Well then share! :) What is your rent/mortgage and utilities look like? Half of what we make would be about 14k a year. Our rent alone is 8820 a year. Our electric averages about $200 a month. That is 2400 a year. Between those two things it would be 11200. Based off that it would leave $233 a month for everything else. I have to think you aren't being honest in your income OR you have to rent/mortgage, no utility payments or something else. I an sincerely not trying to accuse but your proclamations border on hyperbole. So if you are completely serious then please, please share. I would love so see how you do it!

Congrats to the hubs and yay for "no school"!! :D

OK so what about when I pay the CC bill? It reduces the balance by the payment amount but doesn't take into consideration interest and such. Do I need to adjust the balance every month or is there a way to have it account for interest?

I have thought about the electric bill, I personally think it is because we live in a very old (and somewhat dilapidated) double-wide home. It is not efficient. At all. Everything in our house is electric. I think one thing I am going to do is stop using the dryer. Since I have been working I use the dryer more because it is easier for me. I am going to have to hang up the clothes in the morning and then have dd or ds10 take them down and fold them later. That would work. That should help some. The big thing is the A/C dh tries to keep it down and won't up it. Not much I can do there. :)

:iagree::iagree::iagree: Another thing that bugs me is the basketball team. The Olympics aren't for professional, career-getting-paid-to-do-it athletes. I can't stand that they use pro players for the Olympics. I think it gives an unfair advantage. :rant: for me too :)

Sweetbasil suggested this to me so I downloaded the free trial to check it out. I am confused. I added a credit card and it takes it out of my income? For instance I have $600 in my bank account, the credit card balance is $900 so it says I have $-300? I can't pay off my bills like that every month. Am I doing something wrong?

I want to go that route. However dh will not follow and menu or schedule I try so we don't do it. I plan meals but not a specific meal on a specific day.

Hmmm Our rent is $735... and electric has been running 200-250. So that is almost half out income between the two (I said that in the original post :)) In our area this is the least amount of rent we can get without moving to a single wide trailer (which I am not against but in this area? I won't go there). Anything equivalent to what we have is way more. Less than what we have is maybe $50 less or so. I'd rather stay where we are than save $50 for what we would get. Minimum wage is $7.25 :) You are correct if my dh hours were consistent. They are not, neither are mine. I work between 32-40 hours a week. The average of that is 36 but I typically work 34. Dh can work up to 20 hours a week but they have been low on work and he has only been getting 15 hours a week. That 20 hours or so a month is what is killing us. You are also figuring our income before taxes :) My dh is a IC, so he has to pay self-employment taxes. Last year we did great. I was a IC as well and we made 36k, however we paid almost 5k in SE taxes. This year I was an IC for only 4 months then the contract wasn't renewed and I was unemployed for two months and I am making less than I was as an IC. So between the two of us we make about $2100 to $2200 a month. When dh is making his full hours it isn't so much of an issue, but he isn't so we are struggling and I am trying to figure out how to cut back and what to cut back on. If we only didn't have medical and a cell phone bill! That is $200 a month right there. Ooo yes we will be getting that Magic Jack after our cell contract expires in October.

I am wondering if, perhaps, it isn't so much I am "wasting" money as the prices have gotten higher as well? Has anyone else noticed prices going up significantly? I don't buy processed foods and such (well try not to, there are a couple items that we sneak in) and I spend...thinking... about $325 to $375 for 3 weeks. I think I am going to have to be more "anal" in how I categorize my spending and have separate transactions for each one. That way it would be easier to track spending.

Thank you for all the ideas! For those about the yearly income. We are a family of 5 :) and yes combined income is about 27k. With out tax return (if we spread it out over the 12 months) that allows for the filler in the budget to make ends meet. Although with this next return we are going to pay off as much as we can with it to get a little breathing room! Karate is the only expense we have that isn't "needed" The only reason I am hesitant to stop it is because dd is 6 months from her black belt and she needs to keep going. It is only $60 a month and can go as often as I can take her. We do have two vehicles but both are paid off and our insurance for both cars is about $250 every six months. The problem with only have one is we would need to have the van the other is a Civic and doesn't fit us 5 as our youngest is still in a car seat and it takes up a lot of the back seat) and the van is a gas hog. So sure I would save in insurance but I would spend a lot more in gas. My dh is a independent contractor but doesn't (and can't) negotiate the contract he has. It is a take it or leave it thing. He is basically an "employee" just classified as a IC. So there is no help for the internet. I will do as others suggested and analyze everything I spend. I will be looking at the you need a budget and see what I can do!

I began working *almost* full-time at the beginning of June (I works about 35 hours a week so far). I hate it. I miss being home. That said I do have opportunities to work from home making the same amount of money that I am working outside the home. The *only* problem with the work is monotony. It will be the same thing day in and day out with no advancement or difference. The job I hold now I can change departments every 6 months as long as there is an opening. That said, I would consider staying at home as long as I don't have to work as many hours. 35 is killer. 25 is more doable but significantly cuts into our income. We don't make much as it is, about 27k a year or so. We are not on any assistance and I don't want any. I don't want to jump through those hoops unless absolutely needed. So how can one live with less? I am cutting off the cell phones at the end of the contract which is in October. I was thinking of going prepaid but if I am working from home and home most of the time I won't need it. So I can cut that off. We don't have cable. We do have internet and we *need* that. Dh works from home and relies on the internet. If I were to work from home I would need it as well. We have medical bills that need to be paid. Of course rent and electric take up almost half the income and food and needed items (like feminine needs as such) take up almost the other half. Then put in a couple things like karate, gas for the car and medical bills and that takes up the rest. The thing is I know I am overspending somewhere but I can't figure it out. So are there any suggestions on how to live with less and what needs to be (or can be) cut out? Anyone willing to look at my budget and make adjustments? :) I have to work from 1-10pm (EST) so I won't we on here to respond but anything is helpful. I am willing to make some sacrifices in order to come back home.

Ok.... yesterday I zipped up my pants and felt a pain in my finger. I looked at it and there was a small sliver of metal in my nail. Somehow my zipper gave me a sliver. I went through my nail. It is exactly like a wood sliver just metal and in my fingernail. I can't get it out as there is nothing to grab. However it is really tender. I don't know that it is infected (at least not yet) as it isn't red or really swollen (there might be slight swelling but to be honest I never really noticed if my right finger was ever slightly bigger than my left!). Just tender when I press it or hit it by putting my hand in my pocket. It is near where my nail grows out but it will still take about 2 weeks for it go grow out. Any suggestions?

I am the same way. I can eat and eat and eat in the evening/night. It is like I am a bottomless pit. Yet during the day I don't seem to eat or want to eat as much. I hate it.

Hmmmm I tried downloading a couple but I can't download them in xls format? Only pdf, docx or txt. How can I get them in xls format? Anyone know?

Nice! Thank you!!

Thanks for the ideas... keep them coming! No graham crackers :(

The stovetop works just the oven is broken. I have sugar, chocolate chips, sweetened condensed milk, heavy whipping cream, almond paste, powdered sugar, brown sugar, peppermint chips, chocolate almond bark, white almond bark, flour, butter, eggs, candy corn, vanilla and a myriad of spices. What can I make if anything?

:iagree: to a point. I don't mind vendors speaking about the product they have like the "How to use TOG" type classes. I went to the TOG class and gleaned a lot of good info. It was educational but not a parenting, we need to raise Godly children class. Or like the Lukeion Project which I missed at the convention I went to. I also like SWB :) She would also be a vendor but is a most awesome speaker too! The last convention I went to was so packed full of how to parent and raise kids I only ended up going to about 4 classes. I won't be going next year. I will be going to one next year I just don't know which one yet. Depends on if we move or not :)

I started working outside the home in the beginning of June. We need it. As it stands we barely break even every month with both dh and I working. I don't mind my job, but I do miss being home :) My schedule is sporadic, it isn't set and changes every week and my days off aren't always the same either. This makes it a little hard. It also makes me always tired. For instance I have to work 1pm to 10pm next Wednesday and then I have to be back at 7am the next day. I *will* be tired. I feel as if I am failing. I use TOG and neither of my kids have done it in the last week because I never made it to the library to get the books. Dd can pretty much do everything on her own with little help from me so she is keeping up. It is ds10 I am worried about. He hasn't been doing TOG (which covers History, Geo, Vocab and a couple other things), Science or Latin. The only subjects he can really do independently is Math (he needs some help but usually very little) and Logic. I have to do *everything* else with him. Which I don't mind, it is just finding the time when I have to work 10am to 7pm. I have to leave at 9:30 and I have to start getting ready at least by 8:45am. Ds doesn't even wake up until after 9am. When I am home I feel like a task master. I am always after them to get things done. Then I have to go grocery shopping which takes almost half a day around here. I have bills to pay. Cooking to do (and I try to cook extra for the evenings I am working). I don't even get to shower every day. I have tried schedules at my house. They Do. Not. Work. I have driven myself into a tizzy trying to get schedules to work and it never has. However I need one but I just don't know how to get it started. I feel to overwhelmed. I do not want to have to send the kids to school here. They schools are terrible. Does anyone have any pointers? How can I keep from being so tired. More sleep isn't an answer as I already try to get as much as I can. How much responsibility is too much for a 14yo and a 10yo? If you read all of this thanks :) I hate to whine (because I do feel I am) but I am just so tired I don't even know what to do.

:blink: 1-2 YEARS? Wow. I buy Xylitol in the 15 pound bags. That lasts me about 2 months. Less in baking season. I *do* bake a lot though. I never much thought about the portion sizes. This has been an eye opener. I noticed the Bryers too. It sucks.

I have seen the ones on youtube.. thanks for the link to these! I can't wait to listen!!

This includes a 4yo and a 10yo. The 4yo probably won't watch much but will still see. Which would be better?

We have a BAD ant problem. Think of the Infestation show. That bad. They come out of the walls, floor, ceiling and sink. They are in every room of the house. Terminix is useless. We can't leave any dirty dish out for longer than a few minutes without them going after it. We have to keep the house almost sterile. We cant keep it up. How... for the love of all that is holy... do we get rid of them? ETA: These are not normal ants either. They do not go after sugar. They go after protien-ish things. The only sugar they will go after is natural sugars like in fruit, xylitol and honey. Regular white sugar they don't tough. They decimate beef, chicken, cheese and other dead bugs.

WOOT! You remind me of my mom! Kick tush and take names! I didn't get embarrassed though :D I loved it when my mom did things like that!

Woot! That is it..... knew I could count on the Hive!