A Snowball's Chance in...

The bad news:

• Due to certain changes (to pay schedule, benefits alterations, and - mostly - losing a freelance gig), our monthly income has been reduced by $551 per month.
• This change reduces our debt snowball from $718 a month to $167 a month.
• Plus, we've had to stop the snowball repeatedly to cover other expenses. Like $1,300 to fix the van. Like to have a baby (the LAST baby, silly, not a NEW baby - yet, ha). Like to reshingle the house this summer. Like the curtains I bought and haven't hung up. Gah.
• Meanwhile, we've run up against our biggest debt yet, the student loans. They currently have a balance of $15,553. It's like chipping away at a granite wall with a fork. A plastic fork.

The good news:

• Boy am I glad we were snowballing that money in the first place! Imagine if I had to cut $551 out of our actual budget.
• I'm also glad we were snowballing at all, since we're in a much better financial situation than we were two years ago.
• Those expenses? The van, the grumpy baby, the curtains? We've cashflowed them. No new debt, and that's a great thing, yes?

While I'd like to be making more/faster progress on paying off the debt, I think it's time to redefine "success" around here. Sometimes, in some seasons of our lives (and the economy), just keeping our heads above water is a success. Glug glug.

Oops!

The Quaker "Mini Delights" that I've been eating all week, assuming they were GF rice cakes? Yeah, not so much. Sigh. Starting over. Um, after I have a hamburger. ;)

Best Laid Plans

Remember how I posted our menu earlier this week?

Here's what actually happened:

Sunday: Scrambled eggs, blah blah blah
Monday: Spaghetti and garlic toast (E: What IS THIS on my bread? It's GROSS.)
Tuesday: Macaroni and cheese and baked beans
Wednesday: Scalloped potatoes and ham and pineapple
Thursday: French toast and pineapple and grapes
Friday: ??? Can't have nachos because SOMEONE SUPER ate all the tortilla chips and shredded cheddar. Can't have chicken nuggets because SOME LITTLE CHILDREN ate the chips that go on that.

And here's why. We've been overspending. And the overspending has been dipping into our grocery money. And the groceries haven't lasted the week. And so we eat out. And so we dip into next week's grocery money.

ARGH. Does this happen to everyone?

Trying to get back on track...

Falling Off the Frugal Wagon

Okay, and moving on! :)

The end of pregnancy (hey, I thought we were moving on?) is always rough for me. I'm tired. Unmotivated. Uncomfortable. And, oh yeah, I had to put on 4 shirts this morning before I found one that even remotely fit. And that's kind of a stretch - literally.

Frugality takes organziation and committment, neither of which I have right now. So, we've done some decidedly UNfrugal things lately. Like:

• Eat out. A lot. When we eat out with the kids, it mostly involves cheeseburgers, plain, with no buns. And fries. Or we'll go to Taco John's and get them the chicken that comes in the soft tacos, with no shell, covered in cheese. They like that. We've done Qdoba. We let them have hashbrowns for breakfast. As you can tell, we've WAY overdone our food budget.
• Hire a cleaning person! Is there anything more unfrugal than that? Not really. Do I care? Not at all. She's coming in at least once before the baby arrives, maybe twice, and if I can talk SuperDad into it, maybe a couple of times after too.
• Bought a tree. You know, for the baby.
• Signed D up for some classes at the community center. Because E is back in school now, and he misses her. :(
• Not done cloth diapers. According to my very informal survey, gluten in diapers shouldn't be a concern. There are other great reasons to do cloth, and we'll probably go back to it eventually. But not now.

We're dipping into the savings we built up for the baby. And I'm okay with that, because sometimes that's just how it goes.

Our gluten free eating has been anything but blog-worthy lately. Our menu this week:

• Sunday: Scrambled eggs, ham, peanut butter toast, grapes
• Monday: Nachos, corn, beans
• Tuesday: Chicken nuggets
• Wednesday: Spaghetti
• Thursday: French toast
• Friday: Macaroni and cheese and baked beans
• Saturday: Scalloped potatoes and ham

So this blog may not be very inspirational for awhile, but if you stick around long enough, I promise to show you baby pictures! :)

Um...

Hey, I have an idea! How about instead of organizing the toys like I said I would, I just go ahead and lose my ever-loving mind instead? How about that?

How about I buy a king-sized bed???





And of course, we'll need some new sheets to go along with it.

And, hey, while we're at it, let's go ahead and throw in a couch too. Why not?







Well, and since we're at it anyway, let's tear up the back of the backyard, rip up some fence, and pour a new concrete slab on which to park?


Ugh. So. What we have here is a severe case of nesting, I think. Have you ever seen a bird trying to drag a ridiculous piece of sparkly tinsel or whatnot up to her nest and having kind of a hard time with it because it's a little bigger than she can manage, but, you know, her mind's all set on it, so even if it's not going to add much to her home except a little flare, well... Yeah, I think you know what I'm saying.


Sigh. Don't expect good things from this month's debt snowball, y'all.

Now, I don't want to imply that there weren't deals had with this madness.

Bed with mattress and boxspring = $400 on craigslist
Sheets, comforter, and matching wall hangings = $33 Target clearance (Sheets are actually for E's room. She is outgrowing her toddler bed, the baby needs the crib, she's getting our old bed which will also serve as a guest bed on the freak occurrance we'd actually have a guest, and now we have a bed big enough to continue the quiet time bedtime routine with all three children, whew!)
Couch = $300 on craigslist
Backyard project = SuperDad's realm, aka, I'd rather not know, also boring to me, zzzzz

The whole craigslist business provided for some inspiration to me, however. The couple selling (all of) their furniture is moving across the country and bringing only what they can fit into a Corolla. I have a Corolla, and that's radical. Seriously. Plus, they have really nice things, unlike us, whose seventy grajillion children have ruined everything we own. (Let's buy more stuff for them to ruin! Yay!)

Wow, I would so love to purge our "stuff" like that. However, in reality, the actual work of purging is apparently so distasteful to me, I'd rather go out and spend a bunch of money. Woo ha!

Please tell me you've been here too???

Rhubarb: It's Not for Everyone

The rhubarb in our yard was more than ready for harvesting. So I tried out a gluten-free rhubarb cake (as in, I found a rhubarb cake recipe, and substituted GF flour).

At first, the kids thought, "Yum! Cake!"



Then they hit the rhubarb. And they wondered why I'd play such a downright dirty trick on them.



I officially declare this one "not a success." I also officially apologize for my less-than-stellar videography skills.

Crazy

We went a little crazy this week. I don't know what happened, except that (we thought) we were too sick to cook. So we ate out. A whole bunch. To the tune of about $160 over budget. How insane is that???

That's money that should be going into our savings account for the baby. A savings that is supposed to keep us out of the credit card debt that plagued us after the births of the first two kiddos.

On top of that? I can't even say that we ate anything very tasty. We said over and over how it wasn't really worth it to eat out, that it was just as easy and much better tasting to just cook at home.

So why couldn't we make it happen?

Back on track, back on track, back on track!

Sara has an awesome and inspirational post up today on Walk Slowly, Live Wildly. Perhaps I should print that out and hang it on my fridge...

Big Mess Up

E has been acting reacty for a week or so. She's had some skin problems with her hands and face, and we've had the kind of discipline problems that indicate a gluten reaction. We reviewed everything she'd been eating, especially new things, like the dried banana chips we tried this week, and they were clear. I checked out the gum she got from the dentist, fine there. Could it have been something she ate at school? No, since we provided the treats this time. We were baffled.

And then I checked the new shampoo and conditioner. The shampoo is fine, but, oops! Wheat starch and wheat protein in the conditioner.

So, I'm curious: Gluten free people, what shampoo and conditioner do you use???

Not Perfect

SuperDad suggested that I come clean about how very much we failed the budget this pay period. Admit my faults? Ah. Okay. Here it goes.

In addition to the $40 we had from the Great Snowsuit Return of '07, we spent an additional $74.62 that we didn't have, which had to come out of this pay period. Ouch.

Let's see where it went, even though it's extremely painful to do so:

1. Fabric for Halloween costume (which could have waited, but I was excited and the fabric was clearanced and I lost my head) $3.25
2. Frappucino $1.88
3. Chips .33
4. Thai noodles for kiddos .99
5. Gatorade because we were all sick (um, and really we just wanted it) 3.79
6. Diet Mt. Dew (ouch) 3.49
7. Bananas 1.52
8. Pears 1.73
9. Frozen secret after kids are in bed pizza of deliciousness 2.19
10. And another one 2.19
11. Burger King 7.77
12. Fancy coffee 8.03
13. Kuchen that I promised to take to church 8.38
14. Muffins that I craved 3.39
15. Skim milk 1.45
16. Whole milk 1.98
17. Cereal 2.00
18. Kleenex 1.76
19. Toothpaste 2.87
20. Hot dogs .77
21. Toilet paper 5.28
22. Litter 5.36
23. Tax

You can see how very few of these things we actually needed. It was mostly junk and stuff and impulse purchases and I'm disappointed. It's crazy how quickly money can disappear, especially if you're already off track.

But the point is to get right back on track again. And we're trying!

What we're really losing out on, though, is that $75 we could have put toward our debt. And we're not.

How to Blow $32 in 32 Minutes

2 Indian Tacos (yummmm) $14.00
1 Polish sausage, hopefully gluten free, to be shared by two kiddos $6.00
2 pops $3.00
10 carnival tickets $9.00
sipper cup full of tap water $0.00

Thank goodness the county fair is only once a year.

Cheap?

I lived at the city pool when I was a kid. It was Chicko Stix and Orange Crush and a beach towel on a cement slab. I can't exactly remember what it cost to get in, but I know that if I forgot my pass I used quarter(s) to get in.

Our city just replaced the city pool with a "water park." I can't really describe it since I haven't been there yet, but so far I've only heard it described as "awesome" and "amazing."

I've also had several people tell me that they can't believe how cheap it is.

For our family of four to get in the door for one day is $17.50. And then, apparently, we can buy lunch for "under $20."

To me, that's not cheap. $37.50 is groceries. A credit card payment. New swimsuits for the whole family for a day at the beach, thank you very much.

I don't think anyone should have to say to their kids that they can't afford the city pool. I especially don't think I should have to say that. But I do.

Not Helpful

Web sites that I should not visit:
http://www.danskooutlet.com/Default.aspx