more life stuff. + picture
+ One more thing guys, those of you that have asked for information about Dave Ramsey and the budgeting forms, I haven’t forgotten about you, I’m just trying to get all the info I think you’ll need ready and then I’ll send the same email to all of you. If there’s anyone else wanting this still, leave your email in a note (they’re all private) and I will add you to the list.
Also! All of Dave’s books, CDs, DVDs, software, and generally everything else that has a regular price of $30 or less is only $10 right now! Ten bucks, woo!
Click here for Dave’s store.
Hi guyyss! I feel so productive today. I’m sitting here at my computer listening to the Dave Ramsey radio show online. This morning, Matt and I got up and got ready and had an early lunch, and then we went off to see a matinee showing of Sex and the City 2. I have to say, I expected it to be a little more… I don’t know… dramatic or something? It was kind of boring compared to how great I thought they did with the first movie. But come on… it’s Carrie! Of course I had to go see it. And I offered for Matt to go see Iron Man 2 while I did, but he said he’d rather spend time with me (I know, sickeningly sweet huh?). *shrugs* Whatever!
We came home, took a short nap. I love those great afternoon cat naps on a hot summer day with the fan blowing on me and sheets cool and soft. Best kind of naps right there. Then we watched one of our Financial Peace lessons and Matt went off to work. Since he left, I’ve filled out the desk calendar for this month (complete with cute pictures and doodles, lol), filed a bunch of papers, filled out my taxes for this year (yeah yeah, I know! I couldn’t track down my W-2’s until after April 15th!!), finished the June budget, made a to-do list for tomorrow, talked to my sister and another friend, cleaned off and organized my desk (still sneezy from the dust, eeww!), done laundry, and forgotten to eat dinner.
Yeah… be right back.
Yumm… leftover grilled chicken and broccoli! Alright, where were we?
Right so, let me finish my list from the last entry. Recipes back that way too, if you’re interested. Oh, first here is a picture of the Chipotle Ranch Chicken I listed the recipe for in the last entry.
It was soooo yum! I definitely recommend using the same spicy ranch, but you can marinate it with any kind of spicy marinade with something mexican like, you know, chipotle, lime, etc.
– Speaking of all the stuff I did tonight, we’re in the process of streamlining our schedules since we have so much to do. Matt works 2 jobs (6 days a week when he’s not working overtime), I’m job hunting, plus keeping the house up, we try to get together with our friends to play D&D (yeah, go ahead make fun!) once a week, we do BioLife (plasma donation), and we have therapy once a week. Part of this was doing a lot of spring cleaning in our room. We do rent a room in a house, but it is a 3-level theater room. It’s about 15 feet by about 35 or 40 feet, so we have it divided into a living room, closet, and bedroom. With no enclosed closet, we have to find somewhere to put EVERYTHING, since there’s no where to just throw it. So, we cleaned everything, went through the bookshelves, stored everything that we don’t want out, re-organized where keep our clothes, loootsss of stuff we’d been neglecting. We even had some boxes still left from when we moved in in September! It feel sooo much easier to manage now. We use Saturday (our one day off) to spend time doing light cleaning and wash the sheets and it’s done!
It’s just another way we’re streamlining our life. We’re getting our finances and paperwork we’ve neglected in order, now our living space and our schedule. Next will hopefully come a job for me, and then once we get a good handle on these changes, we’ll start an official diet (Weight Watchers probably) as opposed to just trying to eat healthier and join a gym.
Oh, good news guys! All in all we’ve saved $1950 so far, and we are getting ready to pay off our first debt in the debt snowball, which is $1200! Our next priority are the taxes we owe for this year and last (we are on an installment plan with the government, so no we’re not going to jail or anything, don’t worry!), which is about $3500. I know! Stupid tax for not upping our withholding! Anyway, we’re focusing on the good here 🙂
– I’ve been looking for a job for some time now, but it is so hard in this economy. I went back to Bath and Body Works to see if I could get my old job back, and it seems really promising, but the store here in Utah is going through some changes, which means that it’s taking a little while to find out what’s going to happen. They are losing their store manager and another manager (not sure if it is a co-manager or a assistant manager) in the next few months, so they are looking for replacements. From the conversation I had with the store manager, I’m not sure if she is interested in hiring me as some kind of manager or shift leader based on my experience or just an associate. But I do know that she is interested in interviewing me, and she is just lining up other people for interviews at the same time. So, I am really excited, but cautious.
I am really wanting to go home soon, but I am waiting to see what happens with this job first. If I get hired, I may not be able to go home until next year (which sucks, but worth it job-wise), but it might turn out that they can’t hire me until closer to holiday season (August or September). In that case, I would be able to go home for a few weeks and then come back and start working. I really want to get this job because a) I loooveee BBW and I loved working there, and b) because of all my experience even if I’m not offered a management position right away (I’m actually not expecting this, as I have no management experience), it is very likely that if we are here for a while (which it looks like we will be), I could move up through the ranks. This would be fantastic, as I would be able to earn a lot more money than working part-time, and we could speed up our debt snowball sooo much. So please, keep your fingers crossed that this works out for me!
– Matt and therapy, huh? Well……….. there was a big hairy awful week last week, but this week has been very good. The bottom line here is that Matt is working re
ally hard cleaning out his wounds. He is doing GREAT work, better than he’s ever done before. I can see him changing so much everyday. He’s entered a stage where he says that he is more sad when he thinks about his dad than angry, which is huge progress. I love him, and I know that once he is able to get over this hurdle, our relationship will be so much better. It’s really hard to see him go through so much pain, but I know how important and cathartic it is for him. It’s definitely been hard for me, too. My feelings change from one day to the next. I feel like I’m at the end of my rope sometimes, and then I feel hope shining all over sometimes. I just have to keep doing what I think is best, and that’s all I can do. Right now, I know this is the best place for me to be.
We did talk to our therapist about me leaving and going home to visit for a few weeks or a month to take some time away from each other so that I don’t have to deal with the meltdowns for a little while. She helped us weight our feelings and our fears for either way, and we came to the conclusion that the reasons that we were afraid to take time away were easily workable, and that the reasons we wanted to take time away were the right ones. Our therapist said she thought that it would be a good thing for us because we are wanting it for the right reasons. That said, like I said before, I am waiting to find out something about the job before I know if I can go or not.
So yeah… that’s where we are right now.