Weekend Catch-up

I know this blog's become more about life stuff recently. Groceries and meal planning, frugal living, and personal achievements aren't the only things going on for me right now, but I'm out of library school and there's not much library stuff I can talk about right now. I hope to come back to it in a while. In the meantime, here's what I've been up to this weekend!

Food This Week 13

My bulk purchases from Amazon arrived: whole-grain bread mix and pumpkin bread mix. (I got really tired of waiting for canned pumpkin to go on sale, and this will make a nice easy addition to potlucks or housewarmings and such.) That purchase, plus some coconut oil on half price, took me over the September grocery budget. I'll be reducing the November spending to make up for that, but it shouldn't be hard with all the food we have in the house.

2014 Travel Plans

As my wife and I discussed household plans and timelines the other day, I suddenly realized that we have a lot more plans to travel next year than we usually do. I'm a major homebody, but I enjoy the vacation planning process quite a lot. Guess it's time to start working on that savings goal! And book some reservations as well, in the next couple months. I'm glad I have enough vacation time.

Food This Week 7

Happy circumstance: Mint categorized a purchase of school supplies at the grocery store as Groceries; once that was corrected, I have about $30 more to use for food this month. *cheer* I'll be restocking butter and flour, I think, and maybe getting some apples for applesauce. And treating myself to almond milk. (Cocoa! Pudding! No lactose!)

Stocking Up on Meat

The weekly grocery ad featured a "Pick 5 for $25" sale on selected packages from the meat and fish counter, so I stocked the freezer.

In the Tetris puzzle: beef roast for the slow cooker, steaks with and without bone, boneless chicken breasts, ground beef, salmon fillets, tilapia fillets, lamb round shoulder chops, and a mess of boneless pork ribs. (Dunno what we'll do with that last, as I don't care for them, but my sweetie picked 'em out.) You can also see the last of the Grumpy Kitty soup, sorbet and coconut milk ice cream, some leftover curry, and Trader Joe's packets of confetti rice, samosas, and  multigrain mix.

Keeping Up With Christmas

Well, unlike last year, I haven't gotten all my holiday shopping and wrapping done by now. Oof.

However, we've been through a wedding, a new job (hers), minor veterinary woes, and several concert performances in the last few months. I'm gonna give myself a break.

Here's what the plan looks like this year:

A Month of Bulk Cooking for the Freezer

It's the first time I've done more bulk cooking than simply making enough for leftovers, so there will no doubt be a learning curve in the process. Thankfully, others are more experienced at this type of thing, and many of them blog their tips and tricks as well as favorite freezer recipes. 

I started keeping a Pinterest board with likely meals and then sorting through them to find common ingredients -- that way I can buy in bulk and make the most of grocery sales. I also picked a few more vegetarian entrees than usual -- we've been keeping up Meatless Mondays all this year, but a little less meat trims the budget and encourages more veggies. As the days turn colder, soups and stews are warming and filling (and they usually freeze and reheat very well for lunch or dinner).

Dollar Costs of Marriage Inequality

A week ago, my sweetie and I registered our domestic partnership with the State of California. This week, I worked with my employer's HR department to register my new status and add her to my health insurance plan.

In many ways, this process is the same as if we'd been legally married -- the company recognizes us as a unit, and offers the same insurance coverage as it does to spouses. If she had children, they would be my eligible dependents as well. However, while both the company and the state recognize our partnership, the federal government does not. So how these benefits are treated varies between state and federal level.

Expense Tracking Challenge: Week 3

Expense Tracking Challenge hosted by Mom's Plans -- Join in and share your expense tracking posts if you like!

For my posts: Variable expenses will have dollar amounts; recurring expenses like rent and bills won't unless there's something unusual going on.

Expense Tracking Challenge: Week 1

I don't often blog in exact numbers, but to participate in the Expense Tracking Challenge hosted by Mom's Plans, I think I will for a little while. (Join in and share your expense tracking posts if you like!)

Variable expenses will have dollar amounts; recurring expenses like rent and bills won't unless there's something unusual going on.

10 Things I Don't Have or Buy (or Need!)

I got this idea from Melissa at Mom's Plans, and she referenced a few other bloggers' recent lists. It got me thinking about what sorts of things lots of people spend money on (and think it's reasonable or normal to do so) that I don't. That is, in which Ramsey-ish ways am I "weird"?

Sometimes I get mad about money.

I think most people understand that money can be a topic and an EXPERIENCE fraught with tension. After all,  you've heard that most arguments between couples are about money, right? Sometimes I worry about money: fear and sadness are occasionally big feelings to deal with. But sometimes I get just ANGRY.

Breaking down the budget

This post is a part of Women's Money Week 2012. For more posts about budgeting, see Budgeting Roundup.

I didn't know much about budgeting when I was growing up. I'm sure my mother had a budget, because she's smart with money and doesn't waste it, but I don't recall ever hearing numbers. If I wanted something, I usually got it unless there was another -- non-monetary -- reason for saying no to the request. And there were certainly items pressed upon me -- mostly clothing -- that I didn't want. I think if I'd heard, "It's time to buy back-to-school clothing. We have $XX to spend on it. What do you think you need?", I might have understood the process better. Instead, I slogged through clothes shopping (NOT my favorite!), offered up anything that seemed like it had a possibility of being accepted by my mom and wasn't a total pain to wear, and then she took it to the counter to pay for it. It was kind of weird how price wasn't mentioned. (This is an example of what my sweetie means when she talks about the differences in our backgrounds.)

So, once I'd secured my first full-time employment after college and made it through the inevitable upswing where I bought everyone way too many Xmas presents, I didn't immediately start budgeting. I just looked to see what money I had, and if there was enough in the account, I bought whatever it was I wanted. Ugh. I still cringe to think of how much cash slipped through my hands, and how much further ahead I'd be today if I'd put it toward retirement or emergency savings instead. Thankfully, I stayed out of debt -- I wasn't interested in having a credit card, and by the time I was, I wasn't the best prospect. My thin credit file worked against me, but that's a story for another time. Today I'm writing about how I budget, and what I get out of it.

Saving 50% of my income

This post is a part of Women's Money Week 2012. For more posts about saving and living on less than you earn, see Saving and Investing Roundup.

Out of all of my 2012 goals, the biggest one is probably saving and/or donating a combined 50% of my take-home income. Imagine dividing your income in half. Could you make ends meet if you only brought home that much on payday? It's certainly not the easiest thing I've ever done, but it's probably the best time of my life to do such a thing. My job is stable and my expenses are low; I've got myself and the cats to take care of, and my sweetie contributes as she can to the upkeep of our household.

Here are a few ways I reduce expenses so that I can meet my savings goals.

Month-by-Month Phone Plans

Yesterday, I added my girlfriend to my MetroPCS family plan. It saved both of us money on our monthly cell phone bill!

Supermarket Savings

I get a little excited about saving money. It's kind of weird to most people, but a lot of personal finance bloggers understand. So here's a long part-confessional/part-bragging sort of post about what I saved on the first grocery purchases of the year.

Ahead of Schedule on Cyber Monday

Continuing in my tradition of finishing things long before they are due (why can't I apply this to school papers?), I am now 100% done with Christmas shopping.

First, like Santa, I made a list. Last year I used this spreadsheet from Lifehacker, and it worked so well that I added a new sheet (copying over the formulas from Gift List, and then changing the name of the sheet referenced for the Gift Info formulas) and brought it back this year. I wrote down all the people that I wanted to give gifts to (and also tossed in the three birthdays during December and January -- I refuse to make a holiday gift do double duty) and ideas for what to get them.

I also set a budget. Your budget is up to you -- what you can afford and what you think is appropriate. As a student with many savings goals, I found it best to minimize spending, so I discussed having a small Christmas with my sweetie a couple months ago. We'll still travel to see my family, but we skipped decorating our place this year. (The apartment really doesn't have room for a tree, anyway.) It's also understood that we'll give each other one or two smaller gifts, and nothing extravagant. This is a tradeoff for having the wedding we want next year -- and living debt-free in general.

The next step was to select gifts for each person. There are two basic approaches -- knowing exactly what to get someone and searching for the best price, or seeing what is out there and deciding whether a good deal would also make a good gift. I looked at my family's gift lists, which was easy because my cousin created a database that catalogues each person's wishes and who (if anyone) has signed up to give that gift, and keeps that information hidden from the recipient (but visible to others so there's no overlap) until after delivery. As I come across things I covet during the year, I add them to my eGiveIt list (making sure to update before my birthday and before the holidays). Others on my list had Amazon wishlists (like this one I'm shamelessly plugging for my Read Aloud program). I subtly (and not so subtly -- some of them were tough to hint to!) quizzed friends who don't have such a list. And I looked at a lot of the holiday promotional emails -- more than I usually would -- to see what was on sale. Although I'm in the demographic that doesn't take kindly to stores pushing Christmas decorations and carols before Thanksgiving, I'm up for a deep discount any time of year!

You've still got time, and the sales have just begun. Next weekend is actually a great time to shop, because retailers will have an excess of stock that wasn't sold on Black Friday. Why not make a plan and get your own list out of the way?