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 Month of Highs and Lows

February certainly wasn’t an easy month.  We lost a family companion that had been with my wife for almost fifteen years.  You can read more about that here if you like.  The grieving process definitely had an impact on the weekly routines so I knew our budget would be a little out of whack.

We had two blocks of extra income this month with ESPP shares being sold and my bonus for the second half of 2015 arriving.  The extra money was mostly put toward outstanding debt, but some was used to cover the costs of our DIY project, our upcoming trip to Florida in April, and of course the additional vet bills.

To top it all off, I got a cold on the last day of the month.  Gross!

Current Goal Status:

Financial goals:

• Reduce overall outstanding debt (including mortgage) by 15%.
  1. Debt reduction for the month was 4.41% which puts us on track for a 8.76% overall reduction for the year. Paying off the last credit card balance with the bonus was a huge boost!
• Make contributions to investments (taxable and retirement) of 15% of salary.
  1. We contributed 15.83% of our income to investment accounts including 401k, 529, ESPP, and Brokerage.  A portion of the bonus is also put toward 401k and ESPP which puts us on track.
• Eliminate outstanding credit card debt.
  1. The interest for the balance transfer card did show up on the Feb. statement and cost us $58.82.  I am OK with this since I thought it might happen originally and also because the balance is eliminated!
• Eliminate remaining student loan debt.
  1. The only progress this month was the regular payment leaving a balance of $5600.
• Make a contribution to an IRA.
  1. No progress here… yet!
• Generate revenue from a new income stream.
  1. No progress here… yet!

Expense Goals

Expense goals in Feb were not much better than January.  Still, it was a little better:

• Meet the $800 per month grocery budget
  1. Grocery planning/shopping  went to hell this month.  Over budget by $350.
• Reduce dining out to $400 per month (2015 – $600)
  1. Over budget by $140 this month.  This is $50 lower than last month.
• Reduce entertainment/alcohol to $250 per month (2015 – $435)
  1. This one is also over budget by $200 this month.  While it’s down by $65 from last month, there were extenuating circumstances this month that called for a few more distractions.

Personal Goals:

• Meditate at least three days a week
  1. I managed one day this month.  Again, things got a bit unraveled this month.
• Take walks at least three days a week
  1. Down to about 50k steps this month.  Not as good as I would have liked.
• Spend at least seven days camping
  1. Nothing this month, but plans in place for June and maybe October.
• Go kayaking at least one time
  1. Still Brrr.  Not yet
• Take one family vacation
  1. Only five weeks until we go!

DIY Project Update

At the end of six weeks into the project, I have around 75% of the ceiling complete.  We also went and picked out the new sofa from Ikea.  We wanted something a little nicer, but didn’t want to spend a lot on it.  Finally, two new light fixtures arrived.  We switched from the old spot light type to a new hanging fixture.

Even after two weeks or so of no progress, it’s starting to come together and I expect to have it completed in the next two weeks.  We still need some chairs and a coffee table.  Hopefully we can find a creative way to accomplish that without a lot of additional expense.

 Spring is for Growth

On a final note, I’m really looking forward to March.  It’s the time of year where things start growing again.  I’ve been doing the pre-Spring maintenance work on some of my bonsai and I can’t wait to start seeing leaves and flowers emerge.  It’s also time to play in the dirt and get the garden planted.  I have around 80 tomato plants started.  I will get fresh tomatoes in abundance this year!

Cheers!

-cb3

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 In with a Bang

To say that I wasn’t ready for the holiday to end and work to being again would be putting it mildly.  I could feel my body getting tense the day before.  Now we’re back to the races and I get a little busier each week.

Of course, with the transition from holiday back to routine we let a lot of things slide.  Grocery planning only got done one week out of the month.  We also tried to cram in social nights with neighbors and friends to try to hold on to a little bit of the break feeling.

We also settled on a vacation for the year and will be heading to the beach during the kids’ spring break.  The condo has been booked and we’re really looking forward to the trip.

Current Goal Status:

Financial goals:

• Reduce overall outstanding debt (including mortgage) by 15%.
  1. Debt reduction for the month was 0.54% which puts us on track for a 5.84% overall reduction for the year. This is currently below target, but we’re just getting started!
• Make contributions to investments (taxable and retirement) of 15% of salary.
  1. We contributed 11.90% of our January income to investment accounts including 401k, 529, ESPP, and Brokerage.  This will increase next month since I increased my ESPP contribution and will also increase 401k in March.
• Eliminate outstanding credit card debt.
  1. I was happy to note that we did not get charged interest on the January statement for the balance transfer card even though the introductory period ended on Jan. 22.
  2. This balance should be paid off in Feb. by a combination of ESPP proceeds and other deferred compensation that comes on the 15th.
• Eliminate remaining student loan debt.
  1. The only progress this month was the regular payment leaving a balance of $5700.
• Make a contribution to an IRA.
  1. No progress here… yet!
• Generate revenue from a new income stream.
  1. No progress here… yet!

Expense Goals

Ok, so January flat out sucked for meeting these goals.  Here’s the damage:

• Meet the $800 per month grocery budget
  1. We were over budget by $334.  this is partially due to holiday spending and partially due to only planning weekly meals one week out of the month.  Gotta do better.
• Reduce dining out to $400 per month (2015 – $600)
  1. We didn’t meet this one either, but we were under the 2015 average by $12.  Woo!  Again, a consequence of poor meal planning.
• Reduce entertainment/alcohol to $250 per month (2015 – $435)
  1. This one is also over budget by $265.  Hosting social night gets expensive.

Personal Goals:

• Meditate at least three days a week
  1. I managed three days for the month.  Work ramped up and I’m still not back on track for a good schedule.
• Take walks at least three days a week
  1. This I’ve managed to do and my step count is up to 60k per week.  My average week in late 2015 was 45k steps.
  2. I’m also getting a ton of stairs going up and down the ladder for the DIY project.
• Spend at least seven days camping
  1. Nothing this month, but plans in place for June and maybe October.
• Go kayaking at least one time
  1. Brrr.  Not yet
• Take one family vacation
  1. We booked a condo in St. Augustine where my wife used to go as a child.  We also got a room for her parents to go along.  This added $2200 to our expenses this month, but I know that cash is coming in to cover it.

DIY Project Update

Just a quick update on the progress for the living room renovation.  In the two weeks that we’ve been working on the ceiling, I’ve managed to make it within a few rows of having one side done!  That includes one false start where I made it about 16 rows up and we realized there was a mistake that made one end not align correctly.

I’m really happy with the way this is coming together.  It looks much better than the stomp textured ceiling.  We’re also going to be replacing the overhead lights and the ceiling fan.  I’m estimating around $300-400 for the new fixtures.

I love power tools!

Get It Together

Ok, now that we’ve gotten over the holidays and have started getting back into the grind, I’m confident that we can do much better in February.  The only thing that my put a little dent in our plan is that I’ve been asked to commute into the office two days a week.  That’s an 18 mile drive which could mean thirty minutes or an hour and a half of driving each way.

Cheers!

-cb3

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Almost Two Weeks?!?

Hard to believe that I haven’t made a post in twelve days.  Life sure went into overdrive in a hurry.  The full-time job is back to requiring it’s regular load of hours.  The kids now have an additional evening activity (swim lessons: extra expense but necessary).  We’ve also decided to tackle a little bit of DIY renovation.

Background on the Renovation

Before I get into the meat of this post, I want to set the stage a bit so you understand our current situation.

We’ve currently been living in our home for around six years and most of the furniture either came from our apartment or was hand-me-down.  We have some antiques from family, some craigslist items, and some stuff that came with the house.  The last time we bought new furniture was the dining room set in 2008.

We also have two small children and three dogs (at one point it was four).  Needless to say, the sofas are starting to show the abuse they’ve received.  It’s been mostly OK, but when we came back from holiday visits we found a large rip in the top of the ottoman and a lot of stuffing had been pulled out (Jack Russell’s love to pull stuffing out of things).

It’s time for some replacements.

And That Leads To…

“We should fix up a least one room in the house to look nice”.  Yep, the first thing through my mind was dollar signs.  My wife even said as she laid out her idea that she could tell I was only thinking about how expensive this was going to be.

There are two bits of good news.  First, we had prepared for this a bit by asking family members to contribute to furniture instead of buying Christmas gifts for us.  Second, I’ve laid out the financial projection for the year and I know that I can spare around $1500-$2000 and still make my goals (if everything goes according to plan).  If we’re really good about keeping the monthly budget, there may be more room.

The plan is to put up a plank board ceiling in the living room.  It’s a cathedral ceiling and I estimated around 400 sq ft.  Based on the material she wants to use, that should cost me ~$650.  We’ll also need about $50 in paint.  The second part is to put together some in-wall book shelves (which i’ll probably just hang with French cleats).  I haven’t estimated the cost of materials there, but I think we’re still OK.

Bonus

We had a slightly serendipitous moment last weekend while having dinner with friends.  I almost didn’t go along but was glad that I did.  One of our friends just moved in with another and had a load of stuff in a storage unit.  He needed help moving the bunk beds to their condo.  He also mentioned that he had an almost new leather sectional with recliners that he wanted gone.  Since we were in the market, I said I’d take a look.

The couch wasn’t a good fit for the living room, but we also had a dingy old couch downstairs in the den and this one was a perfect replacement.  I asked how much he wanted for it and he gave it to us in exchange for the use of the truck and not having to pay for the storage unit anymore.  Basically, it was free!

Getting Messy

I was lucky enough to have MLK day as a holiday and made use of the three day weekend by getting started on the DIY.  We went and picked up the planks for the ceiling and paint on Saturday.  Total cost of materials so far is $660.

We spent part of Saturday and Sunday painting the planks.  We did 180 total one at a time.  Once we got a rhythm going it really wasn’t too bad.  I think we spent around five hours on painting.

Yesterday I took advantage of the project and ran some speaker wire along the ceiling in preparation for some wall-mount room speakers.  I know there are a lot of wireless options out there, but I still prefer a wired speaker to the receiving device.  Call me old school.

I also managed to get a few planks up so that we could make sure we liked the color and that the hanging technique was going to work out.  We’re going right over the stomp ceiling with the planks without scraping any of the drywall clumps off.  I’m using construction adhesive on the back of the planks and a couple of brads from a finishing nailer.

Off to Work

It’s time to go focus on the day job.  Hopefully, I can get back in a routine and post regularly.  I’ve got to keep you guys updated on this project.  We’ve got another lead on a friend that is downsizing and maybe we can score a couch for the living room on the cheap.

Cheer!

-cb3