I don't have any photos today, but I did get some decluttering and organizing done. Inspired by Jasmine B, I attacked my work inbox. In about an hour or two, I took it down from over 300 emails to just 2!

When I was done I had a few minutes before it was time to leave work, so I cleared off my desk--threw out some unneeded papers and shoved some in my drawer. Wiped all the coffee rings off my desk too while I was at it.

When I got home, I remembered some more of the kids' craft supplies were in a drawer in their room, so I cleaned out that drawer and discarded or sorted everything in it. The salvageable supplies got put into the big Tupperware and I found a spot for it under the changing table. And now there's an empty toy drawer in their room that we can use to eliminate more clutter.

Tonight I was very unfocused, but all my puttering did bring about some results!

First of all, I thought I'd list books on Half.com for sale as my organizing thing, but I mentioned it to NT and by the time I sat down to do it, I saw he was doing it. Sweet! But then I felt like I had to figure out something I could do myself.

First I thought about organizing the girls' craft supplies, but then I realized I wanted a giant Tupperware box for that. So I checked in the front hall closet and saw some half-full cans of paint. I went on the city website and looked up how to dispose of it, and found there's a dropoff center (we'd have to get a car share, but that's OK). The site also said if the paint was latex and dried out and less than a quarter full, you could just put it in the trash. But when I picked one up at random, it felt more than a quarter full, and I thought I felt movement.

So I'm going to have NT pry them open tomorrow and if they look usable, I'll Freecycle them. If not usable, we'll do a car share and try to bundle a few other chores we've been putting off.

So that was progress of sorts, but I couldn't see any visible results, so I still wanted to do something! I'd noticed some stuff in the closets that we probably didn't want anymore and could maybe put in our friend's garage sale next month, so I thought about just cataloging things in there and making a garage sale list.

I found the modem for the alternative internet service we tried to save money with a year or so ago, and I took that down to see if we could Craigslist it. Then I noticed a giant Tupperware on a top shelf. I took it down, and it just contained some paper-making supplies and some random 45 records. I managed to put the paper-making kit in the same box as a screen-printing kit (AS has a lot of crafts supplies tucked in odd places), and set aside the 45s to Freecycle. That meant I could use the Tupperware for the girls' crafts supplies!

Here's the 45s and the internet modem:


The top shelf of that closet already looked better just by getting the big Tupperware out of there:


So I took down the cardboard box of their old crafts supplies and three boxes of NEW supplies they got for their birthdays this month. I organized, put things into baggies, consolidated, and threw out a bunch of scribbled/painted/stickered paper and various scraps:


I managed to get all four crafts boxes' contents into the one Tupperware, which can either go under the crib, under the bed or on the bottom shelf of the changing table in the girls' room:


Once the main cardboard box was cleared out, I thought it could be used to store various hats and gloves that were scattered over another shelf in the front hall closet. So I brought that stuff out, we tossed a few unusable hoods and odd gloves, and we fit the rest into the craft box.

That meant a bag of bags that was on the closet floor now fits in the shelf along with our gloves/hats box and with our other bag of bags:


And, it also means there is a free spot in the sewing supplies storage unit where the crafts box was!

A month or so ago, I heard two co-workers discussing an open position at our company. One of them was thinking about recommending a contact of hers for the job. The other one said something like, "And don't forget you'll get a bonus if she's hired."

I was shocked. I suddenly remembered that our company has a referral-bonus program. They used to publicize it but hadn't said much about it in the past couple of years. The thing was, I'd referred my co-worker about a year ago and she'd been hired.

I emailed HR and asked if it was too late to be considered for the referral bonus. They hemmed and hawed and said it usually wasn't given out if the new hire was a direct report, like mine was. I pointed out that it wasn't established that I was going to be her supervisor when we were hiring for the position; that was decided later.

The HR rep said she'd see what she could do, and I gently nudged her a couple of times, but I wasn't really thinking anything would happen.

Then today she came down to talk to me. She said they wanted to give me the bonus but it would have to be kind of off the records, I guess because it was over a year ago or because I'm now the person's supervisor. Anyway, she said they'd give me the bonus in the form of Amex gift cards. It's $500, and I should receive it next week!

I'm so excited. I keep a running list of upcoming unbudgeted expenses for the year, and expected offsets/snowflakes for the year. Sometimes we've got enough offsets to cover, but if another expense comes up, then sometimes we have an estimated deficit. Well, I added the $500 to our expected offsets, and now we have a small surplus in the projection again!

So, yay. This is so great!

So today I tackled the stack of papers that's been squatting in various spots in our common area. Here it is before:



I recycled probably about a third to a half of it, filed a few things, and pulled some things out to deal with immediately. Other things I want to have on hand for when I do taxes in a week or so, and there were some other things I need to deal with so don't want them out of sight. Other documents were ready to be filed but I'd have to make a new label and folder for them, which I wasn't feeling up to. So I didn't eliminate the pile, but I cut it in half and neatened it. Here's how it looks now:



I'm pretty happy. The rest will get dealt with over the course of this month, I promise. I just wanted to make a dent tonight!

Our mortgage payments hit today:

US: $476 to principal
UK1: $217
UK2: $47
UK3: $48

All told, that's $788 down, $112 to go on the April debt goal.

I was able to count the leftover flat-rental income toward our UK reno fund, so 361.95 pounds, or $579.12, more to that fund. Takes it to 3906.50, or $6250.40.

NT got one of his annual UK pension statements, and it looks like went up in value about 1561 pounds over the year, or nearly $2500. Not bad for something we're not tending at all! Someday we'll look into consolidating his old pension plans and educating ourselves on how best to invest them, but it would be too much work for too little benefit at the moment.

So, that'll look good on our next net worth statement.

Our mortgage payments hit today:

US: $476 to principal
UK1: $217
UK2: $47
UK3: $48

All told, that's $788 down, $112 to go on the April debt goal.

I was able to count the leftover flat-rental income toward our UK reno fund, so 361.95 pounds, or $579.12, more to that fund. Takes it to 3906.50, or $6250.40.

NT got one of his annual UK pension statements, and it looks like went up in value about 1561 pounds over the year, or nearly $2500. Not bad for something we're not tending at all! Someday we'll look into consolidating his old pension plans and educating ourselves on how best to invest them, but it would be too much work for too little benefit at the moment.

So, that'll look good on our next net worth statement.

Now I can't promise I'll document every declutter day, but I thought it would motivate me to actually see what a couple minutes of my time could accomplish.

This is the load of rubbish I pulled out of my shoe shelf in the closet:



Ridiculous stuff -- I found receipts for AA's first birthday, 2011! Because of this useless clutter, my shoes had been piled up on top of the stuff, or crammed together on bare spots on the shelves. Now look at it:



Not bad for 5-10 minutes work! (If you count breaking down the cardboard for recycling, dissolving the cornstarch peanuts in the sink, and straightening my shoes.)

Must be the spring cleaning bug, but I feel like every area of my home and life has more clutter and disorganization than it needs to. So I declare a declutter/get organized challenge for April! My only rules are that I make SOME progress every day and report it here on the blog.

Tonight I have a finance committee meeting for my condo, so I don't know if I'll have much time or energy. One thing that would be an easy fix is there are a bunch of empty boxes and envelopes from bday and Xmas hanging around in my closet (on my shoe shelf where I tend to hide presents until it's time to wrap them). So if I do nothing else today, my goal will be to clear that out. Should take 5 minutes or less.

Other organizing/decluttering projects I'd like to tackle this month:
- Do my taxes! (Definitely falls under "get organized" because I need to gather papers and fill out forms; plus I can declutter after by filing all the paperwork away when I'm done.)
- Sort/file/discard paperwork. We've got a big pile that keeps getting moved from counter to table to cabinet; need to get rid of it.
- The kids' room. See if I can get them to donate/toss toys; clear out the outgrown clothes; find a place for everything that's left.
- The front closets. Discard/sell/give away unwanted stuff; rearrange what's left so it's not so crowded and chaotic.
- My clothing. I'm sure there are things I can get rid of in my wardrobe.
- My email inboxes. Both my personal and work inboxes have several hundred emails each that need to get filed and/or deleted.
- The bookcases. We need to either get rid of some books, or get some bookends and clear off the tops of the bookcases so we can utilize those as additional shelving options.
- The living room. I want to move more of the kids' stuff into their room once we clear out some space in theirs.

I'm sure some other ideas will come up as the month progresses. I don't need to get it ALL done; I just need to get SOMEthing done every day this month.

How about you? Are you in?

Well, as mentioned previously, my March workout goal stalled at 13 workouts, so I missed my target of 20. My body was begging me for a week off, so I listened to it. Hope to come back somewhat in April so I don't struggle too badly at the 5k!

I exceeded the March debt goal of $900 with $930 going toward principal.

For April, I'm still setting aside extra money vs. putting it toward student loans until I know something, either about up-in-the-air job considerations or the WV land deal. So I'm shooting for the minimum payments only. Therefore the April debt goal is again to pay off at least $900. If the chips fall the way I think they will, we should be able to pay more, but I'm just not sure how soon anything is going to be definite.

Last night was the end of birthday month in my household. Friday was my mom's 80th bday; we sent her a handmade card from the girls and ordered a bouquet. Saturday SL turned 2 (can you believe it??) and we had some grownup friends over for dinner. We ordered delivery and it probably came to about $40 per person (since the three of us split the bill and treated our friends).

Today was *meant* to be a free-ish outing, except for the carshare (which we have a line item for). We had tickets to the science museum that we'd won at a fundraiser auction last year; the package even came with a free parking pass.

But when we got there, we discovered that the exhibit we wanted to see cost $8 extra per person. So that was $24 (kids got in free). I was bummed because we gave a ticket to our friend who doesn't make a ton of money, thinking it would be a nice cheap outing, and I think she had to spend $12 on parking and $8 on the exhibit ticket. Ah well. She was gracious about it.

SO, that should be the end of spending for March. I'm way in the hole still on my own spending money and looking forward to acting like a cheapskate for the month of April to make it up.

I can't believe it's already April soon! It's not as big a month for us as March, but there is AS's business trip to England the 2nd week, and our 5K near the middle of the month. There was a big thaw today, so I'm hoping I can practice outside soon. I haven't run in a week, so I need to get back into it, and I think getting to be outside vs. the exercise room will motivate me.

Several big money things are kind of pending or unsure right now, so I feel a bit in stasis. I think it contributed to not feeling motivated to run; I felt like I was waiting vs. moving.

- The land deal hasn't had any visible movement in a couple days, but as far as I know it's going through. Now that I've come to peace with it, I just want it to go through so I can contact a tax guy and figure out how much of it I'm actually going to get. I also researched nonprofits and decided which one I'm going to support.

- We saved up enough UK money to make up the rest of the 10K the management guy said we needed, and sent him an email. Turns out he meant 10K MORE (not counting what we spent last year), and he meant it as a minimum, and he meant plus VAT (making it 12K). He also mentioned the current tenant leaves in July, not May as we thought, so that gives us more time to save up money. Still, I did some calculations and we're only going to be able to come up with about 8100 plus VAT.

So NT's going to contact the guy and ask if we can do a modest reno for that amount or do a payment plan for the amount we're short. I really don't want to send any US money over there if we can find a reasonable way to avoid it, though if the land deal goes through that would be an option too.

- On Saturday, our realtor friend took us around to look at several condos with renovated bathrooms in our association. We got a good sense of what others are doing, and it's nice but not super high-end. That makes me think we might actually be able to do a budget-conscious reno and still make the place sellable. One of the places had sold for $137K recently, but it was a 1-bedroom. So that gives me hope that we could really sell for $145K in a year or so if we fix our place up.

- We discussed the possibility of buying sooner rather than later if the land deal goes through and we decide to stay in the US. If we didn't sell the UK flat, we might only be able to put 10% down at this point. Out of curiosity, I checked out what it would cost to have a mortgage, PMI and property tax on a $425K home (which might be what we would end up paying unless we decide to go a bit outside our area). It was about $2600 per month, about $900 more than what we pay for mortgage plus condo dues. (Of course I know our condo dues include utilities, so it would be even more than that if I added utilities, but I started there as a rough estimate.)

If our incomes stay fairly steady, there will be offsets next year. Hopefully student loans will be paid off, which is $157 less. We should get about $350 more per month as a result of not setting aside $5K in flex spending. We shouldn't have to spend any more on NT's tuition, which should net us $500 per month on average. So that's over $1000 per month more we'll have per month, which makes the increased mortgage seem more reasonable if we went that route.

And, there is the occasional cheaper home in our area that looks nice; I saw one the other day listed for $275K that looked great and made me wonder what the catch was! So that would mean a cheaper mortgage (especially if we could afford 20% down and avoid PMI).

I've never sold a home before, so I don't really know what the best strategy is; do you wait for it to sell and then start your search? Or do you start your home search with the hopes it would sell before you close? I think we could manage a couple months of overlap in mortgages by cutting back on fun money and maybe even IRA contributions, but anything more than a couple months would start to suck the fun out of life, not to mention stall our retirement planning! I suppose we could try to rent our old place when we bought our new, but I feel like the renters might spoil the renovations we'd made. And that's if we could find renters to cover most of our current costs.

Lots and lots to think about. I feel like things will be clearer once we find out about the land deal, once AS has her business trip and can sit back to consider her prospects in both countries, once we hear back from NT's management company about whether we can work out a deal for the UK reno.

My very business-y brother has taken over the land deal, and so it looks like it's going to happen very soon. I'm kind of stunned.

I've been vague about it because I feel like the words could be search engine/spam magnet, and also because I feel so conflicted about it. But basically the deal would be granting right of way on my dad's unused land for a pipeline for a very controversial type of mining venture.

When I saw the deal was going ahead very quickly, I wrote a very friendly and trying to be neutral but still impassioned email to my brother, letting him know why I thought we should each donate a portion of our proceeds. He wrote a very nice note saying he would consider it and that he understood why I wanted to think about our kids and grandkids when we accepted money from this company. So I'm leaving it up to him; I've definitely convinced at least one sister to donate part of her proceeds to an environmental group.

My brother says the deal currently looks like $78K apiece. I am assuming I will send him $1000 for doing so much legwork, $750 to my third sister who's not taking part in the deal since she got just $75K on her related deal, $10K to an as-yet-undetermined environmental cause, and $20K to taxes (though there may be some loopholes if part of the payment is compensation for damages to the land?). Looks like that could leave $46,250 of straight profit. Just kind of a phenomenal number that could wipe out some of our current goals and contribute to our pie-in-the-sky goal of buying a new home without selling NT's flat. If we decide we can't wait and do need to sell his flat to raise some cash, it still accelerates our goals to an almost unimaginable degree. I was hoping for some windfalls this year, but I was thinking in the hundreds, not the tens of thousands!

We'll see. It all seems made-up so I'm not going to assume anything until I have the actual check in my hands. But my brother is pretty confident it's going through and that the only variable is what the exact number on each person's check will be.

My workout goal, alas, is stalled, but at least I reached the debt goal!

AS's student loan hit, and $138 went to principal. That takes us to $930 paid, exceeding the $900 goal.

Everything else is in a holding pattern right now:
- The weird land deal windfall is still pending; I've done some research and emailed back and forth with one sister and spoken to another one on the phone. My sister in Va. is sort of gathering info and everyone's opinions, so I assume she'll let me know what comes next.
- The various career/job considerations are still ongoing, with nothing too promising or definitive in the past week or so.
- I have some money set aside for extra payments on student loans, but with so much uncertainty about our future income, I don't feel comfortable using it, so I'm keeping it in the bank for now.
- Canceled some CCs, but also opened another Discover card. We now have 9 cards open.
- SL will be getting 500 pounds (US$800) from the UK grandparents soon, so I'll keep that in the UK account for our eventual reno, and will take $800 from U.S. EF/medical fund savings to put in her mutual fund.

Oh, we finally switched our 3rd and last prepaid phone over to Ting, so I guess that's actual progress on something!

I worked out yesterday and today, so I'm at 13 down, 7 to go. Not sure I'll hit the goal since we have a busy week ahead, but I'll be happy even if I just get close. I haven't lost weight, in fact I've gained a bit, but it's been a decadent birthday month plus I've been really lax about avoiding snacks and extra calories. I know what I need to do, so I just need to do it. No one to blame but myself!

It's been a weird weekend. Much like this year, which I thought would be totally routine financially, this weekend started with a curveball. On Saturday, my sister calls to let me know about a potential windfall from my dad -- a land deal -- my share could be $75K!! Then she tells me the source of the money, and it would be from a morally (and environmentally) questionable source. We (my dad's kids) would have to decide whether to greenlight the deal. So then I'm thinking I can't agree to it.

But then, on further reflection, I come around to thinking that turning down the deal would not change the overall course of events. I bring up the idea, and my sister likes it, that we accept it but donate a large portion of the money to a watchdog or other nonprofit org, which might in the end help more to combat the source of the problem than just saying "no" and not doing the deal. Then, I talk to one of my own sisters, who is not going to be part of this because my dad already let her do a similar deal where she got a similar amount. Her deal, I feel like, already has put wheels in motion to the point where the rest of us saying "no" wouldn't even change the course of events on this particular plot of land, let alone the region in general.

So I still don't know -- what my other siblings will say (both about the deal in general and about the idea to donate a portion), whether the deal would go through even if we said yes. But I'm kind of thinking that on my end, I will agree to consider it, and commit to donating at least $10K to a worthy cause if the money comes through, and strongly suggest that my siblings also donate if they think we should do it. I think my two sisters would donate -- they both have offspring who are deeply troubled by the nature of the business we're dealing with. My brother, I don't know if we could convince. But even if three of us did, it would be a significant contribution to a good cause. So we'll see. I'm still trying to think about it from all angles and haven't given my final opinion yet.

It all feels very surreal to me, and will remain abstract unless/until I actually see a check for the amount. But if it happened, I know exactly what I'd do with the money; donate $10K, pay whatever taxes we'd owe on it, and then put the rest in our house down payment fund. It could accelerate our goals by over a year and possibly make it so that we could keep NT's flat for rental income, vs. selling it to afford a new home.

I realize it's been a while since I mentioned my workouts! I haven't done as many as I would have hoped by today--only 11, which means I'd only have one free day after today (when I know I'm not working out) to get to 20. So 9 workouts to go. Even if I don't make the goal, I'll keep working out as many nights as I can find the time or energy. Heck, I can jog 30 minutes at a slightly higher pace than when I started the month, so even that's something.

On the financial side, a few more credit card rewards have come in, so I've canceled a few more cards. We "only" have 11 open between the three of us now! I also have three more that can be canceled now, and three that we need to wait for the rewards on. I'll try to cancel those three this weekend, and then we'll be down to 8! Not for long, though; as soon as we're ready to start purchasing things for the bathroom reno, I'm going to take out a few more bonus cards.

The bonuses we've received so far, along with AS's $1000 check from her recent speaking engagement, helped me pay off my bday party and have enough saved up for our upcoming tax bill. I reckon we'll owe about $1700 between the three of us; I already got AS's federal refund and saved that, so I just had to come up with about $1150 more, and now I nearly have that!

Now we can move on to saving up our snowflakes/extra money for our other unbudgeted wants. All we have left now are (including tax bill since I haven't paid it yet):
Duvet/comforter $40
Dual citizenship for girls $580
NT passport $250
AS yoga x38 $570
Swim lessons (3/$160) $480
2nd half of laptop $500
SL bed & mattress $120
Girls' new snow gear $150
Tax bill $1,154

At least some of these can be taken care of through Amazon or other retailers, so when my SW credit card bonus comes through I'll redeem for gift cards with these items in mind.

So that's $3844 of projected expenses. I have slightly more in expected snowflakes than expected expenses (mostly thru CC bonuses), but you'll see that it's assuming I take out 4 more rewards cards over the course of the year (2 Discovers and 2 Southwests). Expected snowflakes:
Current surplus $1,135.63
Apr-Dec surplus $479
CC bonuses $300
CJ raise $350
Amex rewds $150
Other CC rewards $40
SW GCs $401
NT SW GC? $401
AS SW GC? $401
CJ work anniv bonus $25
NT Discover bonus? $150
AS Discover bonus? $150
Amex GC balance $19
projected total $4,002

I haven't factored in NT's raise because I don't want to count on it (in case he finds a job he likes that pays less), so as long as he stays in his current job, that's a bit more on the surplus side. And this doesn't factor in student loans, which I'm still planning to pay off this year if we don't suffer a major income reduction when our career stuff nets out.

We also have a stack of books to try and sell on half.com, and we'll be gathering up detritus to try and sell at our friend's garage sale this spring. So I'm not ruling out other snowflakes (nor am I expecting to get off scott free on unexpected expenses, so I figure it'll balance out in the end).

On the bathroom reno front, we scheduled one contractor consultation at the home&garden expo, had to cancel and reschedule (their fault), but have since decided they're not the best for us so are planning to cancel altogether. Instead we contacted our realtor to give us some showings of other condos in our building that are on the market and have had recent bathroom renos, so we can get an idea of our "competition." There was one contractor we talked to at the expo who seemed very willing to help keep costs down by determining what we could do on our own and what we needed a pro to do, so we'll probably contact him. And we had a look at Ikea's bathroom offerings, and they actually look pretty good -- might be able to save money on the vanity and sink basin there, so we can use the money on other things that matter more (like actual fixtures, tiles, etc.)

So, things are trucking along pretty well overall. Tonight we have the 4th of our 5 birthday celebrations (NT's), and we're going to a nice restaurant that does wood-fired pizza. Next Saturday is our 5th and final birthday celebration, our little SL's 2nd birthday! I'm pretty far in the hole on my spending money, but I have hopes that I can recoup by early April. I've cut out incidental spending completely for myself, but bigger chunks of expenses keep coming up, such as NT's dinner tonight, and ordering flowers for my mom (HER bday is next week too!), and babysitting this Thursday for a date night. Right now I'm $60 in debt, but after pizza and date night, I'll probably be another $80 in the hole, which means if I don't take any money for myself next week, I'll still be $60 down. SL's bday will probably be another $20-$30 because we're ordering in food for a few friends. Then the next week (assuming no more reasons to spend money come up) if I don't take out any money for myself and don't spend anything, I should break even! Which means I can hopefully start drawing a regular allowance for myself April 11! Whew, this is definitely the farthest in the hole I've ever gone with my spending money; I'll be glad to get back to normal.

OK, enough babbling; got to get some work done today!

This post will be a bit morbid, but it's something I've been thinking about so wanted to get it out of my system.

The past month has felt kind of "death is all around me." First, a college friend passed away at age 39 (cancer). Not totally unexpected, but I'd become very involved in her journey via Facebook and her blog, and had convinced myself she'd live. She left behind 2 young kids, a husband and a mother.

Then, a friend's mother died. She was in her 70s or 80s, but still, it was unexpected. He went up north to check on her and do some work around her home, and found her body.

And of course poor Sicily/Teresa from our SA community.

It's made me think, I'm 40 years old, parents are getting older, siblings are getting older, and plus, death just happens unexpectedly to younger, healthier people. Is there a point where you just start having to deal with more and more deaths of loved ones?

The college friend was a big blow. Not because we were super-close (though I did like her and we had tons of mutual friends), but because she fought so hard, seemed so invincible, and then just died. She sort of represents the realization (or rather, the confirmation) that I and my contemporaries are not immortal.

I vaguely considered going to her memorial but I knew it would be well-attended by people who had many, many more memories and stories to share. It did make me think, though. There are lots and lots of people whose services I would like to attend if they passed away.

Last-minute airfare and expenses could really add up. So what so I do if that situation comes? It's not really an emergency, because you know it's likely to happen (you just don't know when or who). Do you pull money out of "wants"? Take it from the EF and build it up later? Or maybe there should be a separate pocket of money, so if and when tragedy strikes, financial considerations aren't an added burden on top of grief.

I'm not prepared to start yet another savings goal right now, but I'm turning over the idea in my mind as a possibility for the future.

Today has been a do-nothing type of day for me. I'd split a bottle of wine with AS last night and so figured I was hungover this morning (headachey and low-energy), but then NT said the bottle was way-low alcohol and my share would've been the equivalent of a glass of regular wine. That's when I realized I had a cold (or the one I've had has gotten worse). So I didn't work out, or do much of anything, today.

But I did force myself to work out last night for 30 mins. in the exercise room. I did lower-impact stuff, but at least I got my workout in. That made it 8 down and 12 to go to meet my goal for the month. We shall see!

I checked our savings accounts; .32 in interest in one and 6.34 in the other. The .32 will just get set aside in money I'm holding for EF replenishment once the UK renovations are paid for; the 6.34 goes into our moving fund.

NT got his back pay from his raise, a little over $200. This goes into our general surplus to help pay for some of the unbudgeted-for but expected things. In this case it will help cover our taxes owed April 15.

Groceries were about $50 under budget this week! We're going to use the surplus to stock up on Asian pantry staples we're running low on; hoisin and sesame oil and such.

There's been something hanging over our heads lately. Basically, AS's mom started saying about 6 months ago that she was going to try and find a job in our city. Didn't ask us, or discuss it, just started making offhand comments when commenting on our stuff on Facebook. It was a tad odd but I didn't think much of it. Then when she visited in December, she talked about it again, but again, not in a way that really invited conversation. It was like, I'm going to do this. Then she said something about AS's aunt not approving of the plan and saying "who's going to take care of you if something happens?" and AS's mom told us that she told the aunt, we would.

That's when I started getting uncomfortable. We have worked hard to get out of the hole and have grand plans about what we want to do with our money once we're out of debt, and it didn't involve this big unknown quantity. I started feeling insecure about our finances all of a sudden. AS's grandmother once gifted her some money to help with college applications and visits, and her mom cleared out the account (after racking up charges checking the balance repeatedly by phone) and never paid her back.

Additionally, one of the reasons we started getting in the hole was that AS didn't qualify for federal student aid because her parents had refused to file taxes that year. So I took out an unsecured personal loan to pay for a semester, that her parents said they'd pay part of back (I believe I took out $12K and they said they'd pay $4K). They sent me one $200 check and that was the end of it; they never mentioned paying me back again.

Then, when we were buying our condo, a credit check turned up a loan in default under AS's social security number; some digging revealed it was a car loan taken out with her social but her mom's name, when AS was 15. We got it cleared from the record.

A year or two ago, AS loaned her mom $2500 to help pay for a divorce and a couple other things. When I say "loan" it's because her mom used that word; I treated it like a gift and didn't expect to get a penny back, and we haven't.

Needless to say, I was worried that if she moved out here, she'd expect us to finance a lot of things.

So today after another FB message, AS called and spoke for a long time. Not being mean and saying we don't want you out here, but more about thinking practically, considering cost of living here, retirement, etc. Turns out she was really frustrated living with AS's aunt (the mom's sister) and that may be a big part of this wish to move to our city. (And grandkids being here, of course.) AS made it pretty clear we would not be able to contribute much of anything financially, and got her to consider other options, like moving back to the city she used to live in, or just trying to speak more frankly to her sister. At any rate it seems she'll think carefully before doing anything. Here's hoping! I'm just glad things are more out in the open than before.

I feel much better that things are out in the open. Feels like one less variable when we already have so many hanging over our heads!

Wow, I feel like I haven't blogged in forever!

First of all, I worked out Friday, took three days off of exercising (gulp), then worked out Tuesday and Wednesday and tonight. So that's 7 down, 13 to go. The only way I could be halfway done with my goal halfway through the month is if I work out Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Then I'll have 15 days to do 10 more workouts.

My 40th bday party was specTACular. Didn't get a ton of photos, but everyone was so complimentary saying it was a great party, great idea, etc. I sang most of my favorite karaoke songs and some people who'd never done it before tried for me. Including NT! He had never successfully gotten through a song until that night, and he did THREE. My best college friend came from out of town just for my party, so I felt extra special. Also, there were tons of leftovers that made many lunches and snacks.

I had insomnia for two nights after that -- partly exhilaration and remembering all the great moments, and partly freaking out that I spent so much money on a single night! But it was totally worth it, and I'm paying off the credit card I used tomorrow.

There were only a few wrinkles, one of them being I forgot to bring the rewards card I was going to use! Oh well, it will be easy to spend it up in other ways and get the rewards.

Speaking of cards, NT canceled two more last night, so we're down to 15 cards. As soon as some payments post (due to go out tomorrow), we'll cancel some more. Can't wait to get under 10!

I was dead on my feet Monday -- had a slight cold on top of the insomnia. Tuesday I went in late because of a dentist appointment. Wednesday AA woke up with pinkeye, so I worked from home. Today, my company had our long overdue holiday party. So this whole week has felt weird and unproductive.

But, AS got paid for her speaking gig she hasn't even done yet (she's going next week): $1000! And I got a $100 Amex gift card at my holiday party. So we're doing OK on money lately! Still no news on any of the career changes being contemplated. Basically if we manage to make about the same, we should be able to barely make the progress I want to this year, if we make less we'll need to stretch out some of our goals a bit more. If we start making more, we'll obviously be able to hit our goals early.

Until we figure out where we're going, I've decided to bank the money that would go toward extra student loan payments. For instance, I was going to put $600 extra to student loans in March, but I'm keeping that in the checking account until we get some more clarity.

I worked out again last night, 30 mins on the treadmill (15 walking uphill and 15 running). That's 3 workouts down, 17 to go. I hope to go again tonight!

Yesterday my new supervisor (who I've worried might not nurture me as much as my old one) told me that later this month, I'm going along to visit a huge new client of ours. I think this is a direct result of my being proactive and telling him I wanted in on this project a few weeks ago! He also mentioned that he'd like to start transitioning me from my current editing/proofreading role to more of a writer position. That could mean more money! I'm cautiously optimistic.

NT got an email back from someone he'd contacted expressing interest in working for their company, so he sent her his resume. I'm glad he's still working on an exit strategy just in case these promising signs of his job improving turn out to be nothing.

Unrelated: Our cat is showing signs of ANOTHER UTI, yowling more often, going to the litterbox more often, scattering litter throughout the condo. We had him on half wet and half dry food, so we're temporarily switching him to 100% prescription wet food in hopes that clears it up. It's expensive, but if the Rx wet food keeps the UTIs away, we may make it a permanent thing.

Question to Ting customers: My prepaid phone is about to run out, so I'm switching to Ting. Can NT "refer" me to get credits, or does it not work that way since we'll be on the same plan?

I finally got my second workout done! 2 down 18 to go. I realize I cannot take 3 out of every 5 days off if I want to hit 20 workouts this month! But we had three birthdays in the first 5 days of March, so it was a bit distracting.

I added $800 to AA's mutual fund, as planned, because of her granddad's gift, and kept the 500 pounds in the UK account. We'll now almost certainly have enough money to authorize the complete reno in May when the UK flat tenant's lease is up. I took some from our unallocated savings and some from our medical EF to fund the mutual fund, so we now need about $2300 to reach the medical fund goal. But I'm really happy to have the money in the UK account instead, since our income to that account is limited and it would be expensive to send US dollars over there to fund the reno.

NT called the hospital that he'd accidentally double-paid a bill for, and they said they'd refund it in a couple weeks. I'm glad they didn't fight it! The person he talked to actually acknowledged that the payment had gone toward the 2011 workman's comp claim, which is what I thought too.

We finished the credit card rewards last night, at our dinner out for AS's birthday. Now it's just a matter of waiting to receive points, redeeming them for cash, paying off the cards and canceling them. I canceled one more last night and am ready for NT to call and cancel two that won't let me do online cancellation. After payday the 14th, I'll pay off a bunch more and be ready to cancel them.

AS got that Discover offer in the mail (spend $750 get $150). I'm tempted! We'll see. I want to cancel a couple more first.

A very very interesting, potentially lucrative job possibility has appeared on the horizon. Nothing concrete, but something that puts stars (and dollar signs) in my eyes at the possibilities! Cannot go into detail about anything unless something comes of it, so fingers crossed.

Meanwhile, NT's job has actually shifted a couple of things around and eased a bit of the pressure. Probably not enough to keep him there if he gets another job offer, but it's nice to see any amount of progress since he's been under so much strain.

My birthday party is coming up! I'm nervous because there are several moving parts. It's at a restaurant, so there's a room reserved. Usually we just have parties at our place, so you hang out while you wait for people to show up. Hanging out in an empty restaurant space hoping people come on the early side might be nerve-wracking! But I'll have my spouses and my best friend visiting from NYC, so that will distract me. Then, I have a karaoke DJ, so I hope he comes as promised and everything hooks up right. Then, I have a stranger coming to babysit. She's a good friend of a niece of a former boss, so not completely unconnected to us, but I have no idea how reliable she is. I'm really hoping there isn't some babysitting crisis where we end up paying a fortune for a last-minute stranger, or have to take turns staying with the kids instead of being at the party!

I'm sure it will be fine. It's just the most expensive party I've planned (besides my wedding), so I hope it doesn't feel like a complete waste. But then I tell myself, some of my best friends are definitely going to be there, so it'll be a great time no matter what. Also, I went and had a make-up lesson and am going to buy cosmetics tomorrow, and I bought a really pretty dress ($200 value on sale for $50) that I'm looking forward to wearing. Yes, I'm going all out for this birthday!

I'm still surprised by how this year is not turning out at all like I thought it would so far. I thought it would be a routine, buckle down kind of year with lots of knowns and few unknowns. Instead it seems like *everything* is potentially up in the air, and I've made a few bold (for me) moves such as this party. Exciting but unnerving.

The mortgage payments all hit:

US: $474 to principal
UK1: $223
UK2: $46
UK3: $49

All told, $792 down, $108 to go on the March debt goal.

Not doing as well on the March fitness goal; I didn't work out last night, and I probably won't tonight since we're going out for AS's bday. Will just have to hit the goal hard after that!

***

NT's dad gave AA a very generous 4th bday gift of 500 pounds, direct deposited into the UK checking account. That's $800, nearly a whole year's goal for her savings! He said something about planning the same for SL on her 2nd birthday.

I think I'm going to put $800 into AA's U.S. mutual fund and keep the 500 in the UK account to help cover renovations in a couple months. That means the $800 will need to be taken out of existing funds -- I have about $150 in unallocated savings and I'll take the rest from the medical EF. Although this is a setback to the medical fund goal, it's going to help with the UK renovation goal, so we're not losing any progress, just moving some money around.

***

The first part of March I have many expensive fun things planned, so I'm going to go in the hole in terms of spending money. Although I don't like having to borrow against future spending money, I've done it several times in the past and always been able to catch up. I should be caught up by mid- to late March. The main expensive things were/are a new party dress, make-up that I plan to buy this week (I pretty much have to start from scratch since I haven't worn make-up regularly in years), and babysitting for my bday party. My 40th only comes once in my life, so I'm OK with going a bit in the hole for it.

***

We've been having some trouble with a medical bill that keeps coming; it's from a workers' comp claim from 2011 for NT. We'd never gotten a bill for it and assumed it had been handled, but his 2013 ER visit triggered something in the system and now we keep getting the bill. We've tried to have NT's work handle it, and he finally called after they threatened to send the bill to collections! He got through to them and they're going to put off the collections issue and talk to his workers' comp insurance company. But while they had him on the phone they claimed he still owed $142 from the 2013 visit. He paid it via credit card on the spot, but that number sounded familiar so I dug through my own records. Sure enough, I paid them that exact amount back in December! Whether they were being dishonest or dense I'm not sure, but they basically got him to pay part of the balance on the workers' comp claim, and I want that money back! I hope we do resolve it someday. I have not taken the money out of the budget; I have a line item saying that it will be reimbursed. If we fail in our efforts to get it back, then I'll have to take the $142 out of somewhere else, which I would HATE.

Rant over. Sorry!

***

More good news, though; NT got notified of a 5% raise, backdated to February 1! We're not sure how much longer he'll be at this job if they don't employ more help, but at least we can bank some extra income while we wait to see how everything pans out. Looking forward to his next paycheck including some back pay!

I still hope to get a raise in April, but if I do, it will probably only be 2%. I'll take it though!

No word on AS's job giving out raises this year. But, she's getting $1000 for a speaking gig in Chicago this month! It'll come just in time to help pay our tax bill, so it's an immensely welcome amount of money.

***

We are almost done with the spending on this round of credit cards. I just need to spend $70some on the Southwest Visa, and I hope to buy a smartphone this week from Ting, so that should top it out. Now just waiting for CC rewards amounts to post!

It's my birthday! I'm glad SavingAdvice got back online; I was kind of nervous I'd lose all my data!

I worked out today, so that's 1 workout down, 19 to go for the March goal.

It's bitterly cold today, so we skipped the kids' event at a nearby museum. I didn't want to have to wait for the bus, which are all off-schedule because of the icy roads. We already got exposed to enough cold yesterday when a bus was half an hour late! We went to a home & garden show to get ideas and contacts for our bathroom reno, then went out to dinner with our friends who watched the kids for us while we were at the expo.

Anyway, it's been nice to just relax at home today. I got lots of nice thoughtful gifts and extra pampering. I wanted something unique for dinner so I'm going to be making a modified Elvis sandwich: a fried banana/peanut butter/jelly/veggie bacon sandwich. With a salad so I don't feel completely unhealthy.

As I mentioned a few times before, our near financial futures are a bit uncertain at the moment. So I'm going to try very hard to restrain myself and not pay extra on the debt.

The minimum payments should take us to at least $900 down.

As I also mentioned, I'm setting myself a fitness challenge. 20 workouts in the exercise room in March. That's about 5 per week. Hopefully I can do it! I have promised myself a new pair of running shoes (out of my own spending money) if I make it.

Feel free to chime in with a fitness challenge of your own if you like! Misery loves company.

We're on the home stretch of this crazy batch of credit card bonuses!

CJ Capital One: reward received, canceled
NT Capital One: reward received, need to cancel
CJ BankAmericard: reward received, need to cancel
AS Chase Freedom: reward received, need to cancel
NT BankAmericard: waiting for reward points to post
CJ Citi Dividend: waiting for reward points to post
CJ Discover: waiting for rewards points to post
AS BankAmericard: waiting for rewards points to post
AS Citi Dividend: need to spend 132.29 more
NT Citi Dividend: need to spend 500
CJ Chase Southwest Visa: need to spend 184.16 more

So close! I was able to finish up 3 cards today; one needed about 7.75 more of spending and the other about 75. I realized that Comcast lets me pay a portion of my bill at a time, and we owe 83.07 in early March. So I put $8.07 on one card and $75 on the other. Handy! AS bought NT a bday present and it finished out the spending on one of hers.

Now we have $816.45 left to spend. $500 will go to my party, and we actually have a rare week with several social things planned: me, lunch w/co-worker tomorrow (expensed); AS, drinks with a friend tomorrow; and all three of us are going out for dinner with friends who are watching AA and SL while we go to a home & garden expo Saturday. Oh, and I'm going shopping for a dress and MAYBE a makeup lesson on Monday. We may be done with this batch by March 8 or 9!

I need to do a big round of cancellations soon. I also have the Barclay cards I was hanging onto until after our Puerto Rico trip. One of them I may have earned enough points to redeem a small reward, so I'm going to wait until the points from the trip spending posts. I may come up a little short but it's worth seeing before I cancel. I really love the cards that don't make you come up with a minimum amount before you redeem! I notice that CapOne and USBank don't make you wait, and maybe BankAmericard. Too bad Barclay isn't the same.

Since I paid extra on AS's student loan for the first time last month, I was keeping a close eye to see if it set up an automatic monthly payment. Usually even before the payment, it says what's due that month, but that number stayed at zero. So on Monday my impatience got the best of me and I set up a payment for the same amount. I got a warning that a regular scheduled payment would still go through, but I ignored it, figuring that was just a boilerplate message that didn't mean anything.

But today, two payments posted. Whoops! I had to pull money out of what I'm saving up for my bday party. That's OK, I've got plenty of time to come up with the money for that.

I'm kind of happy this happened, because I REALLY want to finish paying off our non-mortgage debt, but I've been telling myself that it's not a good time what with the future job insecurities, tax bill, etc. I know I might have to stick to the minimum payments for the foreseeable future. So this is one extra debt payment I get to enjoy before I crack down and start stashing money instead of sending it straight to the student loan companies.

Between the two payments, $299 went to principal. That takes us to $1576 paid for the month, surpassing the $1400 goal. Yay! I may not be able to knock out all our student loan debt this year, but that feels good.

And, I just realized this extra payment means that we will definitely get the total under $10K by the end of the year, even if we don't pay any extra. Double yay!

I've been noticing (and envious of) several SAers who are ramping up their exercise. I need to start working out more often so I'll be in good shape for my first 5K in April.

Would anyone like to join me in a March fitness challenge? We could all set our own goals if we were at different levels, or do the same as someone else if inspired.

I think I'm going to shoot for 20 days of exercise in the exercise room. Hopefully many of them will be jogging, but if I don't feel like jogging, I'll let myself do walking or the stationery bike or free weights.

Are you in?

- Checking all my credit card accounts to set up payments, I realized I forgot to count the first $50 baggage charge (for the way TO Puerto Rico) in my spending totals. That means we went over by more like $58 rather than $8! But, we'll each put in a bit and it won't be that bad. The good(?) news is that it's more spending on one of the rewards credit cards.

- In the week leading up to vacation and during it, we started to think that work problems would clear themselves up and/or unsatisfied employees (being cagy again, sorry) would find a way to make their job a good fit. Today made it clear that was not the case. There need to be some changes in our family. So the annual budget and goals will be a bit in flux until we see how everything nets out. I still see it as a positive thing.

- But, if we do net out at about the same take-home pay, I recalculated everything we need to do and some potential sources of extra bits of income, and it looks like we could just barely make our goals. That wold be nice (but not necessary).

- Paid the big dental bill and had NT submit for FSA reimbursement right away. Also went out for drinks tonight with AS and put that on a rewards CC (to be paid back with our spending money). One of AS's CCs posted her bonus points and I immediately redeemed as a statement credit. Here's where we stand on spending:
CJ Capital One: reward received, canceled
NT Capital One: reward received, need to cancel
CJ BankAmericard: reward received, need to cancel
AS Chase Freedom: reward received, need to cancel
NT BankAmericard: waiting for reward points to post
CJ Discover: need to spend 7.82 more
AS BankAmericard: need to spend 22.27 more
AS Citi Dividend: need to spend 132.29 more
CJ Citi Dividend: need to spend 74.51 more
NT Citi Dividend: need to spend 500
CJ Chase Southwest Visa: need to spend 215 more

So now we just need 951.89 more. Easy peasy.

- Cold snap is back with a vengeance. With windchills of -25 tomorrow morning and -38 Thursday, will probably have to take cabs again. Unwelcome spending, but safety first. Hopefully it's the last week we'll have to do that (I know I keep saying that)!

- I think that's all! Anyway, I'm too sleepy to remember if I had any other news.

Time to see where I am with bonus spending. We've been using cards for medical bills, some vacation spending, bday gift buying, and charitable donations. I now have an 11th card because I opened a SW one to pay for my additional dental expenses I didn't think were coming.

CJ Capital One: reward received, canceled
NT Capital One: reward received, need to cancel
CJ BankAmericard: reward received, need to cancel
AS Chase Freedom: waiting for reward points to post
NT BankAmericard: waiting for reward points to post
CJ Discover: need to spend 7.82 more
AS BankAmericard: need to spend 54.27 more
AS Citi Dividend: need to spend 132.29 more
CJ Citi Dividend: need to spend 134.37 more
NT Citi Dividend: need to spend 500
CJ Chase Southwest Visa: need to spend 2000

So all told, we need to spend $2828.75 more. We'll put my bday party on NT's Citi card, which will be well over the $500 needed. I'll put my new dental bill (1785) on the new SW Visa. That will leave just $543.75. I'm taking my co-worker to lunch (expensing it) this Friday, which will be about $40. We're planning to go to dinner this Saturday ($75-$90?), and I'll probably shop for a new dress on Monday ($50-$75?). AS and I still have about $140 left to spend on NT's bday and they have about $45 left to spend on mine. And I can pay the cable bill in early March ($83.07). At the low end of those estimates, we'd then need to spend $110.68. Worst comes to worst, we buy little gift cards for places we already spend at already (Amazon, Target) to push us over the edge. I doubt it will come to that, since we tend to use our spending money for little purchases here and there that can add up.

The first 10 cards need to be spent up by the end of March, but we have longer on the SW card. Of course I want to get it spent up and canceled ASAP so I have a better chance of getting the annual fee refunded! I don't think it'll be a problem.

It's been a lot of work keeping these all straight, but it's definitely taken the sting out of some unexpected as well as predicted expenses. Counting the gift card value we'll get from SW (minus the annual fee in case we can't get it canceled), we'll clear $1560. I can deal with some math headaches for that kind of haul!

Per Buendia's request.

SL (with AS) at the beach near our resort:


(It was a nice sandy beach and beautiful ocean, but I didn't get any good shots of that.)

AA at the pool:


Random shot of the pool:


Pics from NT's day trip to Old San Juan:

We're back! Overall we had a wonderful time. Puerto Rico is really nice. I tried to track expenses the whole time so we knew when to pull back on spending. It worked -- looks like we only went over budget by $8! I'll pay that in with my spending money, no problem.

The one thing that wasn't great is that it's not a very vegetarian-friendly culture. They tend to put a bit of pork in everything, even the plantains, beans and rice. We did find one vegetarian-friendly restaurant, a nice smoothie cafe and a few other places to eat. But I think if we go back, we'll try to rent a condo or some kind of accommodation that includes a kitchen. I would've liked to make my own vegan spin on the yummy Puerto Rican dishes I couldn't try! (You'll notice we're attempting a vegan PR feast this week.)

Needless to say, I'm glad to get back to home-cooked meals. We would've been a bit over budget on groceries, but we had money left from last week since we didn't do a full shopping trip before our trip!

Saturday lunch: creamy sun-dried tomato pasta

Saturday dinner: sesame tofu with rice & broc

Sunday lunch: mashed potatoes, carrots, corn, veg burgers/chix nuggets

Sunday dinner: mamposteao, lemon achiote tofu, mofongo

Monday: mushroom lentil bourgignon w/roasted potatoes & carrots

Tuesday: BLATs (veggie BLTs plus avocado) & roasted cauliflower

Wednesday: parsley breadcrumb pasta & salad

Thursday: Southern fried tofu, waffles & broccoli

Friday: franks & beans & salad

I'm on vacation! Just a quick entry to say that my guest post is up.