Yesterday I brought food for work, but still bought a soft pretzel because I was extra hungry. I also gave $5.00 towards a gift for a coworkers baby shower. Then I grabbed some groceries --- normal stuff, plus veggies, cheese & pepperoni to make pasta salad for the shower. So yesterday was a spendy day, but all planned, except for the pretzel.

Today is a no spender, I brought breakfast, lunch & dinner. I'm making that pasta salad tonight after work.

Tomorrow I'm packing breakfast & a snack, but lunch will be covered by the food at the shower.

Tomorrow night, I have a friend coming over. We'll be making dinner and watching a movie. Yummy.

I'm doing a lot of stuff tomorrow, but it'll still be a no spend day if I can help it

Overtime update-So far I've worked 14.5 hours of ot this week. I'm aiming for over 20. Definately attainable.

Yesterday was a no spender. Today will be too. I'm hoping for tomorrow as well.

Our paychecks go up online prior to payday. We get paid the 15th & 30th & today I saw my check with all the overtime.

Once I took out my regular budgeted expenses, minus my car repair amount a planned gift to a friend for a Breast Cancer Benefit, and a couple other things that I'm setting money aside for, I have $480.22 to go to my student loan.

I'll be able to do at least another $500.00 at the end of the month. I'd really like to see the balance go down by $1,000.00 this month, so I'm going to see if there's a way to find a few more dollars. Definately doable!

I truly enjoyed my short time off. With all the OT I've been doing, I haven't had a decent amount of downtime in a very long time. I did little spending, lots of relaxing and nothing that I needed to do around the house, other than mow the lawn.

My goal this upcoming weekend is to plan most of my Christmas shopping. Over the weekend, I recieved an unexpected $25.00 gift certificate to Amazon.com from my Amazon Chase card. I had put the air conditioning bill on it, then paid it off immediately, but apparently it earned the gift certificate anyway! I'm going to put 1/2 of the g.c. towards a book that I've been dying to get and 1/2 towards a Christmas gift. Plus, I have a $5.00 off coupon from purchasing my Harry Potter book through Amazon. I'm also eligible for another $25.00 gift card from my points which I'll use for a gift. The rest of my Christmas money is already in savings.

I kept my A/C on all weekend, but at a higher temp most of the day, utilizing the fan & being downstairs in the day. At night, I turned the temp down a little more so that I could sleep comfortably. There's a lot of humidity right now & its messing with my sinuses.

I've been doing pretty good money-wise. I just sent off another $284.54 as an extra payment to Student Loan #1. I get paid again on the 15th and the check will include 41.5 hours of overtime, all of which, minus my weightwatchers fee and an unplanned gift expense of $43.00, will go to the loan.

My hair dryer, that was already on my list of things to replace, completely broke last night, so I"m going to buy one today. I have the cash for that earmarked in my personal items catagory in my budget.

This week I'm working between 16 & 18 hours of overtime between Tuesday & Saturday. All of which will go directly to that loan.

I've been listening to Dave Ramsey again & all I want to do is to pay this student loan debt off. I really can't wait!

On a side note: I lost 2 pounds this week! For a total of 6.8 pounds.

My goal for this week is pack my lunch every day. I spent 55 cents on a soft pretzel today & I'm picking up some veggies from the grocery store, but I am hoping to make Wednesday through Saturday no spend days.

Some quick updates:
-I made my 12 no spend days for the month!
-I ended up working 20.5 hours of overtime last week
-Yesterday, I bought 4 deoderants, 1 V05 shampoo and 1 conditioner, and 3 Aquafresh toothpastes for 8.33 (or 88 cents each)
-Today, I bought hair products with a gift card to the local pharmacy
-I'm looking for another prescription transfer offer to another pharmacy to get some kind of incentive gift card. Every little bit helps
-I worked 6 hours of overtime today
-I put my car back in the shop because of the check engine light coming back on. Total cost was $135.59.
-My overtime goal for this week is to do 16 hours between now & Thursday. I have vacation time for Friday & Saturday. I plan on using the 4 day weekend as a mini vacation. I'm not going anywhere, but I am going to get some much needed rest.
-I lost another pound this week. I'm down 4.8 lbs so far!

And one random thought---does anybody else get annoyed at those Visa commercials where everyone is paying with their debit card & its going smoothly, then everything grinds to a halt when one guy wants to pay cash? I can't stand those commercials. Which is ironic, because I use my debit card more than cash

Yesterday was a no spend day. I worked 7am to 9pm with a ½ hour lunch, earning 5.5 hours of overtime. I was invited out after work, but I declined because I didn’t want to spend money. Plus I wanted to go to bed early. So I came home, made food for today & went to bed. I was back up at 5:45 am (which is a feat, since I am NOT a morning person & my normal work shift is 11am to 8pm).

Today I’m working 7am to 8pm & then I’m heading to a friend’s house for dinner & movie night. I offered to bring stuff, but she refused, so today may be a no spend day too. We’ll see. I hate coming over empty handed.

I’m making some changes in my current goals. The plan was to replenish my emergency fund after it was hit with the hot water heater & air conditioning problems. However, I have $5,000.00 in my ING account earmarked to pay back a first time home-buyer incentive loan at 0% due in Sept/Oct of 2009. I’ve decided that I’m comfortable with having this as a back-up e-fund. So what I am going to do is put all my extra funds directly to student loan # 1. I’m really motivated to pay it off quickly, because it’s in my parents’ names. If for any reason, I have to touch my emergency fund. I will immediately stop paying down the loan & work on rebuilding the e-fund.

I’m getting paid on Tuesday. I have very little overtime in this check, but I’ll be putting 194.55 towards the student loan. Next pay period (August 15th), I’m hoping to have over 40 hours of overtime to put towards the loan. I REALLY want to get this paid off! If anyone has any comments about my plan, please let me know. I’ve thought this through in terms of my comfort levels, but I’d like to hear other opinions as well.

Today was no spender number 11 for the month. And today I had my annual review. I did really well & I"m receiving a 6.2% raise. I've already set my 401k withholdings to add 3%. Normally, I'd do the whole amount, but my monthly budget needs to be redone & I have wanted a bit more wiggle room for unusual catagories (hoa fee, sewer bill, ect). If I find that I have more than I need, I'll up my 401k contribution in the next paycheck.
But I am VERY happy with my raise. It was pretty much top tier for my department.

On a frugal note, I've had the A/C off since Friday with no problems. Its been very windy lately, so the house has been pretty cool.

Today was another no spender. I'm two away from my goal of 12 for the month of July! I'm looking to make tomorrow number 11. I've already pre-made food for tomorrow's breakfast, lunch & dinner.

I'm working from 7am to 8 or 9pm tomorrow. They've extended overtime hours in a push to meet our month end numbers. So I'm going to take advantage this week. Since I only worked 3 hours of overtime on Monday (my day off), I wasn't planning on making my 20 hour goal for the week. But now its back on. We'll see what I can get done

Today I extended my hold on my Netflix. Its been on hold since May & it was to restart in August. I went online to cancel, but they gave me to the option to extend the hold until October. Perfect timing. I LOVE to celebrate Halloween by watching lots of cheesy horror movies, most of which my library doesn't carry. Also, I have a week's vacation in October, so I'll have plenty of time to watch movies.

In the meantime, I have several movies on request at the library & I'm keeping a list of new releases that I want to watch, but my library doesn't carry. I'll get to them in October too.

My parents friends bought a new grill, so they gave me their old one. Its about 9 years old, but kept in really good shape. My dad is checking it over to make sure its safe, but free is good! Now I just have to learn how to grill

Yesterday, I only worked 3 hours overtime, but I also got my car inspected. So there was some cash out for the 2 year renewal plus gas.

Today, I packed my lunch, so it'll be a no spender. I'm getting a bit bored with the foods that I'm bringing, so I'm going to set aside some time to meal plan some different foods for next week.

Today is the end of my 6 day workweek and I have a few minutes before heading out of work to update some things--- Spending:
Friday was a no spender. Today, I'll be buying gas, but brought my breakfast & lunch to work, so no cash out there.

Harry Potter 7 arrived at my door from Amazon with the free standard shipping. I feel almost bad about it because people paid for extra for the guarenteed delivery & I didn't, but we both got the same service. But I am really EXCITED to read this new. And a little sad, because its the last. At least this series is one that I will reread several times.

So although I have a ton of things I should get done around the house. I'm going to spend the weekend reading Harry Potter & watching some movies from the library. I currently have Last Holiday (with Queen Latifah, Norbitt, Maxed Out, and the Good German. So I think I'm going to make tonight a movie night & tomorrow a book day.

Then Monday, its back to work for some overtime. My goal is to get at least 20 hours in this week. Definately doable!

I had grand plans to stop by the library & the grocery store on the way home from work yesterday, but I was just too tired. So I skipped the stops & went home, ending up with a no spend day.

Today I packed breakfast & lunch, but didnt pack dinner, so I ended up grabbing a sandwich. I'll stop by the grocery store on the way home tonight & pick up the tomatos & banana. I plan on making food for tomorrow & then going straight to bed. I am BEAT!

I'm still doing all the overtime I can, which is good, because I'm in the middle of this monster project & I just want it to get finished. It is really stressing me out. I'm looking at it possibly being done by Saturday, if some of my coworkers pitch in tomorrow, which they probably will. I will be so relieved when its over.

I am planning on cashing out a gift card through MyPoints this weekend. I have a friends birthday coming up & it'll be great to use to buy the gift. As soon as I figure out what to get him.

Today was pretty much a no spender. I brought all my meals to work today. After work, I'm going to run to the library to pick up some free books & movies to go through in the upcoming week & weekend. Then I'm going to stop at the grocery store to pick up tomatos & bananas. That will be my only spending today.

I'm back to using cash for groceries because I finally used up all of my gift cards from work. I had $50.00 that I budgeted for myself on the 15th & the 30th. When I just use my debit card, I overspend. With the gift cards, I stuck with that figure (outside of a Walmart run). So I've been thinking about buying some more gift cards and when that money runs out, then thats it. I'm going to mull this one over a little more.

Quick overtime update, I worked 7 hours Monday, 3.5 hours yesterday, 3 hours today. I'll be doing 3.5 hours on Thursday & Friday and a 1/2 hour on Saturday. So my total for the week will be 21 hours.

I was tracking my daily spending (none for today) and I added up my no spend days for July. 6 so far! I think I can make it to 12. We'll see

Couple of updates since its been a few days since I've posted.

I did some major grocery shopping and a little overspending on Sunday, stocking up on some things. Other than the grocery shopping, I hung around the house, did laundry and made some meal plans.

Yesterday, I did some overtime from 8am to 3pm, then grabbed some cat food on the way home. I'm in the middle of a BIG project at work, so of course, I got a migrane from the stress, but it didn't go full blown & I've been able to deal with just taking pain meds.

Last night I weighed in at Weight Watchers. I lost 3.2 pounds for the week & my mom lost 2. I'm happy that she seems into it. I kinda think she'd have quit if I didnt go.

I packed my food for work yesterday & ate dinner at home last night. Today's a no spender-- I packed my meals for work today too. Both days people invited me to order out with them, but I said no.

Since I've overspent in the groceries catagory & I need (WANT) to replace my ailing wireless router, I am going into super non spend mode to save money.

I'll try to post from work, but right now, I pretty much have no internet at home.

I'm waiting for my first electric bill from the summer with A/C. I have really no idea how it'll be. I did turn it off for awhile, but its back in the 90s again and VERY humid, so its back on

I packed a salad for lunch at work today. But it didn't sound that great to me. What I really wanted was Subway. However, I talked myself out of it. I ate the salad, I have fruit for snack later. And when I get home tonight, I'm treating myself to a big pasta dish for dinner. Yummy.

So today will end up being a no spend day after all.

Yesterday was a no spender. Today, I'll be spending a little on some needed items.

I brought my lunch, drink & snacks to work today, so no spending there.

On my way to work today, I got gas. On my lunch break I'm heading to the dollar store for dishwasher detergant & 2 other things. Then I'm heading to the library, where I owe them a $0.25 fine.

Either after work or tomorrow, I'm heading to the grocery store. I also need to stop by Walmart for some staples. I'll be using gift cards for both.

Its interesting, but its been MUCH easier to stay on my food budget using the gift cards. Its a mental thing, but its kinda like the envelope system for me. Once this last gift card runs out, I"m thinking about getting some more to help me stay on budget.

No news on the room renting front. I've had no responses to my Craigslist ad. So I'm going to keep looking. I also think I'm going to resubmit my ad on there, just to get it back on the top of the list.

Tonight I'm hanging out at home, watching a library movie & reading. Tomorrow, I'll be running errands & cleaning.

On monday, they've opened some overtime, so I'm going in. I also need to drop off my car to the repair shop. My check engine light is on & I have to get my car inspected by the 20th. Hopefully, its just a sensor like I think it is, and it won't be too expensive. I REALLY hope so!

Today's a no spend day for me. I brought food to work & I'm heading straight home afterward. Tonight, I'm planning on making food to take with me to work tomorrow and Saturday.

The Transformers movie yesterday was AWESOME! It was well worth the money. I bought the tickets for my friends & I. They bought the lunch afterward. It worked out really well!

I haven't had any response to my Craigslist ad for a roommate yet. With the holiday, thats expected, but I'm hoping to have some response today.

I have a specialist visit with my gastroenterologist at the end of the month. I used up some of my medical budget on a new medicine I'm trying, so its a little depleted and I have a few 3 month supply of prescriptions to order this month. So, I am going to find little ways to make up the $30.00 copay without having to dig into my medical or other budget catagories.

I also have to get my car inspected, which will likely be a $20-25 fee. I'd like to complete it by the end of the month.

So I want to find ways to come up with $50.00.

First, when I get paid on the 15th, I have $10.00 of the budget going to personal items (shampoo, ect). Since I already have a $20.00 gift card to Happy Harrys (owned by Walgreens), this covers my personal items for the month & the extra $10.00 isn't needed, so I'm starting off this personal challenge with $10.00.

I'll keep updating as I find other funds.

I also came home to a nice surprise. I received the air conditioning repair bill from last week. I had been quoted $322.00 for the visit, but the bill was for $300.00. Yay! When I have the estimate tomorrow, I do plan on asking the guy to consider that I just shelled out such a large amount to their company.

In other news:
-I found out that the $400.00 in gift cards from work is going to come in the form of a Visa gift card as opposed to store cards like last time. I'm hoping to put this amount towards the new A/C unit. I'll have to talk to the company's office, but it shouldn't be a problem. My family has done business with them for years.

-I worked 3.5 hours of overtime yesterday & today. I won't get any in tomorrow because of the appointment for the estimate. But on Friday, I'm going into the office at 7am to do some system checks for the boss, so I'll get in 4 hours of OT, maybe 4.5 if I decide to take a 1/2 hour lunch again.

-And in even better news, the overtime is back on for next week, so I have some opportunity to earn some more OT hours.

Its funny, I keep thinking of the cost of the A/C in terms of OT hours. I'll calculate exactly how much I'll need once I have the figures tomorrow

I already packed food for tomorrow & I plan to have a big breakfast before I leave. So tomorrow WILL be a no spend day for me
Well, I'm off to bed, I'm beat!

I'm working 8am to 8pm today. I packed all my food and my plan is to not buy any food all day.

Well, around 12:00, I started having a drop in blood sugar. Its not unusual for me, but it was really bad. I was shaking like crazy. I didn't want to eat all my packed food before dinner time, but I also didn't want to run down & buy something from the cafe.

Luckily, I had a small stock of stuff that I brought from home that I keep in my desk. I keep a pack of generic Ritz-like crackers and a jar of peanut butter in my desk for just such an occasion. I spread the pb on a few of the crackers, gulped down the soda and now I'm fine! If I didn't have that supply there, I would have spent AT LEAST 75 cents for a soda and more if I wanted food too. So yay! Crisis averted.

A few more tidbits:
- I also found a quater in the parking lot today!
- I'm going to work a 1/2 hour lunch & get another 1/2 hour of OT in today

And just to share my packed food:
Today I had/will have:
-a small blueberry muffin
-a banana
-1 cup dry rice chex (I eat them as a snack)
-all bran crackers
-tuna sandwich on wheat
-5 crackers with peanut butter on top
-salad with light italian dressing
-homemade pasta salad with wheat pasta, tons of veggies and light italian on it

Not the most imaginative meals, but its been REALLY hot in the office and I just couldn't take any hot food.

I know I'm bringing a salad & the other half of the tuna tomorrow, but I still have to figure out the rest. I'm going to work 8am to 8pm again.

****edited to add****

I just found out that I'll be receiving another $400.00 in gift cards from work. This was the last oppurtunity for it, but I am SO excited that I won!!!!

Well, the A/C went again. The last visit from the repair guy was a last ditch effort to see if it would limp through this summer. Obviously, it won't. I have the cash to get the new unit, but I want to pay myself as soon as possible.

Also, there was a glitch between my hot water heater timer and my brand new hot water heater, so I had the installation guy come back out to take a look. It took him 5 minutes, but it was fixed.

Today I:
-woke up at 6:45 am.
-was at the grocery store by 7:30 am to buy veggies and some staples
-made food to take to work
-called & set up an appointment with the a/c guy
-called & got 1 more car insurance quote. I'm just waiting to talk to the company who has my homeowner's insurance to see if grouping them together would save me a few bucks
-met with the hot water heater guy
-went to work for overtime from 11:30 am to 4:30 pm
-came home & cleaned the kitchen, living room and downstairs bathroom
-made dinner and premade food for tomorrow.

now I'm resting, playing on the internet & reworking my budget a little.


I'm actually going to be under budget for groceries this pay period! Yay I have $17.56 left of my $50.00 gift card that I'm using for this pay period. I'm going to save it for when soda is on super sale again. I like to stock up when its at its cheapest

So other than groceries paid by the gift card, I had a no spend day today.

Tomorrow, I'm working 8am to 8pm (3 hours OT). I've packed breakfast, lunch & dinner to take with me, as well as some snacks.

I've been running the house fans, but not the a/c since the a/c isn't working. But even if it was, I'd probably have it off, its been so beautiful in the last few days.

My goal for this week is to pack my meals all the way through Saturday. I say that sometimes and I don't follow through. But I will this time. I actually put a sticky note on my debit card. It says "A/C", just as a reminder. When I was saving for the house, I had a sticky with a picture of a house on it. Its a strange little motivation, but hey, it works for me

For entertaiment this weekend, I'm getting a few movies from the library. I've been watching old Poirot movies, which is fun. I have plans to do some organizational and cleaning stuff around the house this weekend. It should be pretty frugal

Today was a no spend day... the first of the month! I packed all my food & drinks for work today & I have meal plans for Friday and Saturday.

I'll have completed 10 hours of OT by Friday, and if there are any hours available on Sunday, then I'll work then too.

Yesterday I sent an additional $75.00 payment to my school loan.

I was paid on the 30th, paid all my bills that I pay out of that check. Then I set aside cash for expected expenses between now & the 15th. Since I received the $50.00 visa gift card for my birthday, I decided to use that for some of my expected spending (groceries & gas) and use that extra $50.00 cash towards the student loan. I also used a 10.00 deposit (received for signing up on e-statements on my checking). I also squeezed another 15.00 from the budget.

So between now & the 15th, when I get paid again, I have:

$18.75 Spending money
$40.00 gas money
$10.00 gift (need to plan for mothers day)
$20.00 oil change (need to do asap)
$20.00 medical (expected 3 month supply of 1 prescription)
$6.03 clothes (which I'll be carrying into June)

Plus I have some money sitting in my house checking, ready for my mortgage, water, ect.

I've been listening to Dave Ramsey pretty regularly, so I decided to get the Total Money Makeover from the library again. I'll be picking it up on my lunch break. I'm excited to re-read it.

My goal for May is to limit my discretionary spending as much as possible. I need to prepare for the loss of overtime at the end of May. I also need to look to find alternate sources of income. Fun stuff

And for any Lost fans out there... did you see last nights episode?!? It was SO good. I hear the season finale is going to be a 2 hour episode! Woo hoo!

No spending yesterday or today. For Easter, we had brunch at my sister's work. She and I were to split the bill, but she wouldn't let me. Apparently her boss compped (spelling?) her for 1/2 the bill. So she refused to let me contribute. Which I REALLY appreciate. The brunch was GREAT!

Afterwards, my parents & I went to see The Reaping. My parents treat, they wouldn't let me contribute either.

I got some goodies for Easter- a decorative basket, some toiletries, and a few knick knacks. No candy since dieting.

On Friday, I received a $2,500 check from my Aunt's estate. I've known for a year that this money was coming, and I've planned to set it aside in a New-To-Me Car fund. I figure I've got about 2 or 3 years left in the car I have currently, so it'll come in handy

I'm working 6 hours of overtime tomorrow and then I'll head to the bank to make a deposit.

I have a $5.00 Pinecone check, the $2,500 inheritance check, the cash I had planned to use today and the $40.00 found money from earlier this week. All of which is going into my savings, plus 20.00 of my bimonthly 'spending money' that I'm not going to use before I get paid again.

Tonight I'm working on a meal plan for the week. I'm planning on packing my meals for work through Saturday breakfast, lunch & dinner at work (working 9am to 8pm most days). It's easy to do as long as I plan. I have most of the stuff at home already, but I do need to pick up some veggies from the store tomorrow. I'm hoping to come underbudget on groceries for the next few weeks, since I overspent last month (stocking up on some great sales).

Oh, and because I just got around to totalling my March spending, here's my March savings total! $1179.45

I just realized that today is my 1 year Blogiversary! Its great to see what's changed in the last year. I've taken a more active approach to finances, bought a house, changed jobs and much more!

I've learned a lot from the people on this site and I've gotten a lot of support. So thank you all! This is a great group to be a part of!

AND as a nice surprise, I found $40.00 today! I was cleaning out some old photos/memorabilia that I had taken from my great aunt's house and I found the money tucked into an envelope. (She was known for hiding money all over the place). Since my mom is the beneficiary of the estate, I called her to let her know I found the money & she told me to go ahead & keep it. I'm turning around & using it as part of my contribution to Easter Sunday brunch. It was a planned expense, but now I'll be putting that $40 I had planned to use into savings.

Also, in an effort to be more healthy, I've been walking some. But on rainy days I've been doing nothing. Since I'm into video games, I've been toying with buying this game called Dance, Dance Revolution, which requires you to step around on this dance pad (its a VERY active game). My friends had bought the game a year ago & never play it, so I borrowed the game and the dance pad from them. Well, the pad was broken, so I sucked it up and bought a new pad online for $13.00. I'm taking the money out of my 'Entertainment' budget. As soon as it arrives, I'm going to use it as an alternative to walking! I'm very excited because the game is fun

I've taken a break on the overtime this week (just to give myself some 'time off'). I'm started back today and will get in enough next week to make up for the time off this week. I still have that goal of an average of 10 hours of overtime per month.

Oh, and one last thing! While yesterday was a no spend day, today was not. I ordered that dance pad and I had lunch out. All within my budget. My mini goal is to have no spend days all next week!

I spent all day yesterday enjoying 70 degree weather. I had all the windows open, a nice warm breeze flowing through the house. But when I got up this morning, it was about 60 degrees! I am SO glad I was off yesterday to enjoy the weather.

I got some cleaning done, took care of all my laundry, and watched back episodes of Lost. Now I"m all caught up. And I feel all happy and organized

Today, I packed my lunch, so its a no spend day for me!

After 5 straight no spend days, I spent..

$0.55 on a soft pretzel
$7.80 on a book of stamps
$0.95 on a library fine

I picked up Stephen King's Lisey's Story from the library. I've heard good things about it!

I've had FIVE, yes, FIVE no spend days in a row. Tomorrow may or may not be my 6th. It depends on whether or not I stop at the grocery store on the way home from work. I probably won't, but we'll see

No spending today, packed all my food. I'm sticking to my meal plan for the week... Yay!

I"m waiting for my electric bill to come, I should see it in the next week or so. I'm curious to see what the programmible thermostat has done to my usage. Now, the thermostat wasn't installed until the 2nd week of the cycle, but I'm hoping for a good difference anyway. I'll let you all know as soon as I do!

Well, I was going to go in for overtime today, but I just really needed the day to relax. I worked 17.5 hours of OT last week and even with skipping today, I can probably work about 10 this week. I did pretty much nothing all day and it was great!

Yesterday I did some deep cleaning in the kitchen & living room I did all my laundry over the weekend. And while I had a few things to do, non were pressing. So I vegged all day. Even got an afternoon nap in

Obviously, since I stayed in all day, it was a no spender And I've already premade my food for tomorrow. So tomorrow should be a no spender as well.

I deposited more money into my savings after I was paid on the 15th, so because I like to see the big numbers--- I totaled the amount I've added to savings this year.

January $300.97
February $1345.43
March (so far) $1014.00

I had a no spend day today. Packed all my food. And even got to leave work early today due to hailing ice! Woohoo!

Had no spend days yesterday & today. Packed my lunch both days and I'm sticking to my Weight Watchers plan. It makes it easier to stay with the WW when I'm paying for the online priviledges. I feel that I have to follow the plan and lose weight to get my money's worth.

I worked 7 hours of overtime yesterday and a 1/2 hour today. I would have done more this morning, but I wasn't feeling too good, so I slept in a bit instead.

On Saturday, my nephew spent the night & he woke up sick with a fever on Sunday. He's doing better now, but I hope I"m not getting what he had. I'm taking a LOT of vitamin C.

Sunday, we went to IKEA. I spent more than the limit that I had set for myself. UGH. But I got some fun stuff. And I paid cash, no credit. I got a duvet cover set, which definately was a want, not a need. I got a clock for the bathroom. A few small things for the kitchen (like a fun looking spoon rest).

The only other big purchase is a lamp for my nightstand. I have no overhead light in my bedroom and I do have a big lamp on the other side of my room, but I really wanted a bigger lamp for my nightstand.

The one really fun thing I got 2 Dracaena Bamboos, which I put in a rectangular vase with decorative rocks. I tend to kill plants, but apparently this stuff is foolproof. We'll be testing that theory here at my house The plant is also called Lucky Bamboo.

I got a $5.00 coupon towards lunch at my work cafe. I used it for lunch, but really wanted a cafine soda, so I spent .80 cents today because my lunch plus 20 oz soda came to $5.80. It came out of my spending cash, so no worries.

I'm heading to IKEA on sunday with some friends. Mostly to do some wishing. I'm looking for a small clock for my upstairs bathroom. Just to be able to keep an eye on the time while I'm getting ready for work. Also, I'm looking for some small organizational things and I'd like to get some ideas for stuff for the house too.

I'm going with my spendy friends, so I'm setting a dollar amount limit $40.00 and if I really want something more expensive, I'll take down the tag info & hold off. That way there will be no impulse buying. I can go back on my own later if I decide to get it. The IKEA is about 40 minutes away, which helps on the impulse buying too.