Random Snow Day Thoughts

Posted on February 13, 2014 by Sheila

Today was one of the best snow days, I can remember and yet I did not step one foot outside the house!

The kids went sledding early this morning and then made a family of snowmen this afternoon.

Last night we enjoyed “The Croods” including 4 bags of popcorn and tonight we played “Sorry” with the little kids for over an hour and no one cried! They all seemed to catch on to the rules and enjoyed just playing! For the official record, Kendall was the winner!

Matt suggested that since we were going to be stuck inside for several days we should restock some of the convenience foods we have around. I focused on Breakfast today; pancakes (Matt made us some for breakfast and we have enough for several more mornings.), 2 egg and spinach dishes and a huge batch of muffins.

I tried a new recipe with the muffins, with a plan to freeze half but instead they were so good, they will not last another day. Who knew Banana chocolate chip muffins would be such a hit!

Included in my snow day were 7 loads of laundry and emptying the dishwasher 3 times in addition to our regularly schedule bill paying.

If I don’t have to attempt to make it to work tomorrow then this will be the longest weekend I have had without beginning out of town. 4.5 days in a row!

January No/Low Spend Final Update!

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Sheila

~~Get $100 in our Emergency Fund.~~ Transferred $100 today!
Pay off the outstanding Verizon bill from where we switch names
Deposit for Beach vacation
~~Reduce Groceries to$400 for the month with the remaining $200 set aside for Cheerleading competitions~~. Total spent for Groceries $298.63. I did use the remaining $100 on a order from Pamper Chef! $212 used for Cheerleading competition spending money!
~~Transfer $50 to auto fund by the end of the month~~. This has been transferred! Goal Met!

I have managed to met 3 out of 5 of my original goals, I am extremely pleased with these as they were made prior to our planning a trip to Michigan. This was an awesome way to start the new year! I will have my goals for February posted on Saturday!

A Space to Call My Own

Posted on January 26, 2014 by Sheila

This weekend the weather has been extremely cold. That was a good reason for me to stay inside. One of the things, I was able to accomplish was organize and cleaning up my desk. We (Matt and I ) did our yearly purge of paperwork.

My desk before….

After! I was able to purchase the words for $3.00 at an after Christmas sale.

Hopefully this will let me be more productive.

How I Wasted Money This Week

Posted on January 20, 2014 by Sheila

One of the things that happens to me when I am really working to save money or trying to keep my budget on track is that I begin to notice little things that cost more money than they should in my mind. This week has been one of those weeks, we are so close to being on track and even ahead that I am constant thinking of ways to stretch us that last little bit. I often share about how I save money but in order to get an accurate picture I am going to share on how I have “wasted” money this week. I will start by giving you my definition of “waste”. Waste equals buying something that was not needed or on the best deal possible! I will be the first also to say that not all of the items on this list were a waste but maybe better viewed as overspending. I will also say up front most of these things I would not or can not change, so enjoy

Purchased 2 new bras at JCPenny. I had received $30 in rewards for the month of January. My intention was to use this money to buy a bra. I have purchased 10 bras in the past 6 months but am not really happy with any of them. The major problem is that the underwire comes out the side. I did purchase 2 without underwire but these did not provide as much coverage as I like. Instead of 1 bra I ended up purchasing 2 bras and a set of pajamas. I spent $28 and saved $92.
Throwing out over a years supply of Vitamins. In cleaning, out the pantry on Saturday, I rediscovered several packages of Juice Plus vitamins. I had purchased these several years ago and each year start by taking these regular for less than 3 weeks. This year, I knew that I was not going to complete the cycle again. What I did not realize was that all the vitamins that I had expired sometime between 2010 or sooner. Into the trash, they all went.
I often keep extra food items in my bathroom closet, simply because it has some additional storage space. I have been seeing on a shelf and forgetting about a couple of cases of Protein shakes that I purchased last year at Costco. My plan was to starting taking these for lunch; however one case expired in August of 2013 and the second in November 2013. I actually attempted a shake from the November case but they just are not drinkable. I know that I spent around $50 on these cases.
Between Thursday and Sunday, we have eaten out 3 times. We have lots of food in the house but chose to eat out anyway.
Girl Scout cookies. 5 boxes to be exact. Definitely not a need but very good!
$719 for 2 pair of glasses for myself. I need new glasses and I have to go to Bifocals. But I chose a really expensive frame and also purchased a pair of sunglass to use this summer. This was definitely an overspend.

So am I the only one wasting money this week?

Budget and Traveling

Posted on January 10, 2014 by Sheila

Two weeks ago, I had just signed up to be part of Carla’s challenge of Low/ No Spend January. You can see the goals I set here. However just a few short days later we decided to make a trip to Michigan to visit family. After looking at the goals again, I am going to see if I can at least manage to achieve a couple prior to the end of the month. Since I definitely don’t have an update today, I am going to talk a little about our travel budget instead.

Because this is a trip that we had not initially budgeted for, we felt very strongly that we needed to set and stick to a budget. January is one of the two months this year that I will receive an extra check, so this was part of the basis for the budget. I am excited to say that even after paying for the new tail lights on the van that were needed because of our wreck that we are $50 under budget!!!! I have decided that this will be placed in our auto fund to meet one of the low spend goals of the month!

Here is a breakdown of our spending:
Gas and tolls    $350
Hotel                 $285
Food                $185 (We were treated to several meals by family, but also took with us several meals to reheat. We also packed lots of drinks and snacks)
Bronner’s       $115
Replacement parts $106

Total Spent $1050 for a 4 day trip! I am so proud that we stuck to our budget!

The Worst Travel Day EVER!

Posted on January 9, 2014 by Sheila

I have been travelling between North Carolina and Michigan, for over 10 years now. I have made this 800 mile journey probably 15 times but the worst trip ever occurred last week. The adventure started early in the evening when I was woken up half an hour earlier than plan by the sound of Kendall coughing and throwing up. I really didn’t give it much thought because I had made her eat earlier when she was not hungry. After we loaded up it was off to Krispy Kreme for our late night snack. Unfortunately, I had made a mistake and we missed closing my 20 minutes. Next was an usual chain of events that caused a relatively long trip become a really really unforgettable trip. Our GPS sent us on a totally different route than we had ever take, we have since discovered that by mistake we told it to avoid toll roads. We headed west to Tennessee, I will spare all of us the details but Kendall was sick twice more in the first four hours. Matt and I had a serious discussion about turning around and heading home but Kendall did not want to because in her logic ” We have packed everything in the van for the trip.” The route itself was very twisting and turning, it felt like we were in the mountains for ever. Our most uneventful period was between 4am and 9am. We stopped and ate at Cracker Barrel around 6am and thought okay we are about half way with the additional stops we should be at the hotel around 2pm. Things turned from long to worse in Kentucky around 9:30 when it started to snow heavily. In the next 6 hours we travelled less than 200 miles in terrible condition that included “white outs” and long periods of sitting waiting on wrecks to clear. At around 5pm we made it to Ann Arbor and discovered that the further north we headed the better the travel and weather appeared to be. So we decided to continue on. We arrived at our hotel around 8:30pm a mere 22 and half hours after we left! We were both exhausted!

I am completing this post after our travel back to North Carolina on Sunday January 5th. The weather was again awful for travel and we ended up in a wreck in Ohio. Our van hit a patch of ice, did a couple of circles, hit a guardrail. The van was driveablel l will post pictures next week, however we managed to arrive home in 16 hours and so the trip to Michigan remains the worst Travel day EVER!

December 26th – A Day of Reflection

Posted on December 26, 2013 by Sheila

On Christmas Eve, I received a phone call that provided proof of how busy this fall has been. The portrait studio called to remind me that I could pick up my pictures. “You must have the wrong person” was my first reply. After a couple of confirmation questions, I realized they were talking about Zach’s birthday pictures that we had made the first week of September. I honestly had completely forgotten about them. If you know me or have seen the inside of my house or even “enjoyed” my wordless Wednesday post you realize, I love pictures, to completely forget about pictures is not something I would normally do. We just have stayed extremely busy with all kinds of activities. This phone call proved what I had already decided to do for Christmas, enjoy some quiet relaxing non busy time at home.

I am glad to report that this has been a success. The plan for today is a little shopping and dinner with friends but in reality if I ended up at home until time for dinner so be it.

Christmas Eve was spent catching up on some chores and make breakfast for the next several morning. Amanda and Scott arrived at noon, some opening of presents and a quick trip to Walmart, resulting in all the kids enjoying new toys for an hour. My dad called and we left to go over for my family celebration. It was fun and relaxed with lots of laughing and some more gifts. I can’t forget the traditional game of Rook, that was won by myself and my brother! The kids were exhausted and all asleep early by 7:45pm.

Christmas Day was even less eventful. We did awake early, Santa had arrived! Another area that has been successful this year is we greatly scaled down Christmas. The little kids received one gift from Santa; Zach a drum set and headphones, Kendall and Lily both American girl dolls. Stockings had candy only. In addition, each had 2 additional presents from us, one from Grandpa Abbott and one from Aunt Deanna under the tree. But the lack of 6-10 gifts a piece was not noticed. We had a quick easy breakfast of bagels with the entire morning spent playing with the toys. The little kids have been the most engaged and happy I can remember. Amanda is working today but checked in this morning and Haley stayed till breakfast. She has spent the rest of the day celebrating with her Dad’s family. Everyone, well except Matt, stayed in pajama’s all day and alternated playing together and alone.

I can honestly say this has been one of the best most relaxing Christmas’s in memory.

Christmas Eve in Pictures

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Sheila

First thing this morning the little ones helped make French Toast….

After finishing a few chores, we decided to play some board games…

Next Amanda and Scott came over and we opened a few presents….

Finally we headed over to Pawpaw and Granny where there was lots of fun and even more presents…

We ended the night by reading the Birth of Christ from Luke and of course some milk and cookies for Santa.

Christmas Parties!

Posted on December 19, 2013 by Sheila

This has been the week of Christmas parties and fun activities at school for the girls. Today, I was able to attend both Kendall and Lily’s classroom parties at school. At the same time, Matt took Zach to the library for a Christmas party. Afterwards, Zach used his own “card” that he received as a gift to purchase a happy meal. You will need to scroll and see both post of the same name to enjoy all the pictures!

Kendall’s class had 7 different activities followed by food…

Wrapping paper

Picture Frame Craft

I was stationed at this table. Good thing I learned how to make things work. Kendall took a long time with this as they did not have the same number of each color and it was difficult to complete a pattern

Reindeer Food

Ready to complete her last activity making a mouse!

Kendall’s favorite activity of the party. She ate the entire tree!

Thankful Thursday

Posted on December 12, 2013 by Sheila

This has been a long week for me. I know that my life and circumstance is no where as near difficult as some around me but some days I just want to feel sorry for myself. But instead today I am going to list all the things that I am thankful for this week.

Kendall is the only one who has pink eye. She is definitely on the mend as well as she returned to school today.
Rugar, our dog is alive and much better today. On Wednesday morning, early, we were awoken to his cries of pain. I was very much afraid that he was not going to live. After much prayer and a trip to my parents, he is back to his usual self today.
I only bruised my hand when tripping up the stairs yesterday.
A job that allows me a set day off during the week, and the ability to take sick time on a short notice.
A library visit today with Zach, although I did not find the book I was looking for, I did find and am half finished with a book that I needed to read.
A warm house and plenty of food to chose from.
A third grader who enjoys doing her homework and only needs me to sign the paperwork.

Teens Tots and Everything In Between

Life, Love and Coupons

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