We are in our new home. Our beds and household goods arrived on Thursday. And I have to say that sleeping in our own bed after more than three weeks was bliss!

We have unpacked all but about 6 boxes. However, things are not organized in the least. I'm trying to figure out how to store the same stuff in fewer cabinets and closets. We do have a large storage room that I'm sure I will have to use!

Spending is at an all time high. I don't have meals planned. Our dryer isn't working since the move. And with a new home there are little things to buy, like shower curtain rods. We will be ordering blinds today for a majority of our windows. I expect to get a pretty good deal online for those.

There is still an inflow of cash to arrive. We expect to receive around $2000 because we used a Homes for Hereos realtor. Participating realtors discount their commissions for buyer and sellers. And then there is the travel money we expect to receive from the governmnet. Some of that money will reimburse us for 10 days of hotel expenses. Fingers crossed that travel voucher doesn't get rejected.

Cat lovers will appreciate knowing that our cats have adjusted well to the new home. They are finding new places to hide and enjoying our wide window sills where they can hang out.

Any great tips for moving into a new home? How did you get organized? How long did it take? Any money saving tips that go along with the move?

I used some of my free time hanging out at the hotel to earn some more Swagbucks. I earned another $5 Amazon gift card. I redeemed enough Swagbucks this month for $20 in AGC's! I feel that is pretty good for being in the middle of a move.

Swagbucks is free and will definitely be a huge part of my Christmas fund this year. If you are interested in joining click the ad on my sidebar!

A few more snowflakes have fallen and are being added to our 2012 Christmas Fund. I redeemed Swagbucks for another $5 Amazon gift card, my third this month. I'm a little slow with the Swagbucks this month because of moving.

We were given a convenience store gift card worth $10 last month when we watched a neighbors cats. I decided to use the gift card and save $10 in my checking account.

I expect to receive a $3 Pinecone deposit in my Paypal account today for a survey I completed last night.

Another $18 towards the Christmas Fund is a good thing. Have you had any snowflakes falling at your place? How big is your Christmas fund?

I received $3 from Pinecone this morning. I also redeemed Swagbucks for two $5 Amazon gift cards. A good start for accumulating snowflakes for the month of June.

I also made a Half.com sale. However, I seemed to have donated that book. I had to refund the buyer. I suspended the other book I had listed, since I won't have access to that while we are moving.

I have a box of other things that I'd like to sale on ebay and craigslist, but those will also wait until after the move. Something to look forward to!

Remember that the buyers were wanting repairs done before closing and we were having trouble getting a contractor arranged in time, as well as, finding a good price?

We left it with the contractor we hired that the repair work was to be under $800. If the work was not finished once the limit was reached, we would complete the remainder.

The contractor arrived yesterday and completed the work in four hours rather than the 20 hours estimated. The cost was $274.40. Now that's more like it.

I think the company is losing business because they can't estimate the work well. We would have had more done, such as repairing a door and painting the nails they caulked over. Instead the door remains as is, and we are going to be up on a ladder painting.

I'm just glad our cost was less than we were expecting!!

In May, I added $109.50 to our Christmas Fund. The money came from various sources: a Target gift card, Ebay sales, Pinecone and MySurvey rewards and Amazon gift cards earned with Swagbucks.

I budget $60 for water/sewer/trash per month. Our actual bill was less, so I added the excess to the Christmas Fund as well.

The current balance of the Christmas Fund is $542.86. My goal is a minimum of $750. I think I will have no problem meeting that goal before Christmas shopping season.

The agent representing our buyers is an affiliate of a program called

Homes for Heroes. The first time I heard of the program was on Saturday when I saw the back of his business card.

The program connects real estate agents with firefighters, police officers, military personnel, health care workers and teachers to help them purchase and sell homes. The agent gives 25% of the affiliate's gross commission back to the client in the form of a rebate.

So we signed up last night online. As of last night we already had a phone call from and an agent where we will be moving. She is already sending us listings of homes and left me a voice mail message just making contact.

Not sure what amount we will end up with since it depends on the price of the home we buy. It will be nice to have a little help in the form of a rebate! It might just be enough to recoup that $1-2K we decided to forgo in negotiating the price of this home. If only we had known before we entered into agreement on our current home. We could have receieved about $1500 at closing!

The program is connected with lenders, home inspection and closing companies as well to offer discounts to help lower the cost of buying a home.

Has anyone else heard of this program?

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I added a $5 Target gift card to my Christmas Fund after purchasing 10 Lean Cuisine meals at Target. I used a $2 coupon off the meals as well. Very good deal. Might need to pick up more before the week is out!

For the month of May I already have $41 to add to my Christmas Fund. I received $10 from MySurvey in my paypal account, two $3 deposits from Pinecone. I also redeemed points with Swagbucks for five $5 Amazon.com gift certificates. I should be able to accumulated enough points to redeem for a $25 certificate shortly, too.

How is your Christmas fund stacking up?

My bonus of $75 was available to withdraw today! Yipee. Let me know if you participated and got your bonus, too.

I did end up sending an email to ING/Sharebuilder about the $75 bonus money I received back in January and should have been able to withdraw by today. I waited the obligatory 120 days and attempted to withdraw the funds. Unfortunately, the bonus money currently shows as unavailable for withdrawal. Ugh! Here is the response I received..errors included.

Your wait is almost over. Our bonuses are on hold from withdraw for a few months to encourage customers to use the money towards investments. I can confirm you should be able to withdraw this money by the end of this week, you could even try to do so tomorrow. Just click on the Accounts tab > Transfer Money > Deposit & Withdraw.

That being said, this is an investment account. If you plan on making an investment, but aren't sure where to get started, take our Research Tab for a spin. Take the Research tab for a spin. You'll find helpful tools such as the Investment Screener, Market Movers, and even PortfolioBuilder if you’d like some guidance based on your financial goals and your comfort level with risk.

I will attempt to withdraw tomorrow and Friday to see if the email is correct. If not, I will email them back to see what the problem is. I will let you know tomorrow what happens!

Way back at the end of December, I opened an ING account with $100 in order to qualify for a $75 bonus. The bonus was applied to my account on January 3rd. Per the agreement, the bonus money could not be withdrawn until 120 days after it was credited to my account.

The way I count up the days, I thought I met the 120 days today. It seems not. When I went to withdraw the money, it clearly showed that the $75 was not available for redemption.

I will wait one more day and try again. If I can't do it tomorrow then I will contact customer service to find out how they count the days!

I think some of you did this offer around the same time. Did you remember that you have that bonus money coming to you? Let me know if you are able to withdraw yours!

I budget $60 for our water bill each month. It actually includes trash and sewer fees as well. This month we were under budget at $52.31. We saved $7.69. Last month I put the savings in the Christmas fund, this month I'm saving the difference in our emergency cash fund. Every little bit helps!

Wow! My Christmas Fund for 2012 is adding up very fast. For April, I was able to sock away $61.95 from various sources, primarily Pinecone surveys, Amazon gift cards from Swagbucks and MySurvey rewards. My new Christmas fund total is $433.36!

I have quite a few Swagbucks I plan to redeem in May and I'm still waiting for another $10 from MySurveys. I also know of another $6 in Pinecone survey payments to arrive in May as well. That's at least another $40 for May. I will try to make my goal to get the Christmas fund over $500 by the end of May. I think I can do it!!

Here's the current list of funds and sources:

The $20 reward I ordered from MySurvey on April 4 finally arrived in my Paypal account yesterday. I had inquired with them and they indicated their processing system was backed up. I do have another reward of $10 pending with them. I hope that this one doesn't take quite so long!

This money is being added to the Christmas fund! I will have an update in a few days with my total and April's funding sources.

How is your Christmas fund going? Is it growing fast?

We decided just yesterday to have DH fly home one more time before his class is out at the end of May. We looked at flights yesterday for the weekend he can get away and the cheapest ticket was $489.

This morning I checked one site and saw $689. Yikes. I thought Tuesday was the day to buy tickets! I actually I read that 3pm eastern was the time the tickets were repriced by the airlines. Anyway, I went off to the gym, did a few things around the house and it was now late morning.

After clearing all my cookies from the computer, I check again. The price for the ticket we wanted was $342.20. Talk about a savings! I have yet to get a ticket for this route for less than that.

What is the best deal you have grabbed on an airline ticket in recent months?

I redeemed more points today from MySurvey. I picked paypal funds in the amount of $10. I redeemed points earlier this month for $20 and have not yet received those yet. I sent an email inquiry about that. Hopefully by the end of the month I'll have my $30 from them. I said before I was done with them, but I did a big survey recently that made it worth staying with them for the next $10...but now I think I'm done. I just need to get that money in my account!

I will add this money to my 2012 Christmas Fund!

The house is still on the market. We have had lots of activity and showings. It has only been three weeks. There has been one second showing, but they decided on another house. We have another two showings schedule for the weekend. There is also another party that wants to view the house again with her brother. I guess they need to schedule a time to come together. It will sell and I'm looking for that offer to come soon!!

I'm not sure why, but our 6 month auto insurance premium was just adjusted...days after I paid the current premium. It looks like I should expect a refund of about $12.88!

I could return the money to the savings account I use for paying this bill or designate it to the emergency fund. I'll decide when I actually see the funds.

It's always nice to get a reduction on a bill. Has that happened to you recently?

I set aside $155 each month for DH's utilities. After paying one, I had $95. Last night he paid the second one in the amount of $65. That left $30!! I guess the weather is mild there, too.

I have put the $30 into the emergency fund. Some of the emergency fund money might go to handle moving expenses or towards a down payment, if we go that route. Our goal is to stash aside as much cash as possible. This just helps that goal.

How were your utilities this month? Better or worse?

I have received $6 from Pinecone Research in the last couple days for surveys completed. I'm also testing a product that came in the mail and will get to do another survey after trying it.

I'm adding the money to the Christmas fund. I will update at the end of the month what the final tally is!

I don't usually have much opinion about payday. We pay bills, save some money when we can and have money to spend on what we need and sometimes things we want.

This week payday is arriving a bit early since the 15th falls on a weekend. Thus DH gets paid on Friday. This payday will be the last time we have to pay for my husband's apartment rental. Woohoo!! I also expect we will get to save several hundred dollars. I like saving.

Yep, I'm looking forward to payday. How about you? Do you count the days to payday or do you just forget about it?

I redeemed more points at Swagbucks for a $5 Amazon gift card yesterday. I think I'm maxed out the $5 ones for this month!! Now to save for something else.

Our house has been listed on market for 11 days and we have had 9 showings. All neutral feedback, nothing negative. Apparently, those 9 just aren't interested in this house. The showings have slowed down as we have approached the holiday weekend. It's kind of nice, since I can relax a bit and not have to keep things quite so orderly for a couple days.

I see many of you are tracking your daily expenses. I've had to opt out of that one. It's too much to track for me right now. It seems the spending here has slowed a bit though. I like that!!

Enjoy the holiday!

I did get another $5 Amazon gift card redeemed today from Swagbucks. I knew I was close!!

I also did a few surveys with MySurveys today. One of them took forever and gave me 300 points. This helped push my points high enough to redeem for a $20 Paypal deposit. I think I'm done with that company though. It takes way to long to get enough points to redeem for anything!

It's nice to have a few more snowflakes to add to my Christmas fund! How are your goals going?

I added a snowflake to my Christmas Fund in the amount of $10.89. This was because my water bill came in under budget by that amount. Always love that!

I found four quarters in my purse, so I'm adding that $1 as well.

And to top it off, I earned another $5 in Amazon gift cards through Swagbucks. I'm pretty close to earning another one, too. I have several offers that didn't credit recently, so I'm checking with customer support on those.

I've used small amounts of money here and there to accomplish all sorts of goals, including getting of debt and saving for a vacation. This one is just as fun. Christmas shopping is going to be even more fun this year! How is your Christmas fund coming along?

I've added more to our 2012 Christmas Fund in the month of March to the tune of $67.38. Or maybe another $21 more. I seem to have more in my Christmas fund that my Excel sheet was actually tracking. I guess this is good. I'm just a bit perplexed about where the money came from!! Thus I have a line for unknown sources.

My end of March total is $371.41. Considering my goal for the year is $700, I'm on track to make the goal and then some if I keep up the pace.

Here's the breakdown:


How are your Christmas flakes stacking up?

The money stuff first. I received a $3 payment from Pinecone today. I also redeemed

Swagbucks for a $25 iTunes e-gift card. I was saving up for the Amazon one, but decided with today's deal it was better to get the iTunes. I will definitely give this to one of my daughter's for Christmas!! So I'm left with over 500 Swagbucks which is more than enough to get my an Amazon gift card on April 1. Yipee!!

House news. No showings today. No reponses from the two showings yesterday. However, we have a showing tomorrow!! Keep the showings coming I say. Fingers crossed there is an offer this weekend. I know that sounds like great expectations, but what can it hurt really? The hardest part is keeping the house tidy. I've done more laundry recently because I don't want our dirty clothes/towels hanging out in our closets for showings. I'm tossing those things in the washer each day and then running a load as it gets full (which is about every other day).

I'm reading The Great Gatsby for the first time. Very enjoyable. It's a classic and it has come up several times recently for me, so I decided it was time. Anyone have a favorite classic book? I've always loved To Kill A Mockingbird.

The Swagbuck links above are referral links.

You can purchase a $10 Amazon.com gift card from their new

AmazonLocal site today only for $5. I heard about it from MyMoneyBlog.

Since this is my primary funding for Christmas this year, I decided to pull the trigger and buy one. Are you going to buy one?

It has been so warm here over the last week, we have not been running the heat. We probably could have turned on the air conditioner as the house did get up to 82 degrees the last two days. It just doesn't seem right to turn it on in March!!

Windows are open, fans are running and I'm sure we are saving some nice cash. I did turn on the house fan to get a bit more cooling yesterday afternoon. And, it is very nice and cool in the basement. A good place to hang out when it gets hot.

How are you handling the heat and air at your home?

I haven't been checking retirement balances much lately, since it is usually bad news. However, I check after yesterday's closing and was surprised to find that the total of our accounts neared $165K. It seems not too long ago that we got to the $100K milestone. I just checked and that was in late November of 2009, so just a mere two plus years. Of course, it could have been much better, but I'll take where we are.

I'd love to see $175K or more by the end of the year. It is possible just by adding in our contributions, but you never know with the market lately.

The girls college funds are just under $20K combined. Also liking this. It will definitely help when the time comes!!

Have you been keeping an eye on your long term investments or were you ignoring them a bit like I was?

Here's a run down of my snowflake earnings since the beginning of 2012. I'm in the middle of redeeming four $5 AGC that I earned in the last half of February. I'm counting them towards February even they will arrive in March.



My total is up by $97.80 since last month! Awesome.

How are your Christmas Fund Challenge totals coming along?

I'm having my Paypal funds transferred to my checking account in the amount of $27.80. The funds are from an Ebay sale and Pincone surveys.

I was right that it was a good month for Pinecone surveys. I completed six for a total of $18.00. The Ebay sale was a pair of jeans that netted me $9.80.

These funds are snowflakes towards the Christmas Fund. I will post a complete update of all those funds in a couple days.

How many Pinecone surveys did you complete this month?