There’s been quite a theme going on in our neighborhood lately.  It’s kinda like the "how many people are sick in your family today?" competition.  Well, today my count is 3, and Mrs. Debtbeater had to be run to the ER because of her asthma taking over her ability to breathe on top of strep throat and a chest cold.  Sometimes your body just gives in and it’s time to go spend $500 in the ER.

Luckily, we’ve got a maximum out-of-pocket amount within our means and we have that amount taken out of my paycheck automatically.  It’s money we don’t count on, and by the middle of the year we burn through it and everything becomes 100% covered.

Other than that, I found a subscription that was recurring in my checking account that I immediately got rid of.  It was for an online book service that I don’t even use any more.  Bummer that I’ve been paying $20/mo and not even noticing.  Glad to catch it though.

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $0
• Spent - $19.99 (book service)
• Debt Reduced - $0

Today was just crazy.  I’m absolutely amazed that I can think coherently right now.  LOL

With the wife and two kids sick all night long, nobody really got any sleep.  So today I played Mr. Mom for awhile to get the kids off to school, then raced home after work to do the same at dinner.  The worst thing about it all is having to sanitize everything every 10 minutes because kids just have this way of sneezing on everything when you least expect it.

So, we didn’t really have time for anything other than stopping by the grocery store for a few things and developing 5 photos via Walgreen’s online system for a school project.  (I’ll pay $1 to develop a few pictures before I go through all my printer’s ink for 1/2 the quality.)

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $2409.60
• Spent - $9.20 (groceries)
• Debt Reduced - $0

Talk about rough day for some of us.  Three were too sick to go to family night at the church.  And one threw up all over the nursery floor about 10 minutes before classes got out.  It was such a stressful night from that point on.  I felt obligated to use half of the money left in our account (until payday tomorrow anyway) to buy $10 worth of cleaning supplies to go sanitize the place after I finally got everyone home.  We’ve also been up all night just getting the children through it all.

‘Tis the season I suppose…

I really don’t like being so close to the bottom of my account every payday.  It looks like I’m going to barely have enough for mortgage out of this next check, let alone enough to pay the few bills that are due the next week.  I really wish we were either paid once a month…or the billing cycles on most things would be 2 or 4 weeks.  Budgeting would be so much easier then.  Oh well…

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $0
• Spent - $81.21(groceries& cleaning supplies, water/garbage bill)
• Debt Reduced - $0
• Left in bank account today - $8.25  (ouch)

It’s that time of year again, where bills start rolling in from over the holidays and we all cringe to open them…unless of course we were responsible enough not to break all the budget rules.  I’ve gotten a couple of statements I’m not too happy about. 

Rather than post the trickle-effect of each one in detail in the journal, I’ll just prepare a post for next week summing it all up.  I think a nice "big picture" post outlining such a major setback done in so little time will be good for my motivation.  I’m already steaming out the ears as it is since I think I’ve seen most of it, but a nicely planned heart-piercing stab-in-the-back revealing post ought to get me moving in the right direction. 

At any rate, today we spent about another $25 in groceries.  Everyone’s getting sick again, so we’re needing to stockpile up on some medicine, juice and such.  Never a dull medical moment in this house during the cold season.  LOL

So I doubt I’ll have my budget all caught up to date during the week, but I’m going to chisel away at it all week as I’m right in the middle of the living-paycheck-to-paycheck payday week.

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $0
• Spent - $25.67 (groceries)
• Debt Reduced - $0

It’s really hard to believe that it’s already been over 60 days since my last journal entry.  It’s amazing how fast life can run past you if you stop to smell the roses just a bit too long.

This weekend I spent some time catching up.  So today I’ve decided to start filling up the daily journal again.  I’m really struggling at figuring out the best way to do this as I just didn’t like the scheduling of things before.  (I tried to post a week in advance.)  I think now, I’m just going to be posting every evening before bedtime no matter what.

Every evening will be the time where I check account balances, pay bills needing to be paid, and make sure we’re lined up with our budget.  Of course, for awhile I just need to keep catching up with updates to my resources pages, most importantly the budget itself.

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $0
• Spent - $257 (groceries)
• Debt Reduced -$00

Boy did we cut it close this time!  My mortgage was due on the 1st, but we took advantage of the 15-day grace-period given so we could pay the bill one payday later.  This didn’t necessarily buy us another 2K, but it allowed us to pay all the bills we had last month on time.  This reminds me that my budget page is a little behind the times since it doesn’t reflect my actual spending the last couple weeks.  Nor does it show my upped income since updating my W4 at work.

So anyway, it was a small payday for Mrs. Debtbeater.  Not as many hours the last pay-period as we’d hoped.  I’m sure that’ll increase as we go into the holidays though.  Department stores have a funny way of doing that to their employees.

That finally allowed me to pay an almost late credit card bill as well as put some gas in the car.  Phew! is about all I feel right now.  Though frustration is building in the background knowing that I simply shouldn’t have this problem had I been ahead on my finances instead of in a lot of debt…

When was your last close call?  Others have to be experiencing the same thing once in awhile when trying to clean up their finances.  How often does this happen to you?

Today’s Progress:

• Earned - $2454
• Spent - $235 (gas, credit card)
• Debt Reduced -$50