Today I slept in, which I haven't done in quite a while. I had breakfast at home. Yay cheerios and milk. Drove to get gas $50.00 (ugh) and then to a different park than I usually go to.

This one is located on the water about a 10 minute drive from my house. Its in a historic district and has a walkway along the water, going through wetlands. Its really beautiful. I made a 2.75 mile walk in about 49 minutes. I walked slower than usual due to the neat surroundings. After the walk, I sat on a bench by the water and soaked up the sun. It really was VERY relaxing. I don't have pictures of the park, but I did find one online if anyone wanted to take a look.

http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/photos/photo_delaw...

I was ravenous when I got home, so I made pasta salad and homemade buffalo chicken nuggets. I had bought a big bag of frozen grilled chicken strips to put on salads and with pasta. However, they have a weird seasoning and are not very tasty by themselves. So I devised a way to enjoy them anyway. I coat them in buffalo sauce and then with Extra Crispy Shake-n-Bake. Very quick to make and very good!

This afternoon, I'm doing some cleaning and watching some old movies that I got from the library.

My frugal goal for this week is to take breakfast & lunch to work & not buy anything.

Still enjoying the nice weather. Last night, I went to my nephew's teeball game. Brought my own drink & snack and afterwards, just vegged at home.

Today, I visited an old family friend with my dad. She's battling breast cancer in her 80s and its a matter of time. But she's doing very well and is hoping to enjoy one last good summer at her house at the beach. I'm going to try to take a few days this summer and visit.

Before visiting, I stopped & bought a $5.85 quart of ice cream from a local dairy farm. She really has a sweet tooth.

Afterwards, I went to another tee ball game with my sister & mom. I brought my own water, but did buy a $1.00 soft pretzel. I'm vegging at home again because I had planned to go out with friends, but got a nasty headache instead.

Tomorrow, I'm hoping to hit the park for a 3 mile walk and then spend the rest of the day cleaning the house. Those bathrooms need to be done

All in all, a pretty frugal weekend. Next weekend is my birthday, but I think its all going to be low-key, which is fine with me!

Its been a great week weather-wise. Its supposed to hit 80 degrees tomorrow, just in time for a night tee-ball game for my nephew. I've had the heat off all week, except on night when it dropped a bit.

Work has been very busy, but good. This new position (that I've had since November) is awesome. Its very challanging, which I LOVE!

On a health note, I've been working out the last few weeks. Walking, a little jogging and Tae Bo. All great workouts. I've been trying to take advantage of some of the local parks.

Money-wise I did a little clothes shopping last weekend. I cashflowed it all, but that means less to my student loan. It was needed since I'm down another size in clothes. I still need to get some new pants. Mine are pretty much falling right off me (Yay!)

We had some really cold weather, then the last 3 days have been SUPER nice. I've been able to keep the heat off & even open some windows during the day. I'm going to LOVE my electric/gas bill this month. Lets hope this keeps up.

Oops! My 2 year Blogaversary was on the 5th. How time flies. I've been crazy busy at work and at home.

I am still working hard to paydown my student loan, which has a balance of $3,047.79. I'll update my totals later tonight to reflect this.

I've been enjoying some nicer weather and utilizing different parks for walking. I'm thinking next weekend, I'll head to the local state park and buy a yearly pass. For $27.00, I get access to several awesome parks. It'll be worth it, plus its motivation to keep working out.

My goal for this month is to keep my grocery bill on budget. Since working on eating healthier, I seem to go overboard. But I have done well so far. I've been utilzing my local Produce stand for veggies and fruit. Really great prices!

Today, I was able to get the following:

9 medium/large tomatoes
1 large green pepper
1 celery
1 Romaine lettuce
3 cucumbers
1 pint strawberries
1 bag of baby carrots

... all for $9.79. I would have paid at least $16.00 at my local grocery store.

Anyway, I am very happy to say that I've been part of this site for 2 years and I love it! Thanks to everyone here, you've been a great group of friends.

I weighed in again on Monday and lost another 3.6 pounds, for a total of 32 pounds. I've been floundering with tiny losses for the last two months, so this was AWESOME! I attribute the big loss to starting to work out again.

I've been on a walking kick. I've been to that new park where I do the whole 2.6 mile trail, plus go up and down a HUGE mound of dirt turned hill (man-made for sledding, most likely). Some days, I only go a mile or two, some days I do the whole track. Its really hard to gauge how hard I'm working out though.

So, I have been really wanting to track how much the exercise is benefitting me. I've been itching for a Heart Rate Monitor. I even told my mom over the weekend how much I wanted one, but how expensive they were. Then on the Weight Watchers forums, someone mentioned a really good deal on a HRM at Amazon for $53. AND then I got a $25.00 gift certificate to Amazon in the mail from a rewards program I participate in. It was fate. So I splurged and ordered the HRM tonight. I can't wait til it comes!!

I spent 2 hours at work yesterday before leaving sick. I never should have gone in, but I didn't want to leave my coworkers in the lurch. Unfortunately, I was MUCH sicker than I realized. By the time I got home, I has a 102 degree fever. I had no idea.

So anyway, I'm home sick again today, all my plans down the drain and unless I feel 100% better, I'll be missing Easter with my family. Which sucks, but I don't wish this virus on anyone!

As for Easter, we primarily do gifts for the 7 year old Nephew only. I got him an Easter card for 50 cents from the dollar store and I had planned on giving him some cash towards snacks and fun stuff at his baseball games, but I don't have cash on me right now and I am having a family member stop by to pick up my card for him. So I made up 5 little homemade coupons on index cards. One for a sleepover at a later date and 4 for a walk/bike ride around the new park I went to last week. I think he'd really like it.

Well, its about time for a nap. I am SO tired and feeling just plain yucky. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Every once in a while I like to think about the little frugal things that I do. Mostly because I like to challenge myself to come up with more 

So here’s a few ideas of what I’ve been doing this week.

Programmable thermostat:
65 degrees for work nights, 61 during the day and its been warm enough that the heat hasn’t been going on in the day time. As long as I open the blinds/curtains to let the light in.

And the last two days, I’ve had the heat off all together! Yay!

Hand washing most dishes:
I have a single sink, although I wish I had a double one. To reduce water usage, I’ve been hand washing dishes. I use the dishwasher maybe once every week and a half or so., but hand wash the rest of the time. I have been using a large mixing bowl filled with soapy water. Instead of running each dish under running water, I wash it in the bowl. Then rinse off in clean water. Much less water usage!

Line Drying:
Although the original reason was to not shrink my work clothes, I usually line dry all clothes. I use the dryer for only towels & sheets.

Using Daylight:
I have been utilizing the daylight more. I keep the blinds open until it gets dark and keep the lights off.

Minimizing food costs
I’ve been meal planning and eating at home often. This is also healthier 

I get the bulk of my fruits & veggies from the local Produce Stand. Eggs are much cheaper there too!


Lowering Electric usage:
I unplug any unnecessary items. I use my toaster maybe once or twice a week. No sense in keeping it plugged in.

Entertainment:
I have been utilizing the library for books, movies, magazines & cookbooks.

This week I taped (yes, I still have a VCR) a movie that I love. Its called Haunted Honeymoon, starring Gene Wilder & Gilda Radner. It was the last movie she did before becoming ill. I’ve been considering buying it on DVD, but now I don’t have to. It was on cable, for free, so I taped it.

I plan on enjoying the nice weather and going to a local park. Free, fun exercise! (I actually walked 2.3 miles at a new park. Its really nice, I will definitely be going back!)

Taking advantage of work perks:
I have been compiling Weight Watchers recipes. My work lets us print out personal papers, so what I do is print out a few recipes each week. I have an old binder from college that I reused to hold all the recipes.

Treating myself:
I splurge a little here & there so I don’t feel deprived. I buy the good Weight Watchers ice cream cups. I go see movies in the theatre every once in a while (the matinee). I feed my movie addiction by the library & Redbox. I have soda at work, but I don’t buy it there. I go out to dinner with my family at least once every couple of weeks. It’s the little things that make me happy, so its easy to splurge on myself.

First I want to thank Fern for looking out for me on this topic. I decided to reply to her comment in another post because I think this is SUCH an interesting topic!

I must say that I was completely wrong in not giving all the facts surrounding the closure of those cards.

All of the cards that I closed yesterday were all 3 years old or less.
I closed mainly store cards and tranferred the available credit of one of the major credit cards to another card with the same company prior to closing. All of my older cards remain open. I periodically use them for cash & then pay them off so to keep the accounts active.

I should also state that I work in a financial industry and I completely familiar of the workings of FICO and all three of the credit bureau agencies. I definately understand the impact of closing cards on my credit rating.

I still have several major credit cards, all that are much, much older than the cards that I closed. My score 3 years ago (before I got those cards) was extremely high and it didn't change after I got the cards. I feel confident that it won't change much now, just because of closing them.

As for the utilization ratio: this ratio absolutely plays a HUGE part in your credit score. However, having no credit card debt, the utilization rate that I currently have won't change for me.

Basically, it works like this: If I have $0.00 in debt compared to $35,000 in credit lines on my bureau, it gives me a 0% utilitation or 100% available credit. If I have 0.00 in debt compared to $22,000 in credit lines (which is what I have now), its still 0% utilization and 100% available credit.

Banks and all 3 credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) look at things in terms of straight numbers. 0% utilization is still 0% utilization no matter what.

That being said, if I had any credit card debt, any at all, I would not have closed the accounts until it was paid off, because the closures would definately have negatively affected my score. I was absolutely remiss in not stating that before.

So thanks again Fern for pointing that out. You were absolutely right in saying it would be almost a punishment to my score to close those accounts with credit card debt.

And because I think this is a REALLY great topic, I plan on checking up on my credit score at the end of March. That will be over 30 days from the closure, giving the card companies enough time to update with the credit bureas. I'll post at that time with the resultss.

I'm betting there won't be a noticible difference. In August 2006, my score was 785 from Experian(see my Aug 06 post). October 2007 (the last time I checked), my credit score was 780 from TransUnion. I account for the difference as being due to using two different Credit Bureaus. Each has slightly different information, which is not unusual.

I will check back with my March 2008 with my Experian score. We'll see how it goes. And one more thing...other than the card closures, there has been no change to my credit bureau since I bought my house in 2006.

This should be fun... don't forget to check back!

Awhile ago, on a whim, I sent my resume into a local part-time job. That was like a week and a half ago. I just got a call today. I had completely forgotten that I had even applied!

They called my cellphone at work, which was a bit awkward. They gave me some details about the job, asked a few questions. Its thru a staffing agency, which isn't unusual in the field I was looking for.

They have part time hours on the weekends, which means I'd be working 7 days a week, but since last year I was working 6 days until 8pm, working 7:30 to 4 Mon thru Fri & 7 to 5:30 on Sat & Sun, it won't be so bad.

I'll have to do security and background checks, which won't be an issue, and it won't probably start for 3 or 4 weeks. I figure I can handle 3 months of that kind of schedule, after that we'll just have to work something out with my schedule. I also have a boatload of vacation time at my full time job, so I may take some half days here and there to get some rest in.

I figured it out, if I worked both Sat & Sun for 4 months, it would speed up my Student Loan payoff about 3 months early. So as a temporary solution, I think this job would be good.

We'll see how it goes

I bought 3 shirts from Old Navy online recently. I got an email today for a clearance sale. I browed the items and saw one of the shirts was on clearence for $3.99. So, I called and now I'm getting $4.00 back!

I love to use the library for entertainment. In addition to fiction and non-fiction books, I utilize it regularly for dvds. It helps that there is a library 5 minutes from my work and another location is 5 minutes from my house.

At any given time I have a running list of requests for the library. I update the list every week or two, getting on the wait list for newer movies. Then I suppliment my dvd selection with older tv shows.

My county has several locations and they all have inter-library loans. So if my work or home library doesn't have what I want, I can get it from one of the other ones. And I can return books and movies at any of the locations. Our system is really well run.

I am a HUGE movie watcher. I cut out my Netflix membership two months ago and I use the library to fill its void.

Now, not every movie I want to watch is available from the library system. So I keep a list of things that I want to watch, but can't get at the library. When I have some time off from work later in the year, I plan on starting up the Netflix for a month and watching the dvds from the list.

And through the magic of the library, I have discovered many different shows. I have been watching classic movies, 70s tv shows, A&E specials and more.

I also use the library for workout dvds. I've tried pilates, Leslie Sandsone, Tae Bo, Pilates and move. Its been a lot of fun.

I know I'm lucky to have such a great library system, but I encourage everyone to check theirs out. You never know what your library has to offer.

The Wawa, a convenience store, closest to my parents house was found to have a card skimmer on its ATM machines. The ATM is very popular because Wawa doesn't charge any fees for using their ATMs.

I've used that ATM dozens of times. Luckily, I haven't used it recently. But its still scary. The photos in the paper showed almost no visual difference to the ATM with and without the skimmer machine.

So, I will definately be on the watch when I use an ATM. And I advise all of you to do the same.

I heard back from that friend of a friend that looked at my place 2 weeks ago. He's decided to stay where he's at right now. Its a shame, because I think we would have gotten along great.

But because I was really liking that idea of rental income, I put another ad on Craigslist. Hopefully, I won't get a lot of spam.

In the mean time, I am putting out the word out with my friends. Maybe somebody knows somebody.

Vegging on the couch. Hopped up on cold meds. Watching movies from the library and netflix (which I'm cancelling at the end of the month). Snuggling with the cat and mainly being bored. I was feeling a little blue and happened upon this website.

Its funny & cute. The internet speak is a little hard to understand at first, but still SO cute!

http://icanhascheezburger.com

I've been going between being excited about my reunion to not really wanting to go. Part of the problem was not having a date (although I could have taken a guy friend if I'd wanted to) and part was not having anything that I really wanted to wear.

After trying on dozens of dresses, I had settled on wearing a plain black dress that's part of a dress suit I had, but I really wasn't happy with it. Then today, I stopped by Old Navy on the way home from work. I had planned on grabbing some pants that I had wanted for $10.00 and getting out of there, but then I passed the dresses.

I tried this one on and I LOVE it! $29 on sale. And I'll be able to rewear it to a holiday party I have to attend on the 15th! Now I'm more excited about going tonight. It should be fun, its at the local country club. There'll be a buffet and dancing.

This time last year, I made it all the way to after Thanksgiving before turning the heat on. This year, I made it to today.

Last night it was 30 degrees out, but 60 inside. And the cold was giving me a sinus headache. Tonight, I came home to 57 degrees inside. And its actually sleeting outside. So I turned the heater on and I'm going to have to buckle down in other ways.

I set the heat to 63 and I'll turn it down when I leave tomorrow. But not too much, because I was feeling guilty all day at work for leaving my poor kitty without heat

I’m on Day 3 of my 9 day vacation and I can honestly say that I don’t know what to do with all this downtime. I’m used to working 6 day weeks, 10+ hour days and trying to fit a social life in between. I’m not going anywhere for my vacation, just hoping to veg a little, spend some time with my family and get some stuff done around the house.

Sunday, I ran some errands with my mom. Stocked up on groceries and went to Borders.

Yesterday, I hung around the house. I was set to watch a few scary movies, but I just couldn’t seem to sit down. So I did some cooking instead. I baked blueberry muffins, peanut butter cookies and banana bread. I made chicken taco filling, meatloaf muffins and hash brown casserole. All of which will be frozen for future meals and snacks.

Last night, I weighed in a weight watchers last night. I’ve lost a total of 20.8 pounds!!!! I still have a while to go, but man, does it feel good! This is a plan that really works for me.

I also started a migraine last night. So now I’m on meds and trying to relax. I’m finding it very hard to do so. So today, I am really going to try to veg on the couch. I’ll be doing a little cleaning here and there. I feel better when my house is organized.

I’ve set myself a strict budget for the time off. And I’m keeping track of my vacation spending. I want to come in under budget if I can.

So far I’ve spent:
$8.00 on dinner out with friends
$12.58 on 2 books from borders (the library doesn’t have this series)
$17.73 for movie rentals
$15.00 for lunch for Mom & me

Total: $53.31

I current have my homemade Excel Spreadsheets to track my finances. But I’ve been hearing a lot of good things about Yodlee. Anyone have any experience with this? Let me know your opinions. Thanks!

I dropped a CFL bulb this weekend and I remembered someone saying that you needed to open a window before cleaning it up. So I opened the window and googled CFL bulb clean up to find out what I needed to do.

CFL bulbs contain mercury, so the clean up is pretty specific. You want to open an window and keep everyone out of the room for at least 15 minutes while airing it out. Don't touch the bulb directly. Wear rubber gloves. Don't use a broom. Double bag the broken pieces.

For more info check out this link:

http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/promotions/change_light/downloads/Fact_Sheet_Mercury.pdf

I've been eating out a lot lately and packing my food, but still buying some stuff at work. But my goal this week was to refocus and I've been doing well. I packed all my food yesterday. It ended up being a no spend day.

Today will likely be the same I packed my food, staying on my meal plan.

I worked 4.5 hours of OT yesterday and I'll be doing 3.5 hours today. I have to rethink my $1,000.00/mo towards my student loans goal because I completely forgot to calculate a few things into my spending/overtime earning for the end of the year. For example, I forgot that since I have a week off at the end of the month, I won't be earning any overtime that week.

So I'm going to re-evaluate and reset my goal. I'll post more once I've done that.

I tried watching Maxed out yesterday. I lasted 20 minutes before I had to turn it off. I understand that credit card companies are out to make money and that their practices aren't always ethical or in the consumers' best interest. What they were talking about was interesting, but there was a big, glaring gap in the film.... where was personal responsibility? If you can't afford it and you chose to buy it with credit, then you have played a part in the 'evils' of credit cards. It really made me mad and I had to turn it off.

Ok, rant over

Things have been pretty crazy lately. And stressful. Work, family, friends, health all seeming to be stressful lately. So, to cheer myself up, I decided to see how much the balance on my student loan has changed. I know, totally PF nerdy of me, but hey, if it works!

It was hard to keep track of the exact balance since the loan is technically in my parents name & I wasn't able to log in like I am other accounts to get accurate balances. But here's what I have:

December 31, 2005: $15,694.69 balance

February 28, 2006: $15,100.52 balance

January 31, 2007: $12,512.40 balance

April 30, 2007: $12,312.40

And drumroll please..............
Todays Balance: $8813.28 (give or take a few dollars estimated)

Well that makes me happy anyway And on that note... Goodnight to All.

Well, shopping on Thursday went well. I ran all my errands and stayed on budget. Then I went clothes shopping. Let me preface this by saying that in the last 2 years, I've probably spent about maybe $150.00 on clothes, shoes, acessories and coats.

Since I was still gaining weight, I kinda refused to buy new clothes at the larger sizes (which really means that I was still in denial).

With the upcoming winter season, I needed to gear up on some long sleeve tees and some sweaters. The last few 'nicer' shirts that I have have been pretty much ruined by my clumsiness when it comes to eating and drinking. I've been known to ruin a shirt the first day that I've worn it by spilling a soda on it.

So I spent almost $250.00(all paid with cash) and I came home with 3 tank tops (for sleep or summer for $4.00 each), 4 long sleeve shirts, 4 sweaters, and 3 bustier-like tops that I plan on layering up under my button-down work shirts. My office is known to get freezing in the winter and layering is a must.

I'm completely set on pants at home, although I only have 1 pair of wearable jeans. I have some old pairs in the basement that I'll be able to use once I lose about 15 more pounds. I also have a few pairs of khaki's that are waiting too. Here comes the bragging part ---- I've already lost 16 pounds! So I know I'm going to keep losing. And I'll soon have several 'new' pairs of pants

I am set for shoes and coats and sweatshirts. I could use some new socks and underwear, but I'm going to save that til I take a trip to Walmart.

In other news, I've been doing a lot of OT, but slacked this week and took some time off to help my sister care for my nephew while her babysitter (my Mom) was out of town. She took some days off & I did too. I also was able to mail off a $637.00 check to my student loan. Yay!!

I've also slacked on packing all my meals for work. But not too much, I still stayed within my spending budget.

Its finally gotten cool enough that I could turn my air off and throw open the windows. I'm really enjoying this weather!

During my lunch break, I went out to grab a movie from one of the many Redbox Dvd units in my area. There's one in nearly every grocery store. I had a free coupon code - DVDONME, which entitled me to 1 free movie. Today has been a total no spender. I packed food for work, I have a friend coming over tonight. I'm making dinner & have the movie & the friend is providing the wine. Fun!

I've been crazy busy lately, but wanted to stop in for some quick updates.

-I lost 1 pound this week
-I'm adding walking to my routine this week, even though...
-...I'm working 20 hours of overtime this week
-I've been overspending in my groceries catagory, but underspending in eating out
-I'm redoing my budget this weekend, something that I've been putting off for awhile. That should be fun

Hope everyone's doing well! Thanks to everyone who responded to my A/C question!

In the winter, I had the programmable thermostat turn the heat on right before I got up in the morning. I turned it back down while I was at work & turned it up again right before I got home & then back down again when I went to bed.

I've noticed that I follow a different plan altogether with the a/c. I leave the temp up higher while at work all day, set to start cooling a little bit more when I'm about to get home. I stay downstairs most evenings and utilize the ceiling fan, so the air still isnt being used that much.

HOWEVER, when I'm going to bed, I turn the temp down more because I am completely unable to sleep in high temperatures and humidity. Its still not that low a temp (I freeze when I go to my friend's houses. But I'm wondering if it a/c is being wasted because I use it the most at bed time.

What do you guys think? Or how do you do it?

Ever since Janet Evanovich's newest book came out in June, I've been wanting to buy it. But I held back. I put myself in the VERY long waiting list at the library and intending to put the book on my Christmas wish list (I have the whole series in hardback & this is the 13th book).

Well, I received an unexpected gift certificate to Amazon.com and I've been toying with the idea of buying the book with it. Well, due to general laziness & unwillingness to commit to buying anything right now, I've put it off.

Well.... I checked my library account online to see if any of my many requests came in .... and the Janet Evanovich book was there!! So I"m stopping by the library to night to pick it up. And I'm going to save the gift certificate for Christmas gift purchases!

I'm glad that I waited

I'm piggybacking on Ima's post, but I am pretty excited. I've been waiting for this bill, because of it being the first month where I was using the a/c. Mine was $69.54! I am SO happy! I budgeted $120.00 & I'm going to put the extra right towards my student loan! Yay!

I woke up really ill this morning, but I dragged myself into work because we were having a work party and I had made brownies. I lasted most of the day, but ended up leaving 3 hours early. Then I came home & took a 3 hour nap. I'm finally starting to feel better, which is great, because tomorrow I have plans to see Transformers with my friends.

The last few months my work has been saying overtime is going away, but then saying its back on. This month, it looks like they're actually not offering it. Except for 4 hours for tomorrow. But I've decided not to go. One, so I can rest up since I'm still not 100%. And Two, because I have 10am tickets to Transformers.

So other than sleeping and playing around on the internet, I've gotten almost nothing accomplished today. I did have a no spender though, which is great!

I put an ad on Craigslist to rent out my spare room. We'll see how it goes. I'm very worried about renting to a complete stranger. I'd much rather have a friend of a friend. But having the roommate would really help me meet my goals.

Since I have planned spending on going to the movies tomorrow & to see Harry Potter later this month, I've pretty much eaten up my enterainment budget.

So what I'm planning to do is this: Utilize the library for free movies, utilize my home video library to rewatch some of my favorites like Rear Window,The Lord of the Rings trilogies, The Great Escape, and a few classic horror movies.

Reading-wise, I have some books from my mom to read as well as I'm re-reading my Harry Potter books in preperation to the new installment. I am also waiting patiently for my turn at Janet Evanovich's Lean Mean Thirteen from the library.

I also have a group of dvds and video games to take to a resale shop. If I like the place, I'm going to thin out my video collection even more.

I'm really going to put the word out about my spare room. See if anyone at work knows anyone who's looking for a room. I'm also going to ask my sister if she knows anyone. Before I have anyone move into that room, I do have to do a few things:

-Put up hanger rods in both of the closets
-Move my furniture & paperwork out of the spare room
-Fix the downstairs toilet. (I've turned off the water to it because it runs non-stop & is wasting water and I need to fix it anyway)
-Make room in bathroom, hall closet, kitchen & entry closet.
-Replace my wireless router (Its only working 1/2 of time. Its definately the router thats the problem)

So I'm looking at some spending to rent out the room, which I will put off until I know I am really renting the room out.