Every Penny Helps

Every penny helps. We've probably all heard that for years. Well, for good reason. It's true!

This large beer stein sits on Lawman's dresser and catches all of our loose change. We've done this for years. Sometimes we cash it in for a special night out. Sometimes it goes toward a planned purchase. Sometimes it goes into savings. And, sometimes we have cashed it in before it's full. This time it's going into our vacation account as a little extra spending cash for our upcoming March trip. I'm cashing it in tomorrow because it's overflowing.

Any guesses on how much is in there? I'll let you know. **UPDATE** $140.00 in the change jar!

Do you save your change? How do you spend it?

eliminating the guilt

Unless you're new here, you know that I moved groceries and gas to an all cash budget last year. I'm expanding on that in 2011.

To help me with this, I purchased a couple of items -- zippered pouches (on the right) and folders (on the left). The new pouches have been marked for our new categories -- clothing, gifts, and entertainment.  All are necessary expenses (yes, even entertainment as it helps to keep us happy!) yet this way they are already planned for.

I've already discovered the joy of spending without the guilt. My payday was Monday. I went to the bank and got cash to put in my new zippered pouches. Tomorrow is the girls' winter formal. Both needed new, fancy flip flops to wear with their pretty dresses. Kohl's had the perfect flip flops, even in January in Kansas. I purchased a new pair for each of the girls. Guilt free. Yep. The money was already accounted for. Amazing how that works. Have cash. Can spend. No guilt. I-Heart-Cash.

grocery geek

I've told you before but I'll tell you again....I'm a grocery geek. I have a grocery budget therefore, I like to know if I stay within my limits. Only way to do that is to track my spending.

For years now I have been saving all of my grocery receipts. I have a clear plastic envelope of sorts that hangs on my fridge. After each shopping trip, the receipt ends up there. At the end of the month I staple them together and tally the totals.

Some of you may remember that last year I announced that I was moving to an all cash grocery budget. I am happy to report that I stuck with it. All year. It's habit now and I love it. Well it turns out that we did quite well. Our annual total for groceries and household items was $5,651.98. Over 52 weeks that equates to $109 per week. Our best month was October, coming in at $344.91. Our most expensive month was December nearing the $600 mark. And yes, I did write a check for one of my trips because my grocery envelope was empty. Lots of entertaining, parties, etc. that month.

This month I am trying to clean up the freezer and pantry. FishMama is hosting her Pantry Challenge again this year so that is my  motivation for trying to use it all up. Here is another place of interest to grocery geeks; I'm planning to follow this lady during 2011 to see what she does with $100/month.

Grocery Update::first 2 weeks of cash only

I'm at the end of the first 2 weeks of my cash only grocery goal. I took out $225 on 12/28 which had to last until January 10. I stopped at the store on my way home last night to take advantage of a special one day sale. I had $35 left in my grocery budget. I don't shop this store regularly - it's new and it's big which means if I were to do a complete shopping trip there it would be overwhelming. I haven't learned the layout so I don't know where everything is which means it would take me 2x as long to get what I needed. Basically, I cherry pick here and buy their loss leaders. (I remembered to use my reusable bags...another 2010 goal.)

Here's what I purchased: deli meat & cheese, eggs, yeast, oyster crackers, peanut butter, ice cream, baking powder, fresh pineapple, cereal, 2 loaves bread, and yes, my diet coke. My total - $24.46.

The remaining balance of my grocery budget - $10.54. I put the change in our big jug that all loose change goes into and I'll leave the $10 in my envelope and add it to what I take out on Monday. What I've spent in the last 2 weeks averages out to $107.50/week for a family of 4. This is still new so I'm still finding the fun in seeing just how much I can get for how little. Ask me again in 3 months if I'm still finding the fun in this. I hope so!

And I have 2 rainchecks for future use - $3.99 for a 3# bag of boneless chicken breast and .88 for a 5# bag of potatoes - good deals last week and this week that they had sold out of.

Spending Freeze

Getting children ready for a new school year requires a lot.

Completing enrollment forms;

Paying enrollment fees;

New PE Uniforms;

School supplies;

New shoes;

New clothes;

Sports equipment;

Appointments for Physicals, Eye Check, Dental check-ups;

What did I forget?


Lawman and I have taken care of all of the above. It requires lots of time. Lots of dollars. $ Cha-Ching $


I did the last of the school supply purchasing on Sunday. When I got home I announced that I was instituting a spending freeze. I'm tired of the money just flowing out of our checkbook. So, we agreed that for the rest of the week we would write no checks and only spend the cash that was in our wallets.


We ran out of milk tonight. Lawman is taking a debit rebate card that has just enough left on it to buy 1 gallon. Ok, I thought. We can do this.


Maybe not. One of our toilets just broke. It's not the kind that you can just run to the hardware store and buy replacement parts for.....it's a power-assist. Requires a plumber. I don't think I have enough cash in my wallet to take care of that. We have 2 other bathrooms that are in working order....do we put it off until next week?

Dressing for Prom

2 daughters = 5 proms, minimum considering Alison is going as a Sophomore

Dress worn one time in the color of Alison's choice = $50

Add in alterations, dry cleaning, shoes and accessories and I'm still below the $190 price tag on the new dress we liked.

Using co-worker's daughter as a resource? Priceless.

This & That

I've been struggling with the fact that I have nothing to blog about. Nothing.

It's been cold. Grey. Dreary. Very run-of-the-mill for late January. Boring and dull would be good adjectives.

Which I guess is a good thing given the daily news. We have jobs which allows us to continue as normal. My heart goes out to the millions who have chaos in their lives due to job loss.

Oh, this post sounds depressing. I'll try to improve the tone. Enough already.

Today I've got random items to share.

Last night was my book club meeting. Turns out I was hosting. Not originally planned but I volunteered as the scheduled host had a sick boy in her house. Mind you, I worked until 5pm and we were meeting at 7:00. Between 5 and 7 I had to do some taxi-ing of kids + feed myself & Lawman.

Dinner had to be quick & easy. I received a recipe from my SIL on Monday for an Omelet in a Bag. What? I know, sounds strange. Turns out, it works great.

Start with quart size ziploc freezer bags and eggs. 1 ziploc + 2 eggs per person.

Crack the eggs into the ziploc, close and give it a good shake to mix up the eggs. Add your favorite omelet fixin's; we used green pepper, shredded potato and shredded cheese.

Zip bag and place into a pot of boiling water and boil for 13 minutes.

Remove bag(s) from pot and dump the omelet onto a plate. Wala! Dinner is ready. I plan to make them again with the girls as an experiment of sorts. I think they'll enjoy it.

It is customary at our book club that the hostess provide yummy drinks and dessert. Since I didn't have time to bake and my magic wand was broke, I knew the chance of me pulling something fabulous out of thin air was slim to none. Popcorn and hot choclate would have to suffice. We were watching a movie after all. The movie version of our book. I thought it would be perfect. Turns out it was. Here's the popcorn recipe I used.

Now for a thought that's been bouncing around in my head for a few months. A No Spend Month or 30 Days of Nothing. Have you heard of it? I've read accounts of several families experience with this. Basically, for 30 days you eliminate all non-essential spending. I mentioned this to my family last fall. Not interested. I mentioned it again in late December. Amy's family is having a No Spend Month in February. Mary's family has done this more than once. I read Rachel's account this fall.

I mentioned this idea to Lawman again on Monday thinking that if we were going to do this, we better make a plan as February is literally only days away. Lawman's response? "Every month is a no spend month in this house." Obviously, he's not excited about this little plan. So I let it go. Some battles aren't worth fighting.

His little comment did give me something to think about. Is every month a no spend month? For the most part, he's right. We aren't frivolous. We don't eat out excessively. We don't spend every weekend at the mall. We see a movie at the theatre about once every 6-8 weeks (if we're lucky).

What I had hoped to accomplish with a no spend month was an educational opportunity for our girls. I know the 12 year old doesn't grasp the amount of cash it takes to keep this family functioning. The 15 year old (B2) has a better understanding. She knows how much we pay for the mortgage and utilities. It's good for her to know but we have the understanding that the information she is privvy to does not leave this house. If we didn't think she was mature enough to be responsible with this information, we wouldn't have shared it. My folks didn't discuss finances with me and I don't want to make that mistake with our girls. Unfortunately, I had no idea how to budget when I left home and the absolute worst thing was that I got a credit card in college. Suffice it to say that I learned some financial lessons the hard way.

I know B2 has taken my rambling to heart. She did a no spend week for herself last week. No lunch out for her. She made a lunch every day.

Have you done a no spend month? Something you'd consider? I know we spend more during the warm weather months when it's easier to go out and do something. Maybe we'll re-consider this spring.

The Economics of Pizza

It was one of those days. You know the kind....long day at work, brain is fried by 5:00 and you arrive home with no energy yet everyone wants dinner. Not only that but it was a gray and wet day which does not afford oneself to large energy reserves.

My drive home was filled with contemplation. Do I go home and make dinner or order out? It turns out that what I had on today's menu wouldn't work because I didn't have all the ingredients and I did not want a last-minutetrip to the grocery store. What could I make?

I remembered that I had a box of Jiffy Pizza Crust Mix in the pantry and I knew I had some pepperoni in the freezer. Maybe I could make pizza rather than order out...

Yep.

I arrived at home and immediately donned my apron. Time to mix pizza crust - 2 minutes; Pull other ingredients from pantry, fridge & freezer and let dough set - 5 minutes; pre-bake crust - 4 minutes; add toppings & bake - 20 minutes. In just over 30 minutes I had a fresh baked from the oven pizza for my family. Same amount of time I would have waited for the delivery guy to show up at my front door.

My pizza saved me some cash -- pizza cost $3.10 to make; theirs would have been at least $20 plus tip. For less than $6.00 I had pizza, sides (veggies, sliced peaches) and dessert (chocolate pudding).

Oh yeah. I win. Shake your booty. Shake your apron. (Say it like a cheer!)

And the girls were thrilled to have pizza.

Defying the Force

Mary has been doing 30 Days of Nothing this month and I've been following along. I'm not really participating but I've been trying to be aware of our monthly expenditures.

Today was hard. I got home from work with zero energy. I thought a protein-packed snack would help. It didn't. I wanted to just lay down on the couch. But, I didn't.

I forced myself to get busy and be productive around the house -- laundry, vacuuming, changing clock batteries, etc. I thought being busy would pep me up. It didn't.

B2 called to say that she needed a ride home from work. Picked her up and she tells me that she needed to go by the school because she forgot her lunch box and could I take her by the library too? Oh but she didn't have her library card and the new policy is now that you MUST have it. So an extra trip home and back. By now it was only 20 minutes until B3 needed to be picked up so we decided rather than go home we would wait in the school parking lot.

When B3 got in the car I was so tempted to head to a drive-thru for dinner. The force of the golden arch was pulling me. I resisted. My phone told me it would automatically dial the pizza place for delivery. But again I resisted.

I forced myself to drive home and prepare dinner. After all was said and done I was glad I did. Tonight's meal was a favorite of the girls, I felt good knowing we weren't eating junk, I hadn't spent extra money and I didn't feel like crap when I was done eating.

And, my neighbor and I went on a walk. As James Brown would say, "I feel good!"

Fine Print...Read it folks and follow through.

Customer Service - - you either love it or hate it.

Last night I decided it was finally time to make a call to Sears Customer Service Department. A call that I had put off as long as possible. Why? Most of the time I get the customer service rep who doesn't speak fluent English, doesn't want to be helpful or isn't willing to ask a supervisor for assistance.

Not the case last night.

I dialed the toll free number, entered my credit card account number and was directed to Karen.

Before I called, I pulled my statements since 01/2008 so my firing power was right at my fingertips. So I was ready -- armed and dangerous as Lawman would say.

Lawman and I had made a purchase several months back that was a special offer. You know, 6 months no interest or some such deal. Anyway, in February I had called to find out our balance in order to pay it off. See, I had read the fine print at the bottom of our statement that said, "You must pay your balance in full prior to 4/1/08 in order to avoid interest." We weren't willing to pay interest so we decided we'd get this taken care of sooner rather than later.

Balance was $103.27. With receipt in hand, I explained to Karen that I had made this payment - in the store AND in the full amount due - on February 27. (Remember this.) I have my receipt to prove it. Could I give her a transaction number or some such hoo-ha to enable her to find it? Oh yes, she tells me, she can see that on my account. OK then, why didn't it eliminate that balance due?

There's a catch, as usual. Go figure.

You see, we were in need of some new tires for our car. On February 26 (one day before I made that payment, remember?) we purchased tires. $550 worth of tires and I paid for it with our credit card. Business as usual, right? Wrong. It works like this.

When you have a "promotional balance" and "other balance", the majority of your payments on account will apply to the "other balance" because it is accruing interest. Well, guess what my payment of $103.27 went to? Yep. Tires. I can guarantee you those dadgum tires had been on that account for less than 24 hours!

The reason I called in the first place is because we received our new statement in the mail a few days ago and a line item of "Interest Accrued" appeared....$148!! That's right folks. Interest on our "promotional purchase" and it was calculated to accrue from the first day of purchase to present. That's 6 mos. worth of interest (or some such magical number) on a balance that we thought we had paid off.

Well, bless Karen's heart. I'm tellin' ya I would send this girl a canned ham for her excellent customer service if I knew how to find her.

She "re-applied" our payment (some fancy jargon for fudging the books or tricking the computer?) to the promotional balance or actually, as much of it as she could. This left a "promo balance" due of $22.00 and she got her supervisor and he eliminated the $148 in interest. How's that for customer service? So now all I have to do is pay $22 before the 25th of this month to avoid interest again on that "promo purchase."

Personally, I think the whole "promo balance" should have disappeared but I wasn't about to argue with Karen. Not after what she just accomplished on my behalf. She's the best customer service rep I've worked with. Ever. Next time I call Sears for some help, I think I'll ask for her by name.

And Karen, what kind of ham do you prefer? Smoked or honey glazed?