As always happens recently, I'm going to try and run through a lot of updates all in one post! It makes for very nondescriptive titles but oh well.

- Had a sit-down with the spouses about our shared spending and vacation budgets being so far in the red. I put together projections of what would happen if we stopped funding the reno fund for a while and split AS's net pay 50/50 between the two line items. If we were careful about our spending for the next few months, we should be back in the positive by October, so hopefully then we can start splitting it 3 ways between shared spending, vacations and renovations.

Everyone gave up some things to make this projection work. NT gave up a second trip he was hoping to take. (I was also idly thinking about another trip because my two have/will be very very cheap. But it's highly unlikely I'll get another one this year.) I cut back the amount I was planning to spend on my next solo trip and pledged to shop my closet for my fall wardrobe and avoid buying new clothes if possible. AS cut her sewing-room renovation budget from $1000 to $600.

And we all agreed to skip the State Fair this year; we love going but most of the charm is buying tons of different foods, which combined with admission (and sometimes a second trip with the kids, which involves rides and games) gets very expensive. There's always next year!

- Some other expenses came to light after our discussion, but also AS logged some more hours on her big freelance job that aren't in the projection. I'm going to update my projection every week or so to keep tabs on whether we're likely to hit our goal.

- I just realized that I'll be in four, maybe five different states this month! Tomorrow we leave for Va. (technically we're spending the first and last night in a hotel in Md. but I don't count that). We may do a day or overnight trip to W.Va. while we're there. We get back Wednesday, and that Friday I leave on a road trip with a friend to Iowa to see my fave band. We get back that Sunday, and on Tuesday I fly to Tenn. for a two-night, three-day business trip! Whew!

- Although I haven't made any progress on editing my own novel, I've been busily chatting with my NY friend on our plans to write a new novel together. We're a long way off from starting; we need to agree on the main plot, character and setting before we can start writing a scene-by-scene outline. But we have lots of great ideas so I'm hopeful we can pull it off!

- I've been neglecting most of my goals except guitar, which I practice almost every day and keep making progress on. However, I realize that most of my goals were about reducing stress and increasing mental health, and guitar is doing more for that than I could have imagined, so I'm kind of OK with taking a different direction than my initial goals for the year.

- I do wish I could finish my emergency preparedness kit and schedule us for some first aid/CPR classes, but I need to wait until our spending deficit is under control.

- Things we decided not to cut back on: kids' swim lessons at the pricier (but very effective) new place we've been trying, art class for the 8-year-old, and we're going to start gymnastics lessons for the 6-year-old. We had her on art but it's not really her thing. She's always doing somersaults and flipping off couches, so maybe gymnastics will be a better fit!

- I thought about withdrawing from my alumni board so I could maybe focus my time on other interests, but then I had a couple of fun events that actually went well, and the alumni office has been so grateful for the work I do. So I'm reconsidering and may try to serve out my term (until 2021).

- My second-weekly guitar lessons end next week, which I'm glad of so I can have more of a social life again! When I finish all this traveling, that is. But maybe I can do some planning now to set up some hanging-out time with various people for when I'm back from my three trips. Tonight though I have to focus on packing, since we'll be leaving for the airport as soon as I get home from work and picking one of the kids up from daycare tomorrow.

- We've had some minor illness and injury lately -- AS sprained an ankle, AA had a fever for a couple days, a few other things -- but overall we're in good health. My one complaint is I've been so busy and our kid dropoff routine is so off-kilter that I haven't been walking nearly as much as I had been, and my A.M. strength exercises have fallen off the radar. Got to get those two habits back, because they do wonders for my energy!

I'm sure there's more I've forgotten, but that's more than enough for one post!