Phase 1 - Complete

Chris wanted to put away all of her "garbage" sale findings, but I had something better I wanted to do. As a man I felt like destroying something, lifting a 200 lb. object above my head,  and then carrying a 500 lb. object up and down several elevations (obviously because P90X has made me a freak of nature when it comes to strength).

The end result was that we reorganized our garage and laundry room..... and didn't touch the garage sale findings at all!  Poor Chris, but at least she now has a better organized garage to look at.

Back to the "man stuff"

I had to do a little demolition in the laundry room to get it to look like this. I removed the old shelving unit (using a only a hammer) then I had to lift the dryer on top of the washer. Chris did help me with this part because it was heavy.  Next we wanted to move the second fridge indoors and that was harder than we thought. It wouldn't fit through the garage door and I couldn't get the door off the hinges to make it any easier so we had to take the entire thing down the driveway and back up the entryway.  That was almost impossible to do, but we got it done.

Then we went to the store and bought some new shelving units for the garage and put them where my work bench used to be.

These things are heavy duty. 

Because we didn't get started with everything until late afternoon we ran out of daylight and will have to finish my workbench re-organization another weekend.



Dear Superbowl,

Seriously Superbowl, you need to be on a different day this year. You're really cramping my birthday plans. I know you are the only football game I care to watch but do you really have to be on my birthday?

2010 Lesson Learned ...

2010 Lesson Learned: Saving money is something that is personal & different for everyone.

Recently I found out, through the hard way, that buying things "on sale" does not help me save $$. It actually makes me spend more without even knowing it.

Through trial & error, these are just a few things we found work for us:

• Budgeting every penny we earn in a month. (A month counts as 2 full pay checks. If it's not budgeted for or we can't "rob Peter to pay Paul" it's not going to be purchased that month. Everything & I mean Every tiny thing & every cent gets budgeted)
• Meal planning for the week/month & only buying groceries for those menu items (If I go to the grocery store without my list I spend more. If I have coupons sure I save money but I also spend more over all. If I have a coupon for my list, sure I'll use that one but only that item on my list)
• Only buying things I NEED (If I can do without then I don't buy. Gasp, even if it's a killer deal. That one took a bit to get over)
• Justifying keeping a car because I can't afford repairs. I didn't even think about not having a car payment gives you money for repairs AND repairs cost much less than a monthly car payment.
• NOT eating out all the time.

I feel like I just described the results of my science fair project! Hopefully writing these down will help me remember what I learned this past year. Getting rid of $40k in debt is a huge relief & we couldn't have done it without finding something that works for us.

Half Glass Full ...

I love all you "Half Glass Full" people. I've had a few comments on my bedroom pic.

You guys are refreshing. All I see is the wrinkled bedskirt, laundry in the corner, Brant's shoes on the floor, a window that looks off & tiny cheap lamps. I'll stop there so I don't empty the glass anymore :)

Thanks, though. I do like to decorate. That's my only hobby I guess.

Happy Birthday Grammy!

Our Grammy turned 80 today! She lifts weights, has a facebook account & always makes us smile.

We celebrated by going to IHOP Saturday morning & ate all kind of breakfast delights.

My Achy Breaky Back

Brant decided that I needed a new matress. He told me he was tired of hearing me complain about my back pain. Ha Ha, he thinks he funny.
Seriously this one makes us feel like we are sleeping on clouds. Thank you Dr Breus for inventing the best matress in the world. We are huge fans.