New toys

So my darling husband talked me into a travel travel AKA camper. I admit, it didn't take alot of talking. We used to have a motor home. For some of those misadventures, click here.

Anyway, I had secretly been thinking about a camper since we got our tax return but hadn't mentioned it to Bobby because if I give the man a bone, he runs with it. So about a week ago, he mentions he's been thinking about buying a camper because wouldn't it be fun to take the kids camping again while they are still young enough to enjoy it? So we talked a little, thought about the budget, then he took off running with his bone.

We found a used camper that we almost settled for. It had two bunks and slept 8, supposedly. I thought we had made up our minds but Bobby talked me into looking at a new camper. I was determined not to like it because it was almost twice as much as the used one. Unfortunately, I loved it. It has four bunks and an air mattress on the fold out couch, so it sleeps 10. With 5 kids, extra space is definitely beneficial to saving my sanity. Plus the bunk room has a DOOR! We can lock them in.

I'll post some inside pics soon, but this is really a story about a truck.

So, we're driving home from the dealer with our new travel trailer and Bobby says "We're probably only going to be able to take short trips because this is the max weight limit for the truck."

I ask, how short is short? Like an hour......

Uh, what? Could you maybe have mentioned this a couple thousand dollars ago? (yes, it's financed but throw in a down payment, insurance and a new tow hitch and there you go, money out of pocket)

So then starts the talk about we need a bigger truck. Wait a minute, bucko, that was NOT part of the deal.

Meanwhile, he still has the bone......

This is what our truck looked like Sunday when I went to work. If you remember a couple years ago, it was a pretty little black number. We seem to have a Suburban fetish. You gotta admit there is something sexy about the lines of a Chevy truck. Throw in a cowboy hat..... (Sorry, freak alert, this is a family blog).

 

This is what it looked like Monday morning when I got home from work. Still gold with a for sale sign in the window.

And this is what it looked like when I left for work Monday evening. A big red behemoth that may require a step stool to get into. It is pretty though, huh? Bobby did good. No money left the bank account. He sold his 1/2 ton and bought this 3/4 ton with a 454 for the exact same amount.

No, it doesn't really fit into our getting out of debt plan, but no one is promised tomorrow. I feel like you got to live a little while you're getting out of debt, know what I mean? What's the point of scrimping and saving if you miss out on enjoying life?

First quarter recap

Looking back at the goals for 2010:


•Lose 10 pounds.
Uh, thoroughly sucking at that. Lose one, gain one, and so on, and so forth. Enough said.

•Pay off 2 credit accounts.
Done! Paid off both of my credit cards. And a student loan, and my Invisalign account. Woowoo!

•Stay in school.
Quarter #7 starts Monday. I have apparently lost my mind and decided to take 4 classes this time around. If you never hear from me again, you'll know why.

Friday update

Working tonight, having a pj party on Monday with my girls for my bday, and have a couple assignments to work on, so you may not be hearing from me over the weekend.

That said, thought I'd update a few goings on.

The spending freeze: Melted, or at least, thawing.

A big part of the reason is my dear husband's Suburban. AKA The money pit.
As if spending $2000+ in November for a new engine wasn't enough, we put another $150 into it in December for some kind of sensor or something because it wouldn't start (with a brand new engine). That $150 part did not get it to start, because even though Bobby thought that was what was wrong with it, uh it obviously wasn't.
Moving into January, we have put another $200 into the darn thing and it does run, at least until the next thing breaks on it. Thank goodness it is paid for or I might be birthing a cow right now.

Needless to say, by the time we replace every. single. part. on it, it will be brand new.

And paid for. I have to keep telling myself that part of it. There is no car payment, there is no car payment, there is no car payment.......

We took the kids to Toys r US to spend their Christmas gift cards, and while we didn't spend any cash there, manuevering five kids through a toy store can take up a chunk of your evening. By the time we left, everyone had the hunger whines going, we were 30 minutes away from home and I hadn't thawed anything out for dinner. Considering it would take at least an hour to get dinner on the table, their favorite buffet restaurant won out. Still only $47 for a family of 7 for dinner out is not that bad of a deal.

Tate has been growing up and out of her jeans so I made a run for the kids resale store. $25 for 5 pairs of pants and a pair of gym shoes. Not too shabby.

So, I've kind of given up on the spending freeze this month. I think I'm going to postpone it a few months. February is not good because it's a big birthday month for us. Then Teag's bday is in March, so maybe we'll try again in April.

The diet: haven't weighed myself yet this week, but have been pretty good about sticking to my points.

School: Only two exams to take in reproductive A&P and I'll actually be done with that class. Pretty impressive, eh?
Now just to get busy with the other two courses.

House: I need to decrapify a la The Thrifty Decor Chick. Now I'm not going to go all "it's a new year, I need to totally decluter my entire house this weekend". Although I do. Baby steps, people. I figure if I can commit to decluttering one area of my house per month, I might actually get something accomplished. I'm not going to announce it or set any schedule, because it depends on what I feel like doing. I might share some before pictures or I might not. They might be too scary. But I think Sarah hit the nail on the head. When my house is out of control, I feel out of control. And with five little mess contributors I feel out of control enough as it is. So just keep your eye out for that.

Maybe you can declutter right along with me. You too can be a decrapper.

First week

Looking back on the first week of January, I have to say, how is it already January 9th? Didn't we just have Christmas????

Anyway, school started for me on Monday. Not only did I check in to all my classes online, I touched base with my learning team partners for my research class and finished two tests in my reproductive A&P class. Starting off well, we'll see if I finish early like I always plan. :op

The kids had a snow day on Friday. By dinner time, they were completely on each others' nerves. The roads weren't terribly bad but since we have so many country kids and a limited number of snowplows for this small town, they usually cancel if there are several inches of snow or if it is icy.

Speaking of icy, I cheated a little bit on the spending freeze. Just in the first weekend of January, I spent $5 at work because the girls wanted to order pizza, I bought about $5 worth of 75% Xmas ornaments (how could I resist), and I bought two pairs of clearance gym shoes for two of the peeps who are going to be needing them soon. As any Mom of many can tell you, if you find shoes for cheap, you buy them then. That was up to Jan 3rd. This week, I've done pretty good. Just bought a capucinno on the way to work one day, that's it. And it was only a buck! Now the hubster? Well, I'll have to reiterate the requirements of the spending freeze.

I finally stepped on the scale last weekend. I pretty much avoided it for the month of December because I knew with eating everything in sight, it couldn't be good. I was up 5-6 pounds depending on which scale you believe and depending on how accurate it is to weigh yourself 10 hours into a 12 hour shift and after eating dinner, two desserts, and a grape pop. Yes, two desserts. I couldn't make up my mind and I knew it was my last weekend to indulge.

Anyway, one week back into point counting and I'm only one pound above my ticker weight. Not too bad. Now to incorporate exercise...... trying to decide about a gym membership vs the YMCA vs home DVD's. Any suggestions?

The big freeze

Spending freeze, that is. Although, it's pretty darn cold outside too. Last year, I implemented a spending freeze in January (I think). January seems like a good time because it is freezing, in general, and I feel like I need to fast after the gluttonous month of December.

The purpose of the spending freeze is just that, to freeze all unnecessary spending paying particular attention to where the money goes for the entire month. Hopefully, it will teach us that we can stick to a budget, and that alot of the frivolous things we think we need are really just wants.

I remember at the end of the month last year, we had cheated a little, but I still felt like we accomplished something by saving a little and paying a little more towards debt. It actually felt good to not spend money. Not quite like the euphoric feeling I get when I walk into Tar*get but close. :op

Garden fresh goodies

Right now my garden is looking like a jungle. Remind me next year to stake me tomatoes, because uh, I didn't this year. They're not really tomato plants, more like tomato vines. And they're covered in gobs of green goodness. (Was I the only one who thought of greasy, grimey gopher guts to follow gobs of?) Anyway, today's lunch consisted of a salad made with homegrown lettuce, brocolli, and cucumbers! (Plus some other not so homegrown veggies).

And is it just me, or is anyone else a little chilly? I mean seriously, the AC is turned off again, the windows are open and my feet are cold. Beats sweating with the AC chugging so I guess I'll stop complaining.

Welcome beautifully comfortable August. To recap July:

• Nope, didn't make the No Spend Challenge. I am a Democrat after all and went well over budget.

• Almost halfway through my fourth quarter of school. I will be heading back down to Kentucky in a couple weeks to finish up the bridge year. I was pretty nervous the first time I went but am super excited to go this time and can't wait to revisit my classmates.

• My baby girl will be celebrating her first birthday next weekend. :o( I'm really not ready for these little people to grow up. I swear I am not letting Teagan turn 5. He will perpetually be 4.

• Bobby and I will be celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary this Friday with food, family, and friends. I've been busy getting ready for that, just one of the reasons I busted the budget.

• School starts in 18 days!!! The kids are not excited but I am. Hehehe.

• Finally finished painting my office. I'll post pics once I get the pictures back on the walls.

• Down to 166! Only one more pound to hit my second goal of 165!

• I've got two big assignments due this week that I am hoping to finish tonight and tomorrow, so I'll be signing off for now.

Sprinkler fun

I took the little peeps and a couple of their friends to the sprinkler park last week. That's right. Seven kids, all by myself. Seven really wasn't all that hard. The hardest part was ignoring the requests for ice cream from the custard stand conveniently located across the street. Tate, Tess and E
Our neighbors also have 5 kids. Nice, huh? Except for my 4yr old, everyone's got somebody to hang out with.The last pic that Tess halfway cooperated for.

See what I mean?

The big kids were too fast to catch on camera, especially while trying to keep one eye on the crawling girl.

Tess was not too keen on the water but she sure enjoyed sticking the pebbles in her mouth.

All the kids tried to evade the camera.

See what I mean?

Update on the diet, I have been sticking to my points and am 3 workouts into the 30 day shred. Let me just say, ow. It's going to be more than a 30 day shred for me. Since I work 3 nights in a row, I will not be working out on those in between days. I prefer sleep. I've been doing pretty good except for that trip to Pizza Hut last night,which will probably screw up my weigh in for this week.

Yep, Pizza Hut. If you've been paying attention, that means I crashed my own budget challenge. So far, I'm at $267 and I still have 10 more days to go. I'm going to need gas before then. Yeah, Pizza Hut should have been skipped, but I over spent at the grocery store too. I have a problem. When I go to the store, even if I know what we are short on, I feel like if xyz is on sale and I have a coupon and I know we will eat it, I should buy it then. Factor in the 40 minute round trip drive and that only makes sense.

Oh well, I guess my brother was right. Democrats can't not spend money.

First quarter review

Being that it is the end of March, I thought I would revisit my 2009 resolutions goals.

1. I will lose 10 pounds.

This one is going well. I have lost 7 pounds, so am already over half way to my measly goal.

2. We will work harder at paying down our debt by paying off at least 2 credit cards.

Half way there too. I used our tax refund to pay off one of our major credit cards. And we've jumped on the Dave Ramsey baby step train, so we're on our way to getting rid of the rest of our debt.

3. Stay in school.

Another half way point. I am half way through my first year, starting my third quarter next week. Yay!!! And I finished that dad gum stats class. There always seems to be one class I dread each quarter. This time it will be Community Health, I think. It seems very involved. We'll see how it turns out.

So, being halfway through my goals at the quarter mark, means I will have accomplished them all at the halfway point, right? Nope, not really. While I hope to have lost 10 pounds by the end of June, and would love to have another credit card paid off by then, I won't actually be done with my first year of school until August.

A budget recap

So the budget for January was eye opening. Our regular bills were just that, regular. We went way over budget on groceries. Now, is that because we didn't eat out much, or because I was really oblivious to how much money I was really spending to feed a family of 7? Probably the latter. I budgeted $600 to feed this large family. Bwaa ha ha ha. Okay, so maybe $900 was a more realistic figure. But darn, that's alot of money. That's more than my mortgage. How scary is that?

Anyway, it didn't go too badly. Even though I under budgeted for food, I apparently don't know how much money I make either because I under budgeted that too. So, in the end, it all worked out.

There were a few transgressions. The trip to Target, of course. Although, like I mentioned before, needs or wants? Probably things I would have needed to buy eventually anyway. I did go out to dinner twice, okay, three times. Twice for my birthday, cuz I'm that special, and once because my SISTER is a bad influence and made me go to Olive*Garden on THE LAST DAY OF THE MONTH! So much for a spending freeze.

However, I would like to point out that one of my coworkers paid for my second birthday dinner. The dinner out with the hubby and dinner with the bad influence were covered by my birthday check from the grandfolks. (Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!)

Bad influence also coerced me into going to Babies R Us. Yes, we did need a gift certificate for a baby shower, but Krista was all like, "there's this great sale, we really need to go look......". Seriously. She twisted my arm. I did buy some things that I don't necessarily need, yet. But Tess will be moving into bigger sizes soon, so I got her some onesies, pants, an outfit, and a pair of cute little gymmie shoes that were on clearance for $4.00. The Diva, AKA Tatum, conned me out of $15 for an insulated thermos straw cup. It is stainless and it is BPA free, and she has used it for every drink she's had since I bought it. So I guess it wasn't a total waste.

So, between the baby store, Target, and the 1 night of ordering out at work, I didn't do too terribly bad. Oh, forgot to mention the Skyline and McD's I had to pick up for the munchkins on the way to gram's house. That was the first time this month I have gotten them anything. I was amazed when I realized how often we used to eat out. 1-2 times a week really adds up. No wonder I have "extra" money now.

Visit Bossy to join in the poverty party.