July Frugalistas

[HomeAgain]

Do we have one of these yet?  How are you all doing?

So far for us this month:
7/2 - took the kids to the science museum.  Bought lunch there because I didn't know if we were allowed to bring our own or if there were places to eat (we are, and will next time).  None of us were happy with the offerings from their cafe, but we know better now.  I did bring bottles of water with us instead of buying their $4 drinks. Since we have memberships, the special exhibit was very much discounted.  We paid as much for the 3 of us as it would have been for 1 without.  We took the metro into the city - children are free and I found free parking, and the oldest took the metro back the next day after he finished his business.
7/4 - spent $4 on popcorn at the fireworks show and $3 on the only package of Oreos I have bought in at least two years.  We had a pretty low cost menu for the day, with a lot of homemade food and lemonade.  Last year I bought individual bottles of lemonade for $2 each.  How silly that was!  This year I made over a gallon for under $1 total.  Same ingredients.
7/5 - dh took back a pair of hiking shoes ($90) because the fit was bad.  And I got his knife sharpened at Williams-Sonoma.  The first sharpening is free, subsequent are $5.  Since he only uses 2 knives mostly and keeps them well, I figure we'll do this about once a year.
7/7 - finally bit the bullet on buying needed school books for the youngest.  Blech. I tried to get as much used as possible.  Latin is expensive.  Total - $170 for everything in my cart at Rainbow Resource.  I still have 3 pdfs to get: ELTL workbook (possibly), French (definitely), and interactive anatomy notebook (probably).

Our goals this month: to be vigilant about what we're spending and monitor our electric usage.  We have a new family rule that on hot days, computers and tvs stay off from 10am-6pm.  We've only had to run the ac once so far and that was because I had guests over.  Otherwise we open up all windows and run fans at night, and during the day we shut everything up/off and spend more time outside or keeping cool on the main and lower floors.  We have beach passes and there are enough free activities to keep us busy.

[HomeAgain]

We have a few cool days this week, so tomorrow I'm hitting up the loss leaders at our cheaper grocery store first thing in the morning and making breakfast burritos to put in the freezer for dh.  He works long shifts and has been looking for something heartier for a second breakfast.  He bought a few things from the freezer section at the store but we're used to something with a bit more flavor (and salt is not a flavor).  I'll do these up and see how they work out for him instead.  I have a feeling these will be an every week meal for a while.

[Condessa]

We are buying a house this month.  Our first, ever.  (Eeeek!)  All of our mortgage, taxes, insurance, etc. will come out to about what a same-sized rental house without its big yard does in our area.  So our monthly budget won’t be much different, but things are tight this month with closing and moving costs.  One good thing is that we will have over a week between the closing and the end of our rental contract to move everything in-town, so this move will be more relaxed than any I have ever done before.

I am focusing on organizing and decluttering, and on trying to save some money on the household budget this month to help with moving costs.  I’ve been meal planning and cooking from scratch and trying to use up the stuff in the freezer.  I have the groceries for the rest of the week, and have spent $132 this month.  

[Condessa]

Also, oldest dd has decided on her own that she wants to take a break from gymnastics this summer, and the boys are done with baseball now, so I’m having second dd also take a break from horseback riding for this month.  So that is saving us some expense and giving us some more time to get ready for the move.

And I’ve been pretty successful with working on keeping our electric bill down so far this summer.  

[HomeAgain]

Congrats, @Michelle Conde!  Buying a house is so exciting...and stressful. 😄

[HomeAgain]

Today is one of the hottest all week - 86F. 😄  But, rather than turning on the AC we're going swimming. There are trees to park my chair under.  Yesterday I spent $100.41 at the grocery store and got enough to feed us for a week, thanks to loss leaders and careful shopping.  I've started taking fruit with us to the beach because my kids will eat more of it there than at home.  Plus, it doesn't ruin dinner. Yesterday was 2lbs of grapes, today I have half a watermelon to slice up.

And, while I did cringe on how much ds(9yo)'s extra music class was, mostly because it doubles our music budget, it has been good for him.  Two weeks in and he's more invested in his instrument and has bounced out of the house on group lesson days.  I also didn't realize he was the youngest invited, by 2-3 years, which I'm not sure is a good or bad thing.  Unfortunately it makes us reassess our budget for the fall.  I was really looking forward to dropping down to minimal costs for a while - and less time commitment.

Tomorrow the family is going to the nearby national park.  We found out that due to dh's disability rating, he gets a free lifetime pass.  It'll save us a little bit of money this summer when we go camping, not having to pay entrance fees.

[HomeAgain]

Oh, yay!  I just checked the event schedule and there's a free master puppetry show put on by the library this evening.  We'll swim, eat leftovers for dinner, and go check it out.  Next week there's a free tour in our town so we'll do that, too.

[HomeAgain]

How are you all doing?

Wednesday - the puppet show was phenomenal. 
Thursday - ds's violin lesson was put on hold because of road issues by his tutor.  We went to the library, came home for lunch, and dh and I made a list of things we wanted to pick up in our afternoon shopping.  We found exactly 2 of the items and spent $34, plus finding a backpack that was not on our immediate list but fit everything I was looking for on my wishlist for this specific thing, so that was another $20.  Not the $200 we had budgeted for that trip.  We'll try again at the end of the month for the other things. One of the things was a new bike helmet for ds.  He had outgrown his and it was falling apart, and the one he really liked was marked down significantly to $25.  We got to the register and it rang up as $45, and the clerk argued politely saying that it was a different model on sale and couldn't possibly be that one.  I had taken a picture of the sign specifying exactly what it was, which cleared it up pretty quickly.
Friday - it's a rainy, do-nothing day.
Saturday - I'm taking ds to a free activity, where he also has a ticket for a free (usually paid for) special thing there.  We'll park in our town and ride the trail 7 miles to get there, both to save on gas and frustration from holiday tourists.
 

[BarbecueMom]

Oh wow, half the month is gone and I haven't even posted in here yet!  I didn't even realize we were halfway through the month until the water bill showed up in the mail today.

I'm not tracking as closely this month - finishing up school supply shopping, letting the kids take over some of the meal planning (a Minecraft cookbook will get my picky kid to cook/try anything), a bunch of birthdays at the end of this month/beginning of next month.

*We're going to our neighborhood party tonight.  Other than some of the cheap games, we won't spend money.
*I finally got a coupon for the place where I get my hair cut every 18 months or so, which means tomorrow morning I'm getting my hair chopped off.
*Swimming at a relative's house tomorrow, instead of paying money for a public pool.
*Signed oldest DS up for a birthday freebie at the place he wants to spend his birthday.  I'll have to pay full price for the rest of us, unless a Groupon pops up.

So I mentioned a month or so ago that I was getting a bit discontent.  Even though we did a lot of fixing up of our house last year, we still have quite a bit to go.  It was starting to get to me, I was getting restless and wanting to move, and that was bleeding over into not being satisfied with other things.  It all seemed to start with the house though.  Last night, DS9 and DS5 (almost 6, yikes) called me downstairs to show me what they had created in Minecraft over the past couple weekends... it was our house.  They made our house, put in all our messy bookshelves and my big freestanding kitchen "island" and the bikes cluttering the garage and even our Lego room, complete with Lego bricks scattered all over the floor!  And they added lights in places where I had mentioned I'd like to have lights put in.

Yeah, it's "just one of those mind-numbing video games", but it meant so much to me that they found so much joy in the house home we already have, not the fancy one we wish we could find/afford/live in.  I'm definitely much more content today.

[historically accurate]

Well, this month has been a month of highs and lows, and it's only half over!

• We started the month out in the hole to the tune of $3700 - our A/C died. We live in a trailer (granted it's a nice trailer, but it's still essentially a tin can baking in the sun), so no A/C is not an option. 
• We found a punching bag at Salvation Army for Tae Kwon Do girl. Looks brand new - new ones are about $100 more than we paid.
• Threw a garage sale, made a little over $100. We will use that to pay for some desperately needed new shoes.
• Tae Kwon Do girl was asked to join the Demo Team, but we had to pay for a new uniform, dress robes, and it increases the fee $50 a month.
• DD was asked to be a Jr. Counselor for the medical camp she was 2 years too old to do. So she got to do it, and it was free.
• Had to travel to get oldest from school 3 hours away as my FIL went on hospice and it was looking like he would not last until her program was over. He has rallied and is holding his own now.
• DH found out he is getting a bonus next month - I am probably going to use some of that to set up for VIPkids (my computer is ancient- DH is a computer guy and has kept this running long past it's expiration date!!); I've decided to give the company a go next month since I have been unable to find an out-of-the-house job (even like Walmart won't hire me???). 
• Kids have been very busy with the summer reading program for teens. They've gone ice skating, rock climbing, bowling, played laser tag, learned some magic tricks, built a robot, done some art projects, watched movies, and this next week, they're going canoeing. They will also get free admission to a local water park to be used in August, but I will have to pay for my admission (it's discounted though). It cost me $20 total since we are out of district; our district library's program is lame in comparison. 

[HomeAgain]

Welp, good intentions and all that are not much match for a lack of communication.   Dh went on a spending spree: baseball cards, getting the underbrush taken care of, and having mulch delivered.  Even he realized it was a LOT all at once..............after the fact. Oy.  But he picked up holiday pay and at least 12 hours of overtime, so it should even out by next paycheck to put the buffer back in the account.

[HomeAgain]

Updating:
-Took the kids to the mall with me Friday for a meeting.  They wandered for an hour and a half while I talked.  By the time we were getting ready to leave it was lunchtime and 5 Guys was looking awfully good.  I mentioned that we *could*....but we could also go home and put the bacon-jalapeño burgers on the grill.  I got immediate votes in favor of that instead.
-Saturday we stayed in.  It was hot as Hades and just as humid.  We turned on the AC to 78 and just vegged as much as possible. I was going to take youngest ds to the library book sale because he has a certificate for a free book, but they even had to shut down because of power outages due to the heat.  I pulled together a meal using what was on its last leg in the fridge and not having to spend too much time cooking: a chicken stir fry over noodles with zucchini, mushrooms, carrots, onions, cilantro, and cabbage, doing up a chili-soy-lime sauce to go with.  Everyone ate two bowls and there was still enough for leftovers. 
-Sunday: not a thing.  Still hot. Paid the mortgage and an extra $80 on it, rounding up to the next hundred.  The bank did the math for me and after 7 months of owning the house, we've shaved 2.5 months off the end of our mortgage.  Our kind neighbor stopped dh and talked to him about the work we had done on the yard.  He offered us a much, much better deal on the rest of the acreage on that side, done at both of our convenience.  I'm not one to like to keep business so close, but......I think this might benefit both of us. 
-Today: still eating leftovers.  I found out our deli sells the ends of meat and cheese for $1.79/lb.  They throw it in meat trays and put it in a cooler case next to the deli.  I picked some up last week and made two large containers of mac n'cheese with what I got for $2, the second of which was split this morning between dh's work lunch and a dinner side for us at home.

9 days until the end of the month!