$20 Challenge/EF Old Balance: $184.46
Feb interest: $.23
------------------------------------------
$20 Challenge/EF New Balance: $184.69

Old Personal Savings: $110.21
Feb interest: $.18
-------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $110.39

Old House Fund Balance: $16.49
Feb interest: $.02
--------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $16.51

Today was moving day and we survived! Got all the furniture and big stuff from the old apartment and into the new one. Still have some small things in the old apartment and some cleaning to do there. But our least there doesn't end until Feb 28th, so we have 2 weeks to get it finished.

I have lots to catch up on, both posting and reading, but I'm exhausted. Will catch up on the blogs tomorrow. Night all and happy sunday!

I just got a DD from half.com for $15.05. I also just transferred $15 from my paypal account into my checking. Now, to decide where to out the $30.05. I want to add some to my personal savings. I need to get a move on with my couch fund. But I know I should add more to the EF. So, I guess the best way to figure it out is $10 into each account.

Old Personal Savings: $100.21
Online sales: $10.00
-------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $110.21


Old House Fund Balance: $6.49
Online sales: $10.00
--------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $16.49

$20 Challenge/EF Old Balance: $129.99
Online sales: $10.05
------------------------------------------
$20 Challenge/EF New Balance: $140.04

Little bits, but at least there is something.

$20 Challenge/EF Old Balance: $109.09
Jan Interest: $.12
------------------------------------------
$20 Challenge/EF New Balance: $109.21


Old Personal Savings: $100.00
Jan Interest: $.21
-------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $100.21


Old House Fund Balance: $6.48
Jan Interest: $.01
--------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $6.49

I spent today. I knew I would. But I actually did better than I thought.

My car needed a ton of stuff fixed. $550 worth of stuff. I did save $10 with a coupon I had, so that was cool.

Other than that, I spent $17 on 2 new rugs and a new curtain for the bathroom. Love that outlet store! And I also picked up a cool new cookbook for $5. It uses all types of odd food for the meals. Like potato chip crusted chicken, or peanut butter thai burgers. When I try the recipes, if they come out OK, I'll share them.

Well, I did it. I managed to make yesterday a NSD, and it was my 2nd in a row! Whoo-hoo! It was also my 7th for the month of January.

Today won't be a No Spender. My car is at the mechanics getting an oil change and check up. I'm praying to the car gods that it doesn't need any other work.

When Mums gets home from work, we are going to a local curtain and bathroom outlet store. They have the cutest stuff for bathrooms, plus curtains, rugs, home decorations, and even furniture. Oh, and Mums has a 10% off coupon on our entire purchase. I still need 3 curtains for the new dinning room. I have some from my current living room I can use if I don't find anything else, but they aren't the right length and look funny. I also need to pick up a small rug and maybe toilet seat cover for the bathroom. The ones we have now have been in my bathroom for 6 years, and are disgusting.

So, I will be spending, but I am going to try to keep it in check.

I made good money at work last night. Brought home $83, including $8 in tips. Two of the 5 clients I had said they were impressed and would be back to see me again. Go me.

I also just transferred $25.76 from my paypal account to my checking. I'd like to throw it at the EF, but I need to pay bills first. :P

Happy Thursday everyone!

I hate the moving process. I think it is because I have so much stuff. Especially books. Tons of books. I don't mind packing, or unpacking, but the actual moving part makes me very anxious and nervous. Probably because every time I moved (twice a year for 4 years of college, and 3 apartments since then) Dads was grumpy and miserable. He complains I have too much stuff, too many books, etc. And I understand it, he's getting older and, well, moving heavy boxes and furniture stinks.

This time, though, I am trying to be more organized. BF and I are packing and moving all my books before the day we move all the furniture. This way there will be no complaining about how many books I own. And, Dads is not helping us this year. I'm going to pay 2 guys I work with to help us. Dads is just getting too old (He's 61).

Anywho, I started packing the books today. Got 2 shelves done of my biggest bookcase. 7 boxes! Still have 3 more shelves of that one, and then another 5 shelf bookcase, plus numerous books spread out through different rooms.

I did run into a bit of a snag when I was packing, though.



That's my kitty Wolfie (short for Wolfsbane). My other kitty Solstice is hiding in terror from the evil brown boxes (she's such a scardy cat).



On a financial note, missed work last night due to this stupid cold that won't go away. Going in tonight, though.

Mums and Dads came up and took me and BF to brunch. Free meal!

And I found a penny yesterday in the parking lot. New Pennies on the Sidewalk total: $.75

Happy Sunday all!

Now that the reality has sunk in that we got the apartment, my mind is starting to whirl with what new things we want/need.

Some things we will be getting free are:
*a dining room set and matching buffet. This set used to be my parents and I LOVE it. When they got their new dining room set about 10 years ago, I begged them to store the old one in the shed for me so I could have it when I got a place large enough. And finally, I got a place large enough! It is a nice dark wood, and the table is round, but it has leaves you can put in to make it bigger. At it's biggest it seats 12!

*bakers rack. When we moved to this apartment, we gave ours to my sis because we didn't have room for it. If we have room in this new place (depends on how we arrange the furniture), Mums has said she will buy us a new one. Awww, such a great Mums!

*Apothecary Table. This is actually mine, but again, didn't have room for it in the new apartment. Mums and Dads have been so kindly "storing" it in their living room for me. LOL

Things that we will need to buy:
*a new couch. As I mentioned before, ours now is completely broken and pretty much only used by the cats. We found one we like at Ikea for just a couple hundred.

*garbage pails. Ones for outside, that is. This is the first place I will be in where we don't have a dumpster. Gotta get our own trash barrels. Also have to call the city and request a recycling bin.

Things I want to buy:
*A couple of area rugs. One for each part of the double parlor, one for the dining room, and one for each of the 3 bedrooms. Ha! I think we'll start with 1 and work up from there.

*More bookcases. Now that we will have more room, we want to get some more bookcases. It's crazy how many books we have between the 2 of us!

*Futon. I would love to have a futon in my office/library. This way I have a comfy place to read, and we also have a place for our friends to sleep when they come visit.

I'm sure there is much more, but I'm also sure I am boring anyone who is still reading this.


UPDATES:
Found a slightly used IKEA sage green rug on craigslist today. It was originally $30 at IKEA, and the woman is selling it for $15. She said it is 6 months old, like new, and she is only getting rid of it because the color isn't right. It's the perfect color for us! I'm just waiting for her to email me back and tell me if it is still available.

Other things we will need that I forgot about:

*new ice cube trays...using someone elses', oh god, my OCD just flares!

*shelf paper, kitchen sponges, tp.

*curtains. We have enough for the bedroom, my office, and the BF's game room. We need enough for at least 7 more windows.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
One another note, yesterday was a NSD. We couldn't get out because of the snow. I hate snow, but I love those NSDs.

Saturday I made $79 at the tarot store. Whoo-hoo! The store closed early last night b/c of the storm, so I didn't work.

oh, I am SO EXCITED! We saw an apartment last week that we both fell in love with and applied for. The landlady called today and told us it is ours!! YAY!!

It has a double front parlor, plus a dining room, bathroom (w/2 toilets!), kitchen, small storage room, and 3 bedrooms!! There is a beautiful ornamental fireplace, built in cabinet and drawers in the dining room, working chandeliers in most rooms, and in the front parlor more built in shelves with glass doors. All for $750 a month, which is about $350 less than we pay now. Heat is not included, but it is in our old place, but seeing as how we don't use anywhere near $350 worth of heat a month, we are still going to come out ahead.

As soon as we get in there I will post pics. Now we need to clean out and pack! Will definitely be posting more stuff online to sell now. I don't want to have to move all this junk!

Our lease will start Feb 1st, but the landlady said after we sign the lease (this week we hope), we can start moving things in and she won't charge us rent for the rest of January. Our lease at our current place doesn't end until March 1st, but if we break it early, we have to pay a fee that is more than paying rent for the 2 places together for the month of February. And this way we can use the whole month of Feb to get out of the old apartment and not have to cram it all into one day.

Have I mentioned I HATE the process of moving? But I love this new place, and I can't wait to get in the new place. And I LOVE unpacking and decorating.

We will be getting a new couch for the new place since the one we have now is broken badly enough that it won't survive the move. Right now only the cats use it anyways. And I have a $25 gift card for Target coming to me in the mail from MyPoints that I can use towards an area rug for the living room.

Eeeeek! I'm so excited!!

This past week Half.com has been VERY good to me! I have sold 3 DVDs and 2 books in the last 5 days! YAY! I am still waiting on my direct deposit from half.com for these items but I checked the payment history on my account and it comes to $26.25! I will officially add this to my Ebay total after I get the dd and after I deduct shipping costs. Hopefully will be around $20.

Last night I spent a couple hours watching tv and listing things on Ebay. I've got 7 items listed in 6 auctions (had 2 of one item). I have 1 watcher on 1 item, and 2 bids on a second one. They are all low prices as right now I am wanting to clean out as much as make extra money.

In other news we saw an apartment yesterday that I am in LOVE with! It is everything I have ever dreamed of having in my dream apartment. Double front parlor, plus a dinning room, 3 bedrooms, ornamental fireplace, huge bathroom, kitchen, in a great area... *sigh* It's FAB! And it's $345 cheaper a month than our place now! We find out Saturday if we got it or not, but I am pretty confident we will be moving in there soon.

I had a good amount of money to deposit today at the bank. There was a check from BF, a check from a survey I did, rolled coins from CITB, and cash from work Sunday night. It came to $105.35

After depositing that, I moved some of it around into my savings accounts.

Old Personal Savings: $94.94
Tally-Up Transfer: $5.06
-------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $100.00 (Goal met!)

Old House Fund Balance: $5.38
Random transfer: $1.10
--------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $6.48

So, this means that my savings goal of $100 is DONE! YAY!

And I have the first deposit into my $20 Challenge of 2009. All my $20 Challenge Money goes into the EF, so here is the new total:

$20 Challenge/EF Old Balance: $40.09
Survey check (1st deposit of 2009!): $10
------------------------------------------
$20 Challenge/EF New Balance: $50.09
(halfway to 1st EF goal)

While my 2009 EF goal is $1,000 I am aiming for $100 right now (small goals work better for me) so I am halfway through that first mini-goal. Wa-hoo!

Hard to believe it has been about a year since we moved to Boston, but it has and it is time to move again.

Since I am no longer working, we cannot afford out apt here. But that is OK with me, since I don't really like living here. We are looking to move back to the South Shore of Mass, near New Bedford, where we lived before.

I loved New Bedford (and the low rent costs, too) and would love to go back there, but BF didn't like it all that much. He has said mostly he didn't like the apt we had and our neighbors, so he is willing to give a new place in NB a shot. Plus, it is a city where you can get the nicest apartments at the cheapest prices (2 bedrooms for $650 a month).

We are looking at other cities, too, but so far NB has had the nicest places, and the most choice.

We found one we really like. It is a 1 bedroom, large living room w/ornamental fireplace and room for an office, kitchen, bath, private covered patio outside w/japanese maple trees, lots of plants and flowers, and all new stainless steel appliances. It is advertised as $650 a month, $850 with utilities (gas to cook, electricity, heat, hot water).

This is making us worry. We don't use anywhere near $200 a month worth of utilities. I don't like having to pay a set price when I know I could be paying less. So, what do we do?

I am going to ask if it is possible to pay the $650 a month and do our utilities on our own, but I don't think the landlord will go for it. So, do we look for another place, where we only pay for what we use in utilities, or do we jump at the chance for this great place (it is so pretty, and on first floor which I need with the MS), and pay a set price on utilities?

Grrr...I hate house hunting.

Got a few tidbits to add to my $20 Challenge.

Old Personal Savings: $91.74
December Interest: $.20
Pinecone: $3.00
-------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $94.94

Old EF Balance: $40.00
December Interest: $.09
-------------------------------
New EF Balance: $40.09

Old House Fund Balance: $5.37
December Interest: $.01 LOL
--------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $5.38

Oooh, big numbers, eh? LOL

Feels good to have something to put into the Challenge! Today I transfered $50 from my paypal account to my Savings. This was from Ebay profits. Yay! *smile*


Old Personal Savings: $93.66
Ebay profits: $50.00
--------------------------------
New Personal Savings: $143.65

Note: EF is at $36.14 (which if I need more, I will use what is in the Personal Savings).

Note: House Fund is a sad and lowley $5.37

I recently added a few bucks to each of my 3 savings account, just to balance them at an even amount. No real reason why, just wanted some nice even numbers.

Old Couch Fund Balance: $186.27
Tally Up: $3.73
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $190.00

Old House Fund Balance: $100.96
Tally Up: $4.04
------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $105.00

Old EF Balance: $33.80
Tally Up: 2.20
------------------------------------
New EF Balance: $36.00

Small addition to the Couch Fund...

Old Couch Fund Balance: $179.16
10% paycheck: $7.11
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $186.27

Sold another book on galf.com. This one was for $60, so after fees and shipping, I ended up with about $55. Yay! New couch, here we come!

Old Couch Fund Balance: $123.45
Half.com DD: $55.71
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $179.16

Happy October everyone!! It's my FAVORITE month!!!

Some small additions to my $20 Challenge:

Old Couch Fund Balance: $92.24
September Interest: $0.05
10% Paycheck: $31.16
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $123.45

Old House Fund Balance: $490.68
Withdrawl for bills: $-290.68
------------------------------------
Updated House Fund Balance: $200.00
September Interest: $0.96
------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $200.96


And I sold a book for $60 on half.com today, but I will wait to add that in until I get the direct deposit from them in the middle of the month.

Just got a half.com direct deposit into my account this afternoon. What a nice surprise! I didn't think I'd get it for another week or so. More to the Challenge.

Old Couch Fund Balance: $69.53
Half.com DD: $22.71
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $92.24

What a great money day!

Made a sale on Ebay this week. Yay! It was enough to cover a want I bought, and to still put a chunk into savings.

Old Couch Fund Balance: $24.53
Ebay Sale: $45.00
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $69.63

Worked at the tarot store last night. 4 hours and I brought home $51. $40 will be for groceries today and the farmers market tomorrow, the 6 $1 bills I had went into my change jar (that eventually goes to the bank) and $5.00 into my challenge for my 10%.


Old Couch Fund Balance: $2.53
Tarot 10%: $5
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $7.63

I sold 3 books on half.com this week. I made $11.44. I am adding $9.32 to my House Fund to total that at $500. The remaining $2.12 is going into a new savings fund.

We desperately need a new couch, so I am starting a savings for that. $2.12 plus the $.51 already in that account.

Old House Fund Balance: $490.68
Half.com: $9.32
------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $490.68


Old Couch Fund Balance: $.51
Half.com: $2.12
------------------------------------
New Couch Fund Balance: $2.63

I got a $3 deposit in my paypal account today for doing a Pinecone survey. I'll add that to the Challenge.

Also, I am adding $38.80 to the Challenge. I finally got my refund for some medical expenses from a couple of months ago. So, 10% went to the Challenge.

Oh yeah, and my whopping $.94 interest from August.



Old House Fund Balance: $447.94
Interest, pinecone, and med reimbursement: $42.74
----------------------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $490.68

I should have known. I had a great big deposit placed into my $20 Challenge account, and I find out I was overdrawn on my checking account due to my check not clearing when I thought it did. The result?

I paid a lot of bills and kept getting over limit fees. Pardon my language, but FUCK!

Took the money from my $20 Challenge account to cover it all. Ick.

Old House Fund Balance: $592.94
Withdrawl for fees: - $145.00
--------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $447.94

I recieved my freelance check for the work I did this past month. It was a good amount, so I was able to pay bills and throw some extra on the CCs.

However, a big check means a big 10% deposit.

Old House Fund Balance: $375.94
10% Freelance check: $217.00
--------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $592.94

Whoo-hoo!!!

I haven't beena round much this month. I think part of it is because money is so tight, and I don't have a lot to blog about. I do notice, however, that when I blog close-to-daily, I am better at staying on track.

I'm kinda bummed I missed my blog-o-versatry here. I missed it last year, too.

I had a job interview this past week. Seemed to go pretty well. She even told me during the interview that she had another position in mind for me. Whoo-hoo! And, after stating that they never did this in interviews, she asked what my availability was. Sounds promising!

Not much else has been going on. I sold a few items on ebay the last two weeks. Most were small $5) items, but I did sell a Mickey Mouse pen I had for almost $30. It's a pen I was given years ago (like 15 years ago) when I was big into Mickey stuff. I've never even used it; it just sat in its box all these years. So I listed it, thinking I'd get maybe $10 at the most for it. But the winning bid was for $27.55. Not too shabby!

As a result of the ebaying, I've made $50.78. It's a nice little chunk of change for barely any work. I wish I could add it all the the Challenge, but I am STILL not working full time yet, so I am going to follow the 10% rule.

And when I checked my balance in this account the other day, it was $3 higher than my records say it should have been. Somewhere along the line I added in an extra $3 and I didn't note it, so I am adding in to the total now.

Old House Fund Balance: $367.86
10% Ebay Income: $5.08
Extra surprise: $3.00
--------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $375.94

Another 10% to go into the Challenge.

Old House Fund Balance: $365.66
10% Tarot Income: $2.20
--------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $367.86

A little for the chalenge:

Old House Fund Balance: $355.66
10% Tarot Income Yesterday: $3.00
10% Tarot Income this morning: $4.80
10% CITB: $2.20
--------------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $365.66

CITB is the spare change I rolled up this month. Had a total of $22 in change..whoo-hoo! I wish I could have thrown it all in the challenge, but with little income, we need all we can get. So, for now, it is the 10% rule.

And although I worked at the tarot store this morning (made $48) I am going back for another shift tonigh from 6-10. Another $50 would be nice!!

I worked at the tarot shop today from 9-5. Long day, but it was fun and I made some decent money. I made $76, so 10% is going into my Challenge.

Old House Fund Balance: $348.06
10% Tarot Income: $7.60
----------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $355.66

Got a $3 check from Pinecone today. Adding to my Challenge.

Old House Fund Balance: $345.06
Pinecone: $3.00
----------------------------------
New House Fund Balance: $348.06