I took everything back

Well I returned all the stuff I bought last week. It felt good to return everything and get that money back in my pocket. Unfortunately that money didn't get to stay there. On the way home from my mom's house the other day I got a flat tire. So I had to spend $208 dollars to replace the one tire because apparently I blew out the tire walls some how. Now you tell me how the heck that is not covered under warranty?! Only 24,000 miles on a tire that is suppose to get 60,000 on it and the tire wall blows out?!?! Whatever!

Also I'm totally sucking on this blogging thing. I'll try to be better.

We fell off, er I did.

We have fallen off this wagon big time!! We are getting back on though, I will not let this be an excuse to just quit. It all started when we moved. There was a lot of eating out for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It's kinda hard to cook and all when all of you dishes, food, and pots & pans are packed and being moved. But we didn't stop there. We continued to eat out every day for about a week, and all meals on the weekends. We were running ragged trying to go back and forth painting my Mom's house and all. Then when I did get the time to go to the store and buy some food to cook I couldn't find my coupons that I had clipped before we moved (still can't find them).

Then we got our income tax return back and I planed on paying off our Target card with it but I really can't bring my self to do that because that would use up most of our money and only leave us with $300. That would be plenty if we had some money coming in. But neither Bob nor I have found a job yet so it seems silly to pay off a card, be left with no money, then charge the card back up to buy groceries. Sigh. So my plan is to put the pay off amount in our savings account so that is out of our direct grasp and then if we need to use it for something we have it but we will try to get by without it and then when we have something coming in we will pay off the Target card. Did that make sense?

Then yesterday I went to the mall to buy me some jeans. I know, against the rules, and yeah the mall what was I thinking! First, I have zero jeans, no really, I don't have one pair that fits or that doesn't have holes in them. I haven't bought any jeans since way before I got pregnant and my husband says that I can't wear my maternity jeans forever. After all she is 9 months old. Ok so I know I didn't look at any second hand stores for jeans for me but honestly I dont' think I have any in the area or anywhere remotely close. If you know of one in Crowley or around Wilmer/Lancaster please let me know. I did how ever look at Wal-mart, Target, Burlington Coat Factory, and Ross first, trying to find something cheap. They had NOTHING that fit me. I hate buying jeans this always happens. Before I got pregnant, if I found a pair of jeans that fit me right I would buy 3-4 pairs that were excatly the same. Any how, that's how I ended up at the mall. I did find some jeans that fit great though. I also found Old Navy, Gymboree, Kids Footlocker, and Baby Gap. I'm having huge buyers remorse today. Old Navy of course had baby clothes on sale and a shirt for me. Gymboree is having their Baby Sale, Kids Footlocker had some pink Converse for the baby (not against the rules and she really did need them so I won't be taking these back), and at Baby Gap they had this cute onesie that I got for someone as a gift. I'm thinking I should take all that back but the jeans and the baby's shoes. What do you think? I have a problem.

Well that sounds like a bunch of excues but it feels good to out myself.

Moving

Saturday is moving day. We are moving in with my Mom. She will be able to pay all the major bills so that we can continue to save and pay off debt. I am so thankful that my Mom is able to do this. It will be interesting living with 3 adults, 1 baby, 5 dogs, and 1 cat in a 1000sq foot, 2 bedroom house. We found a storage facility to store our extra stuff in for $35 a month and we are renting a uhaul trailer for $74. Bob's dad is helping us out with the moving expenses. We are so thankful to have such a supporting family, here's to a debt free 2010!

Half-Price Books rocks!

So I am totally addicted to the Twilight series. I bought Twilight before Christmas but didn't start reading it till last week. It only took me 3 days to read the book! So then I HAD to have the next one. But how to get one with all the rules. So Bob and I have a lot of text books and other books that I really didn't want to have to move, so we loaded them up and took them to Half-Price Books. They gave us $33 for them. I would say it was a little low but really I just wanted the books off my hands so $33 was a bonus. We looked around the store for the next book in the saga, New Moon but they didn't have any. So we went down to Target. I know, new, but it was only $8! So I made some money and got the book I wanted!

online resale

A friend just sent me this link. Looks pretty cool and right up our alleys

http://dallas.handmedowns.com/

Credit Card Hope

Well after the beating yesterday, today is a little better.

When I lost my job in October we quit paying on Bob's CC. It was the highest balance with the highest interest, and the highest minimum payment. Then Bob lost his job. Something had to give. We have never missed a payment on that card since we got it 5yrs ago. And have paid it to zero a few times. (Why did we not leave it at zero?!) Well after a month the calls started coming. I avoided them like the plague and my stress levels went through the roof. Nothing like getting hounded at 9pm on a Sunday night.

Today I got the courage to answer the phone when it rang for the 3rd time. It was our BOA CC. He thanked us for making a payment in October and wondered what had happened because we had never missed a payment. I told the nice man that my husband and I were out of jobs and just didn't have the money. He then put me on hold and when he came back he said he could help us.

He stopped the late fees and over the limit fees. He lowered our interest rates from 28.99% to 6.5%. And he lowered our minimum payment from $450 a month to $220. I heard the angles sing! :) In addition after four payment our credit standing will be changed back to good! He said that with these payment that if we don't miss any more we can have the card payed off in 5yrs. 5yrs is a long time but I full intend to start snowballing our money when our income tax arrives. So I don't think it will take 5yrs.

I was so encouraged by this. I called my student loans and got them all deferred for 1yr due to economic hard times and I am going to use the money that we would have had to pay towards them and pay it towards our CC debt. I also plan on calling our other 2 CCs and see if they will also lower our intrest rates, since we have not missed a payment on those.

In addition I am now able to get my full time hours back and when Bob gets a job we will be doing much better as far as our debt goes then we were when he got laid-off.
Big sigh of relief to not have them calling every hour every day.

falling off the wagon a bit

On Friday I woke up late for work. I had to take a shower (I usually take one at night), get the baby up, fed, dressed, myself ready, lunched packed, etc. Well in the rush I didn't get to eat breakfast. Well pre-baby I would have just skipped breakfast and been fine. Post baby and breast feeding, that is just not an option! I would starve to death! So I grabbed some cash from the change jar and picked up McDonald's. Plus side was that it didn't come out of the budget money.

Today we went out looking for some shoes for the baby and some jeans for me (gift card from Christmas). I skipped the jeans because it was just depressing. I will continue wearing my maternity pants. We went specifically to The Children's Place because they have some knock-off Pedipeds that I like for like $10 or on sale for $6. Who can pass that up when the baby needs shoes! Well all they had for shoes were holiday shoes; black patent leather, and shimmer red. :( But they did have a long sleeved onesie that says "Daddy Rocks!" that was a $1.99 + 30% off that I couldn't pass up. Next we wandered down to Oshkosh. No shoes but I showed Abby a little dolly with a rattle in it and she lit up with smiles. Then I proceeded to put it back and I got the biggest pout and then tears. It was the saddest thing I have seen and made me tear up so I bought it for her. :) It was not needed but it was on sale. :bag (you DAM mamas know what that means) She has not let that dolly go since. She loves it!

Score!

Today Bob took our printer back to Best Buy because it was not working right. We have a warranty on it and instead of fixing it they let us pick a new one for the same price! Woohoo we got a brand new printer and a gift card with $5.14 on it!! We made money. haha

Also my friend Becka went through her daughters clothes and passed down a huge lot of clothes. All from the Gap or Gymboree, some with tags on them! And several pairs of shoes from Gymboree and Stride Rite. Abigail is styling now! THANKS BECKA!

Day 3 & 4

Saturday I got to join my Mom for a girls day out. I brought Abby with me and we all went to the hair dressers. I know, I know not really a need but my wonderful Mom bought me lunch and a cut/dye job. I love my Mommy!!

Today I got up and while eating breakfast cut coupons. There were a ton of coupons in this weekends paper! Then I made my menu for the next 2 weeks.

Week 1/5 - 1/11
Monday-Apple glazed chicken w/rice
Tuesday-Upside down pizza
Wednesday-left overs
Thursday-Fried Chicken, okra, and mashed potatos
Friday-Hamburger Helper w/greenbeans
Saturday-Stir fry w/rice
Sunday-Tuna Helper
Week 1/12 - /18
Monday-Taco Pasta
Tuesday- Bacon Cheese Burgers w/baked potatos
Wednesday-left overs
Thursday-Chicken Quesadillas w/refried beans and rice
Friday-Tuna Helper w/corn
Saturday-red beans & rice w/chicken
Sunday-leftovers

After making my menu I made my grocery list and headed to the store. I really want to get into going to different stores to stretch my money as far as I can but I am going to start off slow. So I decided to go to Kroger for the double/triple coupon deal. The total came out to ~$180 before coupons and after it was $150. I saved $30!! And this is for two weeks so I really saved more because we had been spending $150-$180 per week! *gasp* I'm so excited about my savings. And I have decided to quit shopping at Super Target because that only gets me into trouble.

On another note I was really starting to get bummed that I couldn't buy some kind of storage for all the toys that Abby got for Christmas. They are all just piled in our living room floor and she is overwhelmed by them. She doesn't know what to play with so she doesn't play with any of them. I was talking with my Mom about it and she said that she had an old toy box at her house and would bring it to me. Yippy!

Date to the Movies

Well yesterday Bob and I got Grammy to babysit and we got to go see a movie. We saw seven pounds. Good movie. It will count towards our once a month outing even though we didn't really eat anything but popcorn and we used a gift card we got for Christmas for the tickets. It was a pretty frugal trip to the movies. We packed our drinks and some M & M's and only bought popcorn from the theater. It's going to be a long month of not going out again.

Today shouldn't be too hard because I am working. I thought about taking the kiddo out to walk in the mall but then I would want to buy something. So since it is a nice day I will be walking with her and Abby in the neighborhood.

Let the savings begin!

Happy New Year everybody. So to start off my new year of saving I will be implementing these simple steps.

Pre-baby step 1: Get current on all your bills and make a budget
Baby step 1: Save $1000 (baby emergency fund)
Baby step 2: Debt snowball ( Make a list of all debts, smallest to largest. Any extra money from the budget (snowball) goes towards the smallest debt. When that debt is paid, take the money spent on the wiped out debt and move it to the next debt. Keep going until all debts are paid off.)
Baby step 3: Save 6 months of living expenses
(taken from Kristin's blog)

These steps are not too intimidating for me and I really think we could get our debt paid off by the end of the year following them. Off to make a budget