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.

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.

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 at life there is much to report. It feels like everything is such a whirlwind these days!

The Highlights:

• We painted the living room, which I blogged about yesterday. It looks wonderful, but now is taking quite a bit of effort to put back together. There is drywall dust and paint specks everywhere. Guess what I'm spending my Friday night doing?
• Steve got his PC Points account straightened out finally. Thank Goodness! (There was some glitch the day he applied for the MC and the points were not showing up online or in store) We have 41,339 points already! He got the card in October and I think he's brilliant with it. He uses it and then we come home and he pays it off right away. 41K in points is 40 dollars worth of free merch at Superstore. I am very pleased because that will go a long way towards funding Christmas Eve dinner.
• Last Saturday we went to the bank to invest Andrew's Christmas money. Nana gives him some money every Christmas for us to invest for him. We met with our favourite bank lady (who is pregnant and going on Maternity Leave soon--gah! we won't be making any financial changes until she comes back!) and put his money into a 4 year GIC @ 4.65%. We chose the 4 year because that way it will mature at the same time as his one from last year. I'm proud to say that our son practically has more investments then we do.
• While at the bank I got our favourite bank lady to print off a summary of our Mutual Funds. It's a sad state. Mine are down 23% (if I have done my math correctly) and Steve's are down 5% (he put his in Mutual Funds after the big drop...about 2 months ago?). I'm trying to remain positive and remember that these are long term investments and the market will bounce back and the money will grow, etc...but it is so gosh darn hard!
• I've been playing with this neat little site called Springpad. It's seriously pleasing the chronic list maker that I am. Although, trust me I have recognized the irony that now I have another vehicle to add to the many ways I already make lists...Check it out! I've got my master Christmas Eve Dinner list in there...and yes, I know that I've made one here on my blog as well. But, I love trying to be organized.
• I finished one cross stitch and have started on the last one. This one is smaller then the other 2 I've done so hopefully I'll just zip through it.
  
• Tomorrow we are having some friends over for the evening. It will be low key and I'm not preparing any food or anything. Just a couple of hours with good friends that we don't see nearly enough anymore since we have all grown up. However, having people over does mean that we need to clean up...something we are very good at avoiding. So far I've cleaned my sons room, put the dishes in the dishwasher and turned it on. Not enough progress. So, I'm off to do my interval cleaning and I'll be popping in and out all night.

It's been a cold week here in the Peg. Windchills in the minus 20's. My work has been having heating issues (which really is a nice way of saying that the first and second floors don't have any heat because they are installing new vents) and there is not supposed to be any heat for a few more weeks. brrrr. i'm used to wearing 2 sweaters to work and having the space heater inches away from me under my desk. Although I will admit that it has been better since they got the heat working in the basement. I'm quite surprised by how much only having heat in the basement has warmed up the first floor. I'm so glad it's Friday.

I've just taken an order for a plarn bag and 2 more dishcloths! I'm-a-happening crafty chick this Christmas. It will be more money to add to my mini-holiday fund. I've got money coming for another item that I made. I'm quite pleased with my sales this Christmas.

Since making the round ripple blanket I've been working on my Cross Stitch. I had totally been neglecting my cross stitch and I had purchased quite a few to make for Christmas. I am about 60% finished one (this picture shows it when it was about 30% done--and photographing cross stitch is harder then it looks I would just like to say) and then I have 1 more I definitely HAVE TO MAKE by Christmas. There are 2 others I bought but I can save them for next Christmas. Thankfully, they are all small projects and the more I do this the faster I get.

I've also discovered that it is hard to craft/prepare for Christmas when your house is in complete disarray because your father decides that now is a great time to finish working on your kitchen/living room remodel that was started exactly 1 year ago. (where is that eye rolling emoticon when i need it?) he's drywalling and mudding and preparing doorways. i hope this is all over with soon. i can't take mess and disorganization and having my kitchen all turned upside down.

Me and Steve also worked at organizing/de-cluttering the basement 3 nights this week!

Saturday is super booked for us. The Bank, an event at my church, Steve has work, and I need to plan an Advent Party. Busy as bees!

This week has been okay. Steadily busy but not too busy. I started to feel sick yesterday and didn't feel any better this morning so I stayed home form work today. I took Gravol and slept most of the day and had some wild dreams.

I finished making the 'item' for the Hitched Kids Secret Santa and then wanted to make a hat for friends of ours who just had a baby but I could not get the pattern to work at all. I seriously unraveled over a dozen times. Eventually when the hat was big enough to fit Andrew instead of a 7 week old I gave up and unraveled it. So I figured I would make a baby blanket instead. Baby blankets are easy enough and small, right? Hah. Nope. I must have unraveled at least 4 times and it still wasn't right but I figured maybe it would work itself out in the end? Hah. Nope. I had to rip about 12 rows in. I knew what the mistake was and I just should have listened to my gut. Now that I've fixed the problem it's going along nicely. It's a round ripple and I've done about 15 rows now I think...so only like 30 thousand more to go. lol. Thankfully it's a baby blanket as I tend to lose interest in larger projects.

Tomorrow there is lots on the schedule:

• Wrap Hitched Kids Secret Santa package (card?)
  
• Mail Hitched Kids Secret Santa package out,
• Mail a gift package out for an order I have,
• Make an appointment for Family Pictures
• Make Spaghetti Sauce & freeze
• Type out Daycare Board Meeting Minutes
• Buy more cotton yarn
• Go to used store to look for sweaters to felt

this week has been shitty work wise. tres shitty. but, such is life and there is not much i can do about it due to circumstances outside my control. hopefully next week will be better and the week after that fantastic! (a girl can dream, right?)

i'm hosting family games night tonight for the first time. part of me wants a large crowd, but part of me would also be happy if only 2 or 3 people showed up so i can get to know everyone better and have a low key evening. i also want to go see a movie tonight that starts at 9:30 that is about a 20 minute drive away.... (i'm so selfish, huh?)

we want to go see City of Ember tonight. it's playing at the cheap theater and looked to be the only movie that me and the hubster would agree on. lol. maybe we'll even go out for drinks afterwards, who knows because the kidlet is at nana's tonight! we are child free! woot for us. Tomorrow we are going to lie in and then do our grocery shopping. in the afternoon I am going to go for lunch at a friends house. i'm making the soup and she's making the sandwiches! it will be nice to visit.

i got re-assessed on my taxes and due to an error on my part i owe 207 dollars to the govt. *sigh* but hurrah for the emergency fund! so our fund is sitting at 255 dollars so that will leave us with 47 dollars in there...but at least we have it and we won't have to put the tax bill on the credit card or ignore for years like i did the last time i owed money...

other then that we are plugging along and i've got plans to a big purge/clean-up/reorganization of the house this weekend...(hubster if you're reading this consider yourself warned for cleaning duty!)

have a great weekend everyone. cheers!

This week was very busy and draining at work. Lots to do and not enough time to do it all in. (As usual). We are having our yearly 'evaluation' (the military have some crazy term for it that makes no sense, but whatev) next week and it has been crazy the amount of stuff they have 'reminded' me that I'm supposed to be looking after/doing/updating even though I never knew it in the first place....

I took my parents out for supper tonight because it was my mother's birthday this past week. We went to the Old Spaghetti Factory. It was good.

I downloaded the Hair Soundtrack and I'm listening to it right now on the comp. It's rocking. ROCKING. I sure do love this musical. I've also finished downloading Degressi TNG Season 5 so I'm preparing to kick back and relax and watch this.

Tomorrow morning we are going grocery shopping, then in the afternoon me and Andrew are going to go to the Santa Claus parade it should be fun and not too cold. I haven't been to the parade since I was in single digits. lol.

I only have about 6 dishcloths left to make and after that I am going to move into finishing the cross stitch for my aunt or maybe unraveling a sweater. I haven't done that in ages and I kind of miss it.

This week I have been preparing for a craft show. I have a pre-order for 3 slippers (2 adults & 1 baby). Tonight I made the price tags and everything is in the box ready to go tomorrow. I still have to finish up one of the baby booties and find my shelf and covering for the table. Oh, and I need change. I guess Steve will be in charge of that tomorrow (tee hee--way to make him involved). If I have time I also want to finish up a tea cozy that I started making months ago but lost interest.

So wish me luck for tomorrow. I hope to make some money so I can purchase a cutter to make business cards and a customized stamp for my business cards. That's my goal.

This week felt very busy, but as I sit here trying to think of something to write I can't think of anything of note.

• On Thursday and Friday me and Andrew walked home from daycare (well I walked and Andrew rode in the wagon). That is a good 45 minute walk! I figure we'll walk home as much as possible for a) it snows b) it gets frigging cold and c) he doesn't fit in the wagon anymore.
• I have an 'order' for 3 slippers! One of my facebook friends (a girl from high school that I haven't seen in years) saw my pictures and asked me to make her some pairs! I am so pleased with myself.
• I believe that Andrew is toilet trained now. He still has some accidents, but not many. I am so pleased that he caught on as fast as he did and that his daycare group leader was so awesome in the process. I was so thankful that I crocheted her a hat that matches Andrew's. Now they're hat twins.
• I have a cold. It's not getting better and I'm living of DayQuil an NyQuil. I hope it gets better.
  

This week at life....

• I got my Performance Review today. I didn't even know it was coming. It's only...oh....7 months late (it's backdated to March 31st of last yer). However, despite the tardiness, I was and am quite pleased by it. It said lots of nice things about me. I am even more pleased because it is the first evaluation I have had done since 2001ish. It will be nice to have something to put in my portfolio.
• Right after I signed my review, Head Office phone to complain about me. It was very surreal. I immediately admitted my mistake (because I knew I was wrong), but it wasn't enough! this woman was grilling me for information related to my job! It definitely upset me, especially when she phoned my supervisor to complain about me more! Thankfully, my supervisor didn't even seem fazed and realized that their ruse was really to just send back work they didn't want to do and to get one of us to do it.
• The crazy co-worker that I was working with has retired. Today was her last day! I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.
  
• I'm avoiding writing my competency statements.
• I'm worried about Sunday School. I don't seem really that into it or know especially what I'm doing.
• Tomorrow I'm going for lunch with my work email buddy. We are both very excited. I don't think we get out much.

this week at life....

life has been very stressful. i want to write something witty and funny, but reallly all i can think of is sad and scary stuff. i don't want to write about that. so this week i'm going to write nothing.

this week at life has been full of drama. family drama, work drama, daycare drama, ... *sigh*

1. family drama - my parents are pack rats. before my mom got sick the pack rattiness didn't seem so bad. my mom could keep the main rooms looking okay. but since she's lost a lot of her mobility things have gone downhill. their house has reached a state of 'needs-to-be-condemned'. i've ignored the situation for quite a whilenow, but alas it seems like i won't be able to ignore it any longer. my parents want to rent the upstairs suite (where i used to live) and they want me get it ready. uh-oh. not going to happen. my anxiety goes through the roof just thinking about it. & i told them exactly that. & well...drama ensued. so, i've been dealing with that.

2. work drama - well, remember before how i barely had any work to do? well, now i'm doing 2 peoples jobs and i'm so busy it sucks. sucks big donkey balls. other staff are still wandering around and chatting and surfing the net and i'm plugging away at the work that wasn't while i was on holidays...

3. daycare drama - i won't say much about this one, but i'm the chair of the board and there is a lot of stuff happening and much to do still.

i'm looking forward to the weekend. i think tomorrow the 3 of us are going to go to the beach if the weather is nice.

sunday is a friends little guys birthday party. get to see wall-e in the theatres and i'm super excited!

other then that i'm just getting used to steve working in the evenings and it just being me and andrew after work and for supper. it's not too bad. so far we've been watching a lot of cartoons. :P

This week at life...





1. Steve got offered a job on the spot on Friday! He starts on Tuesday. It's a bit of a pay cut, but i think it won't make much of a difference b/c it'll put him back in the lower tax bracket, y'know. it's a route driver job for a meat company. & best of all the drivers go out alone, so he won't have to deal with silly co-workers. The location is good and the hours are good too. I'm glad the time of unemployment was short and I'm sure being offered a job on the spot was good ego stroking. I would find it.



2. Yesterday I spent the afternoon with my internet friend who is in from out of town. It was a big ol' Hitched day. We started out at the Nook and had a fabulous lunch outside despite the crazy winds. Then we walked to Osborne Village and stopped at Buccacinos to have a Beer. And then we were off shopping at all the neat little stores. We had a darling time M and V. We finished the night off at Carlos N Murphy's with spouses. It was good fun. I'm horribly sunburnt today though--even though I put sunscreen on.



3. Steve's parents arrive next week for their three week vacation here.

this week at life was....sucky...and good....and sad.

1. steve lost his job on tuesday. we're keeping a very positive attitude about it and i know that he'll have another job by the end of may.

2. it seems that i am indeed the new children's ministry coordinator at my church...along with another person. they've made the position joint, which i think is fabulous b/c now i won't be so lost. :P

3. i'm doing my craft show tomorrow; in the midst of all the bruhahaha i've been getting ready for it. i made re-purposed price tags out of old folders from work. i've got a good pile of stuff. i'm going to my craft partners today so we can sort out how our table is going to look.

4. i'm going for drinks and nachos tonight with a Hitched Friend. I'm uber excited to go out. :)

5. i think my husband is making me a composter right now. stoked!

This week at life:

1. I went to a 2 day Writing Skills course. I now know about Independant Clauses and Subordinate Clauses, and adverbs, and adjectives, and apostrophe's. None of which was used correctly in that sentence. :)

2. I went for lunch with a work acquaintance. She assured me that it was okay to take longer then the 1 hour lunch. We were gone 1.5 hours and she was showing me around her workstation when we got back (we work for the same place, just in different areas) and apparently it was NOT okay. Her boss freaked out on her--in front of me! I feel like shit now. & I'm sure she does too. Fuck, her boss needs to take a course on how manage people effectively. What a shitty way to start the weekend.

3. Tomorrow we are going for supper and a swim at my friends house. I'm tres excited; she's one of my only friends that thinks of activities that include Andrew. For that, I'm truly thankful. (& hopefully I used that semi colon correctly there!)

4. Tomorrow we have an appt at the bank and we need to decide if we are going to consolidate all our debt....again. If we do consolidate, it will be the third time I've consolidated in 6 years. :( Kind of makes me sad when I think about it that way. Gotta. Curb. The. Spending.

5. I'm trying to decide what we should do when Steve's parents come to visit in May. We usually go on a little trip when they come here. The first year we rented a cabin and then last year we went to the states. They want to go to Gimli this year...but I don't know if I'm down with that. *Sigh* I wish there were more exciting places to visit in Manitoba.

Anyways...cheers everyone! Have a rockin' weekend! (I thought the picture was adorable)

I used to work in schools as a Teacher Assistant. One thing a lot of the younger grades would do is “This Week At School” or TWAS for short. It was always very cute. This week at school…I ate pancakes and played outside and X is no longer my friend. Priceless stuff. Good times. I was doing this on my old blog. It’s a nice tradition that I would like to keep up.

This week at life.

1. We’re going for sushi tonight. It’s all you can eat sushi and I’m EXCITED. My only goal is to stop eating before I feel sick though.

2. Tomorrow I’m giving blood, going to a used kids stuff sale, and going to the used book sale at St. Vital shopping centre. I’m going to be a busy bee.

3. Work has been…okay. I’m here. I do things. I went to another location yesterday and I’m going to be helping them out at least one half day a week…hopefully more.

4. Gails Magic Money Jars have been working for us. We are not following them exactly. There is niggling room in our budget right now for the odd lunch out or other fun things. But it has been over 1 week since we have gone into the overdraft. This alone is huge for us. We have also been making sizeable payments on our utility bills. By the end of this month the balances should be Zero. That is sweet.

5. I’ve been thinking of getting back on the weight loss bandwagon. For the past 6 months I have been weighing myself everyday & for the last 6 months I have maintained. I have fluctuated between 5 pounds down and 5 pounds up…but mostly hovering around the same weight. I’d like to see that number go down and stay there….without becoming obsessed about food and eating and dieting. Maybe lots of fruits and vegetables and lean proteins and good carbs—and NO JUNK FOOD. If I could exercise a little bit and not have chips and candy and cake and tacos then I could probably get somewhere (maybe?). I’ve got to do something about my weight. Really, I need to lose 100 pounds to be even ‘normal’…130 to be ‘thin’. My dream is to be able to shop at normal person stores and buy clothes at superstore.