Once you pass 40, don't you stop counting? Or is it, you start going backwards????

Lots to do with finances!! DH bought stuff for me.... well, another story for another time!

No, not a sandwich, the girls hamster Peanut Butter went on to the big hamster cage in the sky. He was a good little hamster who did'nt mind when they forgot to feed him or clean his stinky cage. He did really good, he lasted three years which is quite old in hamster years. They made him a "coffin?" (highly decorated and quite large shoe box), will take me a while to dig that hole! DD1 took it pretty hard. I think pets are an excellent way not only to teach kids about responsibility, compassion and well....life.

This time I managed to do better with my ebay sales! I listed a bunch of GS stuff laying around the house. Being the leader of three troops, I collect a LOT of stuff! Made about $42. I will have to pay fees and etc, then see how it goes. Listed some different stuff this time, ice skates, vintage sewing patterns. Will see how these fly. Still have more Girl Scout stuff to list next week!

My MIL has gifted us an over the stove microwave for our birthdays! She gave me her Lowes card and told me to go pick one out. All I wanted was a white one that had 1000 watts and a turntable. I ca'nt say Lowes had a tremendous selection! DD2 picked one out and that is the one we got. Not very expensive at all in fact it is almost as cheap as the installation!! I did splurge $20 and get an extended warranty. I can truly say this is an impulse purchase! I did no research what so ever! Anybody have any thoughts about a Tappan? Anyway, I have always wanted one of these, so thanks MIL!

I was going to buy us dinner last night at Subway. Instead I went home and made home made chicken strips. And they were good. How's that for resisting temptation???

I am still working on my goal of not over spending by $1000 this month! I have been strict, fallen off the wagon - ONCE, but my biggest challenge is gettin DH on board. Although all the debt is "my fault", it is amazing the amount he spends! Don't worry, when I show him he just gets mad. So I told him NO MORE spending! He is a cheap dude, so now that I have really put it out in front of him... hopefully we can get him!

Okay, I must admit, I have never read the Harry Potter books and have only seen bits and peices to the movies when they have been on TV. But my DD1!! Well, thats another story! She has had a countdown going on for this last book to arrive. It is so bittersweet. She is quite sad it is over. She is the perfect age for this whole Harry Potter craze and reaped the benefits of it and LOVES JK Rowling!

Any whoo, I have been reading the different ways people will be obtaining their books. We did preorder from Borders, but decided the hype there was too much, so DH took DD1 to Walmart about 11:30 last night and they just waited in line there for about a 1/2 an hour and she was home and off to Harry Land for the night! Can't wait till she wakes up to see what she thought. (Hey, its a special occassion! Of course I let her stay up all night to read it!)

Our local grocery store has a special on certain Thursdays where they will give you $10 off a $50 purchase. I made my list, followed it so carefully and when I reached the checkout, she told me I hadn't spent enough! So it was back out (running through the aisles!) to pick up a couple of things I had not thought I had enough money to get. Finally made it over the mark!

I thought I estimated on the high side when I made my list. I even went over some old receipts to keep it really close to only spend my $40 (+tax). Things were STILL more expensive than I had highly estimated them to be! Yikes!!

If you look at my magic numbers over to your left, you will see my shameful secret. I am frugal, I know what to do, yet I am racking up $1000 more in debt on AVERAGE per month. The stock market may go up, but we are getting poorer. Some was put on because of the cruise and the trip to Disneyworld. The rest is probably food and junk my kids wanted and I spoiled them with. I do bad things, like not telling myself NO! So I will challenge myself, although I have done it before and simply and easily talked myself out of the challenge for whatever "good" reason I may have come up with, I will challenge myself to see if the last number on the line can go DOWN in one month. Think I can do it???......

Our ebay sales did not go well at all! I just can't seem to get the hang of this. I actually shot myself in the foot on this one. DD2 gave me some little Hamtaros to list and they have been going like HOTCAKES! Big bucks! So we started the listing at .99 to let it ride. Well, it did'nt. One of the items sold for .99! These things have been going for $35 to $100!! Geeze! Had I know, I would have at least listed it for $5 or $10! Ugh! Live and learn.

Hey all, my brother turned me on to this. It is a website that sells manufacturers specials. One only per day. They list the special deal at 12:00:01 and stop taking orders when the item is sold out or 11:59pm, whichever comes first. I just signed up, (really easy to do!) and looked around. Todays special was an indoor grill/griddle for 19.99. Yesterday was a Stanley socket set. Some stuff was weird, like a remote controlled helicopter. Anyway, check it out if you would like:
http://www.woot.com/Default.aspx

Went to the buffet at the casino today. Not bad, but not great. Glad I did'nt have to pay! Dinner was more goodies from the meat sale!

and did'nt spend! Woo hoo! I fought the mall and won!

Came home and had some friends over for dinner. That meat sale came in handy. Also had fresh veggies and shrimp and chips and pickles. Not a feast, but not too bad considering it was last minute!

Tomorrow we get another free meal. BIL has decided to take the family to the buffet at the casino to celebrate my nephews birthday. Not sure why he chose this particular place, since we'll have the kids, but oh well, its free - I'm gonna enjoy!

So, I did a little shopping today. I went to Walmart because DD2 needs a new ceiling fan in her room and they have them cheap! Got one for 18.88. Saw all the wonderful school supplies on sale and picked up some notebooks, paper and so on.

Then I went to our local grocery store and stocked up on meat. I chose to purchase ground chuck, shrimp, london broil, sirloin, stew meat and chicken breast. It was 5 for 19.99 so I bought 100.00 worth. I looked for the largest packages of meat I could get! The receipt says I saved 57.60! Not bad. In regular coupons I only had 2.55! A 60.00 savings in total was not bad. I was aggrevated because our other local store was have a $5 off meat purchase over 19.99 that I could have used at this store. Darn! Never good enough - right!

This is birthday party weekend. Hopefully will get through it without spending any more money!

Spent the evening taking pictures and listing on ebay. Going for some grocery money! My listing fees are up to almost $30, so I have to wait for anything over and above that to make money. (This is from other stuff I listed too, earlier in the month). They have had a summer special, so I am supposed to be saving money on my listings. Kept it to a short 3 day auction. Don't have the patience for longer!

I have resisted the lure of those evil restaurants and have been cooking at home every night! Going to visit my sister out of town tomorrow night, but they live in a small town and we will be dining at "the tavern". Fried everything!!

Have been enjoying reading again. I guess with the kids getting a little older, I have moved from the quick to read romance novels back to the REAL novels!! My DD2 shares books with me now! Fun! Came up with a new system to mark on my calendar so I don't end up with all those overdue books!

I am so excited to report that my favorite store in town is again having its meat sale!!! Last time we ate for two months off the meat sale! Any five picks of their meat offerings for 19.99! London broil, ground chuck, chicken breast, sirloins, so much more! I always look for the largest cuts and pick those! Will go stock up on Friday. Will let you know what we get!

Soooo... yesterday I had my plan in place...right?? DH comes home and tells me he put $1000 in the savings account from the checking account. Ugh! Too bad we only had $800. He had received a bonus and that will go to cover some of our house payment, but he did'nt think about those purchases he made this weekend. Gee, we need to cover that??? Again, ugh! Good thing we have the overdraft. So now when he pulls out the house payment, I am going to remind him to pull out that extra $200 to pay it back. He will have a fit. It is amazing the denial one likes to live in.....

I worked on the budget, made it neat and tidy and even included paying myself. I want to list a bunch of stuff on ebay to help pay for groceries, part of my new "plan". I will be making a little more on my check. Not sure how I will distribute that. Each month I pay for the month ahead and I find myself getting confused and double paying sometimes!

DD3 will be going to a birthday party and DD1 just got invited to one too. Am thinking of using my JCPenney birthday gift card of buy $15, get $15 off to get something for DD3's friend (as she is a good friend of the family) and giving the $10 GC for Walmart to DD3's friend whom we don't really know well. Sheesh! I'm just trying not to spend any more money!

Will go up to visit my sister Wednesday and Thursday. Hope it won't kill me in gas.

Also need a new backpack for DD3 who will be starting back to school next week. (Cycle schools for grade schoolers here!) Have most of her supplies bought or already in our school supply box. Even ready for lunches!

Seriously! I need to stay away from eating out. What the heck is it going to take??? I am so sick of the BAD prices, LOUSY service and YUCKY food!! Yet I keep going!! WHY?? Today I made my kids go to Chili's for lunch. They did'nt want to. They begged for McD's and should have gotten home cooking!! The food was terrible and I did'nt check my bill and got RIPPED OFF!! I'm thinking I need a little device that gives me a shock every time I think about eating out. I guess my July goals should be my new budget and NOT EATING OUT! (Of course it does'nt count if someone else is paying!! Mom and dad are taking us out to eat tomorrow night! )

So, we had our vacation and our big party for the 4th, so now it is time to buckle down and plan for July. I am going to try to make closer to the minimum payments on our bills, so we have more cash to pay for everyday things. Then I will divvy out the cash for gas, food and entertainment. My focus has always been on "paying more" to each of the cards, but then being cash poor, so we put things back on credit. Pretty goofy huh? So I will go againist my nature and try this other way.

We are getting ready to have a big shin-dig tomorrow for the 4th! Besides the meat which I bought in advance at Costco we are adding some cheap eats:

Beans - from a lovely can bought on sale with a coupon.
Deviled eggs - 18 count for 1.18, double it and you have lots
Jello - see it wiggle, see it jiggle and cheap!
Pasta salad - pasta was FREE with coupons, bought salad dressing w/double coupons, threw in some parm cheese I had in the fridge and some leftover bacon bits.
Green salad - head o' lettuce, some shredded cheese from the fridge and a sliced up egg from the deviled egg collection and a chopped tomato from the garden (it was small, but usable!)
Cupcakes - bought mix for .30 and the icing was free with the mix purchase! Yum!

I guess the vacation Gods heard the Meyers' were going on vacation, cause just like our cruise, the trip to the lake was rainy and cold EVERY day! The first day we checked out the condos. Nothing to set the house on fire for, but at least we have an idea of the wheres and how muchs. So Friday we decide to do the indoor stuff and go to the outlet mall and the movies, but by Saturday we were getting pretty disgusted. Hung out at the condo, rented a movie, got up this morning and headed out of town!! We did visit with a friend of DH's when we were down there and we joked that it was US that brought the rain. She called us on our way home and asked if we had left town, because the sun came out!! NO kidding!