In keeping with my theme of introducing you or reminding you of different types of snowflake sources, I have another one for you. Clicking for snowflakes!

If you have a few extra minutes of time, you can earn gift cards and cash for free! I have used these small bits of cash and gift cards to help meet our financial goals. Right now, the goal is to pay down our mortgage. Our mortgage doesn't accept gift cards of course, but when I spend them on things I would be buying anyway, I send the cash I would have used for the purchase to our mortgage.

The main site I have used to accumulate the most money is

Swagbucks. The site lets you earn Swagbucks points for watching videos, using their search engine, shopping, taking surveys and more. In 2013, I earned over $600 from Swagbucks. I have scaled back my time on the site so I can be more productive in other areas, but I still hop on nearly everyday to click some of the easier tasks. Once you sign up, feel free to read my post about How to Swag. It is a little outdated, but it should give you enough information to get started. Their Facebook page is also very helpful.

I'm currently active on Bing as well. This one is a straight forward search engine that provides you with results and points for a certain number of searches each day. It only takes a few minutes to complete each day. I'm able to accumulate my points(known as Swagbucks) to redeem a Swagbucks code that I use on their site to redeem for Amazon.com gift cards. If you are going Swag, you might as well Bing as well!

Another legitimate site for earning gift cards is MyPoints, which also lets you do searches, participate in special offers, click on emails, take surveys and more. I have fallen off the wagon on this site, but I have earned gift cards with them and it is pretty easy to do.

There are probably plenty of other sites you can participate in to earn gift cards for doing free tasks. The key word there is FREE. Do not pay to join any site. EVER.

Do you Swag, Bing or use MyPoints? Do you have another free site you use to earn gift cards and cash? What do you use your earnings for?

The links for Swagbucks and Bing above are my affiliate links. If you are interested in being referred to MyPoints, you are welcome to leave your name and email address in the comments. I will enter your information on their site and they will send you a referral email. I will delete your personal information from my site for your protection. You can also send me a private message on the forum section of Saving Advice.

If you are looking for extra cash to apply towards your debt or savings, I have found that selling things you no longer need can provide that extra cash.

Since the beginning of 2014, I have sold books, cds, a couch and loveseat, kitchen table, side tables and a tv cart. I also had a garage sale in May, and sold all sorts of various items, including clothing and tools. In all, I've sold over $500 worth of our used items!

I would much rather get rid of something I own than be in debt, especially credit card debt. The interest these cards charge when you don't pay your balance in full is your hard earned money! I personally like to keep as much of the money we earn as possible.

Everybody has something they can sell. I have a friend, that last I knew had six shelves full of DVD movies. My guess is these were bought soon after a movie came out, so likely nearly full price. I know they watch them and have been generous with loaning them to people, too. I look at those shelves and think CASH! Sure some of them are dated and not likely to fetch much money, but at $1 each they easily have $180 worth of movies they could sell. My thinking is that one can still find plenty of free options for entertainment. The library for one has just as many movies that one can borrow for free.

A few years ago, I had a challenge on this blog to make $100 a month selling on Ebay. I think my average was less than that in the end, maybe $80, but it challenged and encouraged me to find things in our home we didn't need. At the time, I think the proceeds were applied to a car loan pay down or a home equity loan. I didn't sell anything unique. My kids had outgrown jeans, shoes, toys and books. I sold (and still do) Box Tops for Education, and old army paraphernalia. Anything I found that I was done with I checked Ebay to see if there was a demand for the item. If there was I sold it. If it didn't sell on Ebay I would save it for a garage sale, which back then my neighbors and I would have two times a year. If items didn't sell at the garage sale I would donate them.

As consumers, we are bringing in new things to our home on a regular basis. I think of selling the old kind of like getting a rebate on the original cost of the item, or a discount on the new item I purchased. If we never get rid of anything when we bring in new, we get overrun with our own stuff! I challenge you to look at your stuff in a new way. It can be turned into cash to help you with your financial goal of paying down debt or saving. You will feel less stress with less debt and less stuff. I guarantee it!!

Do you have a habit of selling your old things? Do you sell on Ebay, craigslist or at garage sales? What do you do with your proceeds? Anyone interested in an Ebay challenge for the remainder of the year?

I use

Ebates, when I remember, when I'm doing any online shopping. A little rebate for going through their site as you shop on another site is EASY!

This week I purchased two t-shirts for my youngest daughter for her birthday next week. I purchased from RedBubble, but not before I went through Ebates to get 2.5% back, which amounted to $1.15. I also used a coupon code that gave me 10% off my order so that helped defray the cost of shipping. I still spent $50, but she will be VERY happy with these as they were specifically requested and on the top of her list.

I also purchased a family photo we took last year on my parents land. We used it on our Christmas card. As I was taking it off my fridge, um this week, I decided it was a really good picture and we should have it enlarged to put on our wall. I logged on to Ebates and found that Snapfish offers 10% rebates on their orders. I ordered an 11x14 print that I will pick up at Walmart today for $6.86 plus tax. Ebates is giving me $0.69 back.

Right now I only have $3.04 in rebates, but over the last couple years I have been using them I have earned over $65 in rebates. Those small little rebates add up!

There are other shopping sites that offer cash back, but Ebates seems to be the one that works for me. I think I have used Shop At Home in the past. It is a good idea to check another site to see if the rebate is larger or if they have a store that one site doesn't have. And if you use a rewards credit card for making these online purchases you are getting even more benefit for your purchases online!

Do you use a online shopping rewards site? Do you use more than one? Which one is your favorite?

Today I logged on to my

Capital One 360 Savings account to check my balance. I currently have $772.18. This account is where I'm saving my 52 Week Saving Challenge money. I'm saving $57 every pay period, which for us is twice per month. I believe I started at the beginning of last December with the goal of saving $1378, which is the amount that these 52 Week Savings Challenges total at the end of one year. At this point I have saved up Weeks 1-17 and 4-52.

Originally I didn't have any plan for the money other than to save it. That has changed! I am saving the money for my oldest daughter's band trip to Disney World in the spring. We have been told the estimated cost is $1599. We have already made our first $200 deposit out of our regular cash, so that leaves $1399 to save. It seems I'm more than halfway there!

I just love that the saving challenge turned out to be a blessing to get the trip funded without too much hassle. Kind of a 'it pays to save for a rainy day' type of thing. Kind of.

Any chance you have something you need to be saving for over the next 6 months or more? You can sign up for a Capital One 360 Savings account and earn a $50 bonus. Or if a checking account is better, you can earn $25. Or both! Don't forget the fine print, and know that I do receive $20 for each referral, but I don't get any personal information about you. You will be anonymous to me. I plan to save the referral money towards my daughter's trip, too! I'm sure she will need some spending money.

I also became aware that I can refer people to the Chase Freedom card and receive a bonus. This is the credit card that is currently offering a $200 cash bonus after you spend $500 on the card. I wish I could refer you with a link, but Chase requires I send an email. If you leave your first and last name and email I will input it into the form. You will then receive an email from Chase asking you to apply for the offer. I will delete emails from the blog and will not spam you! I also will not know you applied and whether or not you were approved or denied. I get no personal information. I do need to submit your email by June 20th, so act fast if you are interested!



I think the Chase Freedom card is one of the best cards for the average consumer since it has no annual fee. Of course, please do not apply for credit if you are working on paying off debt or cannot pay off your balance in full each month!

How are you doing on your 52 Week Savings Challenge? Where do you save your money? Do you receive referral money from any products you endorse? What products are they and how much have you earned?

My personal retirement account is closing in on $100K!! I'm at over $96K. For a little perspective, I had just $6,034 in my Roth IRA in May 2003. Compounding interest along with contributions make a difference!!

The markets are finally moving up a little faster the last few weeks. Of course we are still contributing, too. I will contribute $5,500 to my Roth this year, which is the maximum allowed.

My husband has the same amount go into his Roth and also contributes to the TSP with 8% of his base pay. His balances total over $190K.

This also means that at some point, and I'm hoping this year, we will top $300K in retirement funds. Sometimes that seems like a lot of money and other times not nearly enough.

We still expect my husband to put in 20 full time years with the Army. That earned paycheck he will receive from that point forward will definitely supplement our retirement income. There is always the possibility he will not complete the 20 years, which is the whole reason we are saving for retirement outside the retirement pension. The resulting paycheck would be lower and not available until after he turns 65.

Anyway...I look forward to dancing around about my $100K milestone and our combined $300K milestone in the near future. What retirement milestone are you looking forward to meeting next?

It came to me while I was out driving today. A reason for saving with the 52 Week Savings Challenge. I've been saving $57 twice per month toward an unknown goal. But today, that goal hit me!

I will use the money to pay for my oldest daughter's band trip that will happen in March 2015. We have been told at this point the estimate for the trip is $1599. Interesting number, huh? I have sent the required deposit of $200. This means we will have at the most $1399 left to pay. We have participated in some fund raising for the last two years towards this trip. The student has been credited with 25% of the sale. I highly doubt we have even $50 in our account. We will get this information at some point.

The 52 Week Savings Challenge should end up with $1378, which conveniently is nearly the amount I will need to pay! I'm not clear yet if we can pay with a credit card or they want cash for the whole trip. If I can use a credit card to receive a bonus award I will do that and then pay off with the challenge money. Otherwise, I will just follow their payment schedule and send cash from the challenge as it comes due.

Our current balance, including the June 1 deposit is 694. I started this in early December if I remember correctly thus I'm pretty much at the half way mark. It feels good to know what I'm doing with the money!

How is your 52 Week Savings Challenge going?

We expect my husband will be promoted sometime in the next four weeks, likely three. It had been awhile since I had figured our net paycheck for the new pay rate. As it turns out we will net an additional $1043 per month. And I don't really know what we are going to do with it. And I realize this is a good problem to have.

I do know that we will have our oldest daughter in college in the fall 2015. We do have money saved, but it will not be enough for the entire degree program.

I feel like I want to just squirrel it away for some known goal, to avoid the money getting spent without any thought. I talked to my husband about it this morning and his first thought was just to save it,too. Nice to be on the same page!

Although a new fridge would be nice...not a need at all, but an upgrade to the stainless steel is appealing. I sure wouldn't mind some new family room furniture. See I can definitely find things to buy, but I don't want to just buy to buy. My husband said something about replacing our two vehicles, but since they are Honda's with 80k and 60k miles on them and run great, I'm pretty sure that is not a good use of our hard earned cash.

Just to recap, we have a $20K emergency fund, we save nearly 17%+ for retirement, save $4000 towards college per year (currently have $37K+ saved), we have a mortgage of over $200K which we are paying down by $14K this year. We also have my husband's Post 911 GI Bill that can be used to cover up to 36 months of college education. This can be split between all four of us in any way if we choose. We expect to be moving AGAIN next summer.

There are some things we will want to buy in the next year. An Apple Mac, with Photoshop, for our daughter to take to college. An intermediate flute for our youngest daughter. We are also going to be paying for lessons for our youngest daughter, which is a new $80 expense for us. Maybe a car IF our oldest daughter decides to start driving. There are a few other possible expense, but all of them would be within our current salary capabilities.

It seems strange to be at a place where we will have excess money that we have no particular plans or needs for. What would you do with an extra $1K per month? Any better ideas for us, on what we should do with the money?

Although the challenge is 52 Weeks, I am participating by saving $57 every pay period. For us that is twice per month. I have made deposits that cover weeks 1-15 and weeks 42-52. If I'm calculating correctly that puts us halfway to the goal! I did start in December so that seems right.

Our balance is $637. Well, I have a $20 referral in the account and some interest so the true balance is $657.79. We are keeping our 52 Week Savings Challenge money in our Capital One 360 account, which earns interest of 0.75% and there is no minimum balance.

You too can put your money there. Capital One 360 offers bonuses for opening different accounts. I like having it separate so we don't accidentally spend. I also like that I set up our deposits to automatically deduct each pay period so I don't forget. Makes it easy!

How is your 52 Week Challenge coming along? Are you still on track? How about your other financial goals?

I was reading my old posts and found

this one still applies. I posted it March 14, 2008. It's just a reminder that financial security and goals are a journey.

I recently went to my local indoor botanical garden. That experience made me think that gardening has many aspects that relate to money, budgeting and investing.

1. All plants start small...a seed.

It's okay to start saving with small amounts, because one day those savings will bloom.

2. A garden requires maintenance.

Just like pulling weeds to help the plants to grow, a budget needs to be tweaked to cut expenses or increase savings. Money maintenance comes in all forms, including reading your bills, bank and investment statements. Investments need to be rebalanced from time to time to keep your portfolio diversified.

3. A garden doesn't grow overnight.

Paying off debt or saving for retirement take time and patience. Little by little the garden flourishes.

4. A garden requires more than seeds.

A flower needs soil, water and sunlight. For money to work well in our lives, we need to have the right spending attitudes, cash flow, communication with our partner as well as the ability to know what our goals are.

5. Flowers and vegetables can be shared with others.

Some of your money is available to be given away. The smile and appreciation of others is worth the effort.

What else does a garden teach you about money and your budget? Do you have an old post that still applies today?

We were notified of our homeowner's insurance increasing by about $100 for the next year. This so annoys me. I know prices of the replacement cost more, but without ever making a claim it seems unfair.

Our current premium is nearly $700, specifically $693.46. Even that is more than I prefer to pay. We do get several discounts just to get to that amount. Our deductible is $1000.

I decided to make some changes which I can do online with USAA. I increased our deductible to $2000 for all claims other than wind and hail. When you live in the midwest wind and hail are generally the most likely claims on homeowner's insurance. I also decreased the coverage on our personal belongings portion. You all have seen pictures of my house on

Your Organized Friend. We really don't have a lot of stuff. So now we have coverage of $122K of belongings rather than $180K. I think this seems reasonable. Our new premium will be $668.19, which is saving us just $25 over the current premium, but over $125 if we had kept our coverages the same.

We have the $2K to meet the increased deductible IF something were to happen. I just think the odds, especially in a new home are pretty slim.

Did you have an increase in your homeowner's insurance? How about a decrease?

I tallied up our extra funds received (snowflakes) for the month of April using my Excel spread sheet. It was a great month! We found $876.07 in extra money. It ALL went to the mortgage. You will see there are plenty of credit card rewards and bonuses. But notice, too, that I saved a refund, Pinecone survey money, and so forth. There are ways to save extra money with out participating in credit cards.

(Just remembering that we did sell furniture for $300, that is a snowflake, too. We have not decided on a plan for that yet, so it is not included officially.)

Here's where all those snowflakes fell from:



I have 'After' pictures on

Your Organized Friend today! I have my mother visiting and I found an item in our basement that we aren't using but that she can, so I have given it to her. Last week I found a cable my Dad needs that we aren't currently using, so it is his now. Less clutter and helping others feels good.

Have you recently given anything of yours to a family member or friend that you are no longer using? How many snowflakes did you accumulate this month?

I have added $114 to our 52 Week Savings Challenge this month. The last deposit was $57 on Tuesday last week. I'm adding this amount twice a month on payday. Since I started this in December, I have now saved $523. This particular challenge has been pretty easy for us since it is all saved automatically. I recommend this highly!!

I wrote another blog on

Your Organized Friend. It isn't about decluttering, since I didn't get to any of that this weekend with all the painting we did. Although I will clean out my painting supply bin when we are done with our current project. I wrote about laundry instead, since I did have to get that done in the midst of the painting.

Are you still working on your 52 Week Savings Challenge? Do you have any laundry tips? Did you declutter anything this weekend, or did you just relax this weekend?

March has been our slowest month so far this year in regards to snowflakes, but I did have plenty of sources of these funds. The little amounts do add up! Anyone can save small amounts and make them count towards a goal. This month those small amounts came to $247.39! And if your read my blog often, you know that this money is applied to our mortgage to pay down the balance. So far this year we have paid off $1,610.88 in mortgage debt with just snowflake money. We are not quite to our goal of $4,000, but we are getting closer to the halfway point. I expect we will get to the 50% point in the month of April.



Have you recently started saving small amounts of money towards a goal? I'd love to hear what you are working towards. Anyone have a new source for snowflakes?

I just sent off two snowflakes to the mortgage in the amount of $201.20! That money combined with our regular mortgage payment and the extra $103+ I tack on each month, will bring our mortgage down below the $X25,000 threshold! Yippee!! That means less than $9K to go to meet our mortgage goal for the year.

That $200+ is my $150 Discover bonus that I had deposited into our checking account and a check for $51.20 which was our Washington DC fundraising proceeds. I prepaid the trip in full, so the fundraising dollars came back once I had a credit balance. That is about the amount my daughter will take for spending money, but she is to take that from her own savings, since we paid for the trip.

I made another BIG payment to our Chase Southwest card today. It was just over $809. That covered a work trip my husband was reimbursed for and some other miscellaneous spending. The first statement has not closed yet, but when it does I will make our final payment. That payment will include the $69 annual fee, which I will pay. I will then close the account and ask for a refund of the fee.

I'm going to participate, as best I can, in the declutter/organizing challenge for the month of April. I did complete my goal of 20 workouts last month. I also lifted weights 10 times. I started counting calories in mid to late February. I have lost 11 pounds since then. I feel great!!

I will detail March snowflakes and mortgage principal paid in tomorrow's post. It will not include the two items mentioned above since those were not allocated until April.

Did your April begin with a snowflake? Are you joining in on the declutter and organizing challenge? How did you do with your exercise goals in March?

It's the end of the month, and my husband's paycheck is pending deposit. I went ahead and recorded all the bills that automatically draft this next pay period. First is the mortgage payment of $1,415 which included an extra $103+ as a principal payment.

I also went online and made a large payment on our Southwest card. It was $961.70 to cover our recent Honda maintenance expense, our cell phone bill and other miscellaneous spending from last pay period. There is still a balance on the card. Much of that is some travel expenses by my husband. We should get most of the reimbursement very soon. I'm hoping tomorrow. Once we do I will send all that in and get the card down to zero again.

I set aside $50 for Christmas, $114 towards our auto registration and insurance, and the $57 for the 52 Weekly Savings Challenge. I wrote one check for a school field trip and another for a flute lesson later tonight. I will be getting cash out for allowances, and another future flute lesson. Oh yes, some of the cash I need to get is for my daughter's birthday. She received a check for her birthday and she wanted me to get cash for it.

At this point, I plan to send the check for our taxes late next week, around April 11. We have the $413 in our account now, so I can mail anytime. I'm just waiting as long as I can to pay! I will go ahead and right the check, and stamp and address the envelope. I sure don't want to forget to pay the government.

I'm waiting to hear about the $100 credit I have on my US Bank card. I want them to mail me a check, but I have not heard back yet. The credit is from those Ooma referrals I received. If they won't send a check, I will use the card to pay a utility bill and just take the difference to send to the mortgage.

Are you paid on the first of the month? Do you record all your bills for that pay period right away? Or only record when it actually happens?

My 52 Week Savings Challenge is on auto pilot. I really only think about the challenge when I need to record another deposit, which is twice per month. I deposit $57 each time. My current balance is now $409!

I still don't have any particular plans for this cash. It doesn't hurt to save more money, right?!

What is the balance of your 52 Week Savings?

I can finally report another credit card bonus! I feel like these are taking forever to get my hands one, even though I know they are in the works. I had to wait for the statement to cycle closed again before the bonus was available. I could see it there since last month, but it wasn't available to redeem. I was able to redeem $115.76 from US Bank Cash+ Visa card. I had this one applied as a credit. I then owed $33+ which I have already paid. This card offered a $25 bonus if you redeem more than $100. I do get the bonus, but it is a Visa Check card which has to be mailed and takes about 6 weeks to receive. Ugh! Really I am happy about the cash, just frustrated with the delays.

That reward is another snowflake, of course! I sent it in to the mortgage yesterday with $25 from Swagbucks, a Pinecone survey and ATM rebate money recently received. We have $147.27 less debt on our mortgage to pay. Yippee!!

Payday is officially tomorrow, but I have already started paying bills, including credit card balances. Yesterday, I made payments on the US Bank card, my husband's Discover, and our Target Red Card. The paycheck is pending, but will be a hard deposit tomorrow. I think I will spend a few minutes and make a payment on my Discover to get that nearly paid off. I have just another $5 to spend to meet the goal...which I think will happen when I get a car wash later today. I'm also waiting on a refund (I ended up sending that clothes washer part back, since the problem seemed to resolve itself. No more leaking. Anyway, I hoping the refund arrives before the statement closes in less than two weeks. At this rate with Discover we should both get our $150 bonuses in April. I guess I can wait until then.

My snowflake accumulations for March just may not be as high as January and February. My best chance for another big influx for this month is to sell some old furniture (sofa, loveseat, kitchen table and chairs). I let you know when I get those listed and then sold.

The gym workouts continue! I am definitely committed now. I have 10 cardio workouts done and 4 weight lifting sessions complete. I'm already planning ahead to how to fit my workouts around a mini trip we are taking early next week. My husband is on board with the counting of calories, so that is a big help. He is pretty good getting his workouts in when he can as the Army does need fit soldiers. In fact, some of them are working out three days a week at their workplace gym. It just feels good to be making progress towards a fitter me!

Are you inpatient with getting your credit card rewards? Which card do you think rewards the fastest? If you are in on the March Fitness challenge, how are you coming along?

Capital One notified me today that I'm at 25% of my savings goal that I set. Turns out they are correct! I am saving $57 twice per month as my participation in the 52 Week Savings Challenge. If I follow it to the end I will have $1378 plus interest. This means I must have more than $344.50. Turns out I do have that and a little more. My new balance for the challenge is $352. I have saved Weeks 1-10 and Weeks 47-52.

I love that I set this automatically. All I have to do is record the transfer of $57 from our checking account to the Capital One 360 Savings account. Easy!

How are you doing on the 52 Week Savings Challenge? Are you right on track, ahead or behind in your savings? Did you modify yours, as I did?

I did some uphill walking on the treadmill at the gym today, so now I have 2 out of 20 workouts complete for the month. Still no weight lifting though, so I'm 0/10 on that one. Maybe tomorrow?!

I found $638.04 in snowflakes for the month of February. No complaints, however, I did notice it was less than last month by over $84. But I had many more rebates last month. All the money went to pay down the mortgage principal!

As of this month I am at 34% of my goal for the year, which is $4000 in snowflakes. Or money that is not earned from my husband's paycheck!

Here's where all those snowflakes came from:


Did you track your snowflakes this month? How did you do? What did you do with your snowflakes?

I wrote a post on

Our Money Blog about some of my thoughts for this pay day, if you are interested.

The Swagbucks and Pinecone snowflakes arrived in our checking account. Is it me or is Paypal getting quicker at sending money? I have already scheduled this $28 to go to the mortgage principal. Less debt!!

So that washing machine part arrived today. I did a load yesterday and no leaking occurred after. Well maybe a slight drip or two. I'm doing another load now. I wonder if all that dripping the other day was a fluke? I don't want to spend time and money replacing the part if it isn't necessary. We won't get to the part replacement until this weekend, so I have some time to contemplate it.

We are making plans to visit a college in another state over spring break. My daughter has some interest in it. Since she is a Junior this year, it is time to start looking. I attended this institution for two year but transferred to another city, same state and university system to complete. A little looking shows that my graduation, her ACT score (29) and GPA (4.0) might make her eligible for a large scholarship that would easily reduce tuition to the in state amount. My husband also has Post 911 GI bill benefits that could be used for her as well.

I think it would be best to use the GI bill benefits for our older daughter, as you never know when the benefit could be pulled or changed. I think it could virtually make her college cost zero. We then could transfer what we have saved in her ESA to her sister. Right now we have over $30K saved between the two of them. Our youngest daughter won't go to college until Fall 2018, so we have over 4 years to continue to save and for that money to grow.

My best friends son, who is a senior, just decided to attend a private school. His grades are high, but ACT was 24. The school did offer some grants and reductions in tuition. In fact, because they waiting awhile to decide the school actually offered MORE money. My friend and her husband will take out a parent PLUS loan and their son will take out the maximum student loan allowed of $5500. I think that makes their portion around $20K for ONE year. My friend said he will work all summer and have to apply all his earnings to reduce the amount of their portion. They are putting their son on notice that this is a one year trial basis. If he isn't accountable, they won't pay for this private college. Considering they are still paying on her husband's college at the tune of over $600 per month, I'm amazed they are taking on more debt. Although I shouldn't be. They finance EVERYTHING! But they do both work full time and also have part time work as well, so they do seem to make it work.

We expect my husband to get promoted this year. I expect that extra income will help us with the college costs when the time comes. I hope this allows us to at least cash flow the room and board portion of college.

It feels good to be on track to handle college. Are you saving for your child's college? Did you help them with college tuition? If so, did you take out loans or cash flow the cost?

First a credit card question:
I haven't applied for any Barclay's cards because the rewards have to be redeemed for travel which we rarely do. But I'm tempted. I read that currently you can get $400 in travel rewards for spending $1000, but that the spending requirement may be going up to $3000. It seems like a good deal to jump on now. The question I have is about redeeming the rewards for travel. Do you charge the travel expense on the card and then redeem points to cover or do you book travel with points? Has anyone completed travel this way with the Barclay's card?

Other news:
I redeemed Swagbucks for $25, so that will be arriving hopefully by month's end. I cancelled my Citi Thank You Preferred card yesterday by secure message on their site. I opened this card last May and earned a $250 check payable to our mortgage company, after spending $1000. I haven't been as good about closing cards as I intended, but I was ready to let this one go. We were not using it and don't intend to.

I used up the last of a jar of Maple Pumpkin Butter today. It had about a tablespoon left, so I put it on my steel cut oatmeal this morning. I am going to make banana bread or banana muffins today to use two very ripe bananas. I will need milk for either one, so I will use more of that. The milk expires tomorrow, although it may still be good after. I just want to use it up rather than pour down the drain.

I need to decide what to have for lunch. There is leftover taco fixings from last night. However, I also need to eat a salmon filet. I might cook the salmon, but eat it tomorrow. That way I can eat up some of the taco things today.

What are you using up today? Has this been a good challenge for you or it this just the norm for you? Did you eat anything strange just to use it up?

It has been a snow day here with no school (or work since it is President's Day). And a no spend day so far too!

The plan was to eat the leftover mushroom barley soup, but unfortunately, when my daughter pulled it out of the fridge it all fell on the floor! A nice big soupy mess. This led to cleaning our kitchen floor, which it needed. We also cleaned under the fridge and inside.

While cleaning the fridge, I noticed the applesauce that I mentioned yesterday. I decided to find a recipe to use it up with. I found [urlhttp://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Applesauce-Cake-I/Detail.aspx?event8=1&prop24=SR_Thumb&e8=Quick%20Search&event10=1&e7=Recipe&soid=sr_results_p2i20]Applesauce Cake[/url] at Allrecipes.com. Three out of four of us liked it. My youngest daughter thought it was too sweet and spicy. I was able to use most of the margarine I have in my fridge, too. The margarine was bought when we had guests at our house this fall that are allergic to milk products, so I'm glad to have that almost gone.

In other cleaning, we did a wash load of towels and rags, since we used so many cleaning up that mushroom barley soup. Oh, and instead of mushroom soup we made sandwiches with fresh leftover mozzarella cheese, so we were still able to use something up at lunch today.

Did you use anything up today? How long has it been in your fridge or cupboard? Did you find a new recipe in order to use it?

I should really call our challenge Twice Monthly Savings challenge. Our automatic deposit to our savings challenge will take place on Monday. Another $57 deposit will bring the balance to $295. This covers weeks 1-9 and 48-51.

I still don't have specific plans for this money, but it may eventually go for a car for our teen daughter or a vacation further down the road. It just feels good to make a specific and planned savings deposit. We save more than this each pay period, but the amount varies.

In other news, I did list our old kitchen table and chairs on craigslist for $150. No interest yet, but I put it up late last night. I also listed a series of books on Ebay for my daughter. Again no leads yet! But I expect there will be.

How are you doing on your savings challenge? Are you trying to sell anything?

My husband did end up buying flowers for Valentine's day. A bouquet of pink, green and orange flowers from Target for $17. The flowers are for the girls and I to share. Pretty for sure, but not needed. He did look cute with the flowers in hand when he walked in the door last night though!

Payday is today. I paid and recorded all upcoming bills, like life insurance, water softener rental, Roth and college investments. I paid current amounts on both Discover cards, which included our internet and electric bills. The total on those cards was just over $500. I also paid $184+ on the US Bank Visa. I left a balance of about $140 as I expect that the rewards I will receive will total at least that. The $100 shows as pending, once it is available I will redeem for credit on the account.

The good news is I was able to save about $350, which I tossed in our emergency fund. I scheduled a $275 principal payment on the mortgage. I plan to make this payment each month to help us pay down nearly $14,000 in principal this year. I'm recording that on the sidebar.

It's been a good payday! How about you...did you household get a paycheck today? Did it all work out like you planned? Any good or bad surprises?

Make sure if you qualify you take the Saver's Credit, which can increase your refund or decrease the amount you owe. If you didn't save for retirement last year...make sure you do this year!!

Here's a chart I found on the IRS website. You can get more details about the chart and the rules

here.



We didn't qualify this year because our AGI is too high. If I'm looking at this correctly, we could actually save in Traditional IRAs rather than Roth's and possibly qualify. I'm not sure that its worth it being in the 15% income tax bracket. I'll have to run the numbers for this coming year.

Did you qualify and take the Saver's Credit on your tax return? Were you aware of this tax benefit for saving?

Today feels like a good day money wise. I think this is because I paid bills and everything is under control. Our bank will transfer $57 to our Capital One savings account on Monday for our twice monthly deposit to the 52 Week Savings Challenge. Our challenge total is $238, which covers weeks 1-8 and 49-52. Moving right along on that one. We also set aside $164 for things like auto insurance, auto registrations, and Christmas. We do this at the beginning of every month.

We ventured out after the snow stopped falling and purchased fuel for my husbands truck and some groceries to fill in for the next couple days. At the grocery store we found store brand shredded cheese for $1 in an 8 oz package. We buy these at Super Target for nearly $2.50 or more. We picked up 5 or 6 packages, since we didn't know if there was a limit. I did notice the sale ends on Monday, so I may pick up more cheese before then since this is a significant savings for something we buy anyway.

My daughter bought an item from Etsy online last month. She paid nearly $85. I used my credit card to make the payment since I wanted to use the expense towards our credit card rewards spending. I decided she could wait to pay me until it arrived. At this point we expect it next week, so I will get my money at the same time. What is fun, is that I actually forgot that I would be getting that money!

I was able to set $525 aside in savings, which is similar to the amount I saved last payday. Clearly we are not spending everything we earn! Some of that money actually will get to go to the mortgage once I get the rewards and have them credited to our current balance.

I'm going to write a post soon about how a debt snowball works. I think we might have some new members and probably some readers that are not familiar with this process. I don't think anyone is writing much about it right now either. We are not actually doing this type of pay debt down anymore since we only have one debt...our mortgage!

Is anyone snowballing debt currently? If so, will you let me know, so I can refer readers to your blog when I do the post? Did you get to put extra money in savings this week? Did you find any good grocery deals?

I wanted to give you a heads up on a new savings approach I read about today on The Simple Dollar. It's called $4 Per Gallon Savings. The link is on

Our Money Blog, or you can search for it on your favorite search engine. I haven't decided if this approach is something I will incorporate yet, but definitely an interesting way to establish an emergency fund.

I also wanted to mentioned that I changed our withholding from 9 to 8 this week. I did this because we owe $413 this year, and we expect my husband will be getting a raise in several months. As a result more income taxed with similar deductions, means more tax owed! We might as well be close to getting it right rather than owing a large amount. I don't mind owing, just not thousands of dollars! The IRS withholding calculator and the calculator I used on Paycheck City came up with the same result.

My previous post today is my final tally of snowflakes for the month of January and the amount of principal we paid on our mortgage last month.

I was hoping I could write that this month was my largest snowflake total ever. But it isn't. It is the second largest total since I began recording in 2012. I accumulated $725.45 in cash from non-income sources. Credit card rewards definitely made a difference this month. This is 18% of my $4000 goal for the year. Here where that money all came from:



As promised, I put all this money towards paying down our mortgage. As a result we have less debt! Our mortgage balance is down $1,276.53 for the month. This represents 9% of our mortgage goal for the year, so we are ahead of schedule. Love it!!

I think quite a few of you were going to track your snowflake earnings this year. Do you have a total for January? It's not too late to start keeping track and looking for those snowflakes.

I requested my $3 Pinecone survey money to be moved from Paypal to our checking account. It probably won't arrive in my bank account until Monday, but I'm going to count that one for January.

I did my sewing project and ended up not using one of the rolls of thread. I will return that soon, which will put just under $4 back in my pocket. My sewing project will net me about $35! (My client was my mom.)

I received the email from Ebates offering my earnings in the form of Amazon credit. This was tempting as I was about to make a purchase there, but I refrained. I decided that the purchase on my credit card would benefit me more since I'm working towards a bonus reward. The Ebates will be deposited in my Paypal account on Monday. I will be getting $29.35 back!

I'm getting close to earning another $25 in cash from Swagbucks. I made goal for the first 21 days of the month, but have decided to spend my time better this last week. I have been on everyday, but I have not always met the goal. Anything extra is great, but I do need to watch that it is not hogging my time from other important activities.

So it seems I have plenty of little snowflakes showing up soon, most of those will be counted in February. I will update my final January total on Friday. Do you have any snowflakes on the horizon?

P.S. I wrote about some frugal inactions over at

Our Money Blog today, if you like that kind of thing!

One of the things on my list today is to buy postage stamps. We don't really mail that many things, but I would guess we still go through about three books of stamps a year. I don't mail any bills, so most of those stamps are used to send cards.

The price of postage increases tomorrow from $0.46 to $0.49 for a First Class letter. This is just over a 6% increase. I like the idea of saving 6% on something I will use anyway this year.

I'm going to stop by the customer service counter at our local grocery store and pick up three books and charge it to our credit card...since any spending gets us those bonuses!

If you make a purchase of stamps today, make sure to get those Forever stamps, so they will be useful for you tomorrow and beyond.

How many stamps do you think you use each year?