing up the bread for the stuffing and doing all the stirring for the gravy did a number on my wrists and I'm not sure I want to repeat that any time soon. Even with DH and DS peeling and chopping the potatoes, it was just too much.

I think things are just going to be very low key. We'll go out and look at lights this year, though. We skipped that the last two years and I miss doing it. Although it'll probably be a few days before Christmas. So many people go away for the holidays that you can miss some really good displays if you wait until the day of or the night before. I just want to keep it all simple. I'm tired of putting out effort, to be honest.

Been a while since I felt well enough to do one of these, but things are improving with the rheumatoid arthritis this week after about three weeks in full inflamation mode and I am typing with relative ease again, which is why I've been posting this week at all.

We had some overtime this week, 10 hours. All of it went to DH's crown, because it turns out our dental insurance didn't cover any of it, even though it said it would when they did the preauthorization. DH is going to talk to HR at work, because the plan they say they have they don't. So that means we have to come up with another $700 or so out of pocket.

I was able to put $600 into the medical fund instead of the usual $400 this payday, but that means that all of that will have to go towards the crown. Fortunately with this deposit there is $961 in the medical fund. We won't have the breathing room I had hoped for, but we will be able to pay for the rest of the crown.

I have done the budget for December and I am including the extra paycheck for November 30th onto that budget and not the November budget, since it is paying for December things. So on 11/30 I can put $400 into the medical fund and on 12/14 I can put in $700, and on 12/28 I can put in $900.

DS has a sleep study on November 26th (at least if they don't reschedule again) and I am not sure how much that will cost us. The family deductible is $2000 and DD has met $1000 of it (her limit), and I know I have met some of it. I think maybe $500. I know DD has met her out of pocket max, but I think that has a per person as well as a per family, too.

So I don't know for sure whether or not we will have any money left for next year's deductible. That $1500 for the crown instead of $750 is blowing us out of the water. Plus DH wants to get new glasses. He's more than due. At least the vision is decent, but it'll still be around $200. He's getting cheap frames no matter what. Nothing fancy. He's already cost us too much medical money with that crown, even if half of it had been covered.

Here's what went out today:

$319.93 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_600.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Envelope
_596.31 DH's Crown (plus additional from last payday)
__61.74 DH Life Insurance
__60.46 Me Life Insurance
_100.00 Blow Money Adults
_120.00 Allowances
_100.00 Clothing Envelope
_100.00 Christmas Envelope
_172.84 Computer Fund
----------------
3051.38 Total Money Out

DH purchased his new computer online today, so the computer fund is now wiped out. I'll start over in December, but I think at only at $50 a month. We were doing $100 because DH's was on it's last legs and it really felt like a race to the finish line on whether or not it would last until we had the money. His was five years old.

We all have newish computers now. Mine is the oldest at barely two years old and it is still in excellent shape, so there is no urgency to build the fund back up. Still, I want to have something going in there, and it is possible a phone could go and have to be replaced, though it is doubtful. I don't think any of them are a year old yet. Maybe mine. But it is serviceable. Who knows what the status of my computer will be in another year and having the money sitting there to replace it if it goes kaput is always the better option.

I did not go down to the last dollar this time. I have about $250 left in checking. There may be one more autopay yet to come through and then anything else I am holding on to for upcoming medical bills. DH was wrong about the last paycheck not having overtime on it. It had 10 hours. This one is a true representation of base pay with no OT and all of the various insurances and the 401K being taken out.

$268.77 Tithe
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_400.00 Medical Fund
_100.00 Household Envelope
_352.30 Autopays
__56.83 Life Insurance DH
__45.30 Life Insurance Me
_100.00 Adults Blow Money
_120.00 Kid's Allowances
_100.00 Clothing Envelope
_100.00 Holiday Envelope
_100.00 Laptop Fund
---------
2232.31 Total Money Out

This paycheck had the real numbers on it of what the base pay will be. No overtime. So after I get the next one I will know for sure how much income there is in a month. I am hoping they are splitting the insurances 50/50 and not taking it all out of one paycheck. If so, then we'll be bringing home more than I thought, but it still won't compare to all that overtime. Hopefully in October there will be OT again.

$319.93 Tithe
_500.00 Utilities
_400.00 Grocery Envelope
_400.00 Medical Fund
_100.00 Household Envelope
__91.91 Internet
__36.00 Garbage
_100.00 Car Insurance Fund
__50.00 Car Maintenance Envelope
_100.00 Gas Money Envelope
_120.00 Allowances
_325.89 Credit Card
_500.00 Monster Mom Loan
---------
3318.73 Total Money Out

I did my big shop on Friday and Saturday. Usually I do it all in one day, but my mother's car is in the shop and I had to ferry her around on Friday and I am not going to grocery shop at the same time as her because it drives me crazy. It is also a nice time for my son and I to have alone together. My mother has a way of aggravating my son (she baits him) and also of making every conversation about politics even though I have a no discussing politics rule. I'm just sick of it.

Plus she has to comment on everything I put in my cart. She eats a very bland diet so there is a lot of "I could never eat that," and "How can you eat that stuff?" Sorry, Mom, we can't all live on a diet of processed sweet carbs and cube steak. Some of us need fruits, veggies, and meat that requires actual chewing. So basically I drove her around and waited in the parking lot. Then I went back with my son on Friday and did two stores and on Saturday I did one store with my husband.

This is our second two week shop and it went well and I came away with $31 left in the grocery envelope, which is $14 from this time and $17 from last pay period.

Our first stop was at Safeway where I bought mostly loss leaders and pantry stock-up because there were some good condiment sales. Everything I bought was on sale. I spent $124.74 and I saved $88.23 off the total.

4 BBQ sauce
2 Miracle Whip
2 bags potato chips
4 jars picante sauce
6 bottles of ketchup
4 jars spaghetti sauce
2 loaves wheat bread
2 packages of 4 sirloin steaks
1 package with 2 London broil roasts
4 lbs of black forest ham (on sale for $5/lb)

Next I went to Trader Joe's and spent $130.54. I bought:

4 bags of chicken fried rice
4 bags of roasted potatoes with pepeprs
4 bags of fettucine alfredo
4 bags of chicken fettucine alfredo
2 bags of potstickers
2 bags of gold potatoes
2 boxes of fish nuggets
2 Strawberry bars
2 mac and cheese
1 peanut butter granola bars
2 iceberg lettuces
1 box hashbrowns
4 packs of hot dogs
2 spray olive oil

Next was Costco where I spent $127.48.

2 bags of steamer broccoli
1 jumbo package of tortillas
1 bag beef mandu
4 boxes of Kerrygold butter
1 container cashews
1 container parmesan cheese
1 box fruit snacks

There was one more thing on there but it isn't listed in a way that identifies the item and I can't remember what it was.

Anyway, I think this two week shopping thing is going to go fairly well for me. I feel like we are getting everything we need and stocking up on staples without too much trouble at all. And I get to stay out of the stores because more trips always equals more money spent.

$407.46 Tithe
_500.00 Utilities
_400.00 Groceries
_400.00 Medical
__75.00 Household
_275.00 Monthly Chiropractic Family Plan
__91.91 Internet
__50.00 Car Maintenance Fund
_100.00 Gas Money
_110.00 Allowances
_743.12 Credit Card
1000.00 Monster Mom Loan
-------------
$4172.48 Total Money Out