Just a not-so-quick update

I worked 8 hours of overtime today. The unlimited overtime ends on June 1st. After that, OT will only be available on Mondays for June & likely ending altogether for July.

Halfway through the day today, I called my mom and asked if my family wanted to come over to have some food for the holiday. So my mom supplied baked beans and hotdogs & buns. And I made pasta salad, baked fries, hamburgers and all the fixings. It was completely last minute, but very yummy.

I’ve been stalling on handling my bee problem at the back of the house. But they’re wood boring bees and I’m actually seeing sawdust on my deck from where they’ve dug on the side of the house. It’ll be pricey to get the guys out here, but I guess it’s necessary.

I called around & got several quotes, they all quoted a service of roughly $300-350.00. This includes 2 visits because the bees may come back. Even the guy that came highly recommended to me (the one that did my termite inspection) said $325.00. They are on the roof as well as under the eave, so I can't do this by myself.

I turned on the a/c for the first time yesterday, due to the humidity. However, the a/c sounds like its struggling to work and I went into the basement to check it out and found a big puddle on the floor and it looks like one of the pipes is freezing. So I’m going to make a call tomorrow. I’m ‘comfortable’ right now (my ceiling fans are helping), so I’m going to go into work at 8am for some overtime & I'll call and schedule the appointment for sometime between Wednesday and Friday. I'm hoping this will be an easy fix, but I'll have to wait and see. This problem trumps the bee guy, so I’m going to wait on that for another week or two.

My sister & dad kept playing with my fan in my living room. And they did something to the remote, so I can’t get the fan to respond to the remote anymore, although the light still does. I don’t have any instruction manuals since the fans came with the house, but it’s a Hunter fan, so I’m going to call their customer service tomorrow & see if they can help me. I REALLY hope so!

On Sunday, I signed up for paper delivery (I got caught at a weak moment at the grocery store). So I am going to call and cancel tomorrow.

I also need to call the trash service & let them know I’m going to be putting that broken tv out for pickup. I don’t want donate it, since it’s completely unusable. When I put it out for trash, I’m going to put a note on the tv, so nobody thinks it’s a great find & takes it home.

My electric bill came over the weekend; it was pretty low since I had no heat or air on for the whole month, just the fans when needed. My water bill also arrived. It was higher than I would have liked. It’s on my to-do list to replace the tank parts on both my toilets, since one leaks sometimes and one runs unnecessarily. I’m going to use the $100.00 gift card to Lowes to help with this one.

I’m also going to use the gift card to get a curtain rod, since I 'found' these nice white curtains with flowers embroidered on them from Pottery Barn that I bought in college. I’m going to put the curtains up in my bedroom.

I also need to get something to treat my lawn, which has been neglected. There are a lot of weeds and a large section is pretty brown. So I’m going to buy some lawn stuff to help kill the weeds and grow the grass.


So my game plan for the week is to not spend any unnecessary money. So I’m packing food for tomorrow. I’ll make those necessary calls from work. I do have a few dollars cash, which I'm going to use to get a few more veggies from the store.

I get paid on Thursday & I already planned to send $400.00 to my student loan principle. But depending on the charge for the a/c, I might not send it. It's wait and see for that one. I'd prefer not to dip into my emergency fund right now.

Here’s some random updates:

-I worked 4 hours of OT instead of 5 because our systems went down and I left early
-I mowed the lawn, but I only had one row left when the mower ran out of gas. So instead of having a no spend day, I spent 20 on gas, to fill up my container that I use for the mower & to put some gas in my car. I didn’t fill all the way because the prices were high for the weekend & I know the prices will go down later in the week. Other than the gas, this was a no spend day.
-I looked up the value of my car on Kelly Blue Book: The Trade in value is $4,775 and the Private Sale Value is $6295 … for a 2001 Hyundai Sonata with 63,959 miles on it
-My car insurance renewal is coming up in June. They were nice enough to send me the new contract along with a letter stating: “Due to increased costs, blah, blah, blah, we are increasing our rates 10%”. They did the same last year & the previous year. Most people I know are saying their rates are DROPPING. So my priority this week is to stop around for car insurance.
-My mom visited some garage sales yesterday & hooked me up with a few books & dvds… Thank Mom!
-I spent no money eating out today… my goal is to do that the rest of the month
-I’m heading to Bed, Bath & Beyond tomorrow armed with a 20% off coupon & $20.00 in gift cards.
-Tomorrow, I’m heading to the bank. I share a safety deposit box with my parents & I’m getting out all my savings bonds. Time to add them up and cash them out. I was just waiting for them to come due

In the last week and a half, I've been VERY lax in my spending. I've been eating out a lot & its cost me... A LOT. I'm not going to make excuses (of which there are plenty), so I'm just going to suck it up and move on.

I am going to get in a much OT as possible by the end of the month. I've had some changes at work, which make the overtime not so beneficial, plus much more stressful.

So I'm going to do what I can with the OT. In the meantime, I am challenging myself to not eat out at all from today to the end of the month.

I went grocery shopping today and I'm going to pack breakfast & lunch for work tomorrow. In fact, I'm going to leave my cash and credit cards at home. I'll bring my debit card (and leave it in the car while at work), because I need to get gas tomorrow. But thats it. I swear.

I haven't been very good at following through lately, so I'm working on it. I will be spending my lunch hour at the library, which should help. I have a few books to pick up AND I requested The Game (that Michael Douglas movie). It was on tv a week or two ago and I didn't get to watch it, so I requested it from the library instead.

I also have Pan's Labyrinth from Netflix (which I am cancelling at the end of the month).

I packed dinner for work today and they provided free pizza for lunch. I gave .20 to a coworker for a soda and I spent $1.00 for a library fine.

I was tempted to buy dinner becuase what I packed didn't sound that good, but I just sucked it up and ate what I brought.

I did 2 hours of OT today, I'm working on Sunday for 5 hours. My goal next week is to do 14 hours.

Tonight I'm making a mealplan for next week & I'll be heading to the grocery store on Sunday.

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!

Ugh, after a real weekend off (first in quite a while), I went back to work today for some overtime. I'm working 8am to 2pm, then I'll run a few errands. I have a 3:15 doctors appointment & my family is taking me out to dinner tonight for my birthday.

I plan on being home by 8-ish. So I can premake food for tomorrow and then sit down to watch the new episode of Heros. I am SO addicted. By the way, any Veronica Mars fans out there-- the new season starts Tuesday! I love my shows

I packed my food for work today, but I will be shelling out for the office visit & medicine. Oh well, I have the money for it. I'll use the 25.00 credit I have on my chase amazon credit card, and I have some money sitting in my medical fund.

I have a whole to do list for this week, entailing cleaning & organizing around the house. I also want to gather some video games and some dvds to sell in the resale shop. Due to my planned and unplanned spending for this month, I didn't put ANY of my overtime money towards savings out of my paycheck today. So I am looking at other ways to do that. Every little bit counts.

I am happy to note that I have not turned on the heat. I am using the fans some, but not a lot. My electric/gas bill went down consideribly and should be even lower for May.

I also put an ad up on Craigslist to rent my room out. I had a couple of interested parties. I'm still not 100% committed to renting the room out to somebody that I don't know, so I figure I'm going to go really slow about this

Well, I was sick for about a week and a half. Lots of time off work (all paid), but no overtime. This week, I'm still recovering, so I've decided to do no OT this week either. Plus, I've already scheduled off for Friday & Saturday for my birthday.

On the spending front, I've been very very bad. Being so sick, I haven't been feeling like cooking, so I had some food delivered & my mom dropped some stuff off for me (which I reimbursed her for).

Plus I ended up in the doctors office twice, once on the weekend. Since my primary doctor doesn't work weekends, I ended up in the local medical center (not hospital). I had to pay a $30.00 specialist copay instead of my normal $20.00 copay, plus all the meds, but it was necessary & I'm FINALLY feeling better.

On the planned spending side-- I bought a push lawn mower. $134.99 from Sears (with my parents retiree discount). Then I bought a bike chain & tarp to cover it since the townhouse doesn't have storage for the mower.

Although I spent most of my time last week sleeping, I did get the energy to go buy handles and pulls for the vanities on both bathrooms. They were gold, but all the fixtures on the bathrooms are silver, so I switched them over.

Then I bought some Allen wrenches ($17.99) in an effort to fix the existing towel bar that keeps falling. It didn't work, so now I have to buy a towl rack. I'm getting sick of hanging the towels on the door & over the shower curtain pole. I'm keeping the Allen wrenches though, because they'll come in handy for later projects.

And while I was sitting on the couch all week recovering, I found out that I have bees. Big ones with a nest that's in my gutter. Lucky me... why, oh why couldn't one of my neighbors get it?? There's no way I'm going to be able to get up there to spray the nest, and no spray will reach it since its on the roof, so I"m going to have to hire somebody.

AND the worst part about being sick was that my bedroom tv broke, so I couldn't lie comfortably in my bed, I had to veg on the couch for the time that I was awake.

When I first started having problems with the tv, I actually took it apart, fiddled around with some wires and it worked fine again. Then it completely blew up the other day. Definately not fixable.

So I'm in search of a new tv. I know its a bad habit, but I fall asleep to the tv and I'm having a hard time without the white noise. I think I've found a good price on one, I've been doing a lot of research. So I'm going to pick one up tonight after work.

On the upside, I haven't used my heat in about 2 weeks. All the windows are open & in the last 2 days, I started using ceiling fans. Only in the room that I am currently in. I can't wait to see my electric/gas bill this month

And here's a cute story about my 6 year old nephew! Last weekend he went to TWO birthday sleepovers for friends. On Monday, my mom was telling him that it's Aunt H's birthday this week and she asked him what do you think we should do for it. He says to her "Oh, maybe she'll have a sleepover!" And I know in his head, he was picturing my parents, him, my sister & some of my friends all having a sleepover It was very cute.

So I decided to have him over for a sleepover on Friday, then on Saturday I'm going out with my best friends, Sunday will be family stuff.

I'm hoping to be on track with spending. I need to hit the grocery store & organize some stuff around the house.. its gotten a bit messy due to being sick.

I feel happy that, although its been pouring non-stop since yesterday & the wind is really howling, I haven't needed to turn on the heat in a couple of days. Its a litle chilly, but I just put on my slippers & the cozy robe that I bought on sale recently. I can't wait til it turns warm & I can keep the windows open.

I've been working hard at overtime, working nearly 7 days a week. Its something Big that I've been doing to meet my savings goals, but it has been taking its toll on my health. So I'm going to slow it down some & if I don't meet my goals by the time the overtime stops in May, then so be it. I'll find other ways to do it.

I worked 6 hours of OT today & originally I was going to work 7 or 8 hours tomorrow. But since my stomach problems have been acting up, I'm going to see how I feel when I get up, but if I do go in, I'm only going to work 4 or 5 hours. Then I'll doze away the afternoon on the couch

I premade food for tomorrow, so if I do go in, I have food to take & lunch to come home to Dinner will be a veggie burger & baked fries, both of which are in my freezer.

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 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!

Today is a no spend day! And I'm working 6 hours of OT. When I get home tonight, I'm going to be premaking food for the week and cleaning. I feel better when I'm organized, so I've been working hard at keeping my house clean & planning my food.

I've made a meal plan for the week. Since I'm pretty much working 7 days a week, I'm planning a lunch out each week. Just to give myself a break from working 10 hour days then coming home to cook. Its all within my budget, and my diet. As long as I plan ahead

I'm going to get my March totals together. I've been keeping up my goal of tracking ALL spending for the year. 3 months down, 9 to go!

They served pizza at work today & tomorrow they're buying subs us. VERY nice! Just a way to try to gain more interest in overtime, but hey, it works for me!

As for the overtime update: I worked 17.5 hours last week & I'll be doing about 10 this week. I have a few appointments, so I can't come in early 3 of the days I normally do. Still doing well though

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've been working a lot lately, so I've been eating breakfast, lunch AND dinner there. Plus I'm doing the Weight Watchers, so I'm really trying to follow the plan. So, tonight I'm working on a mealplan tonight to make prep each day as minimal as possible. So here's a tentative plan:

Breakfasts will mainly be fruits and cheerios or oatmeal

Lunches will be: Big salads, tuna sandwiches, peanut butter on crackers

Dinners: Mon: Wheat pasta w/ sauce and salad
Tues: Shake n Bake chicken, baked potato
Wed: Chicken taco salad (w/ Tostitos baked scoops)
Thurs: pasta salad, with MorningStar Chick'n strips
Friday: Sloppy joe and baked fries.

Most of the dinners will be made tomorrow. I'll make bigger batches & freeze the extras. I can premake 2 days of salads at a time, then switch lunch the next 2 days to tuna sandwiches (1/2 can each day), then have peanut butter and crackers & do a salad again for Friday.

I've premeasured snacks-- honey nut cheerios, baked cheetos, ect to grab n go. I'm just trying to make this as easy as possible for myself.

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

Packed my lunch again today. Well, since I worked 9am to 8p, it was really breakfast, lunch AND dinner. I'm working hard to keep eating right and eating frugally.

Funny story from work... I was talking to one of my coworkers about the fact that my remote hasn't been working properly with my tv in my bedroom. Its hit or miss if it'll work and its definatley not the batteries. So he said to me "well, I guess its time for a new tv". I started laughing and I said "Actually, its time for a new remote!" And I bought one for $7.99 on my lunch break. Tv's working good as new

I think its funny that his first thought was to replace the tv altogether. That would have been a VERY last resort for me.

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.

$7.75 for lunch out with coworker. (packed my lunch every other day this week). Tonight my nephew is coming to spend the night. We'll be playing games and watching a movie. Fun for a 6 year old

Tomorrow is the IKEA trip. I'm doing a little research online to see what I might want.

Today was a no spend, no soda day. I packed my lunch today. Apple, Banana, baked cheetos, salad, tuna sandwich & baked fries. Yummy. I also got a free soft pretzel for meeting a goal at work! Free is good!

NO spending today. I packed my food for work. Yesterday I worked a 1/2 day of overtime, then ran some errands. I spent the rest of the day organizing. I finally finished organizing & cleaning my basement. Then I organized all my financial papers. Things are a lot easier to find now

I"m going to officially join weight watchers online tonight. I made the decision yesterday, but I'm going to join tonight. Then I'm going to preplan my food for the week & premake some of the food tonight. I was going to do premake more food yesterday, but I got distracted by the paperwork.

I packed food for work today. 4 hours of overtime from 9am to 1pm. Then I'm off to get cat food & litter. I also want to stop at the dollar store for sandwich bags.

I've decided to rejoin Weight Watchers online. I've been doing it on my own, but I've been struggling. I think having the support is what really helps me to stay focused. Kind of like the support here

When I get home, I'll be making some sloppy joe to freeze. I'm also going to make some chicken to take for lunch tomorrow & premake salad & other food for later this week.

Yesterday was a no spend day. Today I packed all my food for work, but I am stopping at the grocery store on the way home. Just a quick stop, will do the bigger shopping once I have a meal plan in place for the week.

I'm working 11am to 3 pm tomorrow, so I'll pack a sandwich for lunch. I may go to the matinee movies tomorrow, which I'll pay for out of my enterainment budget. If not, maybe I'll get to the movies next weekend.

My mini-goals for this week are to pack my lunch/dinner & snacks every day this week and to work a minimum of 10 hours of overtime. (My workweek runs Monday through Sunday)

I worked 40 hours of overtime in February and I"m going to beat that figure for March.

Yesterday I packed my food for work. I'm working so much overtime, I'm taking both my lunch AND dinner at work. I didn't spend a dime on food at work. However, I did stop at the grocery store for some salad stuff. Spent $12.01.

Today I packed again & I'm heading straight home after work, so today will be a no spend day.

I've been doing ridiculous amounts of overtime. Its getting to the point where people are teasing me for working so much. I'm averaging about 10 hours a week. I've already met my 10 hours for this week, but I"m thinking about coming in Sunday for a few extra hours. Probably 11-3.

I increased my 401k witholding, while I have the OT & I'm looking to keep it there even when the OT runs out.

I've been throwing all my extra income straight into savings, but I think I'm going to put some of it to paying down my student loan. I really want to get that one down since my parents cosigned for it. They don't mind it, but it bothers me that they're associated with that debt. I have always been aggressive with the payments, but less so since I bought the house. Its time to step up on those payments!

Just a quick update on my February #s. I'm still totalling the spending, but I've already calculated the amount I've transferred into savings: $1,344.61!

Some of this was my state tax refund (122.00) & an inherited insurance dispersement ($470.00). The rest is all from my overtime and any misc. savings. This is a great number!

I know I way overspent on eating out this month. So my goal for March is to make up for it.

I'm continuting with my overtime, I did 21 hours in January & 40 hours in February. I'm trying to do about 10 hours a week through the end of March. Every little bit helps!

Well today was a spender, but not too bad.
I packed my lunch, but part of it kinda got ruined (long story), so I ordered a salad with some people from work. $7.00, but I ate 1/2 today & I'll have the other 1/2 tomorrow. AND I'll pack the rest of my food too.

On my lunch break, I went to Boscov's. I've been wanting a big fluffy robe, but have been putting it off. I figured now was the time to check out the sales. I found one just like I wanted at 75% off. I ended up paying 13.50 for a $54.00 robe! NICE. And I paid cash from my clothing budget.

One of my coworkers lives in my neighborhood & she waved me down on the way to work today. She had shut her front door with her house & car keys inside & therefore couldn't drive to work. So I brought her and she presented me with at $5.00 lunch voucher for our work cafeteria. So I'm going to hold onto it. I'm planning on packing my lunch for 3 weeks starting tomorrow. When I make it through the 3 weeks, I"m going to treat myself to a free lunch!

Overtime is still available at my work thorugh the 28th. I never made it in on Monday due to a fall on ice. I was really sore, so I stayed home and had a no spend day. Since then, I worked 2 hours OT yesterday, I did 1 today & I'll do another 2 hours tomorrow.

Then next week, I"m going to do 8 hours Monday, 2 hours Tuesday & Wednesday, getting in as much as possible before it ends. All that money is going directly into savings.

I"m having my family over for dinner Monday night and I've asked my dad to help me fix my ice maker & help me install my programmible thermostat. I'm afraid to do it totally by myself.

Today was a no spend day. I had a goal of packing my lunch for 3 weeks straight, but I'm going to break it tommorrow (not even a full week in). Our work team is haveing a little lunch out. At one of my favoritre restaurants. So I'm going to get a fried chicken salad (which is HUGE) & have 1/2 for lunch & the other 1/2 for my dinner tomorrow. I'll bring breakfast & snacks to work & I"m planning on having water at the restaurant.

Then I'll be sticking to my packing lunch resolve for the rest of the 3 weeks, adding 1 day on at the end.

I worked 12-5 yesterday & am working 5 hours today. So I made my 10 hour overtime goal for this week after all. I am working 8-5 tomorrow & I'll put in another 2-4 hours of ot later this week. I packed my food again yesterday & today.

I'm preplanning my meals for the week & after I get home tonight, I'm going to make some spagehetti sauce for dinner & to freeze. I'm also going to make some blueberry muffins to freeze as well. I'm going to premake tuna for sandwiches, and salads for the week. The easier things are to grab and go, the better.

I FINALLY have all my tax info together. One of my w-2s never 'arrived' so I had to wait & request a copy. Normally I break pretty much even on my taxes, but due to the job change, house purchase & tuition expenses, I'll be getting a little over 900.00 back. ALL of which is going to my savings goals.

I had bought a programable thermostat, which I am going to attempt to install tonight. The directions make it look pretty simple, but who knows!

I didn't find a cabinet knob that I liked with the wood on the cabinets, so I'm going to hold off. I want to pick a paint color before I make a final decision anyway, so I'm going to walk through Lowes later this week to get some ideas.

I haven't had a no spend day in a while, and the only reason that I didn't yesterday was because I stopped by Happy Harry's with my mom and while I was waiting for her to make her purchases, I found some panty hose on clearance for 19 cents each. They only had 2 pairs in my size, but I got them both. GREAT deal! Worth breaking the no spend day for.

I've got a couple of movies from my Netflix Trial, so I'll be having a movie fest tonight while I'm doing all my cooking--I have an old movie I"ve been wanting to see, plus GridIron Gang, and the Illusionist.

I went to the new lowes by my work today. I wanted to check out any grand opening sales/presidents day sales. I picked out a couple of different knobs for the kitchen cabinets. I figured I'd check them out in the kitchen, pick the one I like return the others and then get enough for all my cabinets. Little details to spruce up the kitchen

I also bought a programmible thermostat because I can't even begin to tell the temperature on the really OLD one that the house came with. I think I'm keeping the heat low, but I can't really tell if its at 60 or 70 right now. Really. Its THAT bad.

I also bought some windshield wiper fluid, which I desperately needed given all the salt on the roads right now.

I leave work at 8 tonight & I'm heading about 15 minutes out of my way to the Walmart. I'm picking up most of the groceries. I want to do some stocking up, so I'm using some of my spending money on top of my grocery money. I'll make up the spending money by packing my lunch instead of buying.

I also have been offered more overtime, including Sunday hours. So I work my normal hours tomorrow & I"m contemplating going in from 12-5 on Sunday & 8-5 on Monday (my days off). The sunday hours would offset my cabinet knobs, the thermostat & I could still reward myself with the Harry Potter preorder. We'll see how I feel

I'm only going to make 5 hours of overtime this week. Mainly due to snow issues. So I will not be getting to preorder Harry Potter 7. I'm going to hold off on that mini reward for next week. There is overtime available again next week. So if I do 10 or more hours of overtime next week, I will let myself preorder. I like these mini-rewards. This system seems to work for me

On the other side of things, I couldn't bring myself to pack today. I haven't been to the grocery store in a while. So I bought food, but I'm DEFINTATELY going to pack tomorrow & I'm going to hit the grocery store on Saturday. I'm hitting Walmart to stock up on my snacks & veggies. The Walmart has the best veggie prices in the winter & always has the best prices on muffin mixes, microwave popcorn, generic Dr Pepper (2 liters for 49 cents), and other goodies. I also need ketchup, worstershire sauce, some salad dressing, and wheat pasta. I'm trying to make a list & STICK TO IT. I tend to go overboard at Walmart. But at the same time, its a little out of the way, so when I go, I really want to stock up on the cupboard stuff.

I went to the dollar store today, I was looking for a toilet bowl brush, which they were out of. But I found really cute socks & snack cakes and some bath stuff! I came very close to buying all of them... but then I put the basket down & walked away. I didn't NEED any of it. Except maybe the socks...but I'm sure I can find a better deal. Just because they were in pretty colors, doesn't justify buying them at $1.00 each pair.

I'm really going to buckle down with the eating out. I have been doing really badly this month. I made it 3 weeks in a row with packing my lunch in January, so thats my goal---starting tomorrow, I want to go 3 weeks of packing all food, snacks & drinks. Definately doable!