Friday, October 24, 2014

This Week....Frugalness, Money & Wisdom


We got a second car insurance refund last week.
$234.71 back in my wallet?
Why thankyouverymuch!

Hubs took last week off from work and we went away for 4 nights to the beach.  With both weekends that made 9 Days of "togetherness".
I have discovered on this week off how long I can be constantly side-by-side with Hubs before I just can't stand it any longer.
It was on Day 8.
What in the world will I do when he retires and is here in the house fulltime? lolz

That trip to DC in May, where I had to pay $75 for the conference dinner?  The organization still hadn't cashed the check as of Oct.
Upon inquiring we found out that the President of the organization holding the conference decided to comp all the meals for attending spouses as well as members.
$75 back in my wallet?
Why thankyouverymuchagain!!

As of Thursday we have cut the TV cable.
Goodbye $110+ a month for cable and internet.
Hello $40 a month for just internet.
I don't know if we will survive this drastic measure but I do know that having it disconnected on Thursday was VERY bad timing.
Project Runway's season finale was Thursday.
So I have to wait until tonight to watch it online.
Ugh.
But for a savings of $70 a month I will be OK with it.
Give me strength to survive not being able to watch PR All-Stars beginning next week though!

I made Halupki, otherwise known as Stuffed Cabbage Rolls this week.
Having lived here in the Polka Belt of Pennsylvania for the past 14 years I don't know why I never made this dish before.


Hubs had 3, I had 1 and we still have 10 left.
Instead of ground beef I used ground turkey with the ground pork in these to be a bit healthier.

I also have about half of the filling I made up left too, so I'll tuck that away in the freezer and make more another time and/or add some more ingredients to make it Mexican(chili powder, cumin and green chilles)and make enchiladas with it instead.
I spent approx. $9.25 for all ingredients and if I buy another head of cabbage I can make another 14.
Or I can turn the filling into Enchiladas with ingredients I have here already.

Between the leftover halupki, chicken Marsala, meatloaf and side dish of butternut squash & apples, I think the rest of the new planned meals on this week's menu will move to next week at this point.

I went to Target and did the Kleenex/Viva Deal on Thursday.
1 X 4 pack of Kleenex and 1 X 8 pack of Viva paper towels=$14.78-$4.25 in Qs=$10.53-$5 free Target gift card I had=$5.53 OOP......making each item come out to less than .50¢ each.
And I received another $5 Target gift card for buying these 2 items so it truly was only $5.53.
Not "almost free" like Rite-Aid but a good buy and we needed both tissues and paper towels so I am good with it.

I need to get my butt into gear and list a few things on eBay this weekend.  There is a short window of opportunity for Christmas on there after all and I don't want to miss it.  Hopefully I can rehome a few items using that platform and add a few coins to our savings.

October is a 3 paycheck month for us....yay!
I finished paying all the month's bills yesterday and if we don't spend anymore cash this month(besides what I've already taken out of the bank)we will have saved in total for the year just $400 short of the $24K goal.
Plus, unless the train goes flying off the tracks in November and December, I should be able to throw another $1K or so at the challenge in overage from those months.  But then again, December DOES mean gluttonous Christmas spending and then real estate taxes come due in January........
It IS always something, isn't it?  '-)

We just had to re-enroll in our healthcare.  Since we've got it all set up in the plan we are in finally, we are sticking with the same plan for 2015.  When you have ongoing medical needs and use DME it's just easier not to be switching around every year.
We have 5 paychecks, thus 5 more deposits from said paychecks for this year into our HSA before the $4K deductible kicks in again on Jan 1st.  This means we'll have just shy of $1.8K in the HSA that wasn't used this year, which can be put toward our high deductible plan.....so we'll only have to lay out about $2K in new money before we see any benefit from our insurance.  That will be nice for a change.
I swear having to fork over almost $300 for 1 bottle of pills(what they cost before we satisfy our deductible for the year)is about enough to make me swallow my tongue.

Sluggy
 

6 comments:

  1. Wow, I got to the last couple of paragraphs about healthcare and my eyes glazed over! It all seems so complicated! But please don't swallow your tongue - I have a feeling that might be costly!!

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  2. I'll have to look up halupki...been wanting some new good recipes to try..I tend to lean towards mexican though and enchiladas sound good! saw a couple of recipes on youtube that I may get around to trying - was watching the freezer meals for crockpots and got sidetracked on one woman's videos and watched her make 2 enchiladas...
    you may have to get a job or have hubby work parttime or start traveling and staying with friends again when he retires! a woman I used to work with made her hubby work 2 days a week at the local grocery store to get him out of the house..and 2-3 days he spent fishing so it wasn't too bad she said.
    Susanna

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  3. I became friends with a guy whose wife still worked. She told him after a week of his retirement passed that, "You need to find something to do." He worked about three afternoons each week, handing out samples at WM. Plus, he hit all the hunting seasons. Friends, female, went back to work when the husband retired, all out of self-defense. Maybe you two could take turns sitting in the mall, watching people go by.

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  4. I feel your pain, I don't allow hubby in my shop. He has to stand at the door. :)

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  5. I guess I am the odd one. I never get tired of spending time with Hubby. Of course me may tell me to go back to work after I retire. LOL! We could not do the high deductible insurance plan. I prefer to pay the higher premiums....we just have too many medical issues and by we I mean Hubby.

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  6. Den gets on my nerves after 8 hours! LOL!!!!! Unless we are in Vegas then I just ditch him and drink. And maybe you will need to do that in retirement. I have all the answers really.

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