Goals for January

Anything can be accomplished if you take it in small pieces.

My small pieces for January are

• Pay for Spring Semester
• Drink 1 bottle of water every day
• Put the $200 dividend towards the laptop account
• Put the $500 dividend towards the $1,000 savings account
• Wash face every night
• Complete the month caught up on the 365 day bible
• Exercise 3 times a week minimum
• Get my finances organized in quicken.
• Journal at least 2 times a week

I have almost enough in the Missouri Most account to take care of the spring semester so I just need to take a little out of my school savings.  The bottle of water is totally achievable.  I have struggled a lot with what to do with the dividend checks.  For the most part the laptop fund made sense.  I need a good place to get my finances organized and get a lot of my personal stuff off of my work laptop.  I have been reading the finance blogs again and I was inspired when it came to the $1,000 savings.  I need a safety net.  Then I can look at the car.  The bible, journaling and face washing are just self care as is the exercise.  The finances in Quicken is a good first step.  My goal is to figure out where my money went last year so I can better figure out what and where I can save and how much I can afford in a car payment.  Time will tell.

Status how I did in 2008

2008

-Pay off amazon credit account – Success!

-have $1000 in emergency savings account – at one point in time this year I had it.

-Reduce debt by $6,000 – not even close

-Stop paying late fees, overdraft & overlimit (for at least 1 month) – I think I managed it once

I need to figure out my debt number exactly but that isn’t for tonight.  I also need to figure out how I am going to save money….I have some ideas I am pondering.

I did it!!!!!

Recap Yesterday’s Promise:  Promise to self.  Thursday I get out of an all day conference at 3:30….get home about 4.  First thing update the financial planning worksheet, calculate July bills, schedule them and shred what isn’t necessary.

Success!  In fact it went a lot better then I had expected.  I caught up the last 3 months on one account and the last 2 on another.  I went through and made sure all the bills were going to be paid a correct amount, updated the state of the credit, and shredded everything I had in the bin from May and June.  I clarify that because I know that I have a whole pile of receipts in the my purse but as the shredder and I have just about had enough of each other I think it is enough for tonight.

In the beginning of the year I had the thought that I was going to be aggressive on making credit card payments and I was going to have all sorts of things paid off by the end of the year.  That is great except for 3 big things.  I didn’t cut down on my credit card use to basically I spun my wheels for the past 6 months, I didn’t reduce my spending so I caused myself further problems, and I didn’t have much in the way of savings so when bad things happened I wasn’t prepared.  Things like car work so that it can pass inspection to the tune of $700 and the business trip to Orland at a hotel that cost almost $200 a night and I was staying for 5 nights.  Live and learn.

The past two months I have worked hard to reduce spending such that I do not need to pull from my credit union line of credit.  Thus I have over $200 in that.  I know it doesn’t sound like much but I don’t know that I have had that much available since I opened it.  I also only spent 2 times on the credit card.  One time was to purchase my dad’s father’s day gift because I was doing it online and earlier this week to pay $1 for registering at the grocerygame.com.  Hopefully with their coupons I will be able to more then recoup that cost.  I also paid only the minimum balance on the credit cards or maybe a smidgen more.  That said I am looking at what I expect to have at the end of the month in my credit union account that I use to pay bill and I could pay my rent without worry.  I am also getting paid on the first of the month which is also good.  If things continue the way they are and I don’t do something stupid this month I should be able to pay off my amazon card next month.  I do have to figure out what I am going to do about the patio I want to build.

I would like to sit outside more often in my back yard.  I decided last year that I was going to build a brick patio.  I have about a third of it done.  I have calculated (and I do need to review the calculations) that it will cost me $300 in bricks to finish it (including home depot delivery) and then I would need to buy sand.   I have been stuck in this infinite loop in that I would like to finish it and use it before the year is out but that is probably a $400 investment.  I can think of a lot of things that I could do with that money that would probably be better for me.

I think/hope that the good experience I had tonight getting things caught up, the regular discipline of writing on this blog, and the feeling that I have made some progress will help me really truly accomplish the financial goals I have for this year and maybe just maybe some good habits so that I can get out of this hole I am in.  I need to avoid the trap of looking at how long I am currently calculating to pay things off.  Maybe I make the long term goal that I graduate from grad school with no debt.  hmmmm….something to think about.

mental note:  add page of expected expenditures, should/need to spend, want to spend

Head in the sand…..

I am like an ostrich when it comes to finances.  I will go gung ho for a short period of time and then it is time to sit down and crunch numbers.  To sit down and figure out how I have done and what the plans for next month are.  I can’t find a system to stick with mainly because I would rather clean windows (which I hate) then figure out how much money I spent last month, how much is going to bills this month and whether I have a problem.  I guess it is the “whether I have a problem” that catches me off guard.  I would love to get into a situation where all of my variable bills go onto a credit card that earns me rewards (money, airline, points….I don’t care) and then I pay that credit card each month in full.  Everything else just kind of floats along because I have enough to cover my expenses.  That is unfortunately how I ended up in this mess.  I didn’t have enough to cover what I wanted to spend so I went to credit cards which I almost immediately could not pay off.  If I could have paid cash I probably would have and then wouldn’t have had to worry about paying off the credit card.  I don’t have the discipline to pay attention.  I am a planner.  If you ask anyone that loves me they know that I plan things out.  I go on vacation I have figure out where to stay, how to get there, a broad range of things I want to do while there or on the way and have probably even divided up what I do when but yet when it comes to planning where my money goes or what I eat I bulk.  Probably more because I have to then because I want to.  Tonight is a perfect example.  I finished class at about 8pm.  It is now 10pm.  That is 2 hours that I could have done July budget planning.  Did I?  No.  I have checked out ivillage.com/entertainment and am up to date on who got married in 2008, who split, who had a baby and who are the powerful women of tv.  I had a great conversation with a friend of mine on planning a shopping trip, her kids and relationships.  I did a little bit of stuff for work and a little bit of stuff for school and now I have a game to play for about an hour waiting for me to finish this post.  Why do I do this to myself.

 

Promise to self.  Thursday I get out of an all day conference at 3:30….get home about 4.  First thing update the financial planning worksheet, calculate July bills, schedule them and shred what isn’t necessary.  We shall see what happens…..

Beginning anew

In my wanderings on the web I came across http://notesfromthefrugaltrenches.com.  I really liked the way that she had the running tally on the side of where she was on her goals.  I read through her story on how she got where she was.  This all connected into my need to have a place where I am accountable and can think through how I got where I am and how do I get out of it.

I have other blogs but my friends and family know where they are.  I needed a place where I could be honest with where I am without censure.  I am terribly embarrassed that I am in debt to the tune of $36,491.39.  I need to say that number again….$36,491.39.  Wow!  How did this happen?

That is something that I need to think through in the future.  For tonight just gathering all the numbers and setting this up was enough.  $36,491.39 ouch!  If someone comes across this I hope it helps.  If nothing else it hopefully will help me.  $36,491.39….perhaps if I say it enough times it will really really sink in.

For now….good night.