Creditcardfree's Personal Finance Blog

My dryer wouldn't start today! And I won't lie, I did think it was likely that I would need to buy a new one. We had looked at some good deals around Black Friday, but went back to we didn't need one yet. I think our set is at least 16 years old, maybe even 18.

But then my desire to DIY the problem kicked in. No the breaker hadn't tripped. Yes, it was still plugged in. Google said a thermal fuse going bad (or tripped) is usually number one cause. So then, despite a snow day here (school and work cancelled), we ventured out to get a thermal fuse.

The business was open. Roads were awful for the first two or three miles after leaving our neighborhood. Packed ice!! But the remainder of the trip was dry or just wet roads. Cost for a thermal fuse was $30.

So we came home (crawled the last two miles in our truck on the ice) and set about finding where the parts were so we could replace. One was easy to access, the other...not easy. We ended up opening the top, the front panel and taking out the entire dryer drum! Yep, taking that drum out worried me the most. But we did watch a YouTube video about it first! There was another back panel we detached and we took out the heating element. I seriously think my husband and I could put these together for a living now that we've seen all the parts!!

The best news is it's fixed! Back in working order and has already dried two loads of laundry.

Actually, the very best news is that part died and we were able to get so far inside...there is a lot of lint that accumulates inside a dryer. Sure most of it likely goes through the vent, but over time a lot of lint accumulates inside. It has been cleaned a few times before, but not this deep. And yes, I know to check the lint trap and the vent to the outside regularly. I'm really glad that we were able to have a reason to clean it out so well. I won't hesitate to open it up again in a year or two and clean it out again.

Oh, we also know how to replace the belt on the dryer if needed. And if I had known we were going to be removing it anyway I may have purchased one while getting the other part. But it still works!

Have you ever fixed a dryer? Or other major household appliance?

It may actually snow today where I live! They are expecting an inch, so school gets out two hours early. As a Midwesterner I have to laugh, but the truth is they don't have the equipment here, nor do people know how to drive in the stuff!

After school lets out, I'm taking the girls to get their hairs cut. We use Great Clips. I usually tip $2 to each stylist, so the cost is $15 each. My husband is getting his hair cut today on post. I think the cost is less than $10, but he usually tips $4! As a percentage, we are both overtipping, but we do think our service people deserve it. These were budgeted in our personal care category.

I received $3 from Pinecone Research yesterday. It is sitting in my Paypal account now. I was notified we will receive an $10 AutoZone gift card for a rebate on headlights we purchased. And after getting our daughter a new cell phone last week, I am sending her old phone in for recycling and expect a $10 bill credit on next month's bill. I love money snowflakes!

The first two days of the year were no spend days. I made the point of going to the library to check out some books to read to keep me busy and focused on healthy eating this month. I love the library for the fact that it costs nothing to browse a book. My sister just mentioned spending $100 at Barnes and Noble recently. I do think some were Christmas gifts, but wow that is a lot of money on books! She also purchased their membership which means she plans to purchase more books there this year.

Have you found any snowflake money this month? Do you use the library?

We did a big grocery store run on New Year's Eve. We were out of quite a few things, but it feels like we overbought. That may be a good thing as we go into the frugal month.

In some ways, I'm not really planning to start until our daughter heads back to school on Saturday. I did however put cash in our Everyday budget categories and it far less than normal. The amount is $783...and that's for half the month. I know, it doesn't sound that frugal. But yet, some of those are needs, and some have a little fluff in them that I hope not to spend at all.



Groceries are lower and I hope to come in lower than I budgeted. My husband and I are dieting this month, so I expect that will help our food budget. Less snacks!

Fuel is the about the same, slightly higher as we have one trip out of town. I also expect a toll bill this month. I hope to keep myself out of stores, thus only driving will be to school and grocery store.

Spending money is normal. Most of that is allowances for the girls. One gets $17, the other gets $125. The remaining $20 should be for the month to cover parking and tips to baggers at the commissary.

Restaurants is at $60 because I expect one meal out for four people when we are out of town. My husband is also using this category for coffee at work. Not happy about this, but the thermos plan didn't pan out, so he buys a cup for $2 almost every day.

Clothing is at just $25. I'd rather put something in there than nothing. If I find some clearance shirts within that budget, I may buy them for my daughter, but for the most part, I am not going shopping. In the end I hope it is saved.

Household goods is at $20. I know we will need dishwasher detergent and dish soap. Most other household items we should be stocked up on.

I did not put anything in Alcohol or Entertainment. We will not be paying for entertainment in the month of January. And I am committed to no alcohol in the month of January. I think my husband is as well.

Personal care is for haircuts and personal care products. We are well stocked at this point. The only thing that could change is the need for some vitamins, but I do have Swagbucks to redeem for Amazon gift cards, so those could be covered that way.

The gifts category would only be used for postage. I may sew my sister a gift for her birthday late in the month, so that is money I would need to mail it to her.

And the Pet category is a need. I bought our cat food for the month and we will need another box of litter.

Now as I said that is really only for half the month. I will replenish groceries and fuel at the mid month payday. And as you can see some balances are less than budgeted that is because some items purchased (like groceries) were bought on December 31 and but came out of the January budget.

It's cold here in the Southeast! Cold enough that school start times are on a two hour delay today. Cold enough the Army is on a two hour delay! As of 8am it is 14 degrees, and feels like 8. Now I know that those of you in the midwest are far colder, and you are still having school and work!

I'm not looking forward to our heating bill. I'm sure many of you feel the same. We were quite mild though for part of the month, so maybe that will help spread out the cost.

Earlier this year, I decided we should start working towards a big goal of saving $200,000 towards our next home. Since we rent it is similar to paying down a mortgage early, especially if you are following Dave Ramsey's Baby Steps.

We already had $40K in equity from previous homes we owned. So the new goal is another $160K to reach $200,000. I think the deadline is by the end of 2023, which is six years from now.

The amounts I earmarked towards the Big Goal this year came to $6,836.39! It's actually more than I thought it might be. I know I had around $2K in June according to one post I found where I reported it. I only came up with the idea in March of this year, so to save nearly $7K in 9 or 10 months is pretty good.

So in the end we can say we have $46,836.39 saved for our next home. Like Amber I'm tempted to add a little more to get it to an even number! I'll have to look at our budget categories and see if I can make that happen.

While I'd like to be on a faster pace with this goal, I knew that the first couple years would be slower with paying for college. It's when my husband gets his next raise that it will likely move faster.

I am very pleased that I started, since I know from experience if I don't make a plan for the money it gets frittered away. Maybe some of it still is, but at least I know have much more than I started.

So now on to 2018 to save even more towards the Big Goal!

I was watching a few videos about no spend, low spend months on YouTube. I know many here are participating in Frugalwoods Uber Frugal Month Challenge in January. It brought the question up, what do you do with the money you save by not spending so freely?

My guess is many of these types of challenges came about in order to pay down more debt or to save more for emergency funds, or even specific savings goals.

I am just beginning to ponder our specific why for this January Challenge. What will we do with the money? Here are a few ideas I'm pondering:

Vacation fund
College funding
Big Goal

I also could split the savings amongst all of these! The college needs are the probably the most important in 2018. Our daughter will take summer classes, tuition due mid June, which needs to come from our current cash, rather than the small amount (okay almost $5K) in her Educational Savings account, which right now I'm saving for spring 2019 semester. The vacation is a bit unknown, but sure would be nice to get away sometime soon with our girls before they start going there separate ways in life. And as always, if I can squirrel money away to the Big Goal that makes a big difference in the long run.

So what will you do with the savings, if you are participating in a no spend, low spend or uber frugal month?

December interest earned from all cash accounts is $99.14. Starting to approach $100!

I expect that we will exceed $100 a month in interest earned in the coming year. I have added even more cash, specifically $8,000, to higher interest accounts. And it seems interest rates have finally started creeping back up. That is a big deal for savers. We have had a lot of years with very low interest rates. We are earning 1.4% on our online savings account and between 2.0% and 2.25% on three different CDs.

I will include all 2017 interest in my Big Goal total since I am using that money to help meet that goal.

We officially ended 2017 with $500,483.61. Even if we made it by one penny, I'd be thrilled. This was always my hope for this year. And I knew it had to be a year of high returns to make it. Definitely happy dancing!!!

Last year's ending balance was $392,814.02. That's a change of $107, 669.59 or 27.4%.

We contributed the max to our Roth IRA's, $5,500 each. My husband turned 48 this year, so soon we will be able to contribute even more each year. Specifically, in 2019 we will be able to contribute an additional $1000 for him. Luckily, this should be the same year our oldest daughter will graduate with her two bachelor's degrees.

In 2017, my husband contributed $10,067.11 of his base pay to the TSP. Total retirement contributions were $21,067.11 for 2017. Our total retirement contribution is 18% of our gross income.

I haven't decided yet if we will increase our retirement contribution to my husband's TSP. It's tempting to increase another 1%. I need to do some calculations once the new withholding and tax calculator's come out.

I want to point out that it is NEVER too late to start saving for retirement. Anything you save for it is better than nothing. And over time it adds up! Increasing 1% a year isn't noticed particularly if you get a raise of at least that amount.

How did you do with your retirement savings?

More clothes buying today. Another two shirts purchased for college daughter at JC Penney. Spent $35 after $10 coupon. Considering she is no longer growing and we don't buy clothes that often it was money well spent.

Our family went out to dinner tonight. It was planned and budgeted knowing that it would be nice to go out once while our daughter is home on break. Not sure what we spent, but it wasn't a high end restaurant. Dinner for four people adds up even at fast casual restaurants.

I'm looking forward to doing year end final tallies of retirement totals, interest earned, and Big Goal money.

This post may be a bit all over the place...several money thoughts on my mind this morning that I simply want to share.

We bought a new camera just before Christmas. We have been without one for about two years. I personally could probably have passed, but my husband seemed very interested. He has made a great point of using it over the last several days, getting pictures and video of our family. We took a family picture to send out on Facebook. The cost of the camera was $299, plus tax. He also bought an HD SD card. I was mad about that part initially, but I do see it has some better features than some older cards we have, so I will deal. I applied my husband's birthday money that he hadn't yet spent, and the remaining Christmas budget to cover most of it. After that I just took some cash from other budget areas so we can make it work.

We shopped for some grocery and personal care needs at Target yesterday. I used a $2 coupon along with the gift cards I bought for 10% off after Thanksgiving. So no new money out of pocket for things we needed. I was thinking of going to the store again, but I think I'm going to see if we can make it through Friday or Saturday night and just get our regular groceries for the first week in January.

Our final 2017 education and retirement contributions have been made. We added $2K to our youngest's Coverdell account and maxed out our Roth IRA's. These are all on automatic investment from our checking account, so it's easy to make it happen. I will need to double our payment in 2018 for our daughter's final contributions. She turns 18 in July, after which we we can no longer contribute. I think I may actually just take $1000 from savings and put it in for January. and then continue our regular $166.66 for the first six months of the year as we usually do. I can pay ourselves back the $1000 to savings for the remainder of the year.

I'm working on financial goals for 2018, but I need more time to focus. It's a little busy around here this week, with both girls off school and my husband home from work!

Our Discover statement closed the other day. We earned $15.53 in rewards. I'm going to redeem those and put them towards the Big Goal.

I transferred $8K we had in a second checking account to FNBO Direct yesterday. They have 1.4% interest rate, which is far better than our checking account.

We are about to buy my daughter a new cell phone. Her's is 3.5 years old, barely holds a charge and the camera on it no longer works. She is going to get the same phone I have, it will cost us $13 a month for the next 24 months. Since I charge our Verizon bill to US Bank for 5% back we will also get that same discount on the cost of the phone as well, which adds up to $15 in the end. But we will take it!

And finally, we are very close to purchasing a new laptop computer for our youngest daughter to take to school in the fall. We are going to buy it from the university she is going to attend. They offer a four year warranty, a discount and no sales tax. It's a Dell that will work for her engineering study needs. Cost will be $1299. I currently have $1,047 in the budget for it. We should have the rest of the money on Friday when my husband is paid.

Thanks for sticking with me on all my thoughts!

May you see the blessings already abundant in your life right now before the gifts, food and gatherings. We all have things we can be grateful for and they are not dependent on a holiday of perfection.

Wishing you peace today, tomorrow and always!

Merry Christmas!

With my husband's VA benefits my daughter gets a book stipend of $1000 per year. We received a payment of $708.33 in August. We have been notified that the remaining amount of $291.67 will has been sent. We have not yet received it though. I'm expecting it will likely come later this month along with a partial payment for December housing.

All is on track to receive all tuition paid next semester. She is signed up for 19 credit hours! We will continue to receive housing payments monthly for $1,112. They do prorate based on numbers of days in the month. So December, January and May will all be prorated.

After this spring semester, she will have one more full semester of benefits. Our plan is to use that next fall, although I may need to do the math and see if it would be better to use it her final semester, which is currently planned to be Fall 2019.

I've said it before. I am very grateful for this benefit that we have been able to pass on to our daughter's for their education.

It looks like one of our money market accounts has raised their interest rate again! Money we have there will now earn 1.4%. It wasn't that long ago that it was earning just 0.95%. This is at FNBODirect if interested.

I also noticed that our Chase Freedom credit card is offering 5% cash back for the first quarter of 2018 for cable, internet and phone merchants. I think I'll take them up on that offer and pay our cable bill, Netflix and Ooma bill with that card. I already get 5% back on our wireless phone bill with US Bank, so I will leave that alone, but will pay the other two with Chase Freedom January through March. May only net me a few dollars, but I'll take it. Oh, and gas stations are included as well for the same quarter.

Starting to ponder goals for January, financial and others. I usually won't have those quite together until mid month of January, as that is when my husband's new pay starts. He is getting a raise, another $187 pretax per month to work with. This should go to the Big Goal. Some will go to retirement since we put 11% in his TSP off the top. I was disappointed for a second year in a row that our housing allowance did not increase. Based on the market around here, it does make sense. Not much I can do about it. It is what it is.

Let's talk credit card rewards. This probably wasn't our best year, and I honestly, wasn't focused on getting the best rewards all the time. I made a decision to use one credit card almost exclusively, thus the rewards earned on other cards were done for specific reasons.

The primary card we used this year was the Chase Southwest Premier Visa. It offers 1 point per dollar, and 5 points for Southwest purchases. My goal was to earn enough points to buy our daughter's Christmas roundtrip ticket. We succeeded! Her flight was 20,520 points. In total we earned 33,375 points on purchases. There was another 1617 from flying, 3,000 for a bonus and 6,000 as an anniversary bonus. We still have 26K points remaining.

All other credit cards earned cash back. I will list from largest to smallest.

US Bank $86.37
We use this card nearly exclusively for 5% back on our wireless phone bill.

American Express 1 $80
Redeemed $25 in cash from purchases, and received $30 in credits for our cable bill, and $25 from Boxed.com. I have $9.91 earned from purchases, but need to meet the $25 threshold to redeem.

USAA $77
We redeemed points earned on purchases for $77 cash back.

Target Red Card $37.34
Based on our spending and the 5% discount this is how much we saved.

American Express 2 $26.50
Redeemed $25 in cash from purchases. Also $1.05 credit for some purchase (maybe the cable bill offer from 2016?) We have $18.62 in rewards, but cannot redeem until hitting the $25 threshold.

Chase Freedom $17.36
I've been using this card for purchases at Walmart the last few months for 5% cash back. I try not to shop at Walmart, but honestly it is the closest discount store to me. I liked it better when I lived 5 minutes from Target!

Discover $5.75
We barely used this card this year. I have used it in the last couple months for 5% back for Amazon.com purchases. Luckily many of my purchases with them have been with gift cards.

I wish I could remember what the flight we redeemed for points would have been in dollars. I think around $400-$425. I know the year before I redeemed points for what would have been a $600 ticket. I used more points for that one.

All the cash cards come up to $330.32.

Again, not the best year, and most of that was due to looking to earn miles rather than cash. I did like using just one card most of the year. That makes things pretty simple. But the tradeoff is less cash.

I will need to decide if I want to make any changes in the coming year as to which cards we use. Or if we even open or close any cards. I do expect we will fly more in 2018. it may be more of my husband and I going to see our girls than them coming to see us. We will see.

Also a caveat to anyone reading that doesn't know our history with credit cards. We DO NOT every carry a rolling balance on credit cards that would accrue interest. I make a point to pay off all charges on our credit cards each time my husband is paid, which is twice per month. I do not suggest you open credit cards for rewards if you are going to be accruing interest as a result because you will likely earn more in interest than you will make in rewards.

I sold another item on eBay today. I net about $15. Not bad for a used clothing item I was no longer wearing!

That money will go to the Big Goal. More on that can be found on a page on my sidebar if you aren't sure what I'm referring to.

Spending has been minimal, except I ran to the store today to pick up some things to help my daughter cope with a cold. She arrived home from college on Saturday and was recovering from another cold. It seems she picked something else up along the way home.

In other news, we have had a few days of warmer weather, with rain coming tomorrow. I enjoy these mild days knowing it keeps our electric bill lower.

I'm working on some year end posts. More to come soon!

We finally hit another retirement milestone today! And it's a big one at half a million dollars. Happy Dancing!!

Exact total at today's close for all of our accounts is $501,160.59. The change to our balance from Friday was $3,450.92. Yep, one day of trading can make that much of a difference in one day. The more you have the bigger a small percentage impact can make on the total balance.

We were at $392,814 at the very end of 2016. I really did want to reach $500K this year. I knew it would have to be a very good year to make it happen. So grateful it did!

Seriously...start investing if you have not yet! It compounds over time. Just 14.5 years ago we had $25K invested for retirement. You will have nothing if you don't start. And it is never to late to start. Something saved is better than zero saved.

Our retirement balances are close to another milestone. Actual amount at the close of today is $497,709.67...

half a million get ready!!

Honestly, I'm a little stunned. It's really hard to believe that just 14 years ago we had just $25K.

Invest. You won't regret it!

I've done more earning on

Swagbucks than I realized this year. I had taken some time off from it in the past because it can be a time suck. Usually, I just do it when I'm watching television (which is rare) or hanging out in the evening (not as rare).

I redeemed all but $25 of my Swagbucks for Amazon gift cards. I redeemed amounts ranging from $3 to $25. I think I often would redeem the smaller amounts when I knew I had an upcoming purchase on Amazon, so I would redeem to get some cash off those purchases.

The $25 that was not for Amazon was Paypal cash. I applied that money to my Big Goal (see side bar for explanation).

The total amount of cash equivalents redeemed in 2017 was $472! Almost $500. I do have enough Swagbucks to redeem for $15 right now. I will likely earn more and redeem in January. If I redeem before I will update this post with the correct amount earned!

Did you earn Swagbucks this year? How much did you end up with?

Check them out if you want to earn some gift cards and cash! My referral link is at the top!

I just printed my USPS shipping labels for two packages that I will have picked up at our house on Monday. The cost was $32.05. It really does feel like shipping has increased a lot! Luckily, this did fit into my Christmas budget.

I've mentioned before that our Christmas budget is $600. I allocate half of that for our daughters. The remainder is split between my husband and I, my parents, two nieces, and my mother in law. This year I came in under budget, primarily due to using Swagbucks (redeemed for Amazon gift cards) for some purchases and buying some items used for my daughters. Both daughters are used to getting used. I did squeeze in a two pairs of socks for my sister and brother in law. See my Socks for Christmas post about that.

Here's what we spent:
Mother in Law $53 (check for $50 and $3 to ship it with pictures)
Sister's family $99.70 (includes $18.85 for shipping)
Parents $46.83 (includes $13.20 to ship)
Daughter 1 $115.94
Daughter 2 $44.75 (bought used and used Amazon gift cards)
Daughter's shared gift $64.65
Husband $62.16
CCF $58.38
Total $545.41

Technically, I went over budget for my husband and he went over for me. We were suppose to only spend $50 each. I bought him an extra gift of a saute pan (since he uses one every morning and we had to toss our old one out).

Now I must not have accounted for everything correctly, as the balance in my Christmas budget on YNAB shows a balance of f$103.12. The numbers above come from receipts.Maybe I lost a few. I do know of $10 that was for paper plates and lights. And I think another $20 may be for gifts I bought with Target gift cards, but were not recorded as Christmas in YNAB. So I'm slightly off above in my total spending as YNAB has to be a bit more correct.

The good news, we are under budget! I have $103 to be used for something else. I'm thinking a donation might be a good idea.

I was balancing our checkbook on YNAB today and found a transaction that should have been recorded on our credit card. Turns out it was already recorded there too! So a double recording means that transaction can be deleted. That put $140.54 back into our budget.

I should probably put it towards the Big Goal, right?

It's tempting to throw it into a few other pots for some other short term savings goals. We are probably going to buy our youngest daughter a laptop (for college) here in the next month, if I can pull the cash together.

Heck, I will put it towards the Big Goal...I can always pull it out if needed.

We are doing really well this pay period with spending. Out of about $1000 budgeted for our variable expenses this pay period we still have $230 left.

We did get pizza takeout on Friday night for $15.10. We rented a digital movie from Amazon the weekend before last for $4.27. Personal care has only consisted of two haircuts and about $20 in personal care products. Household goods spending is under $20, buying paper towels, all purpose spray, an adapter for my car charger and a few other items I can't remember. Really good deals on all of those.

Most of spending was on groceries and extras for holiday baking, fuel, and allowances for the girls. I have been buying more organic ingredients and making things from scratch like soups. I think these are expanding my grocery bill some. Does anyone here use Better than Bouillon? I use pre made stock or broth for my soups. Yes, I know you can make it but that isn't the direction I want to go. Traditional bouillon is very salty, and I understand this product has less salt.

It remains to be seen if we spend much more before Friday, but I think the leftover cash will likely go in the clothing budget which currently only has $80. My oldest daughter says she is in need of winter shirts. She swears she only has three! I guess when they are away at college we just don't shop that much! We won't need all that money, but I will put it there to be prepared. I could also use a new pair of casual dress shoes. I expect there to be some good sales in the coming weeks after Christmas.

Wow! We spent nothing yesterday. It was a rainy cold dreary day. We stayed inside the entire day. It ended up being very restorative. We didn't have anything we HAD to do.

I know many people probably spent their Saturday shopping, possibly for the holidays. However, my Christmas shopping is basically done! I do have to return two items to Kohl's that I ordered online. They sent me socks in the wrong colors! What's up with that? These are socks I plan to put in my daughter's stockings (a tradition). So those will go back to the store and I will look for something else. And then I am done!

I did make Double Chocolate Mint cookie dough. It needed to chill overnight, so I hope today to roll dough and bake them. That was fun and festive to accomplish. Baking is one of the things I look forward to at Christmas. I had all the ingredients on hand as I planned ahead and purchased what I needed in November.

We watched the Army Navy football game on television in the afternoon. It was a tough game for those players as Philly was getting snow. Army did beat Navy 14 to 13. Very exciting!!

We ate fried rice for dinner. We put shrimp in it, so it was quite filling and satisfying on a cold dreary evening. Then it was time to settle down again and watch a couple episodes of The Crown on Netflix.

My planning in November paid off with a day of relaxation! I'm expecting many more as the month of December progresses. I'd like to spend some of the downtime in the coming weeks really getting a clear picture about our financial goals in 2018. There are a lot of changes next year we need to navigate.

How was your Saturday?

I watch a fair number of YouTube videos. There are several out there right now for which the them is what they do not buy at Christmas. I thought I'd throw my take on it. Join in if you want!

I do not buy ribbons, bows and gift tags.
I still have gallon size ziplock bag of bows that I bought easily ten years ago that we reuse for gifts here at our home. Gifts that are not for us, are usually being stuffed in a car or a box, thus do not hold up well with bows and ribbon. I'm currently using up some blank address labels and free gift tags stickers. I simply write the name and stick it to the back of the gift. When I run out of free options, I will simply write directly on the package. Old cards you receive can be turned into a gift tag. I've even used cards stock I have on hand.

I do not buy live Christmas trees I have two artificial Christmas trees. One is from when I was a child, bought in the mid 1980s. And the second one was bought at the end of season at Target about three years ago. I paid $20. I expect at some point we will downsize and pass one of the trees to someone else to use, but I have enjoyed having two trees while living in larger homes. The trees are our main decorations.

I do not buy holiday music or movies We own Polar Express and about 6 discs of music. We have owned those for years, but as things have gone digital and streaming is available online we simply use free options for our listening and viewing needs.

I do not buy new gift bags. Years ago when my girls were in elementary school I bought some classic red and green gift bags through a fundraiser. I use these gift bags, along with others we have received gifts in over and over. I tend to keep the ones that are just red and green, so they all coordinate. And when I buy gift wrap, I choose ones that can be for kids or adults and stay with the red and green theme. I probably only buy four rolls of gift wrap every three years. I did use up one roll this year, so I expect to hit the clearance sales and pick up one or two. I also limit the amount of tissue paper I use by taping the top of the gift bag. No tissue needed!

I do not buy Christmas themed items This one is a bit all encompassing. I don't buy Christmas jewelry, special outfits, napkins, tableware or plastic storage containers.

For the most part you can probably tell, we just reuse what we have purchased in the past. The stockings for the girls are the only ones they have ever owned. Picking a classic style helped, not feel the need to replace something that was dated.

A few other places where our Christmas spending is limited, is we only buy two new ornaments a year. These are for our girls. I usually buy those ones at World Market for $2.50 each. Or I find some on clearance the year before. I currently only send three Christmas cards. One to my parents, one to my mother in law and one to my oldest daughter at college. Next year I will send four since my youngest will be at college. I did run out of cards this year, so that is another item I will buy on clearance at the end of the season.

Tell me what you don't buy during the holiday season.

Not sure if I mentioned this yet on the blog, but I bought a neighbor and friend an amaryllis bulb for Christmas. I planted it in a pot with soil about mid November, with the plan to give it to her December 1.

The bulb shot up like crazy, so I had to give it to her early (November 27) because I didn't want her to miss the flowering! The most important part!!

I can't tell you how excited she was to receive it! I mean I even told her the pot was found in my garage...spent very little on the bulb ($6). I knew she would like it as she loves plants and is quite an outdoorsy person.

The gift has even given me joy, because she keeps sending me pictures of it as it has grown and started to bloom. I have to say this is one of the very best gifts I have ever given, simply because of the joy and appreciation my friend has for it. And even better it cost me so very little!

Here's the flower today. Sorry it is sideways...not sure how that can be correcedt. May try it later. But you get the idea!



What is a simple gift that you have given that has brought much joy to the recipient?

I'm making a point in the next week to use up some of the food items we have that need to be used up.

In the freezer I have about 1 cup of frozen blueberries, one serving of sweet potato fries, 1/4 cup of diced onion, and diced butternut squash (three cups).

In the pantry, there is a box of pasta with at least one serving in it. Raw popcorn, enough to make one batch for a snack. I also see we have a lot of pretzels! I think we are burnt out on those...need a way to season or change the taste. Oh, just remembered I have 1/2 cup of chocolate morsels that I could drizzle over some of them. I don't want to sweeten all of them. Too much sugar this time of year.

In the fridge, there's several inches of ginger that I need to use. I think I will make a ginger tea with that. I also have heavy cream, and almond milk to use up. Heavy cream can go in coffee. The almond milk need to be used up making steel cut oats in the crockpot.

This morning I used up three slices of bread from the freezer. I toasted them and used up almost all of the apricot jam.

I think we are keeping up with most of the fresh produce, so that is good! I think I need to get moving in the kitchen this morning to get some of these things ready for eating!

Spending is high this time of year. Look at what you have that can fill in for snacks or make a meal. You might save some cash at the grocery store!

I had an email this morning that our Netflix subscription amount is changing from $11.99 per month to $13.99 a month. Sounds like their will be more programs and the ability to download for later watching as benefits. Never a fan of price increases, but we will stick with Netflix for now.

Purchased my daughter some vitamins on Amazon today. I used the Discover cash back for a credit of $2.38. Final cost was $12.36. I think I will send that cash back amount to our Big Goal. I should add in the coupon savings from Sunday, too.

I had to take a mental health break today. I had some stress and anxiety pop up on me this morning. I'm feeling better already. To help, I called my mom, went for a two mile walk, ate a good lunch, and then took an epson salt bath. Later I added some relaxing oils to my diffuser while I listed to some very nice relaxing YouTube music. I also got up and got busy in the kitchen making some muffins and hummus (not to eat together!).

I share because this time of year can be stressful for various reasons. It is okay to take a time out and take care of ourselves. And it doesn't have to cost anything! And be kind to those you meet as you don't know what their current struggles may be.

I combined three errands together to save time and gas money. First I dropped off a large box of donations at Goodwill. I stopped by Walmart and picked up lotion that my daughter said I could give as a stocking stuffer. And then a quick trip to the military pharmacy to pick up a prescription. These were all within a mile of each other but about 15 minutes from my home, so it made sense to combine the errands for one outing.

The only fail is, I wish I knew I needed a lemon for the dinner we had tonight. I could have picked it up at Walmart, instead I had to run to the grocery store just before I started cooking. We had this

Lemon Garlic Asparagus Pasta from the Budget Bytes site. Yes, we still have fresh asparagus in our area! It was really good, the only thing we did different was add parmesan cheese on top after serving. I will be serving it again, it was that enjoyable to us.

My Amazon gift card ordered from Swagbucks arrived so I ordered the final gift I needed to purchase. It was no cost to me after the gift card!

I received $3 from Pinecone. I'm transferring it to my PayPal account. Another snowflake to go to the Big Goal.

Still no charge from JC Penney for the pillow! I wonder how long it could take?! That was $10.69, so if it doesn't show up on by the 15th I think I'll add that as a snowflake to the Big Goal too.

I took advantage of the Target gift card deal. 10% off online and another 5% cash back using my Discover card. I bought the maximum of $300. I checked and in the last year I have spent around $700 at Target. These gift cards will get used.

At the commissary today I redeem a physical coupon I found in the store for $0.50. I also used their rewards card to get another $2.40 off our bill. When I came home I redeemed rebates worth $2.75. Savings from those sources was $5.65. And theoretically, I'm saving 30% shopping at the commissary in the first place.

I'm paying off the credit cards charges this morning. I pay them twice per month when my husband is paid. I was also reconciling the card with our largest balance (Southwest Visa). I noticed that a charge I recorded wasn't showing up on the card. I found the receipt and it shows I did pay for it with that card. So a pillow that we purchased at JC Penney with a coupon last weekend for $10.69 doesn't show up at all?! I had another transaction at that same store (different register) on the same day and it is showing up. So right now, it's like we have a free pillow! I'm sure it is possible that it will show up eventually.

I redeemed Swagbucks yesterday for a $25 Amazon gift card. Once it arrives I'm purchasing the final gift for my daughter. These Amazon gift cards have been very helpful in keeping our spending under our $600 budget.

I totaled up the amount of interest earned on a money market account, a savings account and three CDs for the month of November. The amount earned was $84.77.

One account earns 1.15%
One CD matures at the end of the year and is earning 3%.
Two others are 2% and mature in April and June 2018.

If you hear of good CD rates at the end of the month, I'd will be interested to hear! Although, I'm just now remembering I may be able to roll that money in the 3% CD into one of the other ones. I will check that.

My daughters wanted a series of books. There are 12 in the series. I was told I could skip purchase book two as it is a combination of two other books my youngest daughter already owns.

Each book retails for $20. Thus this expense could have cost me $220!! No way was I going to pay that much out of pocket.

I figured if I could at least pay half of retail I would be doing good. I started purchasing earlier this fall. Two initial purchases came from buying used on eBay. One book was $12.40 with shipping and another was $11.13.

I mentioned that I sold some things back to a used book store and was able to use a $13+ credit towards a new book they had listed at the $20 retail price. I paid $7.70 out of pocket for that one.

The deals get better because I found three ex-library versions on eBay from one seller for $21.40. Average about $7 each.

And I made two separate purchase on eBay using Amazon gift cards I earned from Swagbucks over the last couple months. The book prices offered on Amazon varied from $13.59 to $17.36. One purchase was completely covered by gift cards and the other cost me $2.30 out of pocket.

In the end new books that could have cost me $220 new plus tax, were just $54.93 out of pocket. An average of $4.99 a book. A savings of 75%!

No worries that my girls will be offended by used books. They are fans of the library and know that book costs add up. And the used ones that did arrive are in very good shape! The three ex library books do have tags and tape on the side but again in very good shape! They will be very pleased, and hopefully surprised that I found all of the ones requested.

I do sort of wish I started earning the Swagbucks a little earlier so I could have reduced the out of pocket cost, but it is what it is! Still a great deal.