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Archive for June, 2011

Rain. Work is Good. EF up a bit.

June 29th, 2011 at 10:42 pm

Rained like crazy yesterday, well crazy for a June almost July day. Today the sun is just starting to peek out. Like Monkey Mama we're getting the same crazy weather; 67F today, 95F by Saturday.

Monday and Tuesday we had digital radiology installed at work! This is really going to help me. Having digital xray is so much faster than standard xray. It's as easy and quick as taking a picture with a digital camera. No time needed to develop the film. Just take the xray and about 3 seconds later the picture pops up on the screen. And then, once the radiograph is shot, you can manipulate the image to help see things better. Zoom in, change the contrast, flip the image..so cool. Such a nice upgrade to have in our office. Smile

It's a slow day here at work. Maybe the weather or the upcoming holiday weekend or it's the end of the month so nobody has any money. Last week we were slammed every day.

Today I brought my Labrador in and took radiographs of his hips. My boss and I were eager to use our new "toy", and also to see if we could remember how to use it! My lab is getting older, 8.5yrs, and is starting to slow down a bit. I wanted to see if there were any problems. Nothing remarkable - a very slight indication of a bit of arthritis in the left hip. I also brought our 7yr sheltie in and I cleaned her teeth. No cost for anything.

More perks from work - we get two free lunches out this week. (Did I mention how I'm not losing any weight?) Yesterday we had gourmet pizza and salad courtesy of our digital xray instructor and tomorrow we're all going out to an upscale Italian restaurant courtesy of our dog/cat food salesman.

The Giants won both games of their double-header yesterday. $4 to EF.
And,
I removed a $5/mo data plan from DH's phone.
He tried using the web maybe once from it and it was sooo slow it was ridiculous. I think I will add that $5/mo to the EF now.
See, I'm catching on to this saving thing! Big Grin
Current balance $3787.

Spending & a tiny Bit of Saving

June 26th, 2011 at 09:39 pm

The fair was lovely yesterday. I think the day topped out at 82F with a very slight breeze. Beautiful! DD and her friend had a great time. I can remember how much fun I used to have with my friends at fair time. This is the first time she's been able to cruise the fair unaccompanied. I had them meet me at a set meeting place every 60-90 minutes. My (first) baby is growing up!

Both girls had $20 to spend. They ended up pooling their money and bought food, a few carnival games and one fuzzy hat shaped like a dog, with long ears that have hand pockets. I guess their plan is to "share custody" of this hat. Switching off every time they see each other. Rolleyes We'll see how that goes..

I spent $4 on a huge corndog and $5 on a basket of sweet potato fries that I shared with baby DS. We left about 8:30pm and I took myself and the girls to McDonalds for $12.

I continued spending on myself last night at Amazon when I bought the four book set of Game of Thrones. I so enjoyed the first season on HBO I feel like I can't wait a year for the next episode. Plus the books will have a whole lot more going on. I also bought a board book for DS so I could get the free shipping. Total was $26.

Meanwhile, I am reading Suze's new book, The Money Class. I had been on the waiting list at the library and my turn finally came up. It took a bit over two months and truthfully I had forgotten until I got the phone message that it was on hold for me. So it looks like in the coming week I'll be going from reality to fantasy, literally! Big Grin

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The Giants won yesterday. Plus $2 to the EF. Balance now $3778.

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Now I'm going to do some reading, while the girls are selling lemonade out front and the baby takes his nap. Looks like a NSD today.

Going to the Fair Today

June 25th, 2011 at 08:44 pm

Our fair is in town this week. The thing I find the best about our fair is they charge one price at that gate to cover admission and unlimited carnival rides. So you’re paying $15 total instead of $7 admission and then $20 for a rides wristband or worse $0.25/ride ticket. But, even better for us, we won't have to pay at all... One of our friends has "connections" and we all get in for free. Big Grin The money saved on admissions will go toward all that tasty fair food.

This year DD has a friend coming along with us and she will be staying the night. I'm trying to prepare for a day and night of giggling girls. Wink

DH won't be coming with us to the fair because he is working. He has three 12 hour shifts with his volunteer fire department out at Infineon Raceway for the NASCAR races this weekend. The extra cool thing is he gets paid for being there. His weekend work should bring in about $700.

His side job last week added $1k to the EF and the Giants won three games this week. $6. New EF balance is $3776.

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There wasn't any spending this week, except the grocery trip I made. $180. I will need gas sometime this weekend if I end up driving DD's friend home. Usually Thursday is my fill-up day, but I didn't need to stop 'cause I still had plenty. Not doing as much driving in the summer because I'm not dropping DD at school each morning.

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I think one of my beefsteak tomato plants might die.. Frown It was looking like it had a fungal infection and in my attempt to help I might have hurt it more...we shall see.. What doesn't kill only makes stronger.

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Got to get the house tidied up before our guest arrives and get ready to head to the fair in a few hours. Will be about 85F., beautiful summer weather to be out and about.

EF. CC. Father's Day.

June 18th, 2011 at 07:34 pm

Transferred $6 to savings for three Giants wins.
Current balance in EF is $2770.

I paid $300 toward CC#3 bringing that balance to $13,093.

Yeah, excellent proof why CC debt sucks..Blah!

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Today DH is working and will clear $1k to add the EF. He paid off his motorcycle purchase, so now this extra money is being directed back to where it belongs! Big Grin. Will be a really nice boost and he's got a few more projects on the horizon to boot.

This evening we will be trekking up to the inlaw's house. An unplanned trip, but their A/C has some problem so DH will fix it for them. It will be nice because we'll be seeing both his dad and mine for Father's Day and eating for free for the rest of the weekend. Smile Downside is the cost of fuel, but thankfully it's come down a bit in price. I haven't gotten DH anything yet...Hmm??
For our dads I picked up really cute bottle openers from Yosemite. $7 each. They are shaped like a bear with the mouth wide open for the bottle top to fit in. And they're magnets too. Cute and usable.

Have a great Father's Day weekend everyone!

CC Rewards. Shopping. More Pictures from Yosemite.

June 17th, 2011 at 01:06 am

When I first started getting reward points on my credit card 100 points redeemed as $1. As time has gone on I noticed they had changed the redemption value for some of the lower $5-$10 rewards; you needed 650 points for $5 cash or giftcard. That didn't really bother me, I figured that was good motivation to save up your points.

Then they started doing that to the $50 cash reward. You need 6,500 points.
And now I see it takes 12,000 points to get $100.

Arg..

But I did learn something new while cruising thru the webpages. If I shop online thru the links on the rewards home page I can earn 3 to 8 times the points. Hmmm.. I'll try to keep that in mind since now I need to earn 25,000 points to redeem for $250. And not just redeeming at the $100 mark like I have been doing.

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I bought DS his new carseat from Diapers.com. I also bought some Happy Tot squeezy pouches of food, shampoo, lotion, baby wipes, DH's body wash and deoderant. Some of the items were buy one get one half off and I had a $10 account credit. The grand total was $290.

I had my co-worker sign up at diapers.com so she (I) could take advantage of their new customer promotion where she (I) get 30% back on all diaper purchases for three months. So far she (I) received $58 in account credit with a bit over one month left to earn more cash back. Her (my) plan is to have earned enough credit to pay for two cases of diapers or max out their credit "limit", which I think is $100. Hehe. Big Grin

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Some more Yosemite...

One of the fireplaces inside the Ahwahnee Hotel.


The Ahwahnee dining room where we had lunch. Huge windows.


Outside the dining room. The smaller window on the left is the one in the pic above.

Added to Savings

June 14th, 2011 at 04:09 pm

Was able to ADD to the EF instead of subtract from it.

$6 from two recent Giants wins
$370 from DH's side work
$25 from automatic transfer

$2766 New Balance

Update in Pictures

June 11th, 2011 at 08:03 pm

Wow has time been flying by! Haven't found much time to get on the computer. Busy at work and at home. I've been wanting to share some photos and update on the past few weeks...so TaDa!



My Mother's Day garden.

]
Yosemite. Merced River and Yosemite Falls.


Yosemite Falls. 2425 feet tall! Fifth tallest in the world.


Half Dome.

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Lots of water from spring snow melt and rain.


Flowering Dogwood all over Yosemite.


Settling down for the night inside the tent cabin.

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Last weekend DH and I went to a Giants game, had a fabulous dinner out at The Melting Pot and saw a movie. All to celebrate our anniversary, which was yesterday. My parents stayed for the weekend so we had free babysitting. I had paid for the game tickets two months ago. We spent $30 at the game for parking, $12 for hot coco and garlic fries, $100 for dinner, $18 for movie tickets. Yes a splurge, but the rest of this month we have zero plans for the weekends. Totally the opposite of May. Every weekend was busy in May, and lots of money going out.

This weekend DH is doing some side work (yay! Money!) and my only plan is to do a little grocery shopping and hang around the house. Cheap weekend.
Next weekend? More of the same, DH has more work and I'll be sticking close to home.

In other news, effective June 1st I'm making a $1/hour more! WhooHoo! My job satisfaction has certainly increased with getting some overdue pay raises. Big Grin