It's the last day of January and I'm here to check in about my January Goals. January has been a tough month for me. Unfortunately, it's been a series of blarghs and blahs and blechs.

Goal 1
Exercise 500 minutes this month. 500 minutes is better then nothing!

Right this minute I am sitting at 200 minutes of exercise. I am going walking with my friend this afternoon and I expect we will be on the move for about 2 hours today -- so 120 minutes. Still quite short of my goal.

Goal 2
Pay Hydro Bill off completely for this month and previous months.

Negatory on this one. our last bill was for 390 bucks and that is about 1/5th of our monthly income...so it's just not gonna happen. I did pay off the previous months bill completely though--not that that is anything to be proud of. :P

Goal 3
Set Up bill paying system as per Gail's Instructions

This one didn't happen either. In fact I've been doing probably the worst thing possible with the bills--ignoring them.

Goal 4
Eliminate stash by 2 boxes. Crochet stuff!

I have not eliminated 2 boxes. I still have all 4 boxes sitting in the basement and my large bag and my storage unit upstairs full of yarn. The Post Christmas Crochet Blues have really hit me hard this year. I have been plugging at my Round Ripple but progress is slow.

Goal 5
Not make any Crafty purchases.

Hurrah! Success! I have not purchased any thread, cotton, sweaters, buttons, hooks or other miscellaneous craft stuff.

I'm thinking about what I should have for my February Goals.

I'm having a shitty week. Please excuse the lack of posts. I hope to be back to our regularily scheduled programming by next week.

um...oops...I mean Round Ripple Progress. *Tee Hee* Naughty Dinah.

I've been working on the De-stashing Round Ripple for ages now. I'm in no hurry to finish it and right now I don't have any desire to work on anything else (I've got the Post-Christmas-Crochet-Blues). So far it's 26 rows...and each row takes longer and longer to finish. The next color I'm going to introduce is like a dusty rose. i've just got a little of the red, grey, and purple left...After the dusty rose I have a lot of black (but I'm not too sure about the black).

I really like the randomness of how I've been interchanging the colors. I don't want there to be any rhyme or reason to the color scheme.

I cannot wait until we are lounging in our hotel suite, watching cable, taking long HOT showers, relaxing, taking leisurely walks, swimming in the pool, enjoying the small town, reflecting, snuggling, and having the biggest decision be whether we have supper at 5 PM or 6 PM. Two whole days of that (possibly 3)--sans child as well!

Cannot Wait. Bring on the Weekend Getaway!

The Good - I've been on task and keeping up with my work load very well this week. Things are not piling up and less questions are being posed regarding stuff I've worked on.

The Bad - I've not been keeping up with my January 2009 goals at all this month. I think the only one I am really on top of is not purchasing any new crafty stuff. We are not going to have the Hydro bill paid off, I have not exercised 500 minutes, I have not created the bill paying system...however, I still have 11 days to pull everything all together.

The Ugly - The Ugly? Well, the Ugly has been Ugly. & yes, that is Ugly with a Capital U. The Ugly has been realizing how quickly debt has re-accumulated in the past year and realizing how easily I have ignored the state of our finances. I think we are going back to the jars STAT and we need to recommit ourselves to living frugally.

I updated my side bars.

I'm pleased to report that our EF is continuing to grow--albeit slowly. We are at 296.32 or 29% of our initial goal of 1K. The more I hear about job losses and the poor economy the more I am glad that we have this little fund and the more I want to work at growing it.

I'm also excited to report that we are halfway towards our goal for our Mini Holiday Trip!!!!! (okay--not quite halfway--only 49.8% but I'm taking it as halfway!). I looked online at the MyBonds site and they have not logged the deduction from yesterday's pay yet so I haven't included that 15 bucks which would put us at 51.8%. We still have 1 month to save for the trip and while I am not entirely sure we will reach the $740 dollars I am confident that we will be able to work with whatever amount we have saved.

I am seriously contemplating opening a second savings account with PC Financial. It was a wash transferring money into the Credit Union Savings account and I am already finding it difficult trying manage the money that is in the EF.

I am also going to add another side bar. This one represents our LOC. It somehow just keeps growing...and growing...and growing. I might have some cc debt from my VISA and MC to add...I will have to check later...but I am just putting this embarrassing number out there for public humiliation and as motivation to pay it down faster.

I am perplexed though. I know that some advocate for paying down the highest interest debt first-to avoide interest payments-and others advocate for paying down your smallest debt first-for the reward of feeling something is accomplished--but I'm not sure which strategy I should pick. Our car loan does have a higher interest then the LOC... But I do know that I hear Gail's voice in my head saying, "It doesn't matter how you do it--Just do something! Pay Down Debt!"

With that I am just going to do just that...SOMETHING!

PS. I re-read Wednesdays Post and I apologize. My writing was quite sub-standard and repetitive. I am actually contemplating going back and editing it quite a bit...

PPS. I have this BIG idea that I want to Blog about...but I can't seem to find the words. I hope they come soon.

This scarf was my first foray into upcycling. I remember reading about unraveling sweaters on the internet and becoming instantly intrigued. It all seemed so....incredibly earthy. The excitement of transforming an object back to it's original state also seemed incredibly earthy and spiritual.

In some ways unraveling a sweater also seemed sad in a way....especially if it was a handmade sweater. All those many hours creating the object only to have someone else rip it apart? But if you think about it there is also joy in unraveling a sweater. Bringing new life to a forgotten object is always joyful.

I remember purchasing the sweater from value village and being quite excited, yet unsure that it would actually work. I remember painstakingly snipping each individual stitch in each panel. That first sweater took me FOREVER to get into panels. I remember being so proud that I took the panels to my grandmothers to show her. My grandma, mother, and myself ended up unraveling the panels and winding the yarn back up again together.

I remember crocheting the scarf from the upcycled yarn and enjoying the knowledge that doing this had been an act of green and that I was really keeping with the 3 R's (reduce, reuse, and recycle). I was amazed (and addicted!) with the knowledge that I could take an object that had been discarded and was unwanted and turn it into something beautiful and appreciated. I was even more pleased when a co-worker purchased the scarf this past December as I had not found it a home yet.

1. We have Phosphate Free Dish Detergent. I'm not entirely sure why this is good, but I've heard it is. Probably something do with the fact that it just washes away and leaves nothing behind...or something like that.

2. We compost. We started doing this last Spring and it seems to be going well. We had some smell issues briefly...but it seemed to resolve itself quite nicely. We've even continued composting during the winter. I don't know if the quality of our mud is great, but I'm mainly just pleased because we are keeping compostable food out of landfills.

3. We changed all our light bulbs to the Earth Friendly Light Bulbs last year. My husband actually took the initiative on this one. He even changed our outside lights. Contrary to what people are saying they do work outside...they have trudged on through -50!

4. I take used plastic bags and make plarn. I take the plarn and make lovely and strong re-usable bags.

5. We use only re-usable cotton dishcloths or old towels cut up into squares to do our dishes and general cleaning. In fact, I am still have 2 dishcloths that my mother got for me about 5 years ago. They are faded, but wonderful and trusty. They always get the job done.

Because the arrival of our fridge was so delayed Sears has promised to compensate us by refunding the delivery charges! Delivery was 60 bucks and we still owed 50 bucks on the credit card from when we bought the fridge...so if everything works out according to plan then we will actually be 10 bucks ahead!


PS. I have 3 followers now. :) & I've been trying to write about the serious stuff going on in my head but it's just not working....yet. Maybe I'll try tomorrow at work.

Our fridge arrive today! Finally. We bought it Boxing Day and I was beginning to think that it would never arrive. But it's here now. :) I love it!

In a nutshell this has been a very quiet week.

Andrew is feeling better. It's been REALLY cold outside. I keep falling asleep at the same time Andrew does. We've been waiting to hear back. I had a good work week. I feel like I am finally starting to find my little bit of a niche there and I'm finally starting to grasp what I do and how I should be doing it (which is kind of sad because I have been there for one and a half years and due to circumstances mainly outside my control I was never properly trained and mostly ignored by supervisory staff until very recently). But excuses aside, I have decided to take CONTROL of my situation and be pro-active. So far it's working.

Crafty wise I have been working on destashing. I have completed 4 dishcloths with cotton leftover from other projects. I am considering selling 3 of them and the 4th is super crazy and is definitely going to be for me. I will will have to take a picture to show everyone what I mean. I'm continuing on with the Round Ripple. I anxious to see how it will turn out.

We got our Hydro Bill yesterday and let me just right now that my January goal of having the Hydro Bill paid in full is NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. We had carried over $221 from December (mostly because I suck at paying bills on time and partly because of a mis-communication) and yesterday the bill came in for $390 bucks. That five hundred and some odd dollar bill is about 1/4 of our income. I have already paid $100 off of it and my hope is to only carry over $200 into February if everything goes according to plan. I think next year we will sign up to be on the budget. I thought it would be better this way, but it's really not been. I can't handle the fluctuating bills.

When I logged in to Blogger today I saw that I have 2 followers! 2! that's right 2! I'm a little giddy. Thanks Spots and Lana.

I've been thinking of some BIG stuff lately and hope to get my ideas written down and into my blog in the next few days. There might be more lists involved. :P hah.

I hope everyone has a great weekend and stays warm wherever they are.

My husband went to a job interview today.

It's for a company in the area that he just faxed his resume to last Thursday. They phone yesterday and one of the employees is looking for a quasi-assistant. I've been trying not to say anything because I don't want to get my hopes up and I don't want to jinx anything. I figure I will post about here before I explode. My husband seemed to click well with the person looking for a quasi-assistant. They are both British and he says they got on well, so I think that is a great sign! It would just be so nice for him to have weekends off again and not work evenings.

I have not purchased any new yarn/thread/crafty materials since before December. YAHOO for me!! I haven't even missed purchasing anything new. I'm beginning to think that as long as I stay away from Value Village and Salvation Army I will probably be okay.

Things have been slow going...mostly because I am not usually in the crocheting mood right after the Christmas Madness. I have made 3 dishcloths so far out of cotton I had leftover and I have started a round ripple afghan. I'm so excited to start another one seeing as how I fell in love with pattern on the baby blanket I made.

It's going to be a mish mash of colours because I'm going to use all the old acrylic and unknown fibers I have kicking around and I have accumulated quite a bit over the years. It will be an excellent destashing project, freeing up at least half of one of my tubs.

I've got red, beige, grey, mauve, black, and green lined up so far. I don't tend to use that stuff for my projects anymore (aside from slippers). I think because I've become a bit of a yarn snob. Acrylic just seems so....unpopular these days.

I'm not very far in, only 9 rounds. I've got about a 100 more to go because I want to make this big enough for a bed. & if that becomes too ambitious (or I run out of yarn) I definitely want to make it a good sized lap blanket.

This project is for ME. That's right ME. It's been so long since I've made anything that is just for myself.

Little Spots has a little link love in her 'Whatcha Working on Wednesday' post. Thanks for the LOVE hon! Make sure you check out her Etsy Shop--AngelaSpots. It's a good place. My favourite is this upcycled Felted Market Tote. I wish I could felt the way she does. My felting experiments have always just been disasters.

In other Etsy News Thistledown & Finch had her Louisa Bag featured on the Front Page. Congrats to you T&F!

I've been thinking about how we clean again. (wait a minute, how WE clean? let's face it dear readers, I should rephrase that to read--I've been thinking about how I clean again--cause the husband just does not clean unless under severe threats). Let's start that again.

I've been thinking about how I clean again. The interval cleaning does work well for me and for him. I usually start in the kitchen and I am beginning to think that perhaps that is not the best tactic. The kitchen is always the room that needs the most work (the dishwasher needs attention, counters clean off, counters wiped, garbages, recycling, fridge is full of junk, floor is dirty, and on and on) and because it needs so much work I end up spending WAY too much time in there, thus neglecting the other rooms in our house.

I started to think, 'wouldn't it be nice if I could get most of the rooms clean in the same time that I was spending in the kitchen?' & it's true. It would be nice. Then I started to think about what rooms are the cleanest in our house. Andrew's Room, Our bedroom, The Upstairs Bathroom. These are the rooms we spend the least amount of time in. They often just need a quick pick-everything-off-the-floor and make the bed etc. 5 minutes max in each room. And I mean MAX. The computer room does not usually need that much more attention. It's the Kitchen, living room, main floor bathroom and dining room that take up the bulk of my time. Especially because in the living room and dining room as fast as I clean Andrew messes it up again by taking ALL his toys out and dumping them everywhere.

What I've started doing is cleaning the upstairs first and worrying less about the main floor. I don't know if this plan is any more efficient, but it sure is nice having a clean bedroom to sleep in at night and it sure is nice knowing that at least half my house is in a good state.

Well, we finally made it to Superstore to do our grocery shop. We hadn't been for a 'proper' shop since before Christmas. The breakdown:

Junk Food
Cookies - 5.00
Tortilla Chips - 3.38
Popcorn - 4.98
Cheesies - 2.26
Guacamole - 4.99
Total - 20.61

Misc.
Pasta - 2.34
Freezer Bags - 5.28
Salsa Verde - 2.29
Peanut Butter - 4.19
Granola Bars - 5.47
Granola Bars - 5.98
Sea Salt - 5.39
Table Salt - 1.02
Sundried Tomato - 3.99
Fruit To Go (They did not have any No-Name ones) - 7.87
1000 island dressing - 2.47
Chicken Broth - 1.67
Taco Seasoning - 1.19
Tin Foil - 3.48
Bulk Almonds - 3.11
Worshehtshchcheire Sauce (spelling is too hard) - 2.39
Bulk Sunflower Seeds - 3.94
Storage Tower* - 32.99
Total -95.06

Dairy
Skim Milk - 1.98
Chocolate Milk - .99
Yogurt - 4.78
Cottage Cheese - 2.58
Cheddar Cheese - 5.89
Parm Cheese - 3.10
Total - 19.32

Canned Goods
Canned Tomatoes - 2.91
Tomato Paste - .52
Total - 3.43

Produce
Mushrooms - 2.41
Celery - 1.28
Avocado - 1.58
Blueberries - 2.98
Oranges - 1.99
Bulk Raisins - 3.21
Green Pepper - .98
White Onion - 1.33
Tomato - 2.98
Red Pepper - 1.80
Yellow Pepper - 1.05
Bananas - 1.42
Fresh Parsley - 1.35
Cantaloupe - 3.10
Total - 27.46

Grains
Wraps - 2.68
Mini Bagels - 6.99
Bulk Brown Rice - .68
Total - 10.35

Meat
2kg Frozen Chicken Breast - 22.99
4 pkgs Hot Italian Sausage - 9.99
Ground Beef - 4.37
Sandwich Meat (Chicken) - 3.47
Sandwich Meat (Roast Beef) - 3.94
Total - 44.76

Cleaning Stuff
Dish Detergent - 6.49
Total 6.49

GST - 3.69
PST - 5.17
Total 236.34

Deductions
Storage Tower - 32.99
Colleague Discount - 22.27
Superbuck - 5.94
Coupon - 5.00

Final Total - $170.14ish
Actually I think I'm out somewhere...it should really be $173. 14 but I am too lazy to go back and re-check everything.

I'm feeling kinda 'meh' about this shop. It really felt like prices were higher then they used to be, but I'm not too sure if that was just me thinking that because of all the media reports or if they really were? Also, $6.49 for dishwasher detergent?? Wazzup with that. $5.98 for No Name freezer bags?? Seems high. Anyways, I've got a good menu planned for the week so I hope it all goes well.

*The Storage Tower is for my job at the church. I will be getting reimbursed for it so I am not going to use it as our grand total. I'm just listing it otherwise I won't be able to do the mathing and it will be all screwy.

Apparently I am on the ball. Who knew.

I recently signed up for a payroll savings bond through my work. I thought that the $20 that was getting deducted off my pay was all going into a bond in my name. Last week I thought to myself, 'Self, you should have made it so that $15 goes into a bond in your name and $5 goes into a bond in your sons name'. I quite agreed with my self and was making mental notes to remember to do this next October as you can only make changes like that once a year.

I signed up to look at my bonds today and lo and behold...$15 is going into one in my name and $5 is going into one in his name.

I'm a genius.

I think I can post now that I've calmed down. :) I got all giddy and giggly when I saw that Gail had left a comment.*

I unfortunately did not get anything a) finance related or b) blog related or c) craft related done this week as Andrew has pneumonia. He was starting to feel sick last Friday but I thought it was just a cold. I should have known something was very wrong when I took the Christmas Tree down on Saturday and all he did was lay on the couch and not 'help' in any way. Things got worse Sunday night and by Monday hubby decided to take him to the doctors. They took a chest x-ray and confirmed it was pneumonia, gave us antibiotics and sent us home. He started to do better by Wednesday and now today he seems in tip-top shape. He had pneumonia last year and it was way worse last year. I think it's because we got the very early diagnosis, last year we waited about a week before we took him to the doctors.

Today I had a great day at work. I took the time to make a spreadsheet so I can better manage one of the ordering tasks that I have to do on a regular basis. The computer program will spit out a silly report showing when the particular items need to be ordered for individuals, but I don't find the report user friendly at all. I can't manipulate the report in any way, so I have to print it and then I make my scribbly notes on it and then when I set to work ordering the item I have more scribbly notes on other papers and I end up getting all confused. Now I hope my problems are solved. I can sort the spreadsheet, I can easily see upcoming items that need ordering, I've colour coded certain aspects, added comments, and I can track my progress with ease. I just have to remember to keep it updated...because as all my dear readers know that while I am obsessed with lists, I am not so good at keeping up with them. & a spreadsheet is really just a giant list...**

It has been quite cold here (in the minus 30's-40's with the windchill), so it's hard to get motivated to do anything. I get home and I just want to curl up with a blankie and stay warm. I cannot wait for warmer weather. I'm dreaming of a day when it will be minus 10! lol.

On the mini holiday front I have this to report. I have been diligently having money transferred every week from our PC checking account into our credit union LOC. From there I have been transferring it into our credit union savings account because the PC account and the Credit Union savings account aren't linked online, but the LOC is (for payment purposes). Sadly, there appears to be service charges surrounding e-transferring money from the LOC to the savings account. There was a glitch on the credit unions side and the charges were never being applied, but I guess they've realized their mistake. Thankfully, they are not applying the previous charges but they have sent us a letter and it clearly says that they will starting applying the service charges (but they conveniently don't tell us how much these charges will be). I have just cancelled those automatic transfers and set up automatic transfers to go into our EF. I guess I will just need to be diligent in tracking how much money is in the Mini Holiday fund vs the EF.***

I also want to report that I've increased our EF saving and planned spending saving (which at this point is the mini holiday fund). We were saving $17 a week into the EF and I've upped that to $20 (I was going to do $19, but then I figured why not just make it a nice round number) and i've increased the planned spending saving from $8 a week to $10 (this is not including the $40/month that comes off my pay and is in a payroll savings bond). At this point, I think those will be our saving figures for the next little while. I am very proud of myself because we went form saving zip, zero, zilch, nada, nothing to $10 a week, then $12 a week, and upwards in increments to now $40 a week (including the payroll savings). That means that we are now saving $140 a month! It was a slow process. I started with $10 a week in May and I am very pleased to say that we have continued EF saving even though we have been going through a very tough time financially.

I've updated my side bars too.

I think after this very long and rambly post I am ready to hit publish and wish everyone a wonderful weekend! Relax and stay warm everyone.

*Hi Gail! (if you've popped in again)

**I'm being intentionally vague on purpose here, seeing as how this is work related.

***I just realized that this paragraph sounds vague as well, but really it is not vague on purpose. I think I am just bad at explaining things.

This week I am going to work on figuring out exactly (if it's even possible to figure that out exactly) what our Net Worth is. I know it is somewhere in the Negative 20 thousandths. One of the Yearly Goals I made for 2009 is to get our Net Worth to Zero. In order to do this I need to figure out exactly where we stand.

I have some questions about figuring out what your Net Worth is:

--Can someone refer me to a good site that will explain everything in detail (what to include, what not to include?)
--Do you include your yearly salary?
--How do you know what to put for the value of your house? (I know what houses are LISTING at on MLS but not what they are SELLING for?)
--How often do you typically do a Net Worth Statement?
--I only get quarterly statements for many of my investments...how often do you look at your investments?
--What do you use to calculate your Net Worth? (excel, paper, what?)

I did a quick Net Worth Statement and it came out at Negative 21K...I used the purchase price of our house as it's value and I forgot to put my husbands loan in it...so this is going to be a work in progress.

Tomorrow I need to phone these banks to figure out what our balances are on loans/investments:

1. BMO (that pesky car loan and my GIC)
2. ACU (Consolidation Loan and LOC--although I think all our stuff is online there)
3. First Line (Mortgage)
4. Husband will need to figure out what the status of his loan is.

I've been slightly AWOL from my blog and from others blogs. I'm playing a new computer game right now that I am absolutely obsessed with....so today's post is going to be 10 random things.

1. My fridge is not here. We got a call last night saying that it had not yet arrived from the warehouse in Ontario. They did not give us an ETA. I hope it comes soon. It's a good thing we don't need it right away.

2. Andrew is sick. I don't know with what but he has not ate today and is only reluctantly drinking. It's 5:50 as I type this and he's already asleep.

3. Our pilot light on the furnace and hot water heater went off for some reason on New Years Day. It got WAY chilly in here. The thermostat said 10.5 degrees! Yikes! Thankfully my father and my hubby were able to light them back up before any pipes froze. It was worrisome because it was MINUS 35 outside that day.

4. I've been thinking a lot about God and serving God and how I should (could?) be doing this. I am currently the Sunday School co-ordinator at my church, but really it is making me more upset and frustrated and not wanting to go to church. Something I did not want to happen again. I am really considering not continuing as co-ordinator when this session ends in May. Children are not my thing (no matter how much everyone tells me I am good with them and no matter how much I might like colouring and pasting with them) and managing adults to manage children is really not my thing. Right now the only bonus to this position is that I make an extra $192 a month which we have needed to have in our budget since I started in August.

5. While playing my computer game I am crocheting intermittently. What am I crocheting, you ask? You guessed it...more dishcloths. I'm making some for ME. I haven't made anything for myself in a very long time.

6. Gas is getting quite cheap in our city! It's about 76 cents a litre here! & because we get gas at Superstore we get an extra 15 cents off a litre for using our PC Mastercard. It was pretty darn cheap to fill our car the other day.

7. We spent New Years quietly this year. We went for supper (Yummy Thai!), then for a beer (at Billabong), and then we came home and watched 3rd Watch.

8. I took our Tree down today, but we are missing one box...so quite a few ornaments are sitting on the dining room table until I find it.

9. I really want to win Gails contest. I hope I do.

10. We have gotten quite lax with money and our budget over the Christmas Holidays. It's time to get back on Track.

We booked 2 nights in the sleepy hotel in Gimli. We have booked the 27th (Friday) and the 28th (Saturday) with a return on the 1st (Sunday). I was thinking that we would go for another night, but now I'm not too sure. Hubby will already be missing 3 days of work (he works weekends) so I don't think it's the best choice financially for us.

They only had suites available so it was $100.12 a night. Not too bad. My husband booked over the phone and apparently they have this program for 18 dollars more a night you get lunch and breakfast. They said we could upgrade when we got there if we wanted. If we have a suite though I might just bring good things to eat for breakfast and lunch. My husband is not a big eater anyways, so going out for every meal is usually lost on him.

Gimli is a lovely little town. It is really touristy in the summer because it's right on the lake, but in the winter it's pretty sleepy. We went last year for hubby's birthday and he really likes it there. I'm just glad to go anywhere! lol.

So far the plan looks like this;

Hotel - $230 2/nights
Gas - $60
Supper - $150 2/suppers & evenings out
Misc Spending - $75
Food For Breakfast/Lunch - $50

This all totals $565. We have $320 saved up so that leaves $185** to save up until the last week of February. I think that is a doable amount to save It will be nice to get away! It will be even nicer to go on a holiday that we have saved up for. I'm so proud of us.

**It's only $185 because I have $60 in gas vouchers from Air Miles that should be arriving any day now.

There's big things on the horizon for us this year. That's what I've decided.

I'm going to break this post up into 2 parts -- 2009 Goals and January 2009 Goals. I am always one to be making goals...it's harder for me to stick to them. This year is going to be different....

2009 GOALS--Short and Sweet and Simple

1. Net Worth to Zero (We are at about MINUS 21K right now)
2. Run 5K (I can't even run 1 block right now)
3. Establish Savings for Home Improvement
4. Follow Through on Goals Set!

January 2009 Goals

1. No Crafty purchases.
2. Eliminate stash by 2 boxes. Crochet stuff!
3. Set Up bill paying system as per Gail's Instructions
4. Pay Hydro Bill off completely for this month and previous months.
5. Exercise 500 minutes this month. 500 minutes is better then nothing!