Winter Has Come Back?!

I was planning on writing this brilliant post about my garden. I was going to take before and after pictures share about where my plants have come from and why they are sustainable.

But, it has snowed.

Again.

Last weekend when I bought the plants it snowed....then it was nice for a few days and there was hope. Yesterday, my city at a Winter Storm Warning - and this morning the world is covered in fluffy white stuff.

So sad.

So, this lovely spring post about my garden has been put on hold for a slight while.

On a positive note, I received my pay stub (pay day's tomorrow) and I'm really looking forward to posting my bi-weekly budget.  I had a weeks worth of overtime paid out - so I'm about to make some big headway on two goals!

Saving Money in Small Ways

I'm still feeling great from our purge and re-organize this past weekend.  I've loved sitting in the living room drinking my coffee with the morning news on.

Which got me thinking.

Just by setting the coffee maker on delay to brew a fresh pot for 6:45am I'm saving upwards of $600/year ($3.00/coffee * 5 days a week * about 40 weeks).  That's not too shabby.

What small ways do you save money every day?

Spring Cleaning

When I got home on Friday Jordan and already completely cleaned our bedroom!  He had laundry started and was vacuuming!  It was pretty great.

Well, that got us started on a huge Sunday clean and re-organization of the house.

Sunday, we woke up and had our coffee.  I looked around the living room and sort of had this i'm fed up moment.  Fed up with the dust on the baseboard and the crumbs between the couch cushions.  First, i started at the front door.  I cleaned out the closet, dusted the table by the door and mopped the floor.  When I was done, I realized that Jordan had grabbed a broom and started sweeping.

Before long, we had dusted, swept and mopped the whole living room - after which Jordan and I decided to complete re-arrange it.  We didn't stop there either - while Jordan did the stairs I did the downstairs bathroom.  Then we both tackled the kitchen and dining room - which also got re-arranged.

We started at about noon and didn't stop cleaning and organizing until 7:30pm.  It was a loooong day.

How often do you do a huge clean up?  Do your house mates (be them roommates, boyfriends, girlfriends, spouses, parents or siblings) help?

This and That

So I suppose you can tell that there's not a lot going on this week with my lack of posting and all, but there are a few odds and ends that I can share.

My Aunt gave us a chain saw to cut up some firewood we have (giant wood that needs to be sawed before axed) however; it doesn't work right. My dad had a look at in and figures it needs a new diaphragm (a piece in the carburetor). So, yesterday I bought a carb kit and fuel filter. That combined with chainsaw oil and a five gallon jerry can cost about $45 - I thought it would be way more, so pretty pleased about that.

hmmm..What else is new?

I haven't been making my lunch as often as we should - this always seems to get dropped off in favor of sleeping in - need to find a way to want to wake up earlier. Though this morning I woke up with a headache and a sore throat....which made me not want to wake up....lol

I requested to have 37.50 hours of banked time paid out on my April 30, 2010 pay yesterday - and then I'll get the remaining 15 hours paid out on my following pay if I need the $ for anything. The extra week of hours should pay off the rest of my Canada Student Loan (sitting at about $400 right now) and put a big dent in my Christmas Funds.

Hope you are all having a great week!

It's BBQ'ing Season

...and Jordan and I bought a new BBQ.

We've been saving for this on the side for a while now and finally found one that would meet our needs!  It cost about $400 after taxes from Costco. The online price is a bit higher ($550) - my mom says that's because of shipping.

We've roasted hot dogs and grilled steaks - and so far - she's cookin' fine!

Pay Day Today!

so, today is kind of a big day.

why is today a big day you ask?

For one, today is the first pay with my new salary PLUS I had 21 hours of overtime paid out.  So I have a big fat pay.  As a result of my big fat pay -

I'm paying $1,100 towards my Canada Student Loan

That leaves $472.11 remaining.

wow that feels good.

I think the rest of my bi-weekly budget is pretty self explanatory - not a lot going on.

$300 bi-weekly

Further to my post last week about the eventual demise of my Alberta Student Loan, I have changed my repayment plan on my loan.  I was going to just do extra payments through onilne transfers but, after thinking about it some, I thought that was too easy to not do.

Effective May 14, 2010 my default payment will be $300 bi-weekly.  From the spreadsheet below, I will just have to make one extra payment of about $15.00 to have my loan paid off before Christmas, 2010.

So, I'm pretty excited about that and pumped that I won't be able to cop out.