Well here it is 7 more days before the 3rd of May and I have $26.36 left out of the original $57.00.

This is what I spent this month:

Fans--$15.00
Eating out--$9.45
Water filter items--$4.00
Dry cat food--$4.00

I know I overspent a little on treating myself to lunch, but there's a great Chinese restarunt that has a buffet from 11:00 am to 3:00 pm, it's only $4.95 for all you can eat, and ohhhhh the food is good!!

Other than that, I think I've done very well for someone who has always been broke every month around this time of the month. I ended up buying the cat food and water filter items(activated charcoal and knee high stockings work well in those filters that attatch on the faucet)because SO was not paying attention to what he spent(again)and was broke(again)

When I get the check next month, I already know I'll be adding another $55.00 to what I already have, bringing the total to $82.36.

I gave it a whole lot of thought yesterday before deciding to spend even one penny of my carefully saved $57. It hit the 90 degree mark again. I figured that it's only mid April and already we are seeing 90 degree weather;that indicates to me it's going to be an even longer, hotter summer than last year(summer lasted from May all the way into mid October).

What finally decided me to be willing to spend $15 for fans was seeing and hearing my oldest son tired,sleepless,restless and complaining of not getting a good night's sleep. He did not have a fan in his room last year, and suffered greatly due to the heat. I called Wal-mart and found out that they had box fans for $10, so I gave T a roll of quarters and $5 in ones. He did better than expected. Not only did he come back with the box fan, he also stopped off at a permanent local garage sale 2 blocks from our house and came back with 2 nice oscillating fans.
Now we have one in the front room in conjunction with the box fan we're already using, but we have one for the garage/studio in conjunction with the other box fan that is suspended from the rafters.

I weighed the cost of a box fan against the cost of recharging and using the air conditioner, and of course the cost of the box fan came out on top.
Even so, I still have $44 still stashed away until the 3rd of May, when I plan to add another $55 to it. I probably won't reach my original goal of $100 by May, but I will come very close to it, and that's good enough.

This is Cloud Warrior. He found me and my youngest son when I was walking him home from school on Febuary 4th, 3:15 pm Febuary 2004. Cloud is very special to us because he came into our lives exactly 4 months to the day after my beloved Bogus Khan of 12 &1/2 years left this world and went on to Rainbow Bridge.


This one is Little Seven,who was rescued by a friend of ours from a very abusive situation and person. She's so pretty I can't understand how anyone could mistreat her. She was out of her mind from anger and fear. Cloud saved her sanity, and that's why we have 3 of her kittens from her first and only litter.

I just got the word from my significant other that it's going to be in the 90's today. Ugh! What a good thing we have our polystock tank pool cleaned out and filled up.
I had just finished the main housework and was getting ready to print up my how to booklet about saving money and taking it to a place on the downtown square to see if I could sell it on consignment. I think I'll still get several copies of it printed up and put together, but I don't want to go any further than the back yard and pool today.
The kids are in school and all the kitties are staying in the house out of the sun. I don't blame them.

Fire is the most laid back of all the cats. He adopted a young three month old kitten that my youngest son brought home and was begging us to keep him. His dad told him to place the kitten down beside Fire and to see what Fire's reaction was.
Fire took to him immediately. That kitten is now 7 months old and his name is Angus.

These are just a few pictures of 3 of my six kitties. The orange one is a male named Fire, the white & cream colored one is named Cloud Warrior, and the buff & white one is named Claw. Cloud is a flame point Siamese, Fire and Claw are bobcat/domestic mix.

Hello, my name is Carol and I am so glad I found this site. Reading all the blogs here of those who are climbing out of debt and saving has strengthened my determination to make this the 1st year of the rest of my life to build a financial safety net and to teach my boys lifelong lessons about budgeting and saving.
I was one of those kids whose parents never discussed finances, let alone ever taught me anything about good money management habits such as budgeting, saving and investing. I never had an allowance of any kind when I was growing up, and by the time I hit the workforce, I was woefully unprepared. It leaves me feeling so sad that I ended up going thru 30 years of frivolous spending and no saving. Funny thing though, when I hit the big 5, it was like a huge wake up call for me.
So I made a New Year's Resolution last year that the year 2006 would be a big change for me as far as finances, bugeting
and saving, both for myself and the boys.
So far, I have managed to save $57.00 and have gotten the boys started on saving a part of their allowances. I hope their dad will come on board soon.