Happy Saturday!

It's Saturday.  For most people that means a day off work and time to relax.  But in our family, no way!  When you have a husband with irregular work schedules, a Saturday is just like every other day.


Morning:

This morning I worked on my grocery list.  My very, long grocery list, which includes sales, meal planning, and coupons to go with it.  My boys helped, of course.  They like to help with the paper work.  After creating a list it was time to pay some bills.  *insert YUCK face here*  My boys helped with that too.  They are such great little helpers.

 

Afternoon:  Things were slowing down a bit.  Caleb decided to FINALLY take a nap around 3pm.  His nap is usually closer to 10 or 11am.  So as you can imagine, our afternoon schedule was thrown off a tiny bit.  But that's ok.  The boys did fine.

Evening:  Caleb helped me get peppers ready to chop.  It was a relaxing evening.  The boys both stayed up about 45 minutes past their bedtime because naps were thrown off today.  As for me, I'm sitting around waiting for Steve to get home.  And chopping peppers.

Bubbles & Dump Trucks

Bubbles...bubbles are everywhere!

Well, not everywhere, but all over my floor at least.  The boys love bubbles and it kept them busy the other day.

Kaysen stayed in the other room for most of the time and played with his truck book.  He likes driving it across the lines on the floor.

Boats

I helped my boys make boats earlier this week by using blankets spread out on the ground.  As you can imagine, they were so excited!  Kaysen sat and read his books, Caleb brought over his cars and started running them across the blankets.  It kept them entertained for a good hour.

 Here's a good picture of "boat".  Steve and I got kicked out of the boat by Caleb.  Apparently, mommies and daddies are not allowed on the boat.

Kaysen is in love with books!  He wants to sit on my lap all day and read.  It's hard to tell him that mommy's busy when that's all he wants to do.  So I give in. 

Isn't this the cutest picture?  He was posing for the camera.  I think that may be a smile...but I'm not for sure.

Colors and Patterns

Caleb has been working very hard with his colors lately.  He has been matching, repeating, and even naming a few.  I never pressure my boys into things like this.  I feel that all this knowledge will develop over time.  But we do incorporate it into our play time.

Yes, that's Caleb's finger.  He was repeating "green, green, green, yellow, yellow".  What a huge improvement from where we were a few short months ago.  This kid has more words in his vocabulary than I ever thought he would at 2.  I am so proud.   

Sacrifice and Change: UPDATE

Back in the beginning of October, I wrote a post about the sacrifice and change that has been going on in our family.  It has been almost 5 months since I wrote that post, and I wanted to do an update about how things are headed in our life.

Here's the original post, edited with updates!

This week has been full of changes. More mental than physical. This is the week that I have decided to make some major changes in our life. This is the week that I have finally stopped making excuses and have decided to get on the path to becoming debt free.



I want to add a little disclaimer: All of this is OUR CHOICE. You will probably read some of the steps we are taking and think that our family has gone crazy. Do we have to do this to survive? No. Are we making it financially the way we are living right now? Yes. But we don't want to. We are making sacrifices today for a better tomorrow.


We have been slowly following this path for about a year. It has been a slow ride. But that is in the past, and now is all about the future. After sitting down and analyzing my budget for 3 straight hours last week, I decided that we need to make some major financial sacrifices to reach our goal. It will be tough, long, and difficult. But I know it will be worth it in the end.

ENVELOPE SYSTEM


I created a new budget with new envelopes. For those who don't know, we are doing the cash envelope system. I take out a set amount of cash for each of my expenses. Those expenses are put into envelopes. When the cash is gone from the envelope, that is it until pay day. I cannot spend any more in that area. We've been following the cash envelope system for a while now. But this week I created more envelopes and lowered my budget in each one of them. I am now doing cash for everything except utilities and debt. I have an envelope for car plates and insurance, another for medical co pays, another for home maintenance, one for home repair, and list goes on and on. I have 16 categories total. Some of the envelopes are really small. For example: I'm only putting in $5 into the clothing category every month. But that's $5 I do not have to worry about if Steve needs new pants for work or if the boys need underwear.
Update:  This truly has made dramatic changes to our budget!  It has been long, hard, and tough.  There are days where I want to cry, and some days I do.  Forcing myself to be on such a tight budget while the rest of the world goes on spending money is one of the hardest things I have done in my adult life.  But I know that it is for the best, and we are doing what is best for our family.  

MAJOR CUTS


As of this week, we are getting rid of DirecTv. We are hooking up the converter box. We had originally budgeted $80 a month for 6 months out of last year's tax return. That money is no longer coming in because 6 months are up. So bye bye TV. We are moving back into the living room again this winter to save on heating bills. The master bedroom will be closed up and our bed will be in the living room. *sigh* I'm not looking forward to this AT ALL! But it saved us at least $100-200 each month last year. And that's money that we can use elsewhere. I am only allowing our family to have $25 worth of fun money a month. Really, if you think about it, that's not a whole lot. That's only $6.25 a week. Fun money is just like it sounds. Fun. Going out to eat, new toys, a book to read, a trip to dairy queen, only $6.25 a week. I'm lowering my grocery budget too. (as if I thought it could get any lower) I still allow myself $50 a week, but I'm attempting to only spend between $30-40. That extra money is getting put back to pay off debt. I have quite a few more that I'll add later in tonight in a new post when I get a chance.

Update:  Moving into the living room lasted until the middle of January.  We saved about $300-400 all together this winter.  It's hard to say for sure how much we saved, but it did save some.  However, being stuck in this tiny house in the middle of winter with 2 toddlers got the best of me and we moved back early.  Directv?  I don't miss it.  I'm watching all my shows on the internet.  Steve and I have pulled out some old DVDs and the boys love their disney films.  It all works out.  As for the entertainment budget/grocery budget...still going strong!


DEBT SNOWBALL


So what am I doing with all that extra cash? I'm doing what Dave Ramsey calls a Debt Snowball. All the extra money at the end of the month gets put towards your smallest debt. Everything else you pay minimum payments. When you pay off the smallest debt, you take that minimum payment plus all the extra cash each month and put it towards your next debt. You keep snowballing till everything is paid off. Over the past year we have cut a huge chunk of our debt. We only have a little bit to go.

Update:  We have paid off over $2000 in debt since I made this post 5 months ago.  All that debt has went straight toward my car payment.  As soon as I get our tax return back, some of it will be going toward the car and that payment will be G-O-N-E!  The only thing left for us is one, lonely, little credit card.  Which actually isn't so little, but it sure does seem tiny after the huge obstacle we have overcome these past few months.

So where are we going now?  That will be discussed at another time.  For now, let's just say the future is positive for us.  We are headed in the right direction.  As long as we have each other, we can conquer anything.

Sensory play: Macaroni Noodles!

My boys love to scoop, pour, mix, and splash.  They love anything they can dig in or sift through.  To keep the inside days interesting, I usually bring out something that allows them to do just that!

The other day, it was macaroni noodles!  I have never allowed Kaysen to play with noodles before, because he would always eat them.  But he just turned 16 months and I know he's old enough to learn.

Honestly, the boys did a really good job sharing the scoops and the bowls.  They made a tiny mess, but did really well.

It was a sunny day and they both chose a place in the sunlight.  It makes the day go by so much smoother when there is sun.  The boys are always in a good mood, they are quiet, relaxed, and happy. 

Here's another picture of them sharing.  I'm such a proud mommy!

Caleb, being goofy!  Cute, huh?

What a great sensory activity!  Kasen loved the feel on his toes.  I wish I had a video camera to capture him stomping up and down on the noodles squealing and laughing.  He really did have so much fun.  That's what being a kid is all about, right?

Flashlight Tag

Yesterday, Daddy and the boys played flashlight tag.  First, we turned off all the lights in the house and gave each boy a flashlight.  Then, Steve would run and hide and the boys would go find him.  He would jump out from behind doors, beside the bed, under the blankets, and yell BOO!  The boys would squeal and take off running!  So cute!

Kaysen got his hair cut today.  No, I didn't take him anywhere.  I did it here at home.  I think it turned out pretty well too.  Here's some pictures.  He looks so handsome!

 

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope you get to spend it with someone you L-O-V-E

Catching up

I'm playing catch up right now with my day to day life because the boys and I took a two night trip down to Grammies this week.  It's hard to get back into the swing of things when you are gone for 3 days.


The world outside is melting!
Thank goodness!  I am so sick of snow.  It's supposed to reach the 40's today and maybe later on this week.  I'm really excited to look outside and see everything wet and dripping!  My goal is to start running as soon as the weather gets a bit warmer outside.  I've been slacking on my work out routine.  No motivation.  It's the winter blues doing it to me.  Ugggg.

Steve and I want to get out into the garage and start organizing the toys again.  Everything has been sitting around since Christmas.  It will feel good to get everything picked up and put in the proper place once again.


Grocery Shopping
Tomorrow I have a ton of grocery shopping to do.  I still have a few more lists that I need to write today before I head out.  Should be a pretty successful trip, from what I can tell.  I need chicken and hamburger BAD so I'm hoping that there are some good sales going on for those sort of things.


The Boys
The boys are great!  I bought them a new tent about 2 weeks ago from Target (75% off) and they've been playing in that for the past week.  Well, at least the days that we've been home.  Here's a few pictures.  I had more, but those turned out really bad, so I'm skipping them.

They've been staying busy.  Here's a few more...

Yesterday
Yesterday I rearranged the living room into a play area.  I brought out their ball pit, kept out the tent, added the tunnel, and moved the train table.  It kept them busy throughout the entire day.  So what did I do?  I worked on my grocery list, baked cookie bars, and scrubbed my kitchen and stove top.

Yes, I know Kaysen doesn't have a shirt.  He just ate lunch and got food everywhere!  So this was transition time. 

Today's Plans

Today is going to be a relaxing day.  I am clipping coupons and hanging with the boys.  I'm making chicken in the crock pot for chicken tacos tonight.  I think I'm also going to cut out some paper hearts for the boys to play with and decorate for Valentine's day.

Valentine's Day

Steve and I never celebrate Valentine's day.  I don't know why, but we never do.  Instead we celebrate anniversaries and things that have more meaning to us.  Tomorrow is going to be a normal day.  I'm going to decorate the house for the boys with pink/purple balloons and red streamers.  Hopefully they will help me decorate.  They haven't been into crafts much lately.  Then on Tuesday we were thinking about going out to eat at Chilis.  Should be fun. 

Digging Out

This blog should just turn into a photo album.  Teeheehee.  Hopefully one of these days I will have more interesting thing to talk about. 

More Blizzard 2011

After Steve and I shoveled, we went in for a few hours.  Wouldn't you know it, we had to shovel again.  These pictures were taken after the blizzard/lake effect snow went through.  It's still very windy, so we will see if we have to shovel again tomorrow.  Yes, our front door is still blocked.

This is shoveling for the second time today. 

 YUCK!!!

Oh, I am not looking forward to shoveling out the front of my house.

Blizzard of 2011

The pictures say it all.

Needless to say, I cannot get out my front door right now.  The only way we were able to get out was through the garage.  And guess what?  It's not done.  Currently there is a white out as I type this.  I just went out to get the mail (I shoveled out my mail box and everything but apparently the mail lady decided to still skip my house), and this path above was blown over with another couple of inches.  We just shoveled that out 1/2 hr ago.

We are Snowed in

...and we haven't even hit the worst of it yet.

Thankfully, Steve is home.  He got off of work early and made it home just fine.  One of the many blessings of living so close to a hospital, the main roads were plowed.  As for our subdivision, we have not seen a plow in the past 6 hrs, and counting.

The wind is blowing.  The snow keeps building up.  I shoveled for Steve when he got home and it was covered up in less than 45 minutes.  The boys are tucked away in bed, and I'm going to start making a batch of brownies.

Like I promised, here are some recent pictures of the boys.

I was doing laundry and starting to fold towels.  I walked out of the room, and Caleb had thrown the towels (and one of his PJ pants) over his head and was sitting on the couch watching TV.  Why?  I have no clue.  But he gave me enough time to go grab my camera before he took it off.

The boys were feeding their piggies!  They are so patient and careful when they fill up their piggy banks.  It is such a great fine motor skill.   

 Even though Kaysen is not the best at it yet, Caleb always helps clean up the mess.