5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I started a letter of the week program with my 3 yr old at work.  I utilized the library to get free books to read based on our letter of the week.

2. I really wanted a new planner to use this year but could not find one that fit my needs. I am using a composition notebook I already had and designing my own planner based on the things I feel I will use each month.  

3. I eat lunch 3 days a week at work for free. Helping save on our grocery budget.

4. I hung 3 loads of laundry this week through out the house to dry. 

5. We ate our leftovers and my husband took leftovers for his lunch all week :) 

Few New Things Going On Here...

It's been a while since I have posted a blog post! Hard to believe that it is 2017 already! Hope everyone had a lovely holiday season. We did! It was busy and hectic though and one of my goals this year is to try and simplify that for this year.

Here are a few happenings at our house: 

In November I took a part time job, working 20 hours a week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, as a Nanny. I watch primarily a 3 year old boy and a 11 month old girl. I make $15 an hour to go to their house and care for them. Occasionally and in the summer months I will also be watching their 6 year old brother who attends kindergarten. I love my job! I love the family I work for. They are all very nice and very good to me. It truly is the perfect job for me. I can also bring Kid # 5 with me to work when I need too. Which is just another added bonus! 

This job will help tremendously with some new financial goals we have for this year. We have completed our Babystep 3 and even ended up adding more to it when we had a job loss scare and then potential move in early 2016. Now we would like to move on to Babysteps 4-6. Our primary goals this year will be to up our retirement savings,  save a small amount towards Kid # 5's college ( more on that later), start to save to purchase a new to us car with cash and pay extra towards our house. Big goals and even bigger dreams for someday :) 

Our other really big news is that we will be having a new Grandchild in August. Kid #3 announced to everyone in Decemeber that she is expecting.  We all are hugely excited!  

Looks like 2017 is going to be an awesome year for our family!

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. We ate our leftovers :) 

2. I only ran the dryer for two loads this week. Everything else has been hung up to dry. 

3. I ordered a Christmas present from Kohls. Had a 30% off code. Went through Ebates to earn cash back and choose in store pick up to save on shipping. I picked it up after work since I work right by Kohls to save on gas. While I was in the store picking it up I paid my Kohls charge account right then in cash. No late fees or forgetting about paying for me! 

4. While at work I walked with my kids to Joann Fabric since it is also close to my work. Bought some fabric I needed for a Christmas gift using a 60% off coupon for it :) 

5. Reach my first goal with my part time selling on EBay. Paid cash for my husband 4 new tires for his car this week. 

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I had 3 stay at home days! 

2. We ate leftovers for most of the week. We have started having Sunday " family" dinners with some friends. We take turns at each other's houses. Sunday was our turn. We provided the main course and everyone else brought something. We had a lot leftover. 

3. I started working on a quilt which will be a Christmas present. So far I have been able to use up material I already own :) 

4. My husband wears bow ties when he plays in his band. I made him 3 new ones this week using scrap material I already had. 

5. I finished one of my projects I had been working on, spray painting some light fixtures in our house. This was cheaper then buying new fixtures in the color I preferred. Saved me approximately $40 a fixture :) 

Thrifty Thursday

I had to drop my car off to be fixed this morning. I posted last week about having a issue with my car. We had to wait for a part to come in to have it fixed.  Turns out it was a wheel barring that is bad.  The shop we use is about a 1 mile from our house.  I frequently walk during the day at the minimum of 2 miles.  So I just walked home from the shop so that I can get some of my exercise in. It was a nice sunny morning, although kinda chilly.  When  it is time to pick my car up later today I will just walk to do that also.  Easy exercise and it saves on gas.

What did you do that was thrifty today?

My Goals With EBay

Two post in one day..say what??!!

My first mini goal I set for myself when I started selling on eBay in June was to be able to make enough profit to buy both of our cars new tires.

 Today after mailing my packages from sales over the weekend I realized I have now made enough to get our first car new tires!  Woohoo! one car down, one more to go!

Reaching this point totally helps keep me motivated to keep at it. Even if my sales are slow and I only sale 3 or 4 items a week.  I am still making a profit!

Happy Tuesday!

Well I didn't manage to post over the weekend or yesterday which was a holiday from school for Kid #5.  Today we are back to our normal schedule.  Nothing to exciting happening this week.  We just have our usual schedule until the weekend.

 I do have a few projects I am hoping to finish.

 One is the recovering of our dinning room chairs.  I have 3 left to do so I plan to work on them today.

 The second is I am spray painting some of our light fixtures that I really wanted to update but discovered they would cost us about $40 a piece to do that.  We have 4 of them.  The can of spray paint cost me about $5. This was a much cheaper option.

The third project is finishing up the painting of my half bathroom vanity. I was waiting on my husband to help me with the holes for the new handles I bought, which he did over the weekend. So now I can paint the primer on them and then purchase the actual paint.

I need to run to the Post Office at some point today as I have 3 packages from my eBay sales to mail off.  EBay  has been slow going for me but at least I am making some money doing it. Every little bit helps!

Hope you all are having a great day!