I already planned to fund baby step #1 with a large portion of the paycheck. Once I make sure the money got deposited into my account at the bank(tomorrow or Wednesday). That day during my lunch hour I will move it to where it needs to be.

I hope I am able to do it tomorrow. It feels so good to have a goal again. For a while there I was really feeling like I had no direction.

The paycheck on the first is the big one to do things with since alot of payments need to come out of the one on the 15th.

Well as of this evening Baby Step #1 is funded to the amount of $85.

Slowly but I am doing it.

Today went to the dollar store, bought four nunchuck covers for our WII, I only have two nunchucks but since these usually get sold as a 2 piece set with a cover for the controler for like $14 I figured I get two for later and save $13 a piece on them. I also bought four packs of pencils for DS.

At DSs school they have a birthday "Day" which due to allergies the parents cant provide snack treats. So they say if the students want they can bring a small present etc for the children in the class. Last year the teacher suggested getting a gift for the birthday child to open that is for the class such as a board game or whatever. I hate the idea of cheap toys as part of a party bag that break after a half hour, so I went with a school supplies theme.

Anyway this year I went to wal-mart and got a 20 pack of gift bags for $1.33.

Then bought the 4 10 packs of shiney pencils and got two large packs of stickers. The stickers were the most expensive item I bought a disney princesses pack for girls and scoobey doo for the boys. Everyone will get one sheet and they were about $.50 a sheet. I bought a pack of 30 scented pencil tip erasers a while back that were $1. and I have three packs of red pencil tip eraser that were $.01 or free from Staples last year. Finally I got pencil Gripper for $2.30.

Overall the giftbags for the 20 students cost $20.60 or $1.30 a person and they will all get a pretty bag with 2 pencils, a sheet of stickers, 3 pencil top erasers, and one pencil gripper.

Well now that the back to school freebees are over the free after ECB deals are starting to be few and far between.

This is okay, They are now charging tax on the purchase when you use your ECB's so you get taxed on the free stuff so now you need to decide if the taxed amount is worth it.

Notebooks for example free after ECB cost once you factor in the tax is $.06, which is not bad as the lowest Walmart got this year was $.15. I was really surprized as for as many years as I can remember the two weeks before school started the price droped to $.07. Whatever I got the notebook but had to factor the tax cost. Staples gave away six notebooks at $.01 a piece so add the CVS notebooks I did not need to pay Wal-Mart $.15 plus tax per notebook.

I have Sundays trip all planned out on my Account I will have to spend $2.05 after tax and I will get:
The Glade Candle or Defuser
Two Bounce 2 month fabric softner bars
One Gillette gamer razor
Two Bags of Chocolate
Starting with $20.96 ECB will have $11.99 for next week for a cost of $11.02 after tax which is okay because it is cheaper than Wal-Mart. Its just paying the tax on the original "way higher than Wal-Mart" price that keeps it from being the awesome deal it would have been in the past.

What I will be picking up For Grams:
The Glade Candle or Defuser
Two tide stain removers
Fiber chew 30 ct
Chocolate 8 pk
Starting with $8.97 ECB will have $8.99
for next week for a cost of $2.93 after tax which is awesome!!

PS on the Dave Ramsey Front $45 to put in the Baby Step #1.

I need to go to the library and rent one of his books and or go to my favorite used book store and buy a copy of his book but for the time being...I am using my idea of what his 7 baby steps are to get me started and set up a sidebar note.

Step One: Emergency Fund $1000, do to my lifestyle and recent life emergencies my amount will be $2100.

Step Two: Pay off all debt with the debt snowball. My ONLY debt is my special acessment for our house, I never really thought of this as debt but it is even though it gets paid with our taxes out of our escrow account. $8215.87

Step Three: 3 to 6 months expenses in Savings. I have desided to do 6 months mortgage payments and 3 months Child Support and Bills. Total $7146 Mortgage, $6000 Bills (note the Mortgage amount will go down once Step #2 is done since this amount includes the escrow but I will not know how much my monthly house payment will go down until the specials are paid off.)

Step Four: Invest 15% of Income into Roth IRA's and pre-tax Retirement Plans.

Step Five: College Funding (Is this a ongoing thing like # four of is it a get it funded and forget about it like step 3?) I am treating it like step four and planning $142 per month.

Step Six: Pay off Home Early $137,000???

Step Seven: Build Wealth and Give!

I wanted to say Step Three is Started because I autopay my mortgage from a savings account, I wanted to make sure incase something happens where the payments do not make it to the savings account there is plenty to pay the bill. I do not consider this emergency money as it is doing the job similiar to overdraft insurance.

I also wanted to say I have Step Four complete according to the plan, but it is no where near where I would like it to be since DH is 40 and has chronic health conditions that will either require BIG $$ in retirement and/or a early retirement. But I will leave it where it is for now (auto pilot) and start the steps from the bottom and pass that on without modification to step Five when I get there.

I feel it is okay for a child to get a loan for College since people will loan you money for college they will not loan you money for retirement. But since we are only talking $142 a month that little bit will not derail my ability to prepay down my House once I get there. Depending on where I am at when I get to that step I may change it. DS currently wants to be a fire fighter which does not require college so we will see when we get to that step.


***Where do house repairs and improvements fit into the plan?**** I want to put filler wood to the cabinents in the kitchen and replace the countertop. I also would like to put insolation in the ceiling for the basement (Husband is almost deaf - noise barrer) then sheetrock ceiling. I also would like to build a deck (not a NEED so much but it does add the safety of a exit in case of emergency as our house is a walk out lower leave and all main floor exits are to the front but the main floor windows are atleast 12-16 feet from ground).

Here is my 1K list of things I have purchased that have cost more than 1K. I will add more as I think of them.

If you notice a trend it is the cars which are all pretty spendy but the last two which we are both driving still are from 1999, so not so bad.

Another trend is 1200, why is my magic number 1200???

1,200 2009 Car Body Repair (Crushed Front Hood)
1,200 2009 DH Laptop
______ 2008 Sheetrock Basement/Garage
3,780 2008 Electrical finish Basement/ garage heaters
_____ 2008 Framing Basement
3,500 2008 Bedroom Set-King Bed Frame, three Dressers
2,000 2008 Sprinkler System
1,500 2008 (1988 Chevy Truck)
1,200 2008 Whirlpool Duet Sport Front load Washer and Dryer
38,898 2007 downpayment/closing on house
1,200 2006 DH Laptop
3,000 2003 Pregnancy and Delivery
8,000 2003 (1999 Honda Accord-Used DH)
2,000 2002 Honeymoon vacation and shopping
1,200 2001 Mattress and Boxspring
2,000 2000 School Loans (was more but gott paid partially by employer)
13,000 1999 Chevy Lumina (My Third Car-NEW)
1,200 1997 California Vacation
7,000 1996 P-brand (not Dodge) Neon (My Second Car-New)
3,000 1995 Surgery
1,200 1994 Ford Tempo (My first Car-Used)

** I will need to fill in the basement totals later but I know they were more than 1K.

137,000 Mortgage

Well the good news is, after taking all last week off to put down the topsoil and grass seed the day after I posted the pictures the grass sprouted.

How is it that it goes from zero to one inch tall in the time it take to water? What I mean is I checked it before watering and no growth checked it after watering to make sure I got water on all the areas and there was new grass an inch tall in areas.

Two and a half days until school starts. On the 26th at lunch we head to the school to meet the teacher and see the classroom and then add money to the lunch account (school) and the snack account (teacher).

Last year once every 20 days of class we would provide the snack, now there were peanut allergy kids in the class last year but this year DS teacher is asking we pay $15 every nine weeks to a snack fund. I was coming out way cheaper last year but oh well.

The other thing is last year after the nutrionist came to class DS started drinking milk again because they told him it was healthy this was after we had stopped using dairy and making some headway on his medical condition. BAD idea, that was a major nightmere. All I can say is if I am paying $15 every nine weeks for snacks then they better take his dairy allergies into account also.

-----------------------
Different topic
Today I finally got the shelf that fell partially from the wall while DH was home all the way down. Basically the screws at the top of the brackets ripped out of the sheetrock. We need to use much longer screws but like I said it is a two person job. I was able to get the bottom bracket screws out by myself, so now I am able to restock the shelf that was under it that that shelf was leaning on after it ripped out of the wall.

I also got the brackets up to hang the ladder. Slowly the garage is getting cleanned up. I wish I could reinstall the shelf but because of the weight of the shelf it is a two person job.

Tomorrow I hope to pick up the limit of Carefree pantyliner which are free after ECBs. I have two computers so I was able to print enough coupons to make this a $1.00 Moneymaker per pack (limit of 4).

I plan on dropping these off at the local homeless shelter along with a bunch of other items I have been collecting from their need list they posted recently in the newspaper.

I also want the Composition notebooks that are free after ECBs. DS does not need composition notebooks so I am planning on donating these to the local back to school supply donation round up.

I have been waiting for a good deal on rechargable batteries. Energizer ones; I was able to print two coupons off the energizer website so after ECBs these will be $4.50 a pack. What a deal and frugle since they are not use and toss batteries.

Not bad, I will pick up three different items, two for donation to improve my community and one for me.

Three weeks, That is all I lasted. The first week was good, the second was okay, the first day of week three I desided to increase my food amounts retroactive to the first week.

I wanted to stockpile some back to school lunch items and have a little quick and easy items on hand for when I am just to tired to cook. Well after doing to All-You grocery challange My freezer and pantry were picked clean.

With all I was doing with the yard, I would pick up take out (Pizza $6.09, Subway $7.80, McDonalds $8.46) for a meal atleast twice a week.

I went to the grocery store and spent $100. Saved $30 with coupons. My freezer is now full my pantry has stuff for school lunches for DS, but I still want to pick up a few easy items for the pantry.

I could now make it on the $50 a week grocery budget but then what, will two or three weeks from now I need to stockpile and I spend an extra $50. I wonder if I failed because I started so low. Maybe I need to start higher and as weeks go by and I dont spend it all the amount can be reduced.

I totally discarded the clothing for me envie because I can go months without buying anything and then I will hit the thrift store or kohls and get what I NEED. I tend to shop for clothing once every six months so a monthly envie I carry around does not really work.

How do you do it, I really want to get on a budget instead of just spending. Truthfully though I need some savings goals.

Well I got a total for the landscaping that I did this year. I am sure a few receipt will show up after I post the total but.........$608.01

I had pre-saved up at least $1122.73 to do this project and that was without me planning to do the border. I say atleast because that is the amount I transfered into savings from closing my $20 challange account.

Overall the professional estimate for this was $5,000+ which is not bad as our neighbor spent $15,000+ on his yard.

Here are some pictures!!
Before



The two shots above are the side of the house which you will notice in the first of the afters is nice lush and green now!


An example of the backyard before
**************************************
The After Shots

The beginning of this week


The backyard, dirt down seed down, just waiting for the grass to grow. Dirt has been placed down everywhere it is yellow. I used roundup to kill the crabgrass, weeds and filed grass. The picture does not show equal brown dirtness because of the fact I took this picture after the sprinkler system had wet some of it.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The border, now it is not completely done all the way around as I am scouting out ads for free river rock so I can finish without spending $4.98 a bag on rock. But this is a little taste as having the film down is truthfully enough for me right now.
---------------------------------


The front flower bed which next spring will be filled with flowers!! The bricks are just to hold down the plastic until I can fill with flowers and mulch. The bricks were what we had used to frame the flower bed right in front of the house but it was not easy to mow around so I pulled them out and will try to sell them for cheap/ or donate them once they are done serving a purpose.

I am so happy I could dance. This is our third summer in our new home (it was built), so landscaping was not done.

I took this week off from work so that I could get the landscaping done. I wanted to give the grass seed time to sprout and grow before winter. I would like to put winter weed and feed on it so it needs time to grow and be able to be mowed atleast three times before winter.

This last week was on the cool side so that made for ideal outside working conditions. I put down dirt, put down grass seed, and even put down edging all around the house. I put down the landscape fabric and am currently hold it down with some rocks and bricks that I had originally purchased to build a flower garden.

I did not like how hard it was to mow next to the brick so I took it out. They are serving a purpose now and I will probubly list them or donate them next year.

I hope it warms up a bit now that the grass seed is down to help it grow a bit faster.

I will add up the cost so far, (I may end up buying rock for the border). I know I did not come anywhere near the $5,000+ estimate that I got. I got an estimate for the work to be done because I was tired of it not being done. It also helped so I could see what we were saving by me doing it. Our neighbor had sod put down and grass seed sprayed in the backyard the first summer and he spent $15,000+. His yard is nice but I sure like the look of ours for so much less.

Well this is the final day of the third week of using envlopes.

I was budgeting 25 per person per week, but have desided to allow 30 per person per week. I tend to do major projects on the house/yard on the weekends and I put my all into it. Which means I want to increase the food budget so that I can plan for take out/fast food/delivery etc once per weekend.

I stopped at the grocery store today, they had pizza rolls on sale for $.88 I had four internet coupon to save $.55 off two so I got 8 boxes for $.61. I also got four 8 ounce cheese block for $.99 each.

____________________________

A while ago I got a landscaping estimate. I was told $3500 for what it would take to put down dirt, level it etc and spray grass seed. Well I have been doing it myself. I have not spent nearly the $1600 which they alloted for dirt. I think I am at $200 or so, anyway I need to buy more dirt for the next section I am going to work on. A while back I bought atleast 110 bags of scotts premium topsoil with peat in it. The store had them on clearance for $.50 a bag. I finally got those put down this morning.

It took four hours and it covered a 32 by 25 foot area. I need to do another two section about that size each. Sadly though I finally got the truck unloaded and the store is out of that soil. Anyway I have a few options the store brand 40 pound bags of potting soil for $1.97 which goes a little farther than the scotts did or a big bag of scotts grass soil on clearance for $3.00. I am not sure which way I am going to go, but I need to make up my mind soon as I took this week off work to finish this up and I dont want to have to run all over town to buy dirt.

Yes I have had dirt delivered by a dump truck and also have hauled FREE dirt using my pickup but when all is said and done doing the bag this comes out cheaper and easier.

We will see how it works out. I also have been putting down a mowing border around the house, it has turned out very nice and much cheaper that what it would have cost me to hire someone to do it.

__________________________________

Since I planted seed a few weeks ago I upped the watering of the yard to help the seed germanate better, I have turned off the system on days where rain was forcasted, but I must admit I over did it a bit, the new grass is awesome and I want it thick so next year so we can set the sprinkler and mow the grass and that be it, no projects trying to get the grass to grow.

While trying to clean the table off I opened the water bill, I spent $86.52 this month between watering the grass, the ballon fight at the BBQ and filling up the pool. Basically my water bill was $76.52 above my normal bill. Oh well I adjusted the sprinkler so only the new dirt/seed I put down yesterday is getting extra and the rest is getting normal. Even with the extra water cost which we would have had even if we would have hired someone to do the landscaping I am coming in under the cost of hiring for the job.

I got an Kohl's coupon in the mail yesterday. It was a spend $10 save $10. So I was able to pickup a jean deal.

Two pair jeans for $25.00, subtract the coupon that comes to $7.50 plus tax each.

I need one more pair for him. So far I have gotten:
1 pair clearance Kmart (a while back) $1.80
2 pair Wal-Mart $7.50 each
1 pair Wal-Mart $10.88
2 pair Kohls $7.50 each

I need one more pair since I need 7 pairs to start him for school. I do laundry once a week on the weekend, usually Saturday. I plan to have him wear his patched/holey pairs on the weekend. On the weeks that I have to work on the weekend It usually takes me until Tuesday to get to the laundry so that is my I need 7 pair.

I have checked everywhere including thrift stores and consignment shops but because DS is slim and MUST have adjustable waist since he cant wear a belt due to his medical condition it is very difficult. Funny how I feel the need to defend spending $10.88 or $7.50 on a pair of jeans and most people drop $25-$30 on a pair of jeans without thinking twice.

I know when we buy for DH tall and skinny we spend whatever it cost to get his size. Luckily he has put on some weight in the last year so we have been able to find his size at Wal-Mart; the only down size is we some times have to check back daily for a couple weeks until we can buy them since he is a uncommon size they get in less of his size. They are $25.98 a pair and with shopping experiences we just pay the price and dont even think twice.

On the 29th of July I tried to take a few things into a store to sell but they were closed. I called to find out their hours. They are a small store and they do not have their hours posted outside so it is hit and miss but I had four large bags of things to take in to them.

Today I went and they were closed??? They had told me they were open until 5pm on Saturday; so we went out for lunch and when we were done I called and they said were open.

It was so worth driving there three times to get this done because when it was all said and done; there are four less kitchen garbage bag sized bags of stuff filling my storage room and I am (Drum Roll) $90.00; Yes I said 90 dollars richer.

Add that to my prior $20.15; and now I have a total of $110.15 Emergency Fund found in my Storage closet!

I need to go through my closet because I have a third selling option to try out; this will be platos closet for a few of my never worn dress shoes and smaller jeans, and a few of DH's size medium sweaters they are trendy, new with tags.

Went to the grocery store today. I had about $25.00 left to spend for the week. I went in wanting to pick up some deals which I had coupons for and a few must haves (bread and Silk).

If I had not had that $25 limit it would have been much harder to walk away from some purchases. I actually walked away from somethings I had coupons for. I wanted chicken nuggets/patties and I had a tyson coupon but the Banquet were cheaper than the with coupon price of the tyson. So I walked away!!!

I will see if I can get some banquet coupons and buy them later.

I got bread, Silk Soymilk, 5 Healthy Choice entrees, 2 boxes chocolate chip eggos, 2 boxes of toaster struddles, and 2 boxes of cereal for $15.

The scary thing is DS has his birthday coming up, he went to see if the store had their free cookies out. He came back carrying a $19.97 cake. Yeah I got scared when he came back carrying a 1/4 sheet cake. I did not find out it was a $20 cake until I went to put it back, in my mind I kept seeing him dropping the cake and me having to pay $20 for a bunch of sugary mush.