Driving back from REI after failing to buy her new winter gloves (that don't freeze her fingers off - we're going for mittens this time)... F suggested that we stop and get the mail (we have a ganged box for our whole street).

She brought it back to the car and listed off "boring thing, boring thing, Highlights Magazine! Yay!" And I took the "boring things" into the front seat. Well - they were NOT boring. I saw an envelope from a solar panel company... and it was a referral check! I made some referrals a loooong time ago, and sort of forgot about them. I didn't know that one of my referrals got panels!!! The check is for $500!!!!!

D is also over the moon because we had already decided that we were taking F to Phoenix to do a soccer camp with her idol/hero/role model Meghan Klingenberg. This helps so much!

Anyway, I got online and bought F some gloves that we saw at REI... and I bought them through REI, but on the website they were 50% off! We also got her a 50% off balaclava so that she's prepared when soccer starts outdoors in February (indoor is in January).

I so want to go deposit this check, but it's Sunday....

We are having our neighbor over for cake and tea/coffee because we haven't seen her all Christmas, so I need to go feed everyone lunch (big salad and garlic bread) and get the cake going...

Not-so-frugal:
- We went cross country skiing yesterday (super fun!). It was not in the forest but at the groomed trails, so we had to buy trail passes ($60). D rented his gear ($10).

Frugal:
- F and I have our own skis and boots, so maybe it is frugal...and maybe not so bad compared to downhill (we don't downhill ski, but a lot of our friends do). We made sandwiches at home and ate in the warming hut on the trails. Got to talk to lots of nice people!

Not-so-frugal:
- D bought new wiper blades for his car.

Frugal:
- He put the wiper blades on himself rather than paying someone to install them.

Frugal:
- Went to Target and bought half priced wrapping paper. Also a shirt that F loves in the next size up for $5 on sale. I have a little stack of "favorites" in the next size.

Frugal:
- We joined our friends at their club today to go swimming (indoors of course!). I insisted on paying the guest fee, and they insisted on me not paying it. I insisted again, and my friend reminded me that I had them over for Christmas dinner and did almost everything (which I was so happy to do!) and that she wanted to do something nice for me. Sometimes when I think of my friends, I just want to cry because I'm so thankful for the support (particularly since we don't live near family).

Not-so-Frugal:
- Our NYE celebration will consist of lots of special foods... it wasn't inexpensive, but a lot less than going out to a big party or getting champagne or something. We don't drink... but we do love to eat!

Now... on to 2016! Lots of super exciting things planned including a visit to D's family in the UK (and an add-on trip to Croatia), a trip to LA to see my family, spelling bee, more soccer, and a few things in the works. Most of this was already paid-for last year. I am really looking forward to a year filled with wonderful experiences rather than stuff.

I am at the school gym right now while F has basketball practice... and since I have internet access (I know the secret password!), I just did some end-of-year financial stuff.

I paid myself reimbursables and mileage.

I also sent an additional amount to each of our Roths - so we've now met the maximum of $5500 per year each. D also contributed to his work 401k up to the match. I will take a distribution from my business in early January to cover the additional Roth amounts (it's a little over $2000). I am also putting $5000 from the business into my SEP (that is with the profit I made this year in the business which was about $11k total). The rest of the profit will remain in the business.

I also worked out my salary for 2016. I am increasing it a little bit. It won't hurt our chances for tuition assistance at F's school because we don't have any chances for tuition assistance anymore since the value of our Dublin house is too high. I guess the equity in our house here is also a factor. If the Dublin house was an IRA instead, it would be different (and that's really what the Dublin house is, but that's not how they see it).

Other financial stuff:
- estimated taxes are coming up
- I have to do the office quarterlies for Q4
- I have to do a bunch of billing now for the end of 2015!

The rest of this can wait, though, because we are going to drive up to Red River tomorrow to go x-c skiing! This is our new year's gift to ourselves! Then it's New Year's Eve which will be spent at home eating lots of nice hors d'oeuvres (we just do nibbles on NYE, no real dinner). Then New Year's Day - and we have a party to go to... it's one of the families at school and they have a VERY fancy house (they are really nice people); it's kind of fun, and D didn't go last year, so he's looking forward to it.

I have to say, and I realize I'm rambling now, if I had that much money, I'd spend it differently. I like our smaller house, and I don't need a grand piano or a $100k car. I would travel A LOT though. I'm surprised at how there are so many wealthy families at school and only a few of them are adventurous travelers. Most spend their vacations either in Hawaii (ok, I would LOVE to go there) or Telluride (which is pretty close to us).

If you had that kind of money, how would you spend it?

Well, it's snowing... a lot! The City just sent an advisory that no one should drive unless absolutely necessary. They have like two snowplows for the whole city. That may be a little bit sarcastic, but not much. Most of the plows are people with plows on the front of the their pickups who just clear snow (maybe sub-contract with the City?).

Anyway, we just took stock and we have a ton of food! We wrote down three days worth of really nice meals, and I don't have to be anywhere until Monday at noon.

Also have a puzzle going, a bunch of shows to watch and a load of laundry to do! And F and I have our mother-daughter coloring book we got for Christmas... it's the Secret Garden book and we got a set of pentel pens, too.

It's beautiful and quiet outside... I love the snow so much (maybe it's my So. California upbringing, but it never gets old living where it snows; I've been here 23 years).

I hope you're having a great weekend, too!

Little snow flurries all day... we relaxed and played and just hung out.

Then this evening, downtown to see the farolitos and christmas lights. We popped into my friend K's house. It's always great to see her - she is a wonderful person and great hostess... also very glam!

Then home where we had frito pies (one of the least expensive and yet most satisfying meals ever), and the carrot cake just came out of the oven; it needs to cool a little before we frost it. It will be breakfast, too (and I bought some smoked salmon!).

Right now I'm running a bath for me and F in the "big tub." Then we'll crawl into bed and watch a silly Christmas special.

F knows she needs to stay in the bedroom while I put presents under the tree!

I hope you're having a wonderful evening, too!

I really want to start thinking about next year's goals, but my work just dramatically ramped up! I really want to b concentrating on relaxing, Christmas dinner and 2016, but right now I'm trying to answer bidder questions. We are issuing an addendum on 12/29... crazy!

Anyway, I decided to take a quick minute to look at last year's financial goals and amend them for 2016.

FINANCIAL GOALS
- Retirement - increase from $730/month to our IRAs to $800 per month and increase what D puts in the employee matching plan from $249/month to $265

- Mortgage (our only debt) - Hope to pay down $12,000 in additional principal this year. Total paid to principal for 2016: $0 so far but I have $10 from a Craigslist sale.
Currently will be paid off entirely July 2019.
Owed at the beginning of 2016: $43,109
Now owe: $43,109

- Tuition - increase amount we pay out of our budget from $750 to $800 (which will reduce the amount we take from school savings each month and stretch that out until we pay off our mortgage)

- Car Savings - continue putting in $150 per month (automatic withdrawal)

Also Christmas Dinner:
- Turkey (brought by my friend M)
- Ham (brought by my friend B)
- Potatoes Dauphinoise (me!)
- Wild Rice (me)
- Roasted Veggies (me)
- Salad (B)
- Gingerbread cookies (M)
- chocolate cake (me)
- wine (M)

Now for relaxing...

One of the things on my winter break to-do list was to go downtown to our Art Museum where they were having puppet-making for kids.

Once a year at Christmas, the Museum brings out the replicas of the Gustave Baumann marionettes and has a puppet show. The marionettes are beautiful (the originals are too fragile to use). We were just in time for the 2:30 show.

It was magical, held in the beautiful St. Francis Auditorium of the Museum of Fine Arts; it looks like a traditional New Mexican church.

The story was really funny and involved Santo Niño, a little duende (sprite) called Warts, Rosina and her husband Juan and a burro called Miguelito.. and Santa Claus at the end. There were references to Taylor Swift and Martha Stewart and evites... we all loved it!

Afterward, the kids could have their parents take a photo with Santa (the puppet) on their laps (a totally cute twist and the only way we were able to get a picture with Santa this year).

It was a great (free!) thing to do on a cold Sunday afternoon.

More on Gustave Baumann here: http://www.santafenewmexican.com/pasatiempo/performance/theater/wood-stock-gustave-baumann-s-marionettes/article_3527ea39-ed13-5b90-8f6b-991c9498789d.html

It's cold outside, and snowing a little bit, but that's ok because I've done my Christmas shopping. It was going to be just the three of us, but now it's either 9 or 13 people (we still don't know about one family - we're giving them a deadline to decide!).

Meanwhile, we've made up a list of all of the Christmas specials we want to watch... we are not big TV addicts (we watch either a half hour or hour a day), but we love those Christmas specials! We'll spread them out.

We've already watched "Back in Time for Christmas" which is the Christmas version of "Back in Time for Dinner." (That's the show where a family experiences the food and lifestyle of each decade since WWII - totally fascinating especially with rationing). Have any of you seen this? It's brilliant and challenged a lot of my assumptions about food.

Here are the others on our list:
- Supershoppers do Christmas
- Bear Goes Wild with Barack
- Eat well for less at Christmas 28 days
- Tigers about the House - What Happened Next (we saw the original of this, and can't wait to see what happened next!)
- The Secret Life of Children at Christmas
- Gogglesprogs
- Great British Bakeoff Christmas Masterclass

In our busy-ness this week getting ready for the holidays, I completely forgot to tell you about Phoenix!

We went last Friday night to see the US Women's National Team (USWNT) - the women who won the World Cup in soccer! - play China. It was the second to last game of their Victory Tour, and Abby Wambach's second to last game.

Wow, wow, wow!!! What an incredible weekend! This was F's primary Christmas gift, and both sets of grandparents made contributions.

We had fourth row center seats, and we even had F's favorite players (Meghan Klingenberg and Tobin Heath) on our side of the field.

The entire weekend was fun, and we were there with another one of F's soccer teammates. They wore their warm up pants and training jackets the whole time.

Now we're gearing up for Christmas, but no big gifts. We did get her a Tobin Heath jersey and Fifa 2016, though. And a Harry Potter book (Care of Magical Creatures). Also I sewed her a pair of pajama bottoms with some on-sale flannel. And of course a chocolate orange!

I will write about the school Secret Santa debacle in a future post...

I just paid our last mortgage principal payment for 2015... it consisted of $100 gym payment and $20 Craigslist sales.

The totals for the year:
- House value about $600k
- I wanted to pay down $8k in additional principal in 2015
- Actually paid down $10,127
- Our mortgage was $64,601 at the beginning of 2015
- It's now $43,327 (so that is $21,274 of principal from our regular payments)
- If we don't pay down another dime and just make regular payments, we'll pay off the house in July 2019...

... but you know we're not going to do that!

I know that there are good arguments for putting the money into IRA's instead, but these are our reasons for paying off the mortgage:
1. We will need the money to pay for F's school
2. It has trained us to live on less (we might just have spent the money without this goal)
3. When the mortgage is paid off, whatever does not go to the school will go to savings now that we're trained not to spend our excess

And... It's snowing, and I made this chocolate cake for dessert tonight! We'll be eating it for days!
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/9404-chocolate-dump-it-cake?utm_source=sharetools&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=website

There is only a tiny nugget of financial stuff in this story, so be forewarned!

So.... I was driving down to Albuquerque (to the Apple Genius Bar) yesterday from the Community College where I'd just dropped off a brochure/portfolio (looks like I have a project there coming up - hooray!). It was about 10 am.

I passed an elementary school on the right, and after that the landscape is just rolling hills without buildings or houses; no shoulder, but about 30 feet of tall, scrubby brush and then a simple three-strand barbed wire fence after that.

Then I saw a person walking in the brush on the other side of the road, and when the car in front of me got close, he ducked down. He popped back up and I saw it was an 8 or 9 year old boy. When I passed, he ducked down again.

I couldn't stop (no shoulder) so I went another half mile to a fire station (that I designed, so I knew it was there) and told the firefighters what I'd seen. They called dispatch, and I got back in my car to make sure the boy was still there and ok. I found a little turnout off the road, and just watched him in my rearview mirror. I didn't want to scare him.

Eventually, he kind of came near the car, and I called out "hi; are you ok?" He came over to me, and I talked to him for a while. How old was he? Nine. Why wasn't he in school? (He said he was homeschooled but he was in the public school dress code). He said he was "out for a jog." I said I thought his parents would be worried and asked if he was cold (no, he'd been "jogging."). He said the truth was that he was trying to go see his grandparents, and his parents wouldn't let him see them. He gave me an address, and asked if I'd take him there. I told him that I thought it'd be better if he went with a policeman or firefighter.

We talked about 8 minutes or so, and then a cruiser and fire truck showed up. He told them the same story, then they took him into the fire truck to get warm. I talked to the policeman a little longer and we both thought he probably went to the school up the road (yikes!).

When I got back in my car, I was so sad, I felt like crying. I thought of the parents who probably had no idea he was walking along this narrow but busy road by himself.

I have no idea what happened after that, but at least he was safe.

I went to the Genius Bar and ended up with a new phone (exactly the same one I had before but not broken) for $79 even though I am waaaay out of warranty because Apple is good that way and the guy that helped me was really sweet. (That's the financial part of my story; if you're having a problem with your iphone, go to the Genius Bar - they don't charge you to check things out and you may end up with a new phone).

Financial stuff:

- I put the gift money for the teachers in the envelopes, so I can cross that off my list. I had budgeted for this, so it came out of the Gifts for Others category. -$40

- I sold our old fish tank. +$10

- I ate my lunch at home, and did not buy any food out, but I hardly ever do! Still - I am patting myself on the back for this!

- I went to get basketball shoes for F and found that the sneakers I just got her at the Nike outlet were on sale for $25 less than I paid! I am taking the others back to the Nike outlet. -$25

- The basketball shoes are necessary, but I'm a little bugged that they don't make shoes for girls. I got her a good pair that were not name branded. They're blue and grey, and she liked them (phew!) -$40

- I printed out some origami patterns at the office for F; this is for her Secret Santa recipient. I think it's a very clever addition to the origami paper she got her with a half off Michaels coupon! She even did a cover and table of contents. I brought her a report sleeve from work to put it all in. Note that I am not stealing from my employer since I'm self employed!! -$0

- We are sharing a ride down to the airport with a friend (and her daughter, F's friend), then we're renting a car together too, and sharing gas when we're in Phoenix. Savings should be about $40! Plus we love our friends, and it'll be a lot more fun with them! +$40

Here is our list of things to do during the Winter Break. Maybe there are similar things where you live?

Things that are Happening All Month:
- GLOW at the Botanical Garden $9 adults, $6 kids - 5 to 8 pm

- River of Lights in Albuquerque - $12 adults, $6 kids - we haven't done this since F was little, but it's amazing!

- Christmas Eve Farolitos - we do this every year as does everyone where we live - it's free and beautiful. Here's a google search so you can see what it's like: https://www.google.ae/search?q=farolitos+santa+fe&espv=2&biw=1408&bih=689&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwizyLOb18XJAhVJWRoKHUN-CccQ_AUIBigB

- Christmas in Madrid - it's an old mining town that is now an artists' community; they LIGHT UP at Christmas! We're going to the parade tonight (free!!!)

- Ice Skating up at the outdoor rink in Los Alamos $5.25 adults $3.75 kids


General Things:
- Hot chocolate
- Cross country skiing (F and I have our own skis)
- Make christmas crackers - we are saving toilet paper tubes!
- Make nisse logs http://smartgirlsdiy.com/2013/12/danish-nisse-logs-christmas-craft/
- do a puzzle
- build a Trader Joe's gingerbread house
- watch it’s a wonderful life
- make lamps for our dollhouse from toothpaste caps I saved
- make yarn covered tree decorations with the yarn cones my friend Marta gave me - something like these: https://www.google.ae/search?q=yarn+covered+yarn+cones+christmas&espv=2&biw=1408&bih=689&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjW6JjI2MXJAhXKhhoKHbB0CwsQsAQIGQ#imgrc=kxyC199mVf-aUM%3A


Things that are only on a certain date
- Christmas events at our Plaza (but we won't be here!)
- Holiday Faire at the local Waldorf School
- December 29th - make puppets at the Museum of Art downtown
- December 27th 4 pm - Holiday Circus Cabaret - $20 adults and $5 kids tickets online (we already bought our tickets - it was this or Nutcracker!)

What are you planning on doing?

I am happily exhausted!

Another day of cleaning the garage (including a load to the scrap metal place, a giant dumpster load and went through all the paint cans).

I did all my invoicing for work for the rest of the year.

Went up to school to see F in the school Spelling Bee... she came in 2nd which means she's going to the County Bee in January. Her best friend is the one who came in 1st, and they were so happy! They went about 37 rounds together, and then it went off-list.

Then we stayed around school for Basketball practice.

Now.. it's 8 pm and the dishes are done and the kitchen is clean and the tree is glowing. Time to watch a silly tv show (Junior Bakeoff?) before an early sleep.

Hope you had a great day, too!

Organizing for the holidays, decluttering the garage, trying to do my work...

1. F's two advent calendars are almost done, and just in time, too! We have a cookie advent calendar (I cut the fancy-schmancy cookies from Trader Joes - four different kinds of dipped oreos - in half, wrap in foil and put them in the pockets of the fabric advent calendar that Grandma embroidered (we use it every year). The second one is a set of "drawers" and I put a note for each day (often with things we may be doing that day). So the total cost is $6.99 for the cookies (although we really just use half the cookies and she gets the rest in January in her lunches!)

2. I bought two large storage bins at Lowe's today. My idea is to eventually have everything in the garage encased in bins! There was a deal, and with each bin, I got a smaller bin for free... so two bins was actually four.

3. I used a $5 gift card at Target today to buy some Hanukkah candles, mechanical pencils for F and some fancy candy canes. Also a couple of ingredients I need for dinner next week and sugar.

4. I picked up a couple of free magazines (New Mexico Kids and Tumbleweeds) to see what is going on during Winter Break so that F and I can plan a few things. There are all sorts of free programs at the museums. I will list of everything we plan to do in a post tomorrow in case it brings something to mind where you live!

5. I only have one more load of laundry from the week away; I'll have to do it tomorrow.

6. I recently wrote a recommendation for a friend who was looking for a job at the community college. He got the job! And he called me today to say there are some projects there that I might be interested in... so we're meeting tomorrow! That is great news for 2016!

7. The tree is up (it's artificial and has been re-used the past ten years)... we are going to start decorating tonight!

8. Almost all presents are purchased. It's really just little things for F...

9. Why did I take the medal for the 5k we did on Thanksgiving Day? F is keeping her medal, of course; it's her first 5k. But mine is just clutter! I'm tossing it!

We're back from California which was not that warm. Except when we landed last night the cold outside hit us and we all gasped - so I guess it was warmer there after all. And that was Albuquerque; it's colder here.

Overall it was a pretty frugal Thanksgiving. I had packed a few things so that I could make apple pie and red chile sauce. My mom had bought cans of cranberry sauce which I think is just too processed, so we bought some cranberries and I made my own. My mom will take back the cans. Everyone brought dishes to share and we all ended up cooking together stuffed into my mom's tiny kitchen.

We went out for lunch on Wednesday and hot the Korean hot bowl (yum!) but it was a food court, so not that expensive. And then the rest of our meals were at home.

We played Heads Up at Thanksgiving, and the next day had our annual soccer game in the park.

Airport parking was $11, so not too bad for 5 days.

Our neighbor watched our cat, and the dog boarding - well, it's not cheap, but not as bad as some places.

No Black Friday sales for us. I am not a shopper!

Today I bought groceries for the week, and it looks like we're having D's coworkers and spouses over for dinner next weekend. It's casual - so just chile, cornbread... someone can bring a salad, someone else beer or wine. I will probably make a chocolate caramel tart, too.

Here's the meal plan:
roasted veggies and potatoes
tuna melts with tomato soup
fish, broccoli and rice with aoili
chili and cornbread
chicken sausage pasta with white wine sauce
something from the freezer and a salad

I have lots to do today because we are going to California for Thanksgiving tomorrow.

- get ingredients for coleslaw for the 5th/6th grade feast tomorrow
- find a sub for spinning class because I have to be at school pretty much right when spinning starts
- return books to the library
- tidy up house (friends coming into town tonight and this is the only night our travel plans connect, so they're coming over!)
- vacuum up dog hair
- make quick clementine cake for all of us to share tonight
- fold and put away yesterday's laundry
- pack for me and F!
- boarding passes

Tomorrow:
- sandwiches for the plane (we're flying right at dinner time)
- 5th/6th 1 mile turkey trot and feast
- pick up school cookbooks from the printer and take up to school
- a little bit of work (mostly financial stuff to get in order) plus pay renewal on state architecture license

Luckily I don't have a lot of work right now. One project just bid, the other is about to bid. So I may have a nice, quiet holiday season (at least quiet at the office) - wow!

I've finally finished our 2014 (yes, 2014 not 2015) photo book... there is a 50% off sale on photo books that ends tomorrow and I also had a $10 off coupon. Also free shipping.

It was fun to look at photos from 2014 - it seems like a long time ago now! F looked really young... awwww! And that was the year we went to Europe and France, so there were a LOT of photos to include.

I think 2015 was a little more low-key, but I love the everyday photos too.

Do you print photos or do photo books? It's not inexpensive, but so important to me.

For her birthday last June, we got F a new bike because her old one was sooooo small. She rode it once, and it scared her a little bit because it was bigger and had hand brakes and gears. All summer we kept suggesting bike rides and she kept saying no. Then she learned to ride a unicycle, but the bicycle was still too scary (???).

Yesterday she said to me, "I want to ride my bike." We have a river trail a block away (wide and paved), but she wanted to go to the park where there is a narrow circuit of sidewalks and ramps. OK. When she sets her mind to something, she usually achieves what she wants, so we put the bike in the car and went to the park.

She did it - and she was great! We were there two hours and went back today. Now she is really good on her bike, and I said that we could ride the river trail to the park (1 mile) or to downtown (3 miles). I'm so happy for her!

That's my good news for today... It's frugal news, too, because that is a great zero-cost thing to do on the weekends when there isn't snow on the ground.

And here's the frugal meal plan for this week:
S - to a friend's 50th birthday party (not sure if it'll be enough for dinner; if not then home for soup and garlic bread)
M - chicken shepherd’s pie (Rachael Ray recipe that makes enough for lunch the next day)
T - tuna melts and green beans (because when D made the tuna melts last time they weren't that good, and F and I have been craving them ever since)
W - potatoes dauphinoise and broccoli (having these because I won't be making them for Thanksgiving, and they're so good!)
T - frito pies (a Santa Fe specialty! - beans all piled on top of fritos or tortilla chips but fritos are better even though they're kind of gross), cheese, chile not chili, sour cream, lettuce, green onions)
F - pasta with zucchini and goat - yummy recipe with a goat cheese sauce and lemon zest
S - freezer and salad (I have white chicken chile in the freezer)
M - friends coming into town, so probably out to dinner (we have enough money in our "dining out" category)

Sold a bag on craigslist and made $10 today. I have more things to sell; I need to post them! Some of them would be great Christmas gifts, so I think now is the time.

Tomorrow F and I are going to see a movie. You have no idea what a big deal this is! We haven't been to the movie theater in years! Literally years. The last time was a birthday party for a kid in her class. She says she doesn't like watching movies in the theater, but this is one she did want to go to: the Peanuts Movie. And I want to see it, too. And we have a really nice new theater here. We haven't been, but I hear the chairs are super cushy and you can order food! (We'll wait and have dinner at home). Tickets for both of us will be $17. There is $34 in our entertainment category.

It just dawned on me that we'll be in California in two weeks! I am looking forward to seeing everyone for Thanksgiving. We are still working out the menu. I want to make mashed potatoes with red chile sauce (on the side!), but my niece who was going to make brussels sprouts is now making quinoa; we need something green. So maybe I'll make a vegetable, too. I also need to make a dessert (so that I can eat it because regular flour is out for me); maybe something chocolate since my mom is buying a pumpkin pie? I love apple pie, though. Hmmm... I need to think about what I have to bring in my luggage (pans and stuff that my mom doesn't have). And red chile to make the sauce.

We won't need to do a full week's grocery shopping, but obviously I still need to buy some ingredients. After we pay for the dog boarding place, it's an expensive proposition even though my parents graciously pay for our airfare (mostly because they are so relieved not to have to travel to me or my brother). Reminder to sign up for airport parking online for the discount!

Do you have plans to travel for Thanksgiving? Are you helping out with the cooking or doing it all yourself? What kind of budget do you have?

I did a lot of decluttering and getting things in order today including:
- the usual housework
- the usual work-work
- cleaned out the trunk of my car
- entered orders for school pics (we are going to place the order tomorrow evening - net should be about $1800)
- rearranged my pajama drawers so that winter stuff is in the top drawer
- cleaned up F's art supplies in the pantry
- got the old holiday cards out to see what we can recycle. I think we'll use an old card and insert a photo or maybe paste a new photo on top of an old card style that we never used up. I am NOT paying for cards this year!

Other stuff:
I've been trying to sell a bag on craigslist, and the woman wants it but she lives in the next town north which is about 30 minutes away. We're having trouble coordinating. She's having some hard life stuff right now, so I'm not trying to sell it out from under her. We'll work it out, I'm sure.

I have other things to sell on craigslist, but I haven't posted them yet. On tomorrow's to-do list!

Also on tomorrow's list: finish the school recipe book! We need to print a trial copy and get the word out so people can order them as holiday gifts! I know what my mom and dad are getting!

F had a hard day at school today. They got to choose science partners today, but the groups are three kids and she is in a group of four best friends. One friend decided to do it by rock-paper-scissors, and F's friend A was left out. She wasn't in a bad group, but not with any of her best friends. F and I talked because she walked out of school looking super dejected because she was so sad for A and feeling guilty. She said "I think I'm going to talk to S and see if she wants to switch groups with me so I can be with A. Then it's two and two. If S says ok, I can ask the science teacher." I told her I thought that was a great idea and a very caring way to handle the situation. I was thinking of LivingAlmostLarge and her Kindergarten woes! The learning process just continues... F is in 5th grade.

F is quitting piano, and the teacher made a really wonderful gesture (speaking of learning experiences and ways to deal with situations). She said F could just learn a song at a time just to still be involved with music, and that if she gets stuck on how to work out the notes, we can have one-off lessons with her here and there. Brilliant! And a great offer! F is playing "Blank Space" on the piano right now, so I guess that's good!

It's dark now, so I guess time to make dinner. Pasta with red sauce and asparagus.

I was just invited by the interior designer that usually does the furniture for my fire station projects to a Purse Party.

Huh?

I almost trashed the invitation (purses are not really on my radar; I have one small baggallini about 5"x7" that I put my credit cards/phone/fold up brush. into and that pops into my laptop bag; I do not have any other purses).

Here is what the invitation reads:

Sponsored by KI and Pallas Fabrics [note: these are commercial fabric lines for desk chairs and stuff]

Come and view the latest Pallas fabric offerings. Select a bag design with your favorite Pallas fabric(s) and receive your complimentary bag in just a few weeks!

Drinks and hors d'oeuvres will be provided

So it's a free purse, and they're feeding me? Also - this interior designer has daughters, and F went to camp with one of them last summer (they loved each other). I'm going to see if her daughter will be there (I think she will - the interior designer is super sweet and has an afterschool kid area in her office that she's invited F to come to before).

So - what do you think? Should I rsvp yes?

If I go, what should I do with the purse? Keep? Sell on Craigslist (or is that rude?).

It's 4:29 and it's raining, and it's starting to be really dark. F has practice (at least they haven't called it yet) under the lights at the park at 5:30. Brrrr! But the girls are always up for more soccer. I need some heavier clothes!

Tonight's frugal dinner is tuna melts and a salad.

So here's another cost-saving thing: I was told by my Physical Therapist (still working on my back pain) that I should temporarily stop eating sugar. She said it's an inflammatory food, and I'm inflamed, and we need to give it a chance to go down. This should save some money but it's sad because sugar is pretty much the only vice I have left! I was way better after today's visit, so that's good.

This week I also figured out our new health insurance. Do you need to switch insurance for 2016? We do because Blue Cross has pulled out of individual coverage in our state. They wanted to raise premiums 50% and the state said no. Our new plan seems good; I used to be with this company and liked them.

The last bit of news from today: F is one of two kids from her class going to the school spelling bee. This has been a goal of hers since 3rd grade! The other student is her best friend, and they are making plans to study together. Her words were moxie, bewilder and lavender. Not as hard as some of the ones on the list: polemic, platinum... but she knew all of them; they only had two days to study!

Now on my list:
- put drawings in my FTP folder so my client can give them to the Purchasing Department
- finish the school recipe book so we can start selling it for holiday gifts
- meet a contractor at his lot to check him out for completion
- call an accountant to set up an FSA (or something else?)

This week's meal plan:
S - pad thai
M - white chicken chile (will make three additional freezer meals!)
T - mexican eggs and mixed veg
W - tuna melts and salad
T - risotto with peas and goat cheese and sundried tomatoes
F - baked potatoes and broccoli (save leftover mash for salmon cakes the next night)
S - salmon cakes

One more frugal thing: my rear tail light burned out, so we ordered a new bulb (about $6) and D will put it in himself. He replaces tail lights and puts the snow tires on himself, which saves a lot of money!

Oh - and I forgot - I am going downstairs to make a carrot cake in a couple of minutes. I was going to make it yesterday, but there was so much going on. Carrot cake at our house doesn't last long, but I'm sure there'll be a piece for F after school! Her soccer practice is early tomorrow due to the time change (4 pm!). I may be bringing other kids to the practice, too, since it's so early and I stop working at 3 when I go to pick F up from school.

Anything else frugal? Yes! How could I forget! I got $300 from my parents for my birthday! Once again, I am supposed to spend it on myself. D and I need a new duvet. Ours is in fine condition, but it's a full size not a queen, so it doesn't fit in the duvet cover and it doesn't completely cover us. We'll pass on the full-size duvet to F who has a full-size bed and duvet cover.

OK, down to the kitchen... I'm going to listen to the Serial Dynasty podcast while I bake.

Are you baking anything from scratch? Listening to any good podcasts?

Almost Halloween!

Last night we went to a Halloween party - super fun!

Today was a no-school day (conferences), so we all slept in.

Then F and I went for her annual check up and our flu shots. No co-pay for anything, so I was happy.

Then she wanted to go up to school because she forgot her "character sketch" which happens to be my birthday present. I said I didn't know if we'd be able to get in the classroom if it was someone else's conference, but miraculously, we were between conferences. Her ELA teacher was thrilled to see her, and hugged us both, and then gave F the character sketch (which I am not allowed to see until tomorrow).

We saw her preschool buddy on the way in (lots of hugs) and then we saw one of her friends on the way out, and ended up taking the friend out for hot chocolate while her parents (also friends of mine) did a quick errand. Fun! They gave me money for her hot chocolate, but I told her to tuck it in her pocket and give it back to her parents.

Then we went home and carved a pumpkin and roasted the seeds.

F has tennis at 3:30, and I'm cleaning the house a little so I don't have to clean so much on my birthday. I vacuumed and did the litterbox.

So, a quiet but fun and relaxing rainy day. Tomorrow is going to be fun and hectic so I might as well relax now!

I track our budget v. actual monthly, but it's not really that accurate, since some expenses are annual expenses (and in the case of our every-other-year trip to the UK, biennial expenses; let's not even go there).

So I look at my budget v. actual annual to get a better look at how we're doing.

But that's not even very accurate since extra money comes in, and it gets put into savings or pays down some on the mortgage, or goes towards a trip (since travel is where we like to spend found money if we're not saving it).

Spending percentages are a really good way of looking at how we're spending. I do the numbers as percentage of total spending rather than percentage of earnings.

Our goal is:
needs - 50%
wants - 30%
savings - 20%

Our actual for the past year is:
needs - 45% (medical/dental and household repairs categories were higher than budgeted, but we kept our personal and food categories lower than budgeted)
wants -27% (pretty much right on budget except we paid for our UK trip this year; this would have been even lower otherwise)
savings - 27% (due to putting most of our extra money into savings!)

I have percentages for different categories, too, but this gives a good overall picture.

In other good news: F's parent teacher conference/report card!
- ELA (English Language Arts): A
- Social Studies: A
- Math (and she's in the challenge math group!!): A

The only negative is that her work is super messy so it's hard to see sometimes that she got the right answer; they're working with her on this, and the teacher gave me a suggestion to try at home.

Some good money news today!

- David got a raise - $88.18 per paycheck net, so about $176 net per month. This is huge for us! I was having to steal money from other categories to make up about $50 for F's tuition. I am doing the fun bit now: allocating the extra money in our budget.

- His raise also means another $16 into his savings plan at work

- I paid $55 to get a diagnostic on my very, very broken computer. They called me to say that there was bad news and good... Bad news: it's really, really broken (I knew that) - the motherboard is completely messed up. Which I gather is like having your brain removed or something. The good news: Apple is fixing it for FREE under its quality program. I told the guy it wasn't still covered by Applecare, but he said this isn't an Applecare thing. It's a known problem with this computer, so they fix it free no matter how old it is!!! I am amazed and so happy!

- I just got a text from the gym... they want me to sub a class I was going to take anyway. It's not a lot more money, but it'll mean more toward the mortgage.

Here is what is (financially) on my mind right now:

- I bought soup at Sprouts on sale, and it was less than the regular-priced soup at Whole Foods! I was in Whole Foods for something else (chocolate milk for F's lunch) which is also cheaper there, and decided to look at the soup aisle. I can't eat chicken noodle, have to eat chicken and rice. Anyway, I'm going to take the soup back to Sprouts; is it weird to return canned soup?

- When I decided to take back the soup, I noticed that instead of giving me three bag credits at 5c each, they charged me a 31c donation! Donation to WHAT? I guess it was a mis-entered code. I will bring this up when I take back the soup. I usually check my receipt in the car because Sprouts makes mistakes all the time, but this time I was late and didn't have time.

- The photo orders are coming in from school (D does the school and class photos; he used to be a chidrens photographer); so far it's about $600! That is really great, but he is sure working for the money. It takes hours to photograph all the kids (three mornings) and then many more hours to process the photos, then he orders proofs, and I then I enter the orders. Last year he made $3000; I'll let you know how he does this year!

- F is going as Hermione for Halloween. D and I amazingly kept our graduation robes (actually his robes are the ones he wore to formal dinners at Cambridge). He has his high school tie, too! An authentic British student's tie. F actually looks a bit like Hermione; I was going to print out a Gryffindor patch from the internet and put it on the robes.

Then I saw a friend's daughter in a Harry Potter costume, ; it was a very fancy store-bought costume and the patch is a real patch (not printed from the internet).

I felt a little bad about our homemade costume, but F and I discussed it and we both think that it's cooler to have the authentic British version of college robes, and a homemade costume means you spent some time on it. She's going to carry her Beetle Bard book, and we found "wands" when we hiked up to see the aspens change color a week ago.

I'm so glad she's not materialistic, and I'd much rather spend our money on something meaningful. We will give her the money we didn't spend on a costume when we visit the London studio where they filmed Harry Potter next summer, and she can buy something at the gift shop that she really wants (right now, she's thinking about a Hufflepuff scarf - she took the quiz on the website and came out a Hufflepuff; she's very proud of that, too, since JK Rowling herself said "This may surprise people, but it is the truth...In many, many ways, Hufflepuff is my favourite House.")

I'll tell you our Halloween plans in an future post...

- Are you trying for a less commercial Halloween? I hope so, since it's my birthday (yay!) and I always liked the creativity that went into making costumes! I used to make both my costumes and my brother's. I made the poor little boy into a butterfly one year (I spent hours making it so the wings actually worked, but I'm not sure butterfly was his first choice).

Last weekend, in addition to buying our tickets back to the UK, I also had to buy a new computer. Luckily, the old computer was fully backed up. It is very, very broken, but I decided to pay $55 to get it diagnosed; I am going to find out if the cost to repair it is less or more than what it's actually worth. Then I can make a decision.

But meanwhile, I'm typing this on my new computer. Since it's my business computer, my business paid for it. I have a business budget item for a new computer every four years or so.

And then came another large expense... definitely not planned. It looks like we're going to Phoenix in December. I will let you know why in a few days when the plans are firmed up, but it's a good thing, a sort of early Christmas present to ourselves.

We have the money for the plane tickets, and we'll need a rental car and a hotel. Ugh. But all of us are fine with using our Christmas money this way. It's my birthday this Saturday, and I have an envelope from my parents which I think has a check in it; I'll use my birthday money for this trip as well.

I'm trying to be frugal with the grocery shopping since we are spending all this money and because there are five weekends in this month. Meal plan:

Sunday - chickpea flour pizzas and roasted veggies
Monday - soup and garlic bread
Tuesday - very sweet salmon with rice and edamame salad with wasabi dressing (because I have salmon in the freezer)
Wednesday - tostadas
Thursday - big salad with turkey, cucumber, carrots, radishes
Friday - chipotle chicken stew from the freezer and a salad

So here's the good news: YNAB says we have $4778 in our every-other-year-trip-to-Europe-to-see-D's-family category.

This represents $3130 that we've saved up and $1648 from credit card rewards (when we get a statement credit for rewards, we accumulate this money in our account rather than reduce the amount spent on budgeted items).

The tickets for the three of us: $4237. That is $500 left over that can be used for the next trip (in two years' time).

The rest of the trip is paid for from our Irish account. We can stay with D's mum and sister and they feed us, so that's good. When we see D's dad we have to get a hotel, but he will probably take us out to dinner. We'll need to sort out breakfast and lunches.

The second half of the trip is always a family vacation (just the three of us!). Since we're already in Europe, we take advantage of Ryanair's low fares and go to one of their not-big airports. This time: Trieste. We'll be staying in Croatia (I am so, so looking forward to this!).

A word on the high cost of our flights...they are actually quite low (we used 1800 Fly Europe) for us. We live in the middle of the Southwest. If we lived somewhere near an actual International airport, the fares would be a lot lower. The nearest major airport is the Albuquerque International Sunport. Since there aren't international flights originating from this airport, and it's called a Sunport, I can only guess that they have flights to the sun or something.

Amazingly, it was actually cheaper (and way more convenient) to fly from our local airport than have to drive to Albuquerque. This is not the case if we're flying within the US, but overseas, it's always cheaper to start here. Which is great! It means we can leave our car at home and have a friend take us 15 minutes down the road to the airport. If you live in a real city, especially one near the east coast, I think Europe is a lot more accessible.

Anyway, we have the flights, now we just need to fill in the gaps: flights to/from Italy, self catered apartment in Croatia, Premier Inn near D's dad.

It's not the most frugal thing, but it's one of the reasons we're frugal with everything else - these trips back to the UK are not optional since D's family does not come out here (except his mum, a few times). I know there are others on here who are married to people from other countries... travel back is one of your priorities, yes? Do you set aside money each month for trips back? Do you have other ways of saving for this?