**I received my overtime for the year (paid as an annual bonus) and was able to fund a chunk of my savings. For the rest of the year all our monthly savings goes to IRAs, and my 2014 raise will go to savings. To top off those goals in my sidebar.

I can't believe how behind I feel still after last year. That said, though I would like to fund 2014 IRAs in 2014, it's not a necessity. That buys us a little buffer if crap happens.

Bonus:

$5,000 to savings
$ 300 to mortgage
$ 100 new kids bike

I was planning to spend more on the bike, but we just happened to find a $100 bike this week. So that worked out perfect.

Great-Grandma insists on giving me $300 for doing her taxes. I asked her not to, but I know her. Will see. This way I figure I already threw $300 to my mortgage so I really don't care either way.

If she insists, I could use $300 for summer classes for older child. I don't sweat that stuff any more. Whether they know it or not, Grandma (MIL) and Great-Grandma pay for that. BM is attending a camp with his school next month and I used Christmas money to pay for that. & I get the feeling Great-Grandma is paying for summer school...

------------------------------------------------

**My gross check was about what I expected, with extra overtime on a big project last year. BUT, the net did not reflect all that extra work. UGH!! I have said that if spouse worked we wouldn't take anything more home. But, my own income seems to be entering that black hole. It's extra shocking because I am used to literally keeping 90% of my paycheck. You get used to what you get used to.

I ran a tax projection and everything looks fairly breakeven for 2014.

Our tax rate on last $10k - $15k of income is hitting about 25%. So, it looks like we will be doing Traditional IRAs this year. I like the way this works out. Our taxes are even steven if we change our mind. But if we do the Traditional I should be getting about a $2700 refund. Which will go straight back into retirement savings. (This would bring our retirement savings rate up to 18%. But, I don't know if that is all good, as we give up the ROTH contributions to do so. I think it just means we need to save more to pay for future taxes. Saving more doesn't necessarily mean much to our bottom line. Though I suppose I will probably be able to work some tax magic on the back end. When we retire).

I also checked the extra property tax deduction and that would save us about 25% too. For several reasons, will probably do this year. I just want the simplicity of one tax payment per year. But I want to make the extra payment in a year I actually get a tax benefit.

We've been doing ROTHs for so long because we haven't been paying any income taxes of any note, since spouse stopped working. But I am not personally comfortable with paying $2,700 taxes that I don't need to. Circumstances change, so we re-evaluate.

In our young 20s I Was strongly encouraged to fund ROTHs. I kind of understand it more with age. There has just never been any tax break quite like it. So when I entered the tax profession it was, "Are you crazy??? Do the ROTH!!!" BUT, we were young and starting out and paying a crapload of taxes. We chose to fund my 401k and our Traditional IRA. I am sure we could have cashed flowed the ROTHs and whatever, we were saving 50%+ of our income. Not like we NEEDED the tax break. BUT... Absolutely no regrets. When dh stopped working, we converted *everything* over to ROTHs. It was win-win. Get a big tax break up front. Convert over at a lower tax rate. So, I am pretty partial to just taking the tax break. I don't know if we will ever be able to convert again, but we do have $100,000+ working for us in our ROTHs. As Dave Ramsey would say, that will be $5 million or something in 40 years. (I don't think it will ever be near that much, but it will do nothing but grow, and I am happy with that. All our aggressive investments are in the ROTHs, for sure).

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Housing Update:

I guess housing has settled down here. Absolutely nothing has listed in immediate neighborhood for about 12 months. A house went for $400k last spring, which meant a 65%-ish increase over a couple of years. (Nothing new, around here. It's always a roller coaster!). But then, that was it.

SO... I saw 3 houses like ours up for sale this month and that piqued my curiosity. I just saw that one had sold for $400k. It will be interesting to see what the others go for.

Overall, I think this is a good sign. Anything much more than that is getting back into crazy bubble territory. Our house actually peaked at $650,000. Which is crazy insane. At this point, anything much more than $400k is "crazy insane". Especially given the chronic unemployment, regionally. But even in a robust economy, the local wages just don't support these kind of home prices.

So I am kind of marveling at the restraint. No huge bidding war??? Heck, the other two houses have been up a week and are still available. (Not a common sight in these parts, even when the bottom was falling out). I am hoping these are all good signs, overall. That things are settling a bit. A sellers market is good for us, but another market collapse would not be good. I am all for sustainable home prices.

Though, who knows... Bay Area real estate is crazy crazy crazy right now. & that always blows up our housing prices, because then our real estate looks super cheap compared to that. (Which is the only reason anyone ever paid $650k for a house in our own neighborhood). IT will be interesting to see how things play out this summer.

**Earned $25 credit card reward (will add to next mortgage payment).

**Earned $50 credit card reward - deposited directly into ROTH.

**American Express did mess up my rewards *AGAIN*. As they do each and every month.

BUT, I also had a mystery $25 show up in my account. ??? Never got around to complaining. So it was really and truly a mysterious $25. I just noticed my rewards balance was higher and I could redeem another $25. I even checked my spam folder to make sure I didn't miss any e-mails about a bonus reward.

So, how is that for random?

**Mortgage snowflakes totaled $85 for March:

--$25 credit card reward
--$25 mystery credit card reward
--$20 carpool savings
--$15 Internet savings
--Total $85

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I will share my Ting referral code again because I am desperate for one more month free.

https://z181d126bt4.ting.com

We did get our March bill. My dad was traveling a lot (lots of minutes and data) and has nothing but travel plans the rest of the year. But we stayed at $53 for our combined bill. $26.50 for our half. I think that is mostly what it is going to be for the rest of the year.

We will probably owe $25-ish cash for April usage (for entire family). As our credits will be all used up with the next bill. So, if I can get one more referral, it will officially make our service *free* for the first 5 whole months.

----------------------------------------------------

Our carpool is defunct because our carpool buddies divorced and returned to work full-time.

I've been eking out the $20 carpool savings anyway, for the mortgage, but I think I will stop adding that $20 this month. I think I just had the wiggle room since we have been paying nothing for cell service. Though of course I will just switch to throwing cell phone savings at the mortgage. As a placeholder for that bill. (The first few months were breaking even with contract termination fees and new phone purchase, but we are past that now).

It's just a couple of more months, and then next year will be a new year to figure out. I am overall pleased with the wear and tear and gas we saved this year already. For the most part we rarely picked up the kids by car the first 75% of the school year. So having to pick them up all the time the last part of the school year, is okay. Not very many weeks left.

I guess this is the opposite of my last post.

**I finally got my 2013 ROTH funded. Sent $4,950 off yesterday, after my paycheck hit the bank. I did not have to come up with the other $550 because my credit card rewards covered it (those get deposited automatically every month).

I updated sidebar.

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**Grandma always *insists* on paying me $300 for doing her taxes. I am going to try to be more vocal this year about her not paying me. She owed a lot of tax. So, I will try.

But... If she insists, we will just throw it at the mortgage. I would be pleased with that. IT would put our snowflakes to $1,000-ish for the year, which is about all we came up with in 2013. So I would be very pleased with that. We don't plan to throw any snowflakes at the mortgage for the rest of the year, so it will be a nice goal to meet in April. That said, I am not really concerned with it either way. If I can talk her into not paying me, we will let it go or I will just deposit $300 from my overtime check.

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**I guess it's feast or famine. I intend to hit most my "2014 savings" goal with my overtime check in 2 weeks. So, that might be $10,000 in financial goals officially hit this month (Overtime + 2013 ROTH). {I could have tallied ROTH savings month to month (have just been hoarding up cash since February 1), but I didn't really want to update my sidebar until I transferred money physically into my IRA}.

The goal for the rest of the year is to save $1300/month towards 2014 IRAs.

In addition, we will save $150/month + snowflakes and windfalls. I am going to open a "taxable" investment account for this money. I put "taxable" in quotes because our investment returns will mostly be tax-free due to our low tax bracket. We are starting small, but expecting to gain some significant momentum pretty quickly. Since our cash savings is pretty robust at this point, this should be where all our non-retirement savings goes.

Not really spending *a lot* of money, but just getting a lot of stuff taken care of. I don't know what it is, but have been on a good bargain streak this year.

Of course, I wouldn't say my new stereo was a bargain, but it is SWEET. Dh was trying to talk me into one but I chose a different brand. & now that it is installed, he is totally jealous. I like it much better than the stereo in his car. The bluetooth seems to be working better, and is easier to use.

OLD:



NEW:



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**I also got new prescription glasses. Guess how much? $11! Seriously. I really was not expecting much. But at the end of the day I really like them.

I ordered my first online glasses 3-4 years ago. The pair I had before that cost like 10 times as much as those, but were fairly high quality and I had worn them for almost a decade.

So, last time, I skeptically tried out Zenni Optical. I really wasn't expecting much but maybe paid in the $40 range for some really nice glasses. They were getting a little worn after 3-4 years, but other than that, no complaints. I could use a new prescription, anyway. So, I just ordered the $11 pair.

I was really skeptical about the quality when I ordered them, so I am really pleasantly surprised. The $11 included the most expensive anti-scratch coating and yadda yadda. Not exactly *cheap* glasses.

I also picked up some new sunglasses - maybe in the $30 range for those.

--------------------------------------------------

**I saw $2/each shirts on clearance at Target. Kid shirts. I did not pick any of those up because the kids refuse to wear long sleeves. Bummer!

{I am into thrift shopping, but it seems pointless with our Target clearances. Our Target is very convenient}.

**We had already planned to replace our rice cooker, and I just happened to spot one on sale for $19.99. I am very pleased with that find.

**Last month I seriously upgraded my wardrobe with some coupons and sales and gift cards. $50-ish for a major wardrobe revamp. That was before most the rest of this shopping. But, it looks like I went out and spent $1,000 or something. On that and all of the above. It's crazy. Dh was teasing me a bit. About how much money I have been spending. (He knew it wasn't that much; just teasing me about the appearances of it all).

We were going over the finances today. I know we had been making a lot of purchases, but it didn't seem to be doing much to our bottom line. Today confirmed that.

I do want to get a smoothie maker still. I broke ours when dh was sick with the flu. (IT was on it's last legs anyway - just didn't expect to use it in the middle of winter - was going to replace it in the spring). I don't expect to spend much more than like $30, but I just haven't found one yet. So, hopefully any day I will pick one out and get it ordered. (I'd love to just get a really nice blender, versus having a smoothie "uni tasker" but I don't think I will find one single appliance that will make us all happy).

BM needs a new bike. He has needed one for a while. We have just been lazy on that. I will peruse Craigslist, but we have seemed to have better luck with "new" on the bikes.

Dh is out right now picking up a Craigslist desk for LM. For his room. We really hardly ever buy furniture. BM has a "used only for storage" hand-me-down desk in his room. So, I hadn't thought that far ahead. But LM mentioned he would like a desk in his room for homework. Fair enough. Dh is scouting out a $19 desk/chair combo that looked pretty nice.

I don't know that we have had much luck with Craigslist lately, but there were like a million desks for sale on Craigslist. Even so, dh was not sure he really wanted to deal with the hassle. This "perfect desk" just happened to pop up. Which never seems to happen. So, will see... {I felt kind of funny about it because I wrote them back the second it popped up. Seemed kind of desperate. But I guess they aren't going to raise the price just because we wanted to rush right over. }.

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Work is crazy crazy crazy. That said, it's probably the most mellow tax season I *ever* remember. Looking forward to the 15th, and getting my weekends back, but not feeling particularly stressed out.

I had time today to update Quicken and sort out all our recent big purchases. So, I will do a "big picture" update if I have time. Mortgage snowflakes, credit card rewards, big milestones I am looking forward to, yadda yadda.

Edited to add: The desk was a win! It was *perfect* for our needs. (It is much bigger and nicer in person than in the picture - but not "too big".) LM loves it.

**I accidentally paid the property taxes with a closed bank account, several weeks ago. I did get an e-mail that the payment bounced, BUT, I never heard diddly squat, otherwise.

I asked dh to go take care of it today. I gathered from online that we had to bring a cashier's check with the "returned check fee" added to it, but lord knows with all the government red tape. (We just got passports last year and the websites and the people on the phone and in person all told us 100 different things. OMG). The saving grace is it wasn't due for another few weeks. Which is why I strongly encouraged dh to take care of it this week, before the tax office gets busy.

As I expected, we needed a new payment coupon reflecting the payment + fee. But, they were able to provide that for him if he just waited in another "line". So, phew! (& there was no LINE!)

$53 rejected payment fee, $5 for the cashier's check at our credit union, and $1 for metered parking.

I will NEVER do that again. Gah! But, happy to have it resolved and for life to move forward.

------------------------------------------------

**I still haven't funded my 2013 ROTH IRA, but I think I will just do it next payday. Next week. Until then, I have just been hoarding up the cash for that.

All else has kind of been on hold.

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**This week the kids have their dentist appointments (which always seem to be $$$$$). Lord knows this might be "it". The eldest is almost 11 and braces are right around the corner. When his current dentist/ortho recommends it we will get some other quotes and likely choose an orthodontist closer to home.

The eldest also has an "Extra permanent tooth" situation. The baby tooth is loose so they will probably pull it. Will see what they think of the progress of past few months (it's possible he will need surgery to get the permanent tooth out; but probably still too soon to decide much).

None of this stuff is particularly surprising. If anything, neither of them have as bad a situation as I did. I have been saving for their orthodontics since before they were born. Accordingly, I am probably way over-stressed about it. Uneccesarily...

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**It's not all taxes and dentists and ROTHs.

I should get my big tax season overtime check on April 15th.

Since I will have saved up enough cash for the property taxes and the ROTH, and then some, by April 1, we decided to jump the gun a bit and do a couple of big purchases. I don't think we generally purchase much of anything with my April check. BUT, last year was a crazy expensive Murphy year. & so I think we are just getting impatient with our splurges. I suppose we aren't spending it anyway. Just feel more comfortable moving forward knowing that we can bulk up our savings account before we actually have to pay for any of these purchases.

To be clear, we can pay cash for these very easily, without the OT.

What do I Want to splurge on? An upgraded stereo for my vehicle. Dh used some focus group money to upgrade the other car stereo about a year ago. & we've gotten spoiled. I don't know if I would care that much, except I can't get my new cell phone (the one I have had since November), to work with my car stereo. It's driving me a little batty. Especially since I get to enjoy bluetooth in the other car. So, I have been telling myself we will fix that come April.

In the end, dh has an appointment to get that installed on Friday. Woohoo!!

What is crazy is that my vehicle actually has the original stock stereo. I think our MO is generally to buy very inexpensive (older) cars and the first thing we generally do is upgrade the stereos. But, in this case, it was a fairly new vehicle and it actually had a CD player. !! Which has since been broken. I'll get the bluetooth for the phone. Yesterday dh found an extra thumb drive for me to put a lot of my MP3s on. That will get hooked up to the stereo too. It will be pretty sweet. (I think it comes with a CD player too, but I don't know, they all blur together).

We also bought a laptop last week. We've been doing without, but wanted to pick up something before the next school year. As the kids have been fighting over their computer more. They are less happy with the netbook for their needs, and the charger doesn't work half the time. We went with something very practical. & if the kids can handle it and take care of it, then we might consider a fancier touch screen latpop in the future. I am amazed how much prices have come down over the years. We haven't bought a laptop in a decade. IT was probably a little bigger than I wanted it to be, and it didn't have the fancy graphics card for gaming. But, we decided it was very practical, has everything we need, and is a huge step up from our broken netbook. VERY happy with it so far. IT was $475 with tax. We picked it up on sale. Dh says it's on par with his fairly new desktop. The processor and memory and everything. Which blows my mind!

We were trying to figure out where to put it, when we decided just to leave it on our dining room table. The one we use *once a year* for Thanksgiving. The rule is the kids can't move the laptop. For their purposes, it might as well be a desktop. Saved us from having to repurpose or buy another table.

I really really liked the small netbook for travel and so on, but do admit that this is far more practical for work. I don't use it that much for work, but it will be nice for when I need it. I just remember the big old monstrosity of a laptop I had to carry around for my last job, and that does help give me perspective.

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Once we see how April shakes out, we will have to sit down and start prioritizing things. Those were the, "I can't take it any more!" purchases.

We've got some home maintenance and travel stuff to sort through.

I think we have literally just been waiting for the storm to settle. IT hasn't gone, but it's gotten much tamer. 2014 so far is the year of, "everything has to be complicated and annoying". Like paying the property taxes with the wrong account. I feel like everything I have touched has gone down like that this year. IT's driving me a little batty. BUT, it is a huge improvement from "A surprise $1,000 bill every single month". That was 2013.

Ugh! I had literally 4 or 5 saved un-posted posts because I just can't get my into my blogging groove. So I was just deleting them all when I apparently deleted my last post about Sicily Yoder. I am sorry about that - it was not intentional.

**ROTHs passed the six figure mark last week. Woohoo!

**Earned $50 credit card reward in February- redeemed to ROTH today. That is my first 2014 ROTH contribution, because otherwise hoarding up every dime I can to finish funding 2013. (I couldn't earmark this contribution for 2013).

**American Express miscalculated my credit card rewards AGAIN. I am looking at other rewards cards. A lesser reward card that actually pays the rewards could be a much better deal...

**I paid the mortgage this week. Snowflakes accumulated were:

$350 insurance rebate
25 credit card reward (last month's credit card reward - got gyped on this one too)
20 carpool gas savings
15 Internet discount (for one year)
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$410 Total

Phew! BM had an expensive filling and cat needed a vet visit, so my resolve was wavering on that one big snowflake. Glad it didn't melt! (Vet visit got pushed off to this week, which helped).

Thanks to some big snowflakes the first few months of the year, I think we are on track to knock $5,000 off the mortgage this year. & that's if I divert all snowflakes over to investments in April, as planned.

**I am not sure what it is, but this has been the easiest tax season ever.

Time is just a FLYING.

I think the mild weather helps too.

I can't believe it will be daylight savings next weekend? I am usually starting to get a little burned out by then, and the daylight savings gives me my second wind. (So nice to come home and take the kids to the park or go for a walk or whatever). This year though, not sure I will care too much. Maybe because it's been so warm and sunny in general. Which I don't know why it matters if I am holed up inside 6 days a week, but it seems to help.

**Maybe the sprinkling of activities has helped too. Dh and I went to a GREAT concert the other night with a few friends. & had a bit of a pre-party at our house. I totally blew off work for that.

I will probably be in the "buckle down/no fun" mode for the next 6 weeks or so. But I am well rested and up for it. (Heck, only 5 more weeks??? Just checked a calendar. Seriously, how can that be?)

**Holy Freaking Murphy! BM's filling fell out. $300 to replace. I am thinking of paying mortgage a few days early before my snowflakes melt. The year is young and we save for this kind of random stuff, so for now can pull from the "short-term savings". & I can leave the snowflakes untouched (latest snowflake just happens to be about as much as the filling, though).

**On a related note, I was at the dentist last week and I asked for some ortho referrals. They gave me a bunch of info I didn't ask for. But I feel great relief about the information I received. IT seems to be one of those things people make an unnecessary big deal about. I know everyone is in debt up to their eyeballs. But it's just people who know us - that we are not in debt up to our eyeballs - and still seem to go on and on about how expensive it is. Running through the numbers? I am not seeing what the BIG deal is. I won't hold my breath or get too relaxed until I get REAL numbers though. We have no insurance, but I expect we will knock 1/3 off the top with cash discounts and income tax savings. When we do full-on braces we will also switch our kids to our "dirt cheap" dentist. Which is adding to the overall cost savings and my feelings about it all. Of course "dirt cheap dentist" recommended more reasonably priced orthos.

So yeah - all of the above won't amount to a hill of beans.

{I personally was probably a fairly worst case orthodontist patient, so I have just always assumed the worst. & then the way everyone goes on and on about it. Like, my in-laws are beside themselves how we will ever afford braces. I think both in-laws and us are fairly debt-adverse. But I find myself thinking lately, "So maybe we would have to get payments? The world wouldn't end?" I mean, they are just so melodramatic. I think somehow we survive. & I have been thinking the payment thing, though hell would freeze over before we actually take on any payments. But they are also overly obsessed how we will ever afford to replace cars. We have enough cash saved to easily replace both cars. BUT, I just think, "We'd get a payment? We'd survive with one car? We'd buy a really used car, like we have in the past? Dh would get a job??" We certainly aren't going to have to go bankrupt over these kinds of expenditures...}.

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**I think I am getting crankier with age. I suppose I found it hard to believe that people could get more financially stupid after watching all our friends in the debt bubble. & all the foreclosure madness. But, with time and money and age it seems people just make bigger money mistakes. Maybe it's because I think we just get more frugal with age, so the juxtaposition is ridiculous.

Anyway, as a background, most my clients are fairly upper middle class and/or just very fiscally conservative. But their kids? Egads! I do a lot of their kids' tax returns. Maybe it doesn't matter because these people will just be taken care of by mommy and daddy.

I haven't formed much a of a strong opinion in the past, but this year I have just been disgusted by every single tax return I touch. I am thinking, "None of these people have been out of work for one second in the last decade. Absolutely no hardships that I am aware of". & I Want to be clear that is the case. Because it is particularly unusual to be so well employed in my region. The unemployment is pretty terrible here.

Nope - these are the people who have every advantage. Every single one of them has a six figure income. & the average retirement savings rate seems to be around 2%. They are mostly age 40-50. None of them has a penny saved outside of retirement.

I've got a couple of lower income clients who are doing MUCH better. They are boasting by far the highest savings rates. Just another reminder of that it's not what you make but it is what you keep. {& I have a couple of $500k income types who are also living FAR beyond their means}.

Quick Kohls question for the Kohls coupon masters. I have $20 in Kohls cash that I have to use up this weekend. I was thinking of going this weekend, but had a $10-off-$30 coupon today in my e-mail. If I spend $30 today, and use my Kohls cash, will it really be a free $30 purchase??? I googled a bit and it looks like you can do that. But I wanted to make sure.

Oh while at it, if you buy enough clothing for a 20% off and free shipping discount, online, do they reverse those discounts if you return the item that put you over the top for the discounts? I feel like they do, because I think I looked it up before. But I may be thinking of something else.

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I don't know how I feel about this Murphy thing. It has WAY TONED down this calendar year. But, at the same time, I don't know why everything has to be so freaking complicated. This started with our crazy murphy year (longer than a year), but has not ended. I feel jinxed. Though I will take the stupid annoying stuff any day over people in the hospital and so on.

For example, I can't tell you how many times I Accidentally double paid something this past year. & I don't remember particularly ever doing that before?? But my payments keep getting lost in space or whatever. So then I send in a second one so my payment is on time or I don't get penalized or whatever. & then the first one always goes through.

So, here is what happened with Kohls. I need work pants and I had about $100 in gift cards. I went shopping and couldn't find anything. I will go back another time when they have more professional clothing. IT was fine because I Went on a non-sale day. So I didn't buy anything, then whatever.

What I did find was a couple of more patterns on a shirt that I LOVE. I hit clothing gold. They work well for work and casual, winter or summer (indoors/at work, anyway). None of the shirts in the store were my size, so I crossed my fingers and looked online. Not only did I find like 10 different prints in my size, but I found a 20% off coupon. SCORE!! When something works - I stock up. No doubt about it. By the time I find it on clearance though, there's usually not much left. This was a shirt I had had for a while and had gotten compliments on - so I know I am very happy with it.

I did my order and it should have arrived in a few days. I am guessing the mail label got messed up because it basically got lost in space. I haven't called Kohls yet but will call them to see what they are going to do. (It's so lost at this point that I think they will just have to cancel the order - unless they still have the stock).

I worried (last week) my order would get cancelled and was pretty upset. Why does it have to be so freaking complicated???

So, I just bit the bullet and re-ordered. Everything was still at same sales prices, still had my sizes, yadda yadda.

I got my shirts yesterday but mail person shoved them in the mail box like you would not believe. The package was WAY TOO BIG for our mail box. What in the heck? (I need to look online and see if I can file a complaint). I was sure I ripped a shirt or some buttons off trying to yank it out of the mailbox.

Seriously, why so freaking complicated??? We have locked boxes (large) for packages and sometimes they bring to the front door. Dh was 100% home all day yesterday. So yeah - I am peeved.

Thankfully, by some miracle, my clothing survived the process. Hallelujah! I will be a very well dressed lady as long as these shirts last. Phew!! I ended up with about 5 new patterns, in addition to the one I already had. About $10 per shirt.

I do have a return because I also bought another print in another shirt I LOVE, but the pattern did not work for me. Bummer!

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I also feel jinxed because I completely screwed up my property tax payment. !! IT's completely random too that I know I screwed it up...

I went to get our money market checks out of the safe to pay the property taxes. I was surprised to find I had an extra 150 checks from our primary checking account. I grabbed checks from our current MM account. I should have listened to my gut, which was to double check I had the right account. But I did not believe I had ever received checks when I had the same account before (it was initially a bank with a different name, so never remembered having checks with the current name).

I did not listen to that gut feeling and just paid it. I paid online. Of course they were the right checks. !!

The next morning I was looking for an envelope and I found all our new checks sitting in a drawer. I had only re-opened the account this year and never put away the checks. DOH!!

So, basically, I paid with a closed account.

I sat on hold a whole hour, just to be told it was too late to cancel the payment.

The fee? $53! UGH! I am so annoyed!!

The bright side? Glad I decided to pay it early. I suppose I could have just sent a check in the worst case, if it was close to the deadline (though every thing I try to mail these days gets lost for weeks - which is why I did not mail it in the first place). Anyway, I will wait for it to bounce back, get the $53 bill and so on. Only then will I be able to re-submit the tax payment online.

I thought I had shred all our old checks and so on - so NO IDEA what happened. I just get so annoyed when money gets completely wasted like that.

I will pay the $53 fee out of the insurance rebate I just got. That still leaves $350 to throw at the mortgage.

Payday yesterday. I will pay our state tax due. I should get the IRS refund this week, to offset that.

I got a reimbursement my parents owed me (for Sprint).

I don't have anything else to pay until March, and so I have a good $3,000 amassed for ROTHs. I'll finish funding 2013 ROTH in March. I don't know if I will send in some now, or just wait. If I can do the whole thing March 1st, I might do that. It will be close and I haven't put March in my Quicken yet. So, will see. Otherwise, I may just send in $2500 now and $2500 around March 15.

I haven't updated my sidebar for savings progress this month - just kind of hoarding ROTH money for now. I will update when ROTHs are funded.

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I just paid the property taxes yesterday, from online savings account. I wanted to cash flow and probably could, if I waited closer to April due date. But decided I was making things unnecessarily difficult, and I just wanted to cross that payment off my list.

I think it is possible that post-April, we can leave a solid 6 months expenses untouched, indefinitely. Will see.

As we hit our goals and I think through them, I Was thinking a sum equal to "8 x expenses" would probably be our ideal target. Just working through the numbers, expenses I expect in the near-term future, our comfort level, etc. It didn't hit me until later that my figure was "8 months expenses". I guess Suze knows what she is talking about. (That's Suze's Orman's rule). I think we are in agreement with her. But I think 6 months is good too, and I won't overly belabor the 7th and 8th months. Like if it takes me two years to get there, as it always seems to, then whatever. It is certainly not our #1 financial priority. But maybe a good long-term rule.

We've had much more cash in the past, but was saving up for a home or for maternity leave (I Was really concerned about covering bed rest or something like that, as sole breadwinner). The flip side of that is it is impossible to save any cash, with two kids. So it feels. So I feel like we need more cash needs on some level, at the pace we run through it. & of course the one-income situation bodes well for a bigger emergency fund. On the flip side, we actually have other assets and savings now (far more than in our 20s when we bought homes and had kids). So, I feel like 6-8 months is probably doable, and we have other assets to fall back on in the worst case.

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I had some nice surprises yesterday.

The annual insurance rebate I get (for life and disability insurance) was TWICE as much as I expected. $400!!

I was expecting it to be $200 and was going to throw it at the mortgage. I will throw the $400 at the mortgage. What a snowflake!!

I also found a box of 150 checks. What in the heck!?! I have no idea how I missed them before. Now I can grumble less every time I have to use one of the 10 checks I thought I had left. (I was hoping on some level to milk those checks until the "end of checks". But I guess it doesn't matter much now. 150 checks will last me forever).

The talk of using up and leftovers, reminded me of a story.

I had some leftovers at work pushing the 2-week mark so I thought I better look up when it was no longer safe to eat. When I googled it, I Saw most recommendations to throw away food after 2-3 days.



It is just so ridiculous what a wasteful society we live in.

I decided to toss to food to be on the safe side, just because it was beyond my comfort limit. But for food less than two weeks we have always used the "smell" test. Is long as it tastes good, isn't moldy, and smells good. I've never particularly tasted anything "bad" if it passed the mold and smell test. So while the "taste" test is good in theory it would be rare to get that far??

A quick google today brought up an article that I think is excellent on the subject:

The Dos and Donts of Keeping Leftovers Safe

http://thestonesoup.com/blog/2012/11/the-dos-and-donts-of-ke...

Sum up:

--Put leftovers away ASAP (in appropriately cold fridge, etc.)

--Cover food well

A lot of food does okay with a loose covering, but there are some foods I wrap in an extra plastic bag to preserve freshness. I most often do this for baked goods or bread. (Loose covered food may never be kept very long, too, to be fair). This may be more due to our dry climate.

--Trust your instincts

--Properly reheat food before eating

--Don't throw away perfectly good food

--Don't leave things sitting out at room temperature for long period of time

So, that sums it up pretty well.

Between me and my spouse? He is the more cautious one - so I can tell he has grown up in a more cautious house. He will raise an eyebrow sometimes, at me, and he gets crazy insane about chicken. (I believe to the point of unreasonable). But, it is what it is - he is not prone to waste food. It more comes out in what we have to cook or eat "today" because he believes it will go to waste given another day. & now that I think about it - he would tell you the same thing about me. When something is way crazy expired (usually condiments and dressings) I will throw them out. & that drives him nuts. So, we all have our quirks.

Which reminds me, we are also far more food cautious in our sweltering summers than in our cool winters. (Since we keep our house much cooler in winter and much warmer in summer).

When thinking about it, the first thing that also came to mind was immunity. We have fairly strong immunities in my house, in general, and you do have to wonder if your body does adjust more to what you do eat. Interestingly, I did see that people with lower immunities should be more food careful. Fair enough.

I was kind of surprised BM's 5th grade class did do the Valentines party thing. I am presuming this is the last year for him, though lord knows.

OMG - you should see the candy haul he got. I guess most parents decided the kids are getting kind of old for this, so just sent copious amounts of candy in lieu of cheesy little V-Day cards.

Or do you think it was just their last hoorah and so they went all out for these kids??

Or is BM just that popular with the ladies?? LOL. (Actually, impossible - his class is literally 75% boy, which is crazy. Something in the water that year).

LM's third grade class was far more mellow.

Anyway, I usually buy V-Day cards on Feb. 15th every year. IT can be hit and miss. They had the cutest Angry Birds cards, so I picked up two boxes today. & some candy for myself, 50% off. I think this is probably the last year?? I've got one box at home still. If we have extras, we can donate later, or find someone who can use them.

Other than that, not a holiday that we celebrate. *shrugs* (I don't think we celebrate many holidays, period. Many seem fairly manufactured, to get you to spend money. & other than that, the crowds aren't too appealing).

I heard on the radio that average person spends $100-ish on Valentines Day? I think $138 or something for men; $75 for women.

???

Nothing in my frame of reference (among friends, past boyfriends, family, anyone).

My co-worker? Her husband sent her a boquet yesterday. Which I don't think he has ever done before, and didn't think a lot of it. But then she was telling me how she bought a V-Day outfit (for work - whatever she was wearing yesterday). & then they were going out to dinner.

I guess that is how it adds up! (Seriously, before discussing and witnessing all this, I would have no idea how anyone spends that much money on V-Day. Now I know!).

MyMoneyBlog had a Paypal warning today. Yikes!

http://www.mymoneyblog.com/preapproved-payments-paypal.html?...

"Long story short, it was my Skype account that was hacked. I didn’t even know this, but PayPal has a program of “preapproved” payments where a merchant can repeatedly charge your account without the need to type in your PayPal password. This is meant for monthly subscriptions and the sort. Although I have bought credit from Skype before, I don’t ever recall signing up for any of these subscription-style plans at any merchant. My suspicion is that it was buried somewhere into a default checkbox that I didn’t undo, or worse it was just hidden in the terms and conditions fine print. (I am usually really careful about this sort of thing, so I am quite mad at myself!)

Lesson #1: If you use PayPal at all, check your preapproved merchant list immediately. To find this list, log into your account and then go to My Account > Profile > My preapproved payments. My recommendation is to make every single one inactive immediately."

http://www.frugalrules.com/what-is-first-bill-you-pay-each-m...

Kind of an interesting article.

"I was reading this article on Yahoo Finance recently and it was discussing what bill people pay first and what it may reveal about our priorities.

So, what bill do most people pay first each month?

Drumroll please…the winner is the car payment.

When comparing credit card payments, mortgage payments, and car payments, the latter of the three comes out as the clear winner."

"The problem I see with making a car payment the first bill you pay is that it’s not a necessity on many levels. Yes, you may need a car to get to work and I cede that point, but if given the choice between my car and my home I’ll let you guess as to what I’m going to choose every time – my mortgage payment as I view it as a necessity for my growing family.

Once the mortgage, or rent, is covered along with other necessities then I believe a car payment should be dealt with. Of course, my priorities may be different than what yours may be, but unless you plan on living in your car then I’d think this would fit many."

"At the end of the day I think it’s important to see what value you’re deriving from the payments you make and more importantly breaking the cycle of a payment mentality."



At face value I Was skeptical about what my "first payment of the month" said about my financial values. But, I guess if I think about it I guess he is right. How we pay our bills does say a lot about is.

Me?

Car loans? None (never)

Credit cards? I tend to pay them off in full, about two weeks before payment is due.

Mortgage? The mortgage is the last bill I pay every month. BUT, it is not technically due until the 10th of the next month. So what I tend to do is pay with mid-month paycheck. But it buys me some significant float if something comes up and I just want to pay it off after the first. The reality is I usually pay it 2 weeks before it is due (like with all my debts - I don't want any penalties or fees, so play it pretty safe).

Most my other bills I pay on due dates because they are small and there are no consequences if the payment is a little late.

The first bill I pay every month? I pay the gardener, the gas company and our HOA around the first of every month. Why? They don't take credit card payments and these are the only bills I can't charge. (Aside from mortgage). The total comes out to about $175.

What else do I pay on the first of the month? Nothing. We pay ourselves first. The bulk of my first paycheck of the month (about 95%) goes to our savings. (Which goes hand in hand as to why we don't have any other payments).

Second paycheck of the month pays off the credit cards (prior month's bills) and pays the mortgage.

**We made it to our 3 San Francisco days of events. I thought we were driving to San Jose twice more this month, but dh seemed to think we would combine trips. Will see. It will be a lot to celebrate his folks' anniversary and his Grandma's birthday on one weekend day. Two weeks might be better for me, though more driving. (I was thinking of skipping the birthday, anyway).

THEN we will probably be on low-spend mode until May.

**It's funny because I really thought SIL (more means) would want to do an extravagant party for the in-laws' 40th anniversary.

But, since they are moving into their $1 million+ home this month? Dh has yet to talk to her about this anniversary at all ( ), but we got the message loud and clear. They aren't planning to spend a penny.

{I am rolling my eyes that dh has yet to speak to his sister about it - rolling them at him}.

I suppose it works out. I was trying to set aside $1k - $2k of money that in-laws gave us, in case it was a big dinner party out kind of thing. BUT, I have failed miserably given how 2013 was, and so it is what it is. I doubt we will spend a penny. Dh and I will offer to take them out to dinner. I just can't imagine them letting us pay.

Dh is working on a video, but has been struggling with his own family. I think it's easier to do for other families - maybe being more removed from the subject? I am sure he is also being too hard on himself.

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**I finished our taxes. Being organized and having a simple tax situation (& having really nice professional software), it was not a time consuming endeavor. Maybe one hour, max, to gather information and file all of our tax returns. I harvested some tax gains for the kids, which means having to file for them when they sell mutual funds.

I always aim for breakeven, but my withholding and deductions have been pretty sporadic in recent years.

I did adjust my withholding in 2013 because our medical deductions are more limited with Obamacare AND our mortgage interest went down significantly (with latest refinance). About $6,000 less deductions than last year, from those two things. Plus income went up a bit, etc.

In the end, I did good. $30 net refund. (Er, I think I just got lucky).

The big question for me is what to do about our IRA contributions. *sigh* I am squarely in "flip a coin" territory with this.

Tax rate has gone up from negative (less than 0%), up to 23%, in the years since we have had kids. So, the ROTH is officially no longer a "no-brainer."

25% is a strong tipping point for me. One reason is because in the past we took a larger deduction up front and then converted ROTHs in lower income years. I am also in the middle of converting my parents' ROTHs (early retirement/no income years). All this to say that it is not a simple situation with a simple answer. (It could be a MUCH better tax savings decision to skip the ROTH for now).

I think the long and the short of it is that even at 23%, it's a lot of money to throw away in the hope that the tax code and our circumstances work out to our favor in the long run. $11,000 x 23% = $2,530 tax savings. Which is certainly no small beans, to me. This would boost our savings rate significantly. ($2500 is like 3% of my income - we'd just turn around and invest the tax savings).

That said, we don't have to decide until next April. At which point we will have more information. If we can easily cash flow the ROTHs at that point, we may just to do so. If not, we can do the Tradiitonal IRA, or do 5/50.

For 2013, I had already committed to doing the ROTHs. Kind of glad about that. Because if I thought to check before I filed, I might have changed my mind. We got our ROTH balance to six figures already, so I think we will do fine whatever we decide. (Those ROTHs will be no small beans when we reach retirement age, even if we stop contributing to them).

I will probably do a few shorter posts because I have a lot of my brain but haven't had much time to blog lately.

Spending wins this month:

**Gas prices are down. Helps with planned 4 trips to Bay Area?? I filled up at $3.15 yesterday. Dh went to San Francisco mid week for a show. Done with the shows. He scored free parking but had to pay $12 for a two drink minimum. $10 on tolls. (The tolls are a *shrug* because I accidentally double paid our toll refill last year. We did spend $25 on tolls the last 3 weeks, which covers the extra payment. Otherwise we tend to spend about $5 or $10 per year).

Oh, and I mentioned MIL gave us a $50 gas coupon. So, I think we will do fairly well with gas this month, even given all the excess driving.

**Groceries - dh did first grocery run on Friday (first for month). I was hoping we could make up excess spending this month ($100+ on food and parking in SF on a recent weekend). I think it looks fairly likely. If we did not need any groceries the entire first week, and can probably stretch out the 4th grocery run into March. That gives us $300-ish in grocery runs ($100 x 3) plus a fair amount of supplementing at Target and ethnic stores.

We haven't shopped Safeway very much in YEARS because prices have been so terrible. But we were at in-laws and they had a 16oz salad with a giant "$5" stamped on the packaging. I asked where they got it and they said Safeway. Whoa!! So I stopped by and picked up some salad. What a great deal!

So, I told dh maybe he should go check out Safeway - maybe they were trying to be more competitive. He is a little resistant as he is just very annoyed with Safeway. But a LOT of our keeping food costs down is keeping an open mind and keeping an eye on prices, and adjusting. So, I think he needs to go check out the prices. (HE does almost ALL the shopping, and he has a price book basically in his head, so he needs to go check it out. He can be the judge).

Spending losses:

Aside from all our shows and driving, was expecting a fairly low spend month.

Last night I caved for a pizza. I believe while we were eating the pizza, dh told me they were going to the movies today. So aggravated, because if he had told me that, I never would have bought a pizza. It's not a big deal. But, better communication would have meant better decisions. I did gripe about that a bit last night. I will make sure that him AND the kids know that it's not a big deal. It was just the communication. It's so rare they go to the movies. I don't want them feeling bad about it.

So, that is our budget loss for this week.

**Because of the above, I got out the old pen and paper monthly budget.

I will never understand on any level why anyone would be tempted to spend more with a credit card than cash. I have very much a cash spending mentality. So, if I don't want to over-spend (and pay interest???), I have to only spend the money I have on hand. & of course we pay ourselves first (money goes to mortgage and retirement and whatever first), so all I really have to spend is what is left in my checking account.

BUT, sometimes it is difficult to manage a household with more than one person. I found a VERY simple solution. I just keep a running total of our monthly spending, by the computer. On a piece of paper. We can usually squeeze out $200 of discretionary spending, monthly. This does not include gas and grocery spending, which we are well versed and practiced in keeping within our budget. So, it's just everything else.

Credit cards make this SO EASY to manage. I can't say dh overly participates in this part. But I can see any credit card charges basically as the card is swiped. SO, I just write everything down. Then either of us can look at the list at any point of the month and see how much we have left to spend.

So yeah, I hadn't bothered with this in a while, but when I do, our spending always seems to be lower than usual. So, I figured if I Want a really tight month, I better write it down.

I wrote down $160 SF spending, though I expect gas coupon and less grocery spending to completely offset that. It will remind us that we had a very big spend month on the discretionary side of things, and we can cool it for the rest of the month.

I added pizza and movies. & dh and I both made a couple of purchases.

I'd like not to spend any more money this month, aside for food and whatever for upcoming Bay Area trips.

Hardly a tight month, as they went to the movies last weekend (FIL paid), I went to lunch with my friend ($$$$), dh went to a show, and we have a birthday and an anniversary coming up (two trips to Bay Area). I think our social calendar is quite full. & I guess another reason why I Was so thrown off by the movie plans.

Another gorgeous weekend in San Francisco. WOW!

I met up with my bff since we couldn't mesh our schedules last weekend. We had lunch and drinks with a beach view. The time went too fast.

We actually had some rain last week and might get more this week. Phew! (Not enough, but it is something).

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**I redeemed $25 credit card reward and added to mortgage payment. Also added $20 for carpool savings and $15 for internet savings. Total $60 snowflake for 2/28 mortgage payment. I will pay it at the end of the month.

I also expect a $200-ish insurance rebate (we get every February) so will add that to the mortgage payment as well.

**I updated side bar for total January interest received. No other savings this month since it was only a one-paycheck month.

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I think we pulled off a no-spend weekend. We went down to Bay Area for FIL's birthday. The car already had a pretty full tank (filled up when we got home last weekend). I spent money on lunch, but MIL slipped us a $50 gas card when we left. She often gave us cash when gas prices were very high and we were dealing with dh's medical problems and so on. BUT, it has been a long time. Not expected in the slightest.

So, if I spent about $20 on lunch, and I got $50, then it nets out to a profit. FIL took dh and the kids to the movies while I had my girl time.

I wasn't expecting to make out so well this weekend. Was just expecting to spend.

It's carpet cleaning weekend at work. I should probably work from home. I should probably do some errands. But, I think I will torture myself by doing nothing. Will mean a crazier schedule next week, but am looking forward to a breather before things get REALLY crazy. Maybe if I relax all day I can work up to a little shopping tonight. I have $90 in Kohls gift cards, and only need some nice pants (my work pants are getting pretty worn from so much wear). So, not expecting to spend any actual cash or to use up all my gift cards.

Do you want to hate my guts or what? Beautiful sunny weather here. Barely using the heat.

It's not all roses. Drought drought drought. Our lake is 17% of capacity (it looks fairly non-existent at the moment). The weather is just a mess everywhere, isn't it??? Ask me again in summer when we have no water.

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I did get to move the needle on my savings, after all. $16 savings interest hit this week. I added it to my sidebar.

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For whatever reason, my auto insurance decreased 10%. Woohoo! I just saw the online bill - I will get the detailed bill in the mail. & try to figure out what decreased. What's interesting is we drove the van to Vegas, AND gas prices have been fairly low, so I do not think it is likely to be a "low mileage" thing. We have overall been saving a lot since we have been reporting our actual mileage. But yeah, will see what the bill says...

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Ting Update!!

We should get our second "bill" tomorrow. Still paying with "credits" for a few more months.

Here is how January shook out:

We used way less data and minutes.

I will copy and paste a bit from my last Ting update, and update the numbers.

Sprint Monthly Charges:

1600 minutes (calls to each other were not counted), unlimited text and data

$ 105 for first phone
$ 25 for second phone
$ 25 for third phone
$ 15 for non-smart-phone
$ 20 Taxes
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$190 - Our split was $100 per month


Ting Monthly charges:

$24 for 4 phones
$ 9 for 500 minutes (Medium)**-we used 350 minutes
$ 5 for 1,000 Texts (Medium)**-we used like 150 texts
$13 for 500MB (Medium)**-we used 300MB
$ 3 Taxes
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$54 - Our split is $27 per month

**You can use however many minutes, texts, data you want. There are different tiers, and then reasonable fees if you need more than the XL tiers. Last month, for example, we had used the large "minutes" tier.

73% savings for the month of January

You could maybe call this "100% savings" because dh won a $50 credit this month.

I did double check and dh and I would use the same medium tiers for everything, if it was just us, and so we are saving a decent amount going in with my parents. It is only $6 per line to add a line and to share in the same data and minutes.

I think this is where our average bill is going to settle. Vacation and unusual usage, aside.

That is going to be so nice when the kids get cell phones. I have a friend who is probably not a great candidate for Ting, today. (Probably will be eventually). BUT, she was intrigued as far as a "kid's first cell phone." The referral possibilities may be quite huge with having a 10yo kid. I got to rack up those referrals! I imagine it's the kind of thing parents will be talking about too. Our friends tend to be budget minded, so they will be comparing notes on cell phone plans, and so on.

Work is crazy busy and has been for a while. & will be for a while.

Of course, January through April is our most profitable time of year. Too busy to spend, and raking in the overtime. Then I generally have the rest of the year to relax and enjoy.

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This is our January discretionary spending, to-date:

$134 groceries
$ 34 fuel

Exciting stuff!

Actually, about $20 of those groceries were a "Christmas Redo". I was sick on Thanksgiving, and Mom and dh were sick on Christmas, so we got together last weekend to spend some time with my parents. My parents are generally pretty easy and very happy to eat anything we cook, or even just leftovers. But my mom was really looking forward to our "Christmas Pizza".

Dh was going to pick up cat litter on sale today, and pick up a gift for a birthday party.

I did charge $200 for school lunches, on the reward credit card I am working on. (I charge every January, so did nothing different for the reward). I charged up some insurance also. I've got about $350 left to spend. I was expecting a $140 Sprint bill (100% my parents and they will reimburse), but Sprint didn't bill us this month. Ugh!! I thought that charge would be perfect since it isn't even really mine. I checked last years' January and February expenses and can't come up with anything else foreseeable, and so will probably just pre-pay some health insurance this weekend. That reward is going to be $580.

Unfortunately, I have no exciting plans for the $580 but to "clean up the checkbook". After the year we had, it's a miracle I did not have to dip MORE into savings, and so I am happy with the outcome. Could be happier (would make a nice snowball!), but happy enough.

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I am not participating in the savings challenges. We save very aggressively with a "pay ourselves first" mentality. (Literally, 43% of my regular take-home salary goes straight to savings. Plus, we tend to bank and snowball the extras). The idea of having anything extra leftover to save = harharhar. We keep it pretty tight. This doesn't mean we can't make spending decisions out of our savings. It just means I will never ever ever spend less than we budget, in a single month. Has probably never happened. Absolutely nothing leftover to increase savings. I guess my approach is more to "oversave" up front. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Saving coins is like nail on a chalkboard, to me. So I have to go get more money out of the bank so I can throw it in a jar and let it earn -0- interest? I don't get it and I never will. Even in the early days when we had to use cash more, we'd just spend the cash (change) we had before we'd go and get more. I am reluctant to waste a single penny. If I don't need it right now, it gets saved or invested.

{My kids are big change savers and if I ever find change I give it to them. I think for their age it is appropriate - they are learning that small amounts add up}.

Of course, in regards to the challenge, having to save a certain dollar amount (different) every week, just gives me a headache.

I don't fault anyone who thrives on the games or for who any of the above works. I just blog to say that these things do nothing for me. & so I am sitting it out. (Really and truly - it's important to do whatever works for you).

The declutter challenge? I was excited to see that post yesterday.

Again, I am not really interested in finding a specific amount of items to purge each and every day or week. But, I am embracing the challenge as far as keeping it front of mind and breaking it down into smaller pieces. Trying to make a little progress each and every week. Instead of complicating things with some fixed number, I will just do whatever makes sense.

I personally can not imagine purging 1,378 things from my home, but I have an open mind and will see what we can come up with. We regularly purge trash and broken items so I am not counting anything that I would toss under normal every day circumstances. I've got better things to do than to count every trash item and junk mail item that I always toss anyway. Looking to see what I can improve on, so will only count the "out of the ordinary" purges. We do also regularly purge outgrown clothing, toys, games and kids' things, so not sure how much of that I will count. Will see how I feel about it. I mostly want to acknowledge going above and beyond "the usual". Wondering if I will ever really feel on top of my "stuff". I have been on major purge mode for well over 10 years. I ramped it up last year because we are planning to downsizing our home in another decade. I want to pick up and move what we have and need - and to have the excess long gone by that point. (Why 10 years? I think our house is *perfect* for 4 people, but would prefer a smaller space for when it is just two of us. Kids will be on their own in another decade or so. Dh and I were more than content when we used to live in half the space).

One thing that makes decluttering hard for me is that I detest throwing things in the landfill. We try to freecycle, donate or sell anything possible. This is my "declutter" achilles heel, but I will stick to my guns. Once I get on top of it, it should be easy to keep on top of, know what I mean? It's the "stuff that I didn't know what to do with 10 years ago," that is driving me crazy at the moment. When I stop finding THAT stuff in my house, I will find some peace in this area.

Oh, and I printed up the challenge for work, too. Today I tossed a small trash bin full of old seminar and tax reference books. (Like 2009 - 2011, which is all obsolete by now). I found a fan in my office and no idea why, so moving it to the common area in case anyone has any use for it. I've been here 12 years and I haven't moved offices in a long while, so it's probably time for a good cleanup. {Oh - since we deal with large amounts of paper - we have a recycle dumpster - so everything I purged today will be recycled}.

At home I have done nothing, but dh just gave me two pairs of pants to purge. I've at least got two items for this week.

Last I ruminated, I wasn't so sure what to do with mortgage snowflakes. For December I did not make a mortgage payment, so just abandoned snowflakes for the month.

BUT, we got a nice cash gift for Christmas and I was able to fund dh's ROTH with it. I was already leaning towards continuing mortgage snowflakes this year anyway. (IT just works the best psychologically, for us). I was just tempering that feeling with feeling like I should put a screech on all mortgage snowflakes until we got our ROTHs back in order. But as of right now the "screech" seems pretty unnecessary. (My ROTH will be funded with Feb. 1 paycheck, assuming nothing else BREAKS. & I do have until April 15th).

So... Snowflakes it is!

I didn't make the December mortgage payment - will pay it today. (Didn't need the interest deduction last year, so pushed it forward).

These are my December snowflakes (paid to mortgage in January):

$20 carpool saving**
$15 internet bill promo savings**

January snowflakes:

$20 carpool saving**
$15 internet bill promo savings**
$25 gas/grocery credit card reward (I just redeemed)
$180 Visa credit card reward^^

**I don't expect these savings to last forever, so am just making an expense "placeholder" with mortgage snowflakes.

^^On the last one, it's a 1% cash back on our CU visa that we receive every January. The amount is only so large this year because they had a 2% promo for a time. (Usually this reward is more like $60).

OF course, we just shifted those rewards from one card to the other. All this money would have gone to our Fidelity AmEx otherwise - those rewards go to my Fidelity ROTH. This just means the mortgage gets a boost because our credit union ran a nice promo. (All else being equal, Visa is accepted more places and I'd rather give the business to my credit union than a big bank).

Snowflakes 2014: $275

Unfortunately, not expecting to keep up THAT kind of momentum. But it's definitely a nice start to 2014.

Hard to believe, but we have been 30+ days on Ting.

I have been anxiously waiting for taxes and fees. My research indicated that Ting charges no fees. But I know taxes can be quite high, but I thought they were mostly based on bill. So cutting our cell bill by 1/3 should decrease the taxes, right?

YES!!

Taxes: $4.59



Of course, our actual bill is $0 because we have several credits applied to our account. We will not have to pay anything for the first 3-4 months.

This bill is larger than I expect it to be for the long run, and to be clear is for FOUR cell phones. We split cell service with my parents.

Minutes: It would have only been $9 for 500 minutes. I presume some months we can stay around 500.

Messages: $5 is for the 100-1000 text rate. (Funny statistic: I texted the least of the group; my old foagie parents text more than me. Even my mom with her her old dumb phone - HA).

Megabytes: $13 pays for up to 500 MB of data. We really thought we would be using more data so this was a nice surprise. I think on an average month we will use less data than this month. Dh found out his speed tests use way too much data, so he stopped doing that. Accounted for at least 1/4 of our usage. !!

We are just shifting mindsets a bit because used to have unlimited data. If we go over on a big vacation or anything like that, we just pay for that we use. So, we have a lot of flexibility with Ting. Other than that, just trying to be more mindful of data usage and using the wireless for any big data.

I'd say the bulk of the data usage is mine, at work. I don't have wireless at work. Everyone else on my plan is retired and so mostly uses wireless.

Devices: We initially activated 5 devices because I was not sure which phone I was going to use. They charged for all 5 this month. Each device costs $6 per month.

This means all else being equal, that this bill would be $6 less next month. About $64. That would leave our half of the bill at $32.

That is officially a 68% cell phone cost reduction in our own household. Woot!!

When we add the kids it will just be $12/month for the two phones (they can use our hand-me-down phones). We've already decided we could cover the $12 but they can pay for their usage. Texts are the cheapest on Ting, so works well for teenage users. I think we have a few years to go, but glad we have a solid plan for the future, one that doesn't cost a small fortune.

----------------------------------------------------

& this is Ting's nifty Dashboard:



It's easy to glance at and see how you are doing on minutes and data an so on, at any point in the month.

----------------------------------------------------

I will copy and paste a bit from my last Ting update, and update the numbers.

Sprint Monthly Charges:

1600 minutes (calls to each other were not counted), unlimited text and data

$105 for first phone
$ 25 for second phone
$ 25 for third phone
$ 15 for non-smart-phone
$ 20 Taxes
-----
$190 - Our split was $100 per month


Ting Monthly charges:

$24 for 4 phones
$18 for 1,000 minutes (Large)
$ 5 for 1,000 Texts (Medium)
$13 for 500MB (Medium)
$ 4 Taxes
-----
$64 - Our split is $32 per month

-----------------------------------------------------

If you don't have Sprint, Ting sells new and used phones directly, as well as they help you buy compatible phones from third parties. (A personal shopper service).

They also have a service for selling your old phones. Overall, they try to make the switch as simple as possible.

Here is a referral for $25 off if you decide to make the switch:

https://z181d126bt4.ting.com

P.S. The credits we earned were $25 for signing up with a referral, $25 for Black Friday sign up, $50 for our first referral, and $88 for "25% reimbursement of early termination fees". They've had some other promos in that time that we did not participate in - for example we skipped on the Starbucks credits because we don't drink coffee.

I updated the numbers below. I will still have to tweak a few numbers as statements come in.

I did also add the $75 we earned from the AmEx Amazon deal.

If I add the Cap One ($152 savings bonus) I added this year, the grand total is $2,775 for the year. VERY close to last year's number. The Cap One wasn't a credit card, but it was really the same difference (but easier, since I only had to open the account and do nothing else). I won't officially include it in my totals because it was not tax-free. But for all intents and purposes I think it belongs in the same category.

{I don't have direct deposit and don't like/trust debit cards so have never been able to do any other checking account or savings account type bonus. I know there are ways around direct deposit rules, but then it is often "at your own risk" and seems like way more work than it is worth. May be re-evaluated in the future, if credit cards dry up. Since Cap One had no direct deposit or debit hoops to jump through, it was *super easy*}.



2013 TALLY:

$580 cash (Chase Sapphire triple dip moi)*
$430 cash (Chase Sapphire triple dip dh)*
$250 cash Citi (dh double dip? Triple dip?)
-----------
$1260 TOTAL *ONE-TIME REWARDS*

+$ 525 deposit to ROTH (Fidelity Am Ex - 2% cash back)
+$ 25 cash back Fidelity Am Ex (bonus for some alternating category?)

+$475 AmExRewards (6% cash back groceries/3% fuel)

+$ 75 American Express Rewards ($25 x 3 cards)

+$ 85 Target rewards (5% discount Target purchases; mostly groceries)

+$ 178 Visa Rewards (1% cash back - for places that don't take AmEx - primarily dentist/insurance/utilities; had 2% reward for a couple of months this year - woohoo!)
----------------------------
=$2623 Total CC REWARDS 2013
----------------------------

*triple dips = rewards redeemed for the third time. We redeemed once every 12 months or so.

Year 2011 = $4,164
Year 2012 = $2,782
Year 2013 = $2,623

Total 3 Years = $9,569
**Tax-Free Income!!**

Caveat: I don't recommend using credit cards at all unless you have the discipline to pay them off 100% within grace period. I have never in my life paid a fee or any interest to a credit card company. I don't think it's a big deal if you don't spend money that you don't have and therefore pay off the balance each and every month. This strategy has worked fine for me for full two decades.

Haven't been posty because work is CRAZY this time of year. Hoping to get time Sunday to relax (will do nothing) and I do get Wednesday off, so not particularly worried about it. Monday and Tuesday will be stressful though with the time crunch. All this stuff has to be done 12/31.

Of course, I will then come home and run my own numbers. Because I just like numbers that much. {You think I'd be sick of numbers, but it fuels me}.

----------------------------------------------------

Christmas:

Christmas was the BEST Christmas ever. The short version is aliens must have invaded my in-laws because they made it very low key. Who are these people? That was the best Christmas miracle of all. (Though a little heads up would have been nice because usually they are such gift hogs that no one else buys the kids anything. The kids got a little gyped this year, but oh well).

That said, all was not perfect around here. A loved one had a stroke (is doing 100% fine). IT just never ends!!! But, couldn't expect a much better outcome than that?

Our friends announced they were divorcing, on Christmas Eve.

Half of us were sick, and with one in the hospital, it was kind of a bummer for Christmas day. The mood was pretty glum on Christmas Eve after getting the divorce news. It just hit dh and I hard, for whatever reason. (We didn't hear about the stroke until AFTER Christmas because they did not want to worry us and weren't sure what was wrong).

----------------------------------------------------

We also got a large cash gift for Christmas (very unexpected) and so I maxed out dh's ROTH. Heck, our total Christmas haul was $5,510. & nothing I wanted for Christmas more than a ROTH contribution. How cool is that??? (Plus $10 to spare!)

We had already committed $300 Christmas money (assuming we'd get even that) to some shows in January. We got front row seats for two different shows! So excited! (Comedy sketch fest - hard to narrow down but I guess easy enough with financial and time limitations - both the shows we are all going to are on the same day - dh and I may hit a couple of others if they don't sell out - they have like 100+ shows and all these big names and all of them we would probably love to see).

But, dh had already put $1k in his ROTH, and so I didn't need the entire Christmas sum to max him out. Still money left for our front row seats.

I believe all the 2013 dividends hit in our ROTHs. As of yesterday the sum of our ROTHs was $99,174. So very very close to six figures.

The six figure mark means a lot to me because in our savings in general things tended to quickly take off after the six figure mark. If the stock market averages a 10% return and we contribute $11k per year, then returns are getting pretty neck and neck with contributions. & this is extra exciting for the ROTH space because of the tax-free nature of the ROTHS.

Plus, heck, dh received a 2% dividend in his mutual fund so holy heck. That adds up when you have a larger balance in your fund. This is one reason I wasn't expecting to end the year so well.

Funding both ROTHs at this late date was over-whelming, but since now only $5,000 is needed to max out mine, I will fund it to the point I don't have to dip into our "6 months expenses". It might be January or February. Much sooner than expected, thanks to the generous gift. Phew! This also puts us on track to easily max out 2014 in 2014 (Assuming we don't have a year like 2013!).

{I always fund dh's ROTHs first because I have a substantial retirement plan balance from my job. He only has the ROTH. Plus, the money came from his parents, so I guess it is extra fitting}.

------------------------------------------------------

Yesterday I sorted out the kids' money.

They both received $20 cash for Christmas. LM had $30 prior and had already agreed to deposit all Christmas sums. BM had $0 but I am worried he lost his money. (He is the bigger saver so I find it hard to believe LM had $30 more than him). I don't know what the heck, but if that is the case I guess it will turn up. (He is also the slob of the two, so it's very likely lost in his room).

After depositing LM's $20, his savings account is up to $300. BM's savings account is sitting at $400 (by virtue of being older). They are both working hard to get to the $500 level. Because their interest rate is 7% on first $500. I spent some time with them yesterday showing them how much more interest they are earning now (used to get once cent per month!). We calculated the interest they should get 12/31, and how their money compounds. I think they are more well versed than most adults. They are both very math oriented and they clearly get it.

I took $20 cash from LM and transferred it into his account. It saved us an ATM run - we might be good for 6 months. (My big cash expenditure for the half year or so was that I gave my dad $10 for a Senior National Park Pass). Lord knows we never use much cash anyway, but it seems to be dwindling down to truly nothing - no cash usage. I certainly could have given my dad $10 without using cash or writing a check, but since it was a gift we wanted it to be more personable than a "check in the mail from a third party." That is how my online bill pay works. If I pay an individual, they just get mailed a check. It saves a TON of time, and of course no stamps for our more long-distance family.

Wow - what a mixed year it has been!

I am optimistic that the big ugly black cloud hanging over our heads since, September 2012, has moved along. It's only been about 15 months. !!! But anyway, will see... It's only been a couple of weeks of calm and so it's a bit premature to get too excited about it.

Because of this, we did terrible on our financial goals, maybe the worst ever. BUT, all our prior savings worked very hard for us, so it was a banner year for net worth and the big picture. Phew??

Anyway, I wanted to close the books on 2013 because I am SO over it! So, unless something big happens in the next two weeks, this is my final "general" commentary on 2013.

In general, we tend to make our financial goals aggressive and we tend to always meet our goals anyway. This year is a first in I ever remember failing. Spectacularly. The optimist in me is fine with that - if some years we do better than planned then it is expected to do worse in other years - it all evens out.

CASH:

Cash is up $5,000 by some miracle. We try to increase by $5k every year. Actually, we had decided to hit our goals one at a time this year. It's a mixed bag. We have not particularly put any money into our ROTHs yet (had wanted them funded by 12/31, and expected to do it easy peasy). BUT, if we had, we'd just be really cash poor and stressed right now. So, I think I am happy with this approach. The ROTHs will get funded. I am just considering doing it in April to preserve cash flow and liquidity. (To be clear: We have never in our lives had a crazy expensive year like this one - so it was pretty unusual).

Our goal for 2013 was to save $10,000. We were going to splurge on a trip to Asia. That is completely out the window because we needed *all* of that money for home repairs. Which leaves me ending the year off with some stress since we were supposed to be so ahead of the curve at this point to be able to splurge on a $10k vacation. I share this to illustrate a point. I have friends who will say we never splurge big and do anything fun. BUT, you see what happens when we try. & it's not like I got caught offguard for not planning ahead. !! Instead I am thankful that we had all that cash to cover it and not dip into savings at all. On the flip side, maybe this was just the universe telling us to do something else with that money. IT was kind of an obligatory trip and our relative in Asia doesn't seem to want us to visit her anyway. So... We aren't too broken up about our change in vacation plans. Heck, I am RELIEVED because I Was never very enthused about it. (Note to Universe: Um, you could have left SOME Of that money to do something fun with though???).

RETIREMENT:

We put a whopping $1,500 into our ROTHs this year, and that is all gifts and credit card rewards. I have been saving the money ($900 per month), but just putting it all into cash waiting for the hemorrhage to stop.

This is our primary goal (above basic liquidity and being able to pay cash for all of our needs) and so it will 100% get done. But, I am pushing it off until April. Mostly so I can fund the ROTH without depleting any cash (from current level). Ideally.

I can't boast a $100k balance in our ROTHs until I get them funded for 2013. So, that will have to wait until next year.

The good news is that our retirement funds are up $23,000 even though all we put in was $1,500.

Retirement milestone hit: 2 x income saved

Retirement investments are, on average, returning as much as we put in. I think that is a SWEET milestone. & also means that going forward that our investments are working harder than we are. (Note: This year was not average - obviously we earned far more than we put in).

& all of that makes this year infinitely easier to deal with!

HOME:

Along the same lines, home value is up 30%. It's been an excellent year for our overall net worth.

MORTGAGE:

Like all our other goals, we failed spectacularly on this one. Only added $950 (snowflakes) to the mortgage payments. Had expected to pay down an extra $4,000. (The rest went to home repairs and other emergencies).

I made the last 2013 mortgage payment in November. Don't need any more tax deductions so will pay the December payment next month (around January 1). So, I was pretty non-motivated on the snowflakes this month. Which is fine, I need to shift focus on the ROTHs. Just waiting to see where the dust settles. (I think I have some snowflakes already applied to the next mortgage payment - probably ones I earned in November since I expected to already pay the mortgage payment, otherwise).

The ending mortgage balance is $190,000-ish. I was going to go for $189,000, as the year progressed, but decided not only did I not need to make another payment this year (Waste of a tax break) but that I really needed to shift focus to ROTHs.

I am not 100% sure what I Will do for 2014. Mortgage has only been a higher priority in past year because of two reasons. 1 - Real estate values were tumbling and we risked having less than 20% equity if things continued. Which is a position I would consider an "emergency". Not an EMERGENCY emergency, but it would be worthy of some drastic measures to correct. 2 - I Thought we were more ahead of the curve and could throw more money at the mortgage.

Today we have over 50% equity (our home never dropped below 20% equity) and clearly we are not very ahead of the curve right now. Not where I Want to be. So, I think mortgage is falling off my radar for the moment as far as pressing financial goals.

BUT, I think the mortgage is ideal for snowflakes. So that is the part I am not quite sure on for 2014. It seems useless to put the snowflakes to the ROTHs because I will fund those regardless. & with anything more short-term I don't find it particularly useful or rewarding. I want to tie up those snowflakes for the long haul (retirement or mortgage). So I may just keep throwing snowflakes at the mortgage even if I am not particularly mortgage-paydown motivated otherwise, in the short run.

For 2014 I am going to focus way more on liquidity, which I think is wise given my job situation. I hesitate to say I am actually kicking the mortgage off my list of goals, because any money we save up and don't need for unemployment can eventually get thrown at the mortgage. It's more of a "better keep it just in case but mostly likely will go to the mortgage eventually," plan.

TOTAL NET WORTH:

Our net worth has increased by $125,000 this year. Since our goal is to increase this by $30k per year, we have quadrupled our goal. Wow, what a year!!! (Last year was similar, but we were making up for a lot of really pathetic years with the stock market and real estate market. This year was some serious forward movement). The $30k figure is just 50% of our annual expenses. That is how much we aim to grow our net worth every single year.

So, yeah, how is that for a mixed year? I don't particularly have anything to complain about. It's always disconcerting when things REALLY don't go as planned, but I also know we had a great year financially, in the grand scheme of things.

-----------------------------------------------------

2014??

I hadn't thought about it yet.

I think our goals will have to be:

1 - Fund 2013 ROTHs
2 - Increase cash by $5k
3 - Fund 2014 ROTHs
4 - Snowflakes to the mortgage ($1k is probably doable)
5 - Increase net worth by 40k**

**My "annual net worth increase" goal has been 30k for several years. I wonder if we can bump this up to a full 60k by the time we are age 40? The plan would be that our net worth would eventually increase by our annual spending every single year ($60k). I don't know what age that will be realistic for, but somewhere in our early 40s is what we are aiming for.

A realistic goal for now is 40k:

Mortgage paydown $ 5,000 (includes $1k snowflakes)
ROTH Contributions $11,000
Cash Savings $ 5,000
Overtime Savings $ 5,000 (to 2013 ROTH)
Investment Returns $14,000^^
---------------------------
TOTAL $40,000

^^Assuming average 8% return, annually

I did not include real estate because way too crazy volatile, particularly regionally. For that reason, $40k may be a conservative estimate. (I did not include additional sources of income, gifts and so on, either).

It is not surprising that we are able to increase net worth more with time - is starting to compound a bit as we move past the real estate bubble and the last stock market crash.

I don't know what a realistic timeline is to consistently increase net worth by $60k annually. I think it will largely depend on short term market fluctuations.

Most of the $10k bump from $30k to $40k "net worth increase" estimate is due to lower mortgage interest rates (faster payoff) and stock market returns on increased investments. When I first estimated annual $30k net worth goal we were probably only paying mortgage down at a rate of $3k per year and probably had less than $50k in retirement savings. Our income has been pretty stagnant in all that time. But mortgage is being paid down faster (with a smaller payment) and investment returns are 3-4 times what they were in 2007 with investment balances 3-4 times as large. Smaller mortgage payment has also increased our savings ability (more to savings).

---------------------------------------------------

Here is my sidebar update (putting it here for the future):

**2013 Financial Goals**

[ ]$11,000 to IRAs 2013 (MAX)
...(6,050 @ 12/31/13)
...Delaying funding to April 2014, to keep cash intact.

[X]$5,000 to savings
...(13,000 @ 12/31/13)
...Had to bump up savings due to lots of emergencies and repairs this year
...All but $5k redirected to expenses

[X]$5,000 saved for Hong Kong
...($5,000 @ 12/31/13)
...redirected to plumbing repairs

[ ]Pay more principal than interest to mortgage (+$4,000) - admittedly a pie in the sky goal
...($950 @12/31/13)
...Redirected the rest to home repairs, medical, vet bills, etc. What a Year!!

Goal savings rate = 30% of gross
(Actual savings rate = 11%? This may be our worst savings rate *ever*?)

[X]To have more cash/mutual funds than debt (mortgage)
...Goal Met as of 3/15/13!

[X]To increase net worth by $30k (or 50% expenses)
...(Up $125,000 at 12/31/13)

I was surprised to see that I already got two $25 credits from AmEx last Friday. (Fine print said it would take 90 days or something - why do they always say that? - it always seems to take a few days).

I was extra surprised because this particular credit card is the slowest one I have ever had as far as rewards. Except in this case!

We did remember to use the right cards. Dh spent about $50 on Christmas stuff and bought a $25 Amazon gift card. I bought a $50 Kohls card and a $25 Amazon gift card - both of which - Amazon cards - I consider "free" with the credits. (I could use some new pants for work - so got the Kohls gift card with that in mind).

I left our regular/usual credit card for last so we would not have to remember to use the correct card. Was just waiting to see if dh needed to buy some gift cards for his family. Well, it turns out his Grandma wanted him to order her gifts for the kids - about $50. So he will just pick up a third $25 amazon gift card for free. (I wasn't 100% sure if we would use that last one - so it was nice to use it for someone else's purchase - she will give dh back $50 later - and hopefully I get the last $25 credit in a few days).

---------------------------------------------------

And... Happy Day! I got my first referral from Ting!! Thank you thank you thank you!! I told so many people about it, but since none of my in-real-life friends mentioned it I presume it was a referral from this blog. Someone anonymous in internet land??

Yay!!

From here on out all my referrals will be $25. I was super excited because only the first one is $50. See my last post for details about Ting and our experience so far. (You get a $25 credit too if you use my link).

As it stands, we have a $200 credit on our account, so definitely will not even get a bill for the first three months. Our early termination refund hit today - Ting paid 25% of it for us. I just submitted the receipt for that yesterday. Woot! & then I got that $50 today too. We already had $50 in Black Friday and referral credits from using someone else's referral.

I didn't lay this out in my last post: If we save $100 month x 5 months with early termination (our half of the family plan) that will pay off dh's new phone in NO TIME. As noted, we won't even pay anything to Ting for the first 3-4 months. & who knows, maybe we will generate a few more referrals by then.

{I wasn't sweating it because I got a credit card bonus to pay for the new phone, but looks like maybe I can use the bonus for something else instead? If the phone pays for itself very quickly?}.

One of those examples where it pays to terminate early. It's a racket - but it would have cost us a larger fortune to wait out the contract.

----------------------------------------------------

Okay, so I FINALLY got my new Chase card.

Old game plan:

Was thinking of charging a property tax installment, fees and all, to get this card charged up. {Even though I cringed at the thought of the fees!} But I also expected to have received it a long time ago. This took forever!

In the end, I already ran my tax return and things were surprisingly breakeven. By some miracle we don't owe any taxes, even without paying December mortgage yet. So, phew! So, I decided NOT to prepay property taxes this year. I still think it will be simpler in the long run, but this year is just not the year. (Surprising because we couldn't deduct as much medical and had way less mortgage interest this year. I had also adjusted my withholdings - paid in more taxes which apparently was enough for this year - phew).

Okay, so property taxes were due before I even got the card and scratch the second installment getting paid before next year. I was relieved because I didn't want to waste $50 or so on fees - though would have been worth it for the large reward.

New game plan:

I am hoping to get this new card charged up by around February 1.

What I have come up with so far:

$400 to Sprint for final bill (50% is being reimbursed by my parents, so this is an awesome hit for the card).

$200 Insurance due

$300 Auto insurance due in January

$250 Christmas Donations. The theme this year is animal shelter. Since our family lost two pets and adopted two pets. My kids won't hear of anything else. I like how we usually spread out our donations among many charities - each choosing one. In this case I was donating as a gift to my mom as well - in lieu of any other gifts - and then the kids both picked the shelter - so it will be one large amount divided amongst two shelters - one in each of our cities.

My choice was definitely the shelter since we had only paid $5 to adopt our cat. At the time it was a stray, we had no idea what we were getting into and just came off a pile of vet bills. But I figured we'd give them $100-ish if the year went well. I am happy to say that he is as healthy as a horse! The year hasn't gone well, but at least we didn't need a pile of money for the new cat.

Other than that - will just put January and February health insurance on that card.

Oh, and another $50 bonus if dh makes one purchase as an "authorized user". He told me he was shopping Scholastic this week, which is PERFECT. He sometimes charges up $0.25-ish there (since he uses his earned credit and tries to pay as little as possible out of pocket). I asked him if he had any small purchases in mind, and I think that is about as small as it gets.

My general strategy is to charge up these cards as fast as possible, but kind of a tall order with having to spend $6,000 on two cards. But, I may just prepay February health insurance and be done with it. Could have that one done by January 1 if I do it that way. Depends when the card closes for the month...

Dh's card already has $3,000 in charges - it was all insurance. Insurance insurance insurance... I should be able to redeem his $430 bonus around December 31.

Things are going well on the Ting front.

**Since we were Sprint customers we were able to all keep our current phones. Of course, our switch was motivated by the new Nexus 5, which dh was able to buy directly from Google and then brought it over to Ting. The phone is $349 new but is a top tier phone. About half the cost of anything my dh was seriously considering up to that point.

Moto G also has a $179 price point? Which would probably be more my style than the Nexus. Ting is not supporting this one yet, but I assume they will work it out (would be a great match for Ting service, due to its reasonable price).

It will be interesting to see what other phones start to flood the market in the next few years.

**In the end, I took dh's android. It was a refurbished phone he bought for about $100 when his phone broke this summer. He hates it, but it's a nice step up from my windows phone. Of note, I can use our bank apps on the android (means immediate deposit of my payroll checks - I had just been using dh's phone when I got home). This phone also has 4G, if we ever get that service... Probably better for the long run.

We are keeping my old windows phone for the kids. It will only cost $6/month to activate it with Ting. In fact, we can activate it and unactivate it at will. Which is nice for this age. I don't see us having any use for the kids having a cell phone for a couple of years, but it is nice to have such a simple option we can activate today if we decide we need it for a special situation.

--------------------------------------------------

**We are shifting our mindset on this Ting plan because are moving from virtually unlimited everything to "charge per tier". The charges are so inexpensive that it will be fine either way. BUT, of course we want to be efficient.

I also checked the details of our landline today. We have been averaging about 20 of our 300 minutes and so we will work on using the landline for some of our calls. If we do so, I think we can keep in the lower minutes tier with Ting.

{I find the landline necessary, particularly for the kids, and it is *free* anyway with our internet service}.

Sprint Monthly Charges:

1600 minutes (calls to each other were not counted), unlimited text and data

$105 for first phone
$ 25 for second phone
$ 25 for third phone
$ 15 for non-smart-phone
$ 20 Taxes
-----
$190 - Our split was $100 per month


Ting Monthly charges:

$24 for 4 phones
$ 9 for 500 minutes (Medium)**
$ 5 for 1000 Texts (Medium)**
$13 for 500MB (Medium)
-----
$51

**Texts and minutes to each other now double counted (versus not counted at all before).

+ Taxes and fees = ??? I somehow doubt more than $10 per month. Maybe only $5.

So, let's just say $60/month. For now we are splitting 50/50 for simplicity. We may re-evaluate later but I don't think either of our families uses a lot more minutes or data than the other. That makes our half at $30 per month.

I think the data usage is realistic given the lack of 4G service in our city. I am not sure on the minutes.

It is possible this will bump up to $80/month when we get 4G. I am expecting that to be the worst case. Only $40/month for us (half):

Higher End Projection:

$24 for 4 phones
$18 for 1000 minutes (Large)
$ 5 for 1000 Texts (Medium)^^
$24 for 1000MB (Large)
$ 9 Taxes
-----
$80

So, either way we save $60 - $70 every month.



I think the best part of Ting is they only charge you for your actual usage. That, and no insane penalties for going over. (They have reasonable rates if you want to use more data minutes or texts than their XXL "buckets").

^^Our texting is nowhere near 1000 but the tier below that was only 100 texts.

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If you don't have Sprint, Ting sells new and used phones directly, as well as they help you buy compatible phones from third parties. (A personal shopper service).

They also have a service for selling your old phones. Overall, they try to make the switch as simple as possible.

Here is a referral for $25 off if you decide to make the switch:

https://z181d126bt4.ting.com

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In other news, we got our final Sprint bill. I was expecting to pay last month's charges + early termination fee.

I forgot we had been pre-paying that bill all along. I was utterly confused until I pulled up our very first bill, which was the only one that indicated it was a "pre payment". The rest of the bills didn't seem to have any indication. Kind of annoying, but I guess it was a nice surprise.

I don't know if my accounting was terribly grand with my folks, but I think they are all paid up. They owe me $175 in early termination fees. My mom had been paying me every other month for their half of the phone bill. At this rate I think I will just ask for reimbursement once or twice per year. Since the amounts will be so much smaller... But I will probably draw up a spreadsheet and keep better track!

Ting also reimburses 25% of early termination fees, up to $75 per device. I submitted for that credit yesterday - super easy and it took less than a minute.

When that hits we should have $140 in credits, so I don't expect to pay a cell phone bill for a few months, until we run through all the credits.

My first referral will be a $50 credit so I am also really talking it up until I get that $50 - might cover a month of service for all four of us. We have a few friends we can probably get to switch, so hope to have a few referrals roll in during 2014.

I am not expecting to pay much of anything for cell service during 2014.

{Reminds me, dh was telling me one of his friends was paying like $120 per month cell service for a single dumb phone. You got me!?! He will likely be our first referral. It was a terrible network too - one far worse than the Sprint/Ting network}.

So, we turned on our heat. It has actually been pretty mild. Like it is usually a bit of a challenge to keep heat off until Thanksgiving, but was easy peasy with the late Thanksgiving this year.

I don't know that I necessarily needed the heat on today, but we had a freeze last night. (I am bundled up and will head to work soon with ample heat). BUT, dh is babysitting today and I thought he would probably never think to turn on the heat. Who knows, it might be so cold that my efforts may be futile (it might cool off quickly when I leave). But is my attempt to not look too insane to other people. Other than that, the kids will have to speak up if they are cold.

Otherwise I have my gloves on and am toasty warm, myself.

It was interesting when we got back from the beach because my parents told me their house was 54F degrees. Yikes! Ours was only 64F though our region tends to get a few degrees colder. Just to illustrate how much of our energy savings is the house itself. This morning it is only 60F in the house (the lowest it gets on its own) but there is definitely a colder chill in the air.

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It is busy here.

I think the Christmas stuff is done. Since it's a busy time of year we don't do much for the Holiday.

Christmas Doings:

--I bought my dad almond roca, like we do every year

--For his 62nd birthday I am giving him $10 for a National Park lifetime pass

--Mom gets a donation to a pet shelter (in the name of her pet that just passed) & I got her some earring on Etsy for her birthday

--I already sent my sister some of these gloves last month - they are DIVINE! We don't necessarily do gifts but I get gifts for people when I see them.

--$10 Starbucks gift card for work exchange - I could only find $10 in pack of 3 but thought that would go well for gifts on hand. I picked up a $5 candle a while ago too. Might give my friend a GC and a candle. I had also ordered earrings for co-worker.

--Christmas work gift will pay for boss work gift

--Dh's family will gift us more than we pay for them - we usually just reimburse SIL for her purchases. Dh might offer to provide Amazon gift cards with the AmEx deal we did.

--Kids bought each other $15 in gifts

--Dh's new cell phone cost me $10 out of pocket. (After credit card bonus paid the bulk). So, the kids ended up buying that for him. He is happy and needs NOTHING else.

--Kids picked up a birthday gift for dh ($10 Blu Ray) - YES it is birthday central here.

--Kids' teachers will get gift certficates to Scholastic (dh earns by volunteering).

Dh's family is driving me crazy with their wish list demands. I thought I had quite a wish list going but apparently they just thought that was for my birthday. I told dh to deal with it. He is trying to talk them into buying some of his and the kids stuff for me. (I often try to sneak their stuff on my list). Will see... I don't think they usually go for it, but if they can't think of anything else.

They are also driving my SIL nuts. Who for one lived in a super teeny tiny space and for two is "homeless" this Christmas. She has a birthday this week too. They sold their home!! But still haven't found another. So, we have both been pretty grinchy about Christmas, but we kind of always are an no one seems to care. Anyway, the past several years I have just put needs on our wish list but I think the thing this year is we no longer even NEED anything. So I have been a little more frustrated than usual.

So yeah, those are the Christmas doings.

Busy doings?

--Only working 4-day weeks most the rest of the year but have TONS of work to do. This week I only get like 2 days in the office. Just CRAZINESS. I will be working some weekends - time is running out!

--Dh is wrapping up his second script - they are rushing a finish because they have an interested buyer. (It's one of those things will believe it when I see it, but overall sounds pretty promising. The buyer is interested in the script they are in the middle of, so no pressure or anything! They want to finish it before the guy changes his mind or forgets about it).

--Dh is volunteering at Scholastic many hours the next few weeks.

--Dh is doing tons of volunteer work at the Public TV station

--Dh is doing tons of babysitting for friends. Our kids are old enough is no big deal, but these friends have a smaller child. I am dreading coming home tonight - SO EXHAUSTING. So much worse in this cold dark weather where we can't run them around outside.

So yeah, it's like dh is working full-time plus nights and yadda yadda. I am only surviving because I am doing all my last minute education this month. Yesterday I attended a seminar from home. BM's shoe broke, so I took him to Payless at 4pm. I hope that is the LAST store I step foot in this year. Often dh is my Christmas elf helper but that is just not happening this year. I think I basically took advantage of down time this past week to get things done. I finished up my online shopping yesterday while attending seminar. I LOVE that. So it seems to be working out.

P.S. See last post for credit card reward tally for 2013!

I've been subscribing to a few more blogs trying to get better notification of credit card bonuses and so on. Anyway, so I had already heard about the Amazon deal about 10 times, but I am glad I read through this post because it had a lot of info that I did not know:

http://millionmilesecrets.com/2013/12/01/american-express-am...

I realized that I was able to register my Fidelity American Express (which in general does not have all of the same perks of a true American Express card). I also saw the tip that authorized users *with different account numbers* can also register. My dh thought I was crazy at first, but I was pretty sure our real and true American Express card had different credit card numbers (our transactions show up separately online because of the different card #s). So, we checked and I was right.

So, we will be able to get $75 off of $225, multiplying by 3.

**Now the trick is to remember to use the right card each time. I think that is TRICKY!!**

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I was starting to worry that I got denied on that Chase $550 bonus. They absolutely *never* contacted me - I have a fraud alert so they always call when I apply for new credit. They certainly did not approve me instantly - never do with the fraud alert.

So, I was relieved today to get a letter that they just needed to confirm my identity. I roll my eyes at the letter because it says they "couldn't contact me". Well, they would have if they tried. ??? But, if I don't even get this card for another week or two, I think I will pass on charging up the property taxes and will just take my time. In this case it probably works out for the best. IT will take a little longer, but the $3k is no problem with all the insurance bills I have due.

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I feel like I have been tested very much this year. !!

But I am pleased to say that our third try of the year for a "vacation" went VERY smooth. It did not start out that way and we had our moments, but overall I'd say was an A+ trip. Phew!!!

So yeah, that above was my view for the weekend. It was about 80F degrees and the weather could not have been more perfect!!

My parents went with us and we celebrated my birthday AND also that dh and I have been together for half my life. Not sure on the exact date for that milestone so we just decided, "good enough!" Was also 18th anniversary of our engagement. So, we have been together 18.5 years - we started dating when I was 18.5. We officially got engaged on my 19th birthday but had talked about it and agreed to marry months before that.

I usually am not really into making a big deal about birthdays or anniversaries, but I enjoyed being treated like a Princess all weekend.

Why do I feel tested??? Well, the week started out with a bout of food poisoning. {I am so behind at work I can't even think about it. Stress!! I was hoping for a quiet week to catch up but instead I was home puking out my insides}.

LM was sick on Turkey Day - we had already called it off due to my illness - so we both stayed home for Thanksgiving.

{I have no idea what I ate or what happened, but my body just reacted so violently. Food poisoning was my guess, the symptoms were classic, and no one else in my house got sick. LM had a sore throat/fever thing; totally different. Thankfully he mostly slept in the car and seemed good as new once we got to the beach}.

I was feeling optimistic for the beach weekend, but after bouncing back in about 12 hours (how my kids usually are), LM woke up pretty sick the morning we were supposed to leave. Somehow he snapped out of it and we took a deep breath and we gave it a go. I Wasn't sure until we left that we would even go. I was determined to enjoy our anniversary no matter how we ended up celebrating, but feeling pretty sorry for myself when I woke up and thought we'd have to cancel. & kind of beating myself up for even trying because it would have been our third ruined trip of the year (NONE would have went well). I think any other time BM and I might have just gone with my parents, but it was an anniversary thing and so dh and I were intent on spending the weekend together.

I guess in the end I learned it was good that I tried. Phew!!

We were going to switch over to Ting next week. I believe our early termination sweet spot was Sunday. BUT, dh talked to Sprint a while back and they told us our early termination fee was already lowest it will get: $350. (Not sure I believe this because does not make sense - but whatever - we could argue that is what they told us).

& now Ting is having a big Black Friday Sale, so we will probably transition our phones over today. Sunday is fine, but we were supposed to be at the beach. Today was a "Definitely not leaving the house" kind of day with Black Friday...

Here are the details on their Black Friday Sale:

https://ting.com/blog/just-about-every-ting-device-on-sale/

In addition to their devices on sale, they are offering a $25 per device credit for bringing devices over to Ting. Of course, we have a family plan with my parents, so this is a substantial bonus for us - $100!! $125, since we decided to just switch over all our phones. We haven't decided which one to drop yet (with dh getting a new phone). So we can try them all out for a bit. We will eventually drop the 5th one - I don't see the older kid getting any use out of a cell phone yet (though we will keep the extra for him - maybe could use in the next couple of years). We had already decided a while ago that when the kids get cell phones we'd put them on Ting. It may only be $6/month/each for their level of usage.

& I have a referral code:

https://z181d126bt4.ting.com/

By using my Ting referral code you get $25 off your phone purchase or $25 account credit if you bring your own phone, and I get a $25 account credit.

This referral code works in addition to the Black Friday deal!!

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These are not the exact numbers, but the figures work out to something like this...

Early termination (4 lines) is $350. It will be $350 for each of the last 5 months of our contract. Last month would have cost more.

Ting will pay 25% of our early termination fee and we will get $125 credit (at least) for switching today.

$350 Fee
- 88 Ting Credit (25%)
-125 Black Friday and Referral Code
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$137 Net Fees for switching

Cell phone bill (pre-tax) goes down from $180 to $60 per month. That is a monthly savings of $120 per month. Which means, we about break even on the first month - maybe so with taxes. I expect the taxes to decrease - just not sure by how much.

Going forward, our own household will save $60 per month ($120 x 50%). The catch is that the phones are not subsidized. But, there are a slew of lower cost non-contract phones coming out on the market right now. Which is actually what motivated our switch right now. By the time I need to upgrade my own phone I expect this to be a non-issue. Dh just bought a new phone and so I expect he will keep it many years. (We usually keep our phones for a long time). The rest of us will keep our phones, though we might drop the most out-of-date phone (since we now have 5 phones for the 4 of us). The kids will have hand-me-downs to use, eventually.

When we were on Verizon (for over a decade) we never got new phones every 2 years. SO wasteful, and that way we didn't have to be on contract all the time. I am sure we were off contract more than we were ever on contract. I am beyond happy that those contract days are OVER!! I knew we'd eventually jump ship, but just didn't expect it to be so soon. Woohoo!

{I suppose it was for the greater good and cost savings that dh's phone broke??}.

ETA: We aren't sure if the $25 credit - Black Friday AND referral code - is really $25 per device or $25 per account. I guess we find out for sure on Tuesday. (Confusing wording on both accounts. Their customer service is REALLY good, but we've already called them like *FIFTY* times so we figured we will just figure it out when we get the credit. Just because we had a lot of questions about various unique situations - not because we had any problems).

Yes, of course Chase upped their bonus considerably right after dh applied!

But, I kind of figured that would happen and I am up for a double dip or a triple dip myself (I don't remember off the top of my head). & we can also always ask them to match the offer on the card we just applied for.

Anyway, here is the 55,000 bonus I just stumbled across today:

http://www.creditcardwatcher.com/chase-sapphire-preferred-ca...

I already applied.

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Dh's total bonus will be $430, and mine should be $580, for a total of $1,010. The reward is CASH.

I am going the "super lazy" route:

For one, I don't think I will bother to ask them to match on dh's card.

Secondarily, I have to come up with $6,000 to spend in the next 3 months for both of these cards. It's not really a big deal because gas + groceries + health insurance is about $2k per month for us. So, we could charge anything and everything and make it work. BUT, that is a lot of accounting on my part.

I've already got dh's $3,000 spent, so the easiest way to do mine is to charge our property taxes. We will pay a $50-ish fee to do so, but this will be infinitely easier in the grand scheme of things. That is one charge versus an entire month of charges to track on some random card we will only keep for a few months. Anything more than that is too complicated for my sensibilities.

So, this is what we did:

--Charged $140-ish to AAA this month.

--Dh's card closes next week (billing cycle closes) so after that I will charge November health insurance, December health insurance & home insurance and flood insurance.

This brings us about exactly to $3,000 (with the bulk of it due January 31). I already have every single one of those bills set to pay after next week.

My new Chase Sapphire Card:

--Charge Property taxes $2,000
--I will probably pre-pay January's health insurance. Or just charge it in January since it is well within 3 months.

--Dh will have to do one small charge for the extra 5,000 points. Hopefully something really small.

& that is how we will spend $6,000 in like one month, so we can get these rewards in hand ASAP.

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Rewards Spending:

--$400-ish is going to dh's new phone (why I applied for the other Chase card in the first place).

--I still owe $350 for BM's field trip for this year so will just knock that out.

--Leaves about $200-ish after the property tax fee. Might just use that to shore up our beach weekend. I didn't pay the entire hotel yet, and will have the kitty hotel. & eating out always adds up so quickly (since we are so used to such cheap home cooking).

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While I am doing a credit card reward post...

Progress on our ongoing credit card rewards:

--Will earn about $600 this year from Fidelity AmEx (Deposited to ROTHs)

--Will earn about $500 with our gas/groceries reward card (has all gone to mortgage)

--Earned $160 on our CU visa (we racked up a lot of charges last month because they had a 2% cash back promotion - I don't get this reward until January - it accumulates all year and we usually don't use this card much - will probably throw the $160-ish at the mortgage when I receive it).

--I looked and we saved $80 at Target this year. Once I get the year-end total I will throw this sum at the mortgage. At 5% back this works out to about $1600 purchases. The bulk of that is groceries.

The credit card reward grand total is going to be close to $2600 this year.