New Family Hobby

First a quick update on us. We are still working hard at our budget. Sadly March and April we didn't do great at sitting down and keeping up with it. We got a few big splurges that we weren't planning on. But all in all we still really enjoy our budgeting. I still recommend YNAB to anyone who is willing to give budgeting a try. Right now its free to students, so that's awesome!

Life has been crazy busy around here. June Bug has been sick, then better, then sick. She is losing weight and has a UTI. Hopefully we get everything figured out with her.

Billy Goat has also been sick off and on, but that's life. Hes a typical 2 1/2 year old. Helping anyway he can, but really causing more of a mess. He wears me out and pushes my patients. But that's good right?

The Husband is super busy with work, a side job, doing yard work, and school. Can't wait for him to finish with his masters! Glad he loves all he does though.

So The Husband gets into phases where he gets super interest in things. He researches it a ton, if its a new hobby that needs new toys we purchase those (within reason.) and he is stuck on it. This new hobby of his/ours (I really am on board and very excited about it too.) is lightweight backing packing/camping. As of now we have purchased most of the things we need. We have our backpacks, sleeping bags, pads, and some of the other basics. (Another post will come on what we have, where to get it, and how we like it.)We are doing Havasui Pai in the early fall and will do a few warm up hikes before that. Until we can leave June Bug (shes nursing still) we've been car camping with the kids once and we go on some day hikes as well. Its been a lot of fun.

We've been doing quite a few days hikes on South Mountain. If you live anywhere close to the Phoenix area I highly recommend it. There are harder trails, easier trails, short trails, and long trails. We have really really enjoyed it.

June Bug rides in this beauty. Its a nice Kelty backpack that we can still fit a lot of our stuff in it. If we were to buy another backpack I would definitely get one just like it. We were VERY lucky and found this treasure at a yard sale for a whopping $10.  I've also noticed a few at a kids consignment store (kid to kid ahwatukee) for less than $100. So a decent discount. Be patient when looking for kid gear, don't always buy brand new and you will find deals.

Billy Goat either walks, or rides in a very basic kid backpack. His backpack was a gift and I don't know what brand it is. Its good for him. If you are hiking with a kid 2 1/2 or older I would not spend much money on one or even possibly don't buy one at all. Billy Goat walks the majority of the time and has little desire to ride. He only wants to ride if he fell or has gone over a mile in walking himself. One thing we did get him that he LOVES is his own back pack. We got him this one from amazon . Its been great. He can carry his own juice and his own rocks that he collects on trails! Plus he feels like daddy with his backpack on. I like it for everyday use because I can attach those leash things on it. Its great for shopping! He can walk and be independent like he likes, and I still have some control over him.

This has been a great family hobby. The kids love it, we love it, now that we have most of the gear its a free activity for us to enjoy whenever we want!

First Solo Outing

We have reached a new milestone.... Drum roll please.... I went out alone with the two kids!

I have been dreading this day since I found out I was pregnant with June bug. After I had her we would go out as a family or either the hubs would go or I would go alone, or the really rare occasions the kids would stay with one of their Grandmas while they were visiting. While those options are doable I have been wanting to go out alone With the kids... Call me crazy.

They just opened a small neighborhood market Walmart by me that isn't huge, but would have everything I would need. I knew this was the store we'd try out this new endeavor... It was a great choice!

Today I woke up feeling brave. I got everyone ready and off we went. I wore June bug with a home made Moby wrap, which worked out great. Billy Goat sat in the cart and loved being able to pat his sister when she would get fussy.

Having two little ones takes forever. Once we were loaded, and the again when everyone was in the cart it was smooth sailing. Since I only go bi monthly we had to get quite a bit of stuff. By the end I had two fussy kids with still about 5 things to get. I was picking something big up (OK you got me... It was a pack of Dr. Pepper). And I may have been struggling a bit. There was a guy in the aisle who noticed, helped me, and to top it off told me I was a great mom. 

Then it was the dreaded check out time. My two kids were still fussing and I knew this could be awful. The store was pretty empty I didn't have to wait in line at all and a cashier who wasn't doing anything came and unloaded my cart and loaded it back up again. They were quick too.

So pretty much the conditions were perfect and made for smooth sailing! I was also under budget! 

This weekend is another dreaded first. My first night alone with them while the hubs is on a camp out with the deacons wish us luck!

September 1 Menu

Here's what we're eating:

Monday:

Beef and Broccoli
    This recipe is in my head. I do just a cheap steak from the store that I cut in small pieces. I cut broccoli in bit sized pieces as well. The sauce I use:
1/4 c soy sauce
1/4 c brown sugar
1 t Ground ginger
Red pepper flakes
I marinate the meat in the sauce for at least half hour. I put oil in a pan and saute 2 cloves chopped garlic in it. Quickly add the meat and cook until it's rare. Add the broccoli and add a little water or broth and cook until broccoli is tender. Serve over rice.

Tuesday:

Hamburgers
I get a pound of ground beef and add worstiershire sauce to it. If I'm feeling crazy I'll add a dry ranch packet to it. I form those into four balls and press into patties. Sometime I grill them and sometimes I cook on a skillet, both ways are amazing! While those are cooking I saute onions in butter until they turn brown and sweet. When burgers are done I top them with cheese and the onions. Serve them on buns with the condiments you want!

Wednesday:

Taco salad
Brown 1lb ground beef and add in red beans. Salt and pepper to taste. Thinly chop lettuce throw in a bowl, add a bunch of crushed chips (we like Doritos nacho cheese), top with the ground beef and beans. Mix in French dressing.

Thursday:

Chicken Parmesan
I butterfly chicken breasts until they are fairly thin. I bread them first in seasoned flour, then eggs that are beat thoroughly, then in seasoned bread crumbs. I pan fry those in hot oil with two cloves chopped garlic until golden brown, I put those in a baking dish with prego pasta sauce and shredded mozzarella cheese and bake at 350 until cheese is melted. Serve over pasta.

Friday:

Leftovers or date night

Saturday:

Sweet and Sour Chicken
Cut 2 chicken breasts into bite sized pieces. And pan fry in oil and two cloves garlic, until golden brown. Put in a baking dish add sauce.
Sauce:
1 can pineapple in juices.
1/4 c ketchup
1/2 c soy sauce
1/4 c vinegar
1/4-1/2 c sugar
1 spoonful of cornstarch
Bake at 350 for 40 minutes, serve over rice

Sunday
Green chili burros
1lb ground beef browned. 1 small can green chilies 1/2 can green enchilada sauce. You can add onions and potatoes as well. Fill in tortillas top with cheese and roll them up!

Monday:
Chicken gravy over rice
3 chicken breasts 1 can condensed soup put in crockpot until chicken shreds then add milk until gravy consistency. Eat over rice

Tuesday:
Sloppy joes
1lb ground beef, 1 can manwich buns

Wednesday:
Korean beef
(Click link)

Thursday:
Ranch chicken
3 chicken breasts coated in ranch packet, topped with sour cream and cheese.

Friday:
Orange chicken
(Click link)

Saturday:
Lefties or date night

Sunday
Chicken Cordon Blue Casserole
4 chicken breasts on a pan sprayed and covered in salt and pepper, top with 2 cups grated swiss cheese, and ham slices. Top that with 1 box prepared stuffing. Top that with 1/2 cup sour cream, condensed soup, 1/2 cup milk. Bake 350 for 40 min. Covered 30 more uncovered.

Our Meal Plan

I love food! More than a lot of things. I love cooking, I love eating, and I love feeding people. I love food!

One of my greatest fears of budgeting was that I couldn't eat out as much as I'd like, or that I would be limited in grocery shopping. Better ingredients really do make for better food. I don't go crazy at the store, but putting a limit on what I could spend put pressure on me that I didn't like the thought of. The hubs is great and reassures me that if I am over its no big deal and he means it! He's great, plus he likes good food too! :-)  How I got over my fear is, first, we set a reasonable budget for it. Something that we can obtain. Next I look at it as a game. I have to be as close to our allotted amount as possible. I can't stress if I am over, this is the food for my family after all! Now it's almost fun having our budget in place. I actually enjoy shopping with it! The last thing that helps is making a menu! (I make a bimonthly menu and do major shopping twice a month, if we need stuff in between we make quick, small trips. Less time at the store means less chance for over spending. Bonus is avoiding the heat and not having to load up the two kiddos a bunch!) I did this before but it really helps me think about what I am going to get and stick to that. This week I am even making a treat menu as well! We also have an eating out budget as well and I like that too. We make it count and we definitely eat better quality! We avoid the not so good fast food restaurants, but eat at the yummier places.

What I love most about budgeting in our eating categories is we waste so much less! I'm amazed at it! Since we are on budget I buy what we want, but not excessively. Since we don't eat out as much we eat our left-overs, always and all of them!

The month of August we were over in both categories :-( , but not by much! In fact I am encouraged by it and not discouraged! Bring on September!

We Bought a Car!

We bought a car! Not a new car, but new to us. In fact its the newest car me and the hubs have ever owned. I feel like we bought this car quickly, yet we did a lot of research on it...and on the type of car we wanted and I feel like we got the perfect deal!

We have been talking about getting a new car for a few weeks, but with our budget I thought we wouldn't get a new car for several months or until we sold our old car. Although we knew we would probably need to wait the hubs and I were checking out Craig's list for options. I wanted something bigger and the hubs wanted something smaller. We decided we would look into both and whatever we found that was a good deal that we both loved we would get. Bigger cars were more money with fewer "luxuries'. I still wanted a bigger car. The hubs made a point that our family would fit a smaller car and we didn't need the bigger vehicle. He was right. And thanks to him we got a nice car without breaking the bank. He's really smart and logical. :-). I'm a bit more of an emotional thinker. We make a great pair.

We found our car and it didn't fit the budget. Thank goodness the hubs had some stocks we were planning on cashing in, so we did just that and it worked out! We did have to rearrange some categories and play catch up in some areas, but we made it work! We won't be able to save as much this month, but it worked out!

I love our car and I love that we could buy our car on our budget. I love how free we are on the budget and seeing how organized our money is and getting the most use out of it! I am a happy girl!

Our Budget

So we have been using our budget for almost a month now. Not so long, I know, but hey you gotta start somewhere right??? Truth be told this is really our second budget. We tried using one on mint and while there is a lot I like about mint (automatically records non cash transactions, all accounts are linked over the internet, etc.) I don't like it as our budget. We do still use it to basically see our accounts in one place.

We are trying out the YNAB software which I like a lot. Now it is a lot like a spread sheet. You manually record your transactions, which I like. I like it because you know what's in your account, and you are aware on what you are spending. Its just a much more intimate way to budget. YNAB also has a mobile  app so you can record your purchases as you go. My favorite part is it links your account on the cloud so I can record something at the store and the hubs can see that transaction right then so we are all on the same page! Its been working out pretty great!

YNAB isn't just software they also have their own philosophy and their own set of rules, but their website talks all about that.

Back in the day I hated the idea of budgets. Not too sure why. My guess is I felt bad for spending all our money that the hubs worked so hard to make for us,(Stupid I know.) or  i wanted some freedom in my spending without being accountable for it, or maybe I didn't want to spend time keeping track of what I was spending. All I know was I didn't want a budget.

After buying our house I didn't like looking at our checking account. I missed what it was. As soon as I felt like we were getting close to building it up, we'd have an expensive month and there it all went. Finally the hubs and I agreed, it was time to hold ourselves accountable. The hubs is also ready to start investing for our retirement and the sooner we start the better, but we need to free up cash first.

So now we have our budget and I love it! The things that turned me off to budgeting  before seem silly now. Now I know the money the hubs makes is ours and its my job to get the things we need. That being said I can also make sure I make that money last as long as we can. I have freedom to spend whatever I want. I just have to plan ahead for it, which is great because if I am willing to wait for it, then I know its worth it. If I have to have something and can't wait, we have money budgeted for that as well, just not a ton. And with YNAB it doesn't take much time at all! We talk about our budget twice a month or so discussing money and our budgeting categories, then with the app I record it all right away which takes two seconds literally!

So far so good and I am pleased to say we are pretty on track for this month and its been fun and exciting! Wish us luck!

Enjoy!

The Start of our Financial Journey

Our finance journey has begun! Well, I guess we've always been on a finance journey, just like everyone, but this is the start of us really watching where our money is and where it is going and what it can do for us.

I guess I should start with the beginning of our finance journey. It started when The hubs and I got married. We had nothing. No money no jobs....nothing. We had our house with a low payment thank goodness. (Right around $400.00). No car payments, and we'd keep our AC at 83 degrees. Yikes. But we found jobs, (making around 8 dollars an hour each both part time.) and lived cheap! We also had wedding money that saved us. Then I got pregnant with Billy Goat and I wasn't going to work after I had him. The Hubs was going to school full time so he couldn't work more. Our only answer was for him to get paid more. Luckily for us he was a rock star at what he does and he started his internship which paid well. 

After The hubs graduated and we were pregnant with June Bug we wanted to move to a better location. We found a nice fixer upper biking distance to work and put a bid on it and got it. (Thanks to the money The hubs got from work and our parents giving us some cash to tide us over until we sold our original home.) We sold our house and did well, paid our parents back and put everything else into fixing up our new home. Now we are trying to build our bank account back up. And that's where we are now. 

I also want to pat The hubs on the back for working his hiney off at school. He graduated early and didn't have to pay a dime thanks to scholarships. Now he is starting his master's degree that his employers are paying for. So I really feel we are ahead of the game. :-) 

Anyway, here we are starting a budget and looking at investing options. We are doing the YNAB (You Need a Budget) budgeting software and I seem to like it so far. I will write more about that tomorrow.

Enjoy!

The Beginning

I'm a 20 something wife to an amazing, slightly nerdy, but perfect guy (The Hubs). A mother to two great kids  (Billy Goat our almost 2 year-old and June Bug our almost 2 month old.)...who happen to nap at the same time giving me a nice break during the day. :-). We love our life even when it is chaotic and we wonder what we were thinking starting our family so young. (You know those moments where we are ready to go to church, load up June Bug to find out she had a huge blowout. Rush to clean her up, change her, clean up the mess to see Billy Goat dumping out his church bag....all the while I'm trying to get those roll dough balls in the fridge so we can eat pronto after church. And Daddy is looking at me like its my fault because if I hadn't made the dough before church we would've been at church already...)no regrets at all and we love it!

What made me decide to start this blog is like I mentioned above Billy Goat and June Bug nap at the same time and recording my life seems like a great time filler. Also me and my husband are starting a new journey on budgeting and investing. This new thing fascinates me and I am extremely excited about it. I Googled LDS finance bloggers and got nothing. While I am no expert I am excited to share our experiences. While I am interested in finances that is not my life. I'd love to share my everyday life of cooking, cleaning, juggling two kids, finances, church, among other things! 

Enjoy!