The Latest
10 Oct
David had his second Humira injection Thursday. It did not go well. Let’s just say we were both upset and yelling, and I’m extremely glad we only have to do this twice a month.
David is not feeling any benefits from the Humira, yet. I’m still praying he feels better by Thanksgiving. Can you believe Thanksgiving is only six weeks away?
We’re experiencing dramatic changes in the barometric pressure this week in Dallas. This is very hard on David. He has had a second acupuncture treatment, although it did not provide nearly the same amount of relief as the first treatment. However, David went to the gym and swam laps right before the acupuncture, so perhaps that has something to do with it.
The house is fairly dirty, and I don’t even care. I’m just cleaning when I can, without feeling pressured by a “For Sale” sign in our yard.
We still haven’t decided what we’re going to do with the house. We could try to stay in the two story, we could lease it or we could try to sell it again after the holidays.
My life has been a bit hectic lately. Our schedule is very full. We are trying to cut back and allow ourselves plenty of time to rest and relax, but it’s so hard. Especially when we have to say no to things like spending time with family and friends. We’re not really good at saying no.
Today, Saturday, we’re watching movies in our pjs. And creating a budget. Our finances seem to become more and more complicated with every doctor we see. One thing I’m finding very annoying with budgeting software is that the software doesn’t recognize the difference between a transaction at the Kroger pharmacy and the Kroger gas pump, therefore it looks like we’re spending 40% of our money on groceries.
What’s your best money saving or budgeting tip?
I use Cha-Ching on the mac. I input everything manually & then reconcile it online. It helps me to not forget things that don’t show up immediately, especially things like tithe checks.
The reason I mention it is b/c you can “tag” transaction with keywords. So if you type in “gas” in the search bar, it will limit to only those tagged as gas & so on.
Lambs.
I use yodlee (moneycenter). You can log in all your banking, credit card, and investments in and it keeps them up to date for you. It does a really good job of labeling your transactions appropriately, plus you can set up custom rules so things that you use repeatedly like kroger gas will always come up in the gas category.
Just remember the little saying “Our house is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy” or “Come in, sit down, converse. Our house doesn’t always look like this, sometimes it’s worse!”
Hope this brings you a smile.
I don’t use software. I have two spreadsheets. One for cash we take out and put in envelopes, and one for the bills we have to pay. Doug gets paid every two weeks, and I get disability once a month, so I take our monthly income, and then start subtracting.
Our cash envelopes have title like “WalMart, Meijer, Costco, Perrigo (bargain drug store), dogs, going out (datenight once a month if we’re lucky) gas,” and a few other expenses that come up once a year, like dues and taxes on land we own in Missouri, campground dues, etc.
It took time to write out everything we normally get, where we get it from, and then we were able to figure out how much money we needed to get these items at a particular store. We tried to think of everything we could. We do NOT have envelopes (which we should) for clothing or medical. We DO have one for Christmas and birthday this year, so we simply will not spend what we don’t have.
Then the bills one, starts with church and charity, electric bill, our credit cards and al other monthly expenses, including what we put in a separate savings account for house insurance and property taxes that we pay once a year. On the spreadsheet is the name of what’s being paid, the due date, the amount due, the amount I paid, the pay period it’s coming out of, and then the check number. GREAT for tax records too.
Oh, and Doug and I each get an allowance (not much!) per month that we can spend on whatever we want.
Sounds complicated, but once you get it set up it’s easy-breezy!
Kerri