Footprints on the Moon

It’s been a semi-productive, semi-lazy weekend. I washed dishes, cleaned out the fridge, cleaned litter boxes, took out the trash, did some grocery shopping, and some sewing. But I also watched an endless number of Mythbusters episodes, am currently watching stupid movies (Stepbrothers, anyone?) and managed to fit in 2 naps.

I’ve got a meal in the crock pot that I’m a little nervous about… not that I’ll need to look for reviews for the best diet pill, though the nutrition information listed on the recipe is questionable, I’m just not sure how well it’s going to turn out. It doesn’t seem like there’s enough liquid in the crock pot, but I had a friend who made it a couple weeks ago and she said it was good. So I guess I’ll have faith.

I wanted to get back to my sewing project but I kind of hit a roadblock.

An orange, furry roadblock.

I set it aside for quite awhile because I didn’t want to drag out my folding table and sewing machine again, but I finally got back to it and finished up what I can.

Here’s as much as the pieced top as I could manage to get into one picture. The good thing about being this far away is that if you don’t zoom in, it’s not as obvious just how much my squares don’t line up. I decided to just go ahead and embrace it, and pretend like they’re not supposed to line up!

And here’s the back that I put together. It’s not what I had in mind, but since I’ve never done this before, the fabric I had didn’t work out quite the way I thought it would. It works though. Like I said… embrace it! It’s a learning experience, right?

Anyways, I’m kind of stuck at this point. I have the front, the back, and the fabric for binding. I can’t really do anything else until I get batting, which I can’t justify buying right now. Even then, I’m not sure how to go about quilting it… I don’t think my machine is really designed for that… but I might be able to do some straight lines. I need some diet pills for my fabric appetite as it is, so I’ve got some fat quarters that I bought on sale after Christmas that I’ll be trying a couple of small projects with soon. Hopefully. And hopefully those will line up a little better than the first set of squares did.

I can’t believe I forgot to get this picture up yesterday… you know, on Sunday? Oh well, 5:30 am on Monday morning will have to do. I took the picture yesterday on my way out the door to get some groceries (finally), and by the time I got home, got groceries put away and got dinner, I completely forgot that I still needed to the the pictures downloaded, uploaded and posted about. Whoops.

Don’t worry, you didn’t miss a whole lot. My grocery/dinner run last night was the only time I ventured out of the apartment all weekend. Have I mentioned that it’s COLD here in Indiana? And that I don’t particularly like the cold? So I spent my weekend inside, in my sweats, trying to stay warm. Watching movies, and breaking out my sewing machine for the first time in awhile. Finished up what I could on the quilt I showed you before, and started thinking about the next thing I want to make. Also need to do some research on thread because I’ve run through the spool that I had, which was basically the first thing I grabbed. Now I’d like to figure out what kind of thread I SHOULD be buying lol

Well I was late getting this post up, and if I don’t wrap it up now, I’m going to be late for work too.

I just checked the weather, and it’s a balmy 10 degrees outside. (-7 with the windchill.) It’s a veritable heat wave!! I could not believe how cold it was yesterday. When I woke up, I had a hard time getting out of bed because it was cold even inside my apartment. Not that I find it particularly easy to get out of bed on a normal day, but that’s not the point. I turned up the thermostat quite a bit higher than I normally keep it, layered on sweats while I got breakfast and packed my lunch, but I was still FREEZING.

Then I turned on the news and figured out why. It was -19 outside, with a windchill of -40! FORTY BELOW ZERO. Gee, no wonder I couldn’t get warm. And you know, when your car sits outside in that kind of temperature, it really doesn’t want to start! Can I tell you how much I’m looking forward to my energy bill from the last several days?

I’ve gone and done it again… I started a new blog! I previously mentioned that I might go ahead and move all my financial talk onto it’s own blog where it might find an audience. I’ve still got some things to tweak over there, but I’ve got the blog up and running.

Financially Foolish: Because everyone makes money mistakes is my blog, so click on that link and go check it out. I posted some exciting news over there today!

I’m about to share with you exactly why some of my friends are starting to talk about needing Solo Slim diet pills. Or why we’re having an extra good time on movie night.

The title says it all: Pina Coladas. I usually make mine with vanilla ice cream rather than ice because then it’s like a Pina Colada milkshake and soooo yummy. Then, on Friday night, I was at the grocery store to pick up a few things, and needed some more vanilla ice cream because my friend Amy was coming over. Edy’s ice cream was on sale, so I was looking for the vanilla when I spotted this:

I thought to myself, oooh that sounds so good! And then I realized, DUH, pina coladas! I immediately snatched that up and went on my way. Let me tell you, they were AWESOME.

Pina Colada mix, Coconut Rum, Ice cream and a blender — the recipe for a good Friday night. And I’ve got to say, that ice cream is pretty delightful even without the rum. I see it says Limited Edition, but I hope it will be around for awhile!

I took this picture when I’d just come back inside from cleaning 6 inches of snow off of my car. Okay, I don’t actually know that it was 6 inches, but it sure seemed like it! Probably about half of that since I know at least 3 inches had already come down when I got home from work on Friday night. Since I’ve basically been locked away in my apartment in my sweats since then, I can’t say I have any idea how much snow we’ve actually gotten.

Don’t worry, I have actually done more than lock myself away in my sweats– at night, I changed into pajamas! LOL Friday night, my friend Amy brought over a pizza, and I made pina coladas and we watched a movie. Pudge was absolutely FASCINATED with her from the minute she walked in, much to my mother’s dismay. She was dangling her fingers in front of him, and he even head-butted her hand to be pet. Very unusual for him, but he was staring at her all night as if he was asking her where she’d been all his life.

The rest of this weekend has been spent in much the same way… I’ve done a small bit of laundry and cleaning, but mostly been watching movies. While those have been playing, I’ve been going through my old issues of Taste of Home and Simple and Delicious to pull out the recipes that I’d like to keep so that I can get rid of this stack of magazines. I’ve also been doing some behind the scenes type work on my blogs. I’m actually getting ready to launch a new one, based on my finances. I like to keep you guys posted on my progress, but I don’t feel like there’s much of an audience here for the financial talk. So I figured if I put it on it’s own blog, I could write about financial things as often as I’d like, and my friends and family can put up with a little less constant chattering about what I might do with my money.

Well I made it about 12 whole hours into the new year before I decided that I probably should have added one more goal to my Financial Goals for 2009 list. That would be Number 5– Buy home insurance. Well, renter’s insurance, as I am currently renting an apartment and likely will be for a while yet. It’s on my 101 Things list, but on New Year’s Day, I definitely set my stove ON FIRE. I mean ACTUAL FLAMES. Whoops? Don’t worry, everything is fine… a pan boiled over into the drip pan, burnt, and then ignited. I was standing in the kitchen in front of the pot when it happened and put it out immediately. But you can’t help but think… what if I hadn’t been standing right there? What if one of my neighbors had set THEIR stove on fire, and couldn’t put it out? After all, the security of my home and my belongings also counts on 7 other people not doing something wrong, not just my own actions!

But back to the goals I DID make. I’ve been crunching the numbers and trying to figure out how to make it work so I can come to you on January 1, 2010 and say YES I accomplished them all.

1. Pay off my car — I’m counting on selling some belongings to accomplish this one. In specific, I’m selling my Wii to my mom. Like I mentioned here when I first threw out the idea of selling it, the MSRP on my Wii and the games is $480. (I may have spent a slight bit more than that due to the Wii Fit being out of stock EVERYWHERE). It was one of those purchases that was almost immediately regretted because I bought it when I couldn’t afford it, but I persisted anyways. Of course the guilt of “Do you realize what you could have done with four HUNDRED and eighty dollars?” kept me from really enjoying it. I’ve barely turned it on in a couple of months, my mom really wants a Wii, and I can use the money she’s giving me more than I can use a $480 dust collector on my TV stand. Mom’s got the money budgeted out of her next paycheck, so as long as nothing changes, hopefully within the next 2 weeks my car will be paid off.

2. Put money back in my emergency fund — my modest goal is $500 for the year. I can either put $42 a month back for this, or put the whole amount back when I get my tax refund.

3. Save money for Christmas in cash– this is basically the same as number 2.

4. Pay off WaMu Credit Card– I’ve been playing with this one alot since this is the one that I’m worried about. According to the many calculators I’ve found online, this will take $278 a month. And for those of you playing at home, no the monthly payments for all three are not in my current budget. I’m trying to decide if I’m going to use the monthly budget for my savings budgets, and put the whole tax refund on my credit card, or the other way around.

Putting the lump sum on my credit card probably makes more sense, given the interest rates in question, but I like the idea of being able to set aside the whole amounts (or just about) into savings at the beginning of the year, having the money there in case something were to happen, and being able to focus on just the one goal that’s left. That’s the way I’m leaning, but I probably won’t decide until I know just how much my tax refund is going to be (I’ve played with the numbers and have an estimate) and when it will be here.

Also, I still don’t know what a regular paycheck at the new rate is going to look like, so that will affect my numbers a little bit. It probably won’t make a huge difference, but it should make hitting those target numbers at least a little bit easier. Either way though, I’m going to have to be good about finding extra money and really snowflaking where I can… right now, when categories come in under budget, sometimes the surplus finds it’s way onto the focus debt, but sometimes it just stays in my account and becomes a checkbook leak.

We all know how quickly things can change, but at this point, I’m optimistic. And hey, even if I don’t hit all the goals, at least I’ll be in a much better position at this time next year!

First Self Portrait of the New Year! This also marks the beginning of the third year that we’ve been taking weekly self portraits. When this journey first started, I had no way of knowing that I’d actually follow through with it. After all, it’s the ONLY weekly meme that I have stuck with for more than a few weeks at a time.

I took this picture shortly before my family arrived for lunch today. We had a good afternoon, sharing a wonderful meal (if I do say so myself), dessert, and just time to sit and visit. Right now I’m watching The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and working up the motivation to go take care of the dishes in the kitchen. I also need to cut up the vegetables for my lunch tomorrow because I’m determined to take my lunch this week rather than buying it at work.

In the meantime, I’m crunching some numbers to see how realistic my financial goals for the year are, if and how I’m going to accomplish them. That’s all stuff for another post, however, maybe tomorrow.

I won’t tell you how old she is, but I bet I’ve let the cat out of the bag in the past, so you could probably go back and do the math if you wanted to

Here’s the trick to taking a picture of my mother– distract her with a baby and take her picture when she’s not paying attention!

Tonight and tomorrow I’m supposed to be cleaning so that she (and Harold and Grandma) can come over for dinner on Sunday. She asked for White Chicken Parmesan so I’ll be making that, and hopefully a dessert if I can track down the recipe I’ve misplaced. Ryan and Ash-lee let her keep the baby for a few days for her birthday… No Swiss Army watches, just babysitting and lunch… is it just me or does her birthday get less expensive all the time?

My apartment is not going to get clean with me sitting here, so I’m gonna go work on that.

Happy Birthday Mom! See you Sunday!