Waiting for a slow down...

Awe, the holidays are finally over and school is back in session. There wasn't much of a winter break this year from school as the week and a half I had off I worked everyday, including most weekends. Grand View is done at the end of April so we don't have the month break like most colleges. However, the no homework thing was just getting comfortable when classes started back up last week. The positive for going back to school last week...the Dean's List came out and with a lovely 3.75 GPA for my first semester back I made it!! That never happened in the 4.5 years I was at Central. However, this semester will be the one that tells all. Last semester I was going for a 4.0 and fell a little short, but I am still happy. This semester I am taking on extra classes still working 3 jobs, taking one of my hardest subjects...Math...and I am shooting for a 3.75. Wish me luck with that.

I have been working like crazy as always, Old Navy at least 3 times a week, my dad's 3 afternoons a week and the schools 2 mornings and 3 afternoons a week and if I'm not working at night I usually get some babysitting in. Thank the lord for my iPhone otherwise I wouldn't be able to remember all my schedules. Life is super crazy and Dan and I don't really have a lot of down time in between homework and jobs, but when we do spend time together it's cherished. I think that is something we have started to realize now that we are so busy. It's great practice for when we have kids I think.

With the new year comes a new haircut- or so I decided on Saturday morning when I woke up. I now miss my long hair but it will be all grown back by summer so it will be fine :) Me with about 5 less inches of hair (CraZy!)

I had a gift card so I didn't have to pay for this, so in about three months someone remind me to put a trim in the budget :)

We have followed our budget so well this month and with extra money coming in from babysitting and extra side jobs we are actually going to have almost $1,000 left at the end of the month. We were looking at our bills last night and realized we have so much left over that something had to be off.. but we calculated and calculated and it's right. Between finding my school books for super cheap...those of you reading this that are in school and buying books, http://www.abebooks.com/ I got a brand new math textbook and another one that happen to be rather thick...one for $13 and the other for like $20. It was like $100 savings a piece..you can't beat that. We actually thought it was going to cost about $500 for books considering one of my classes had eight books, however, I found those for about .99 a piece. I paid total for five classes and 12 books $136. You honestly can't beat that! A little piece of advice...search the Internet before buying at the local bookstores! Okay, so you know we saved a ton there. I also have been doing an amazing job (don't mean to brag) budgeting the groceries and making rather tasty meals. My sister got me this great cookbook for budget friendly shoppers, and the meals are delicious and super cheap! Last week I got 8 complete dinners, and 15 days worth of breakfast for $77. We use our leftovers for lunches and more meals depending on how much the meal makes. This weekend I went to the store again we still have meals from last week we haven't made, but I went super cheap for the next meals because well...Dan says we don't have any snacks which is true, but that is because I wanted healthier meals so this week I went his way :0

Day 1- Pizza (4)- ($5)

Day 2- Mexican Lasagna (already have this stuff)

Day 3- 3 cheese Pasta (already have this stuff)

Day 4- Chili Mac (3 boxes of mac&cheese @ .34 a box, and 2 cans of chili at $1.18 a can-this will make two nights in different weeks of dinner and a box of mac. for Dan to make for lunch)

Day 5- Grilled Cheese & Tomato Soup- (pack of cheese $2.22, soup $1.38, bread1.97)

Day 6- Tuna Helper-($1.12)

Day 7- Breakfast Burritos (already had this stuff)

Day 8- Spaghetti (already have this stuff)

Day 9- Pizza (included in price above)

Most of our budgeted money for food went towards snacks but the list above is this coming weeks and probably most of next weeks food. Which gives me a great idea...I will start posting the ingredients an the prices for each item when I buy them to give you all a better idea of how we are working our money for food and post a photo of the final meal. On stuff to make meals for the next week and a half if not two weeks I spent about $30.00 and that includes dinner, lunch, and breakfast. You just can't beat that when you are doing a budget for food. We budget probably around $150 a month for food. I can't stress enough getting off brand food. IT TASTE THE SAME!!! Another thing I do which ladies means probably leaving the significant other at home, I use my calculator and as I pick up things I add it all together so I stay within the budget, I only take the amount of cash I budget with me so once I start adding things up I know where I stand and don't panic at the register. Plus, this helps when shopping at places like Walmart that extra things that aren't on the list don't get picked up.

We found places (BIG places) to save money this month...writing out meals and a grocery list, finding all school books online, and cutting the DirecTV. We haven't really gotten rid of DirecTV yet as they are giving us 3 months free which is a big mistake on their part, because basically they are letting us "try" out the stations we will get after the three months. The stations they took away we typically don't watch besides the 2 or 3 I watched. Other than that it's been super nice not having to pay that bill yet we still watch almost all of our shows on regular stations. Come March it's goodbye DirecTV hello Hulu :)

Another thing we have learned we have to work with--things come up that we want to do. For me I have given up on tanning :( I don't shop like I used to, and never pay full price for ANYTHING when I do shop. We do weekly money for Dan, I don't typically spend much during the week so if something comes up and usually every other month there is something, we just give something else up. For instance, this past week Dan wanted to play in pocker tournament, so he had to give up two weeks of weekly money. He was okay with that, it helps that he has a brother that helps him out as well as winning some money in the poker tournament :)

I can't say how excited, happy, ecstatic I am to know we are making a lot of ground in our debt snowball, there is actually a small light we can now see in the tunnel if you will. Come April we will have three more debts paid off while keeping our emergency fund in place! I will probably ask Dan about going back and taking the course again in the Fall just to keep things rolling, keeping everything fresh in our minds.

2011 is off to a wonderful start- this year has so much to offer :) Hopefully you have all started your year off on the right foot and have some goals written out :)

Love,

Dan, Hollie, Tyson, and Hershie :)