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Time to set some financial goals for November.  With the holidays right around the corner and some trips to visit family most likely in the future, it should prove to be a fun month!

So without further ado, my goals for November.

$75 per week (or less) on groceries ($300 for the month) - I used to havet this set at $35-40, but I’m doing some healthier eating which includes more fresh produce (I eat salad once or twice a day now!) and leaner meat and healthier bread choices and whatnot. So this adds up.  October was kind of a free-for-all when it came to groceries because I wanted to see what it would be like just buying the fresh and healthy food we needed for my new healthy lifestyle change.  This $75 is a reflection of that, but trimmed DOWN a bit even.  I know. That’s a lot for groceries for 2 people.  We’ll see how it goes.

• $40 monthly Sam’s Club budget - I’m not sure if we’ll need this, but I’m going to budget for it anyway. We may need to get some more meat or other bulk items depending on how the month goes. I’m leaning towards no, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.  I buy our mozzarella cheese and pepperoni from here in bulk since we have homemade pizza once a week, but I stocked up at the end of October so I may not need to get much this month.

• $15 out of pocket on drug store items - The drugstore deals haven’t been all that appealing to me lately, so I should be able to stick to this. Especially since I have gift cards for Walgreen’s, which means the only out of pocket money I would really need to spend would be at Rite Aid if they have something I can’t resist. But we’re pretty stocked up on personal items for now.  I went almost the entire month of October without drug store shopping.

• Put at least $200 into the emergency fund - This shouldn’t be a problem because I’ve got it budgeted and set for auto transfers.

• Dining out budget $75 for the month - With me being in class twice a week from 2-10p, I end up eating at the school cafeteria (they have some healthy options, like the salad bar!).  I usually spend $5 each time, so that’s $10 a week just for me to eat while at school ($40 for the month).  I added a little more in there so that we can go out and have a sit down meal if we want to.

• Menu planning - Continue menu planning and cooking at home. Try to incorporate healthier meal ideas using less quantities of meat and more veggies.  Make a list and stick to it when grocery shopping.

• Christmas budget - Just sat down and kind of figured out my Christmas/birthday budget for December (we have 6 birthday in December…all immediate family — Dave’s parents, my 2 sisters, and Dave’s 2 brother) and with what I was planning on saving, I don’t think I would’ve even been close to what we will need.  I need to throw $150 into our Christmas fund this month to get on track, even though all I’m doing is making gift baskets with homemade goodies in them for all our family.

Been a little busy to sit down and really go over how October went for us (by the looks of it, not well at all…but I kind of saw that coming) and set some new goals for November. This will probably include coming up with a Christmas budget and some plans to make some extra money (mostly selling stuff on Ebay).  I’m going to try to do this within the next day or two (since I usually have it done by now!) since I know I have to tighten the reigns a bit on groceries (looks like we averaged $100 per week throughout October…WHOA!) and try to stick to a better budget in other areas as well…especially with the holidays coming up.

Here’s hoping November is a better month.

Until then, enjoy the rest of your weekend and I’ll be back next time with my October review and my November goals.

So after taking a month-long hiatus from drug store shopping, I made a list yesterday and headed to Walgreens and Rite Aid…and neither of them had what I wanted in stock!  Well, they had a few items, but most of what I wanted was sold out.  I hate that.  What a waste of time.  I ended up leaving the two stores with a box of tampons, a thing of Adidas deodorant for Dave and some Almay mascara for myself.  That’s it.

Frustrating.

I did an entire series on credit cards and the benefits and downfalls of them in the past (you can see it by starting here), but I’ve had some friends and family ask me lately on how to go about finding the right credit card for them.  That’s a really good question, too!

There are many online resources that review different types of credit cards and allow you to apply right on their websites (apply credit card). These sites often break down the different types of cards into categories, such as which is best for balance transfers, which is best for everyday shopping, and which has the best reward programs.  This can be extremely beneficial. Gas credit cards are even an option on some of these sites, so if you’re looking for a card that you just want to use to purchase gas and pay off each month, you’ve got choices.

As always when dealing with online companies, read their “about us” and any testimonials and do the research to make sure they are legit.  This is your credit we’re talking about here, and you don’t want to jump into something before putting in the proper amount of time to make sure that the choices you are making are the right choices for you.

Oh my goodness.  I’ve been so preoccupied with work and school and other household-type stuff that I’m finding it hard to write as often as I would like.  However, here are some financial highlights as of late:

1. I’ve started a “fun money” fund where I can stash some cash here and there so that when I’m ready, I have money set aside for new clothes and shoes and other stuff just for me.
2. I talked about getting the Blazer fixed a while back…it’s still not running.  We’ve had the spark plugs all replaced and the battery charged and we’re still not sure what’s wrong. I hope it’s not very expensive to get it running…that would defeat the purpose.
3. I don’t even want to know what my end of month numbers are going to look like for October.  My grocery budget will be way overboard because of me changing my eating habits.  So I kind of just went with it and bought what I needed and I will evaluate at the end of the month to see how much I spend on average, decided if I think it can be lower, and develop a new budget going forward.
4. I don’t know if I mentioned this, I may have, but I’m putting 10% into the 401(k) at my new job.  It’s not much because I’m part time, but it’s something!

I got shrimp on sale a while back at the grocery store in hopes that I could come up with a tasty, frugal recipe.  Of course, using the crockpot was just a bonus (I love my crockpot).

All I did was throw in the shrimp with a stick of butter, 1/4 cup of Worcestershire sauce, some hot sauce, lemon juice and red pepper flakes…turned out quite yummy!  Served it with some brown rice and everyone was happy.

You could really season/flavor it to your own tastes.  The Worcestershire sauce really gave it a nice kick, and we love spicy food, so the hot sauce and pepper flakes were perfect.

I still have a few pounds of shrimp in the freezer so I’m going to be making shrimp and angel hair pasta tomorrow for dinner.  Can’t wait!  Incorporating seafood into the weekly dinner menu hasn’t been nearly as expensive or as hard as I thought it would be.  And it’s usually much healthier than what we would’ve been eating!

First of all, I’ve totally been slacking on the Friday Roundup front…seems like the week flies by and I have a list of great links and then Friday comes and goes and I forget to post ‘em.  I’m so bad…but I HAVE been good at commenting on the sites I read, so that’s something at least.

Second of all, I got my hamburgers in the mail today!  Got home from work and there was a styrofoam cooler sitting outside my front door.  I got all excited and immediately made room in the freezer for the 18 burgers.  Not bad for $1.98!

Now…we were supposed to go see Saw V tonight, but my husband is on call and he just got a call to go fix an ATM that is down.  The movie starts at 9:55, so we won’t be making it.  He had to call a guard which is coming from about an hour away (after 8pm he has to have an armored guard since he’s opening an ATM), and so now we’re debating whether to go at 11:55 (when I have to be up at work at 5am) or just go tomorrow.  We have a free adult pass, so it’s a frugal date (and we’ve seen every Saw movie in theaters thus far, so it’s, like, tradition!).

Will probably just end up going tomorrow. *sigh*

It dawned on me that not everyone who reads here may be in the same financial situation as me. We all have our own struggles and downfalls and differences when it comes to finances. Even if you have bad credit, it’s still possible to get approved for credit cards and other lines of credit in order to work your way back up into the good credit bracket.  Will it take some time?  Sure.  Do you have to be smart with your choices?  Indeed.  But it’s not a lost cause.  These days having a clean credit score is very important and there ARE companies out there who will work with you.  Do the research, have a plan, and don’t fret so much.  When you start making wiser choices, things will start making sense and fall into place for you!

This article on temptation over at My Daily Dollars inspired me to think about how I’ve changed when it comes to my shopping habits.  I’m not talking grocery shopping or buying the things we need, but instead the shopping that comes from being a self proclaimed shopaholic.

Her article went on to explain that whenever she felt down, she would take a trip to Target because she could always find something that would cheer her up.  Shopping was always my pick-me-up. A trip to the mall for some cute clothes at Aeropostale or something cute from Victoria’s Secret always made me happy.  Even buying new things for the apartment made me happy and I justified it by saying that it wasn’t really for me.

When I lost my job, one of the hardest things to do was to curb my shopping.  It took a while, too.  Even though we were down to one income, I was still shopping like I did when we had two incomes.  Slowly and surely the money in our bank account dwindled and one day it finally hit me that I had to get serious with our finances and take control.  This meant my spontaneous shopping had to go.

Since that revelation, I still splurge here and there on things, but it’s not nearly as bad as it was before.  Over the past few months the only clothes I’ve purchased were 4 plain white long sleeved tee shirts for work and a Phantom of the Opera tee shirt from when we were on vacation in Las Vegas.  That’s just one example.

If there are things we know we are going to want, we plan ahead.  I don’t just run out and buy. One example I can think of right now is Guitar Hero World Tour, a video game that my husband and I have both been anxiously awaiting (and it comes out this weekend!).  We’ve known for a while that we wanted to get it, so we started saving money here and there, estimating that it would cost $200 for the entire thing (it’s going to be similar to Rock Band in that it has drums, guitar, microphone and the game disc all in one…so it’s a bit pricey).  Well, the price was announced recently and it’s only $189.99, plus I’ve got a $15 off $50 coupon, a $20 off any purchase coupon, and a $10 off any purchase coupon that I can use at the store we’re buying it from.  This will save us an additional $45!

How do I fight the temptation to shop (because it’s surely still there)?  When I feel that urge of “I need to buy something…buying something will make me feel better.” I occupy myself with something else. Maybe I clean…or bake…or start dinner.  Maybe I get online and read the blogs of fellow PF bloggers!  Anything that gets me away from my irrational thoughts that shopping will make everything better.  Because deep down, I know it won’t.  It will only make things worse.  I’ll get a brief high from the rush of accumulating stuff and then I’ll feel guilty an hour later.

So I occupy myself.  Most of the time the urges go away and I’m content with what I have. I don’t neglect myself of some of the things I want, but I plan ahead for them instead of just going out and buying whatever looks like fun at the time.

How do you curb your shopping urges?

October hasn’t been the best in the way of reducing our debt.  First, I switched our focus from debt reduction to savings again earlier this month.  Then we bought some things that we plan to sell on Ebay next month because we know we can make a decent profit on them since they are hard to find items that people will be hunting down for Christmas (that set us back almost $700, but we should get our money plus about $200 in profit which seemed worth it to me).

I was able to collect some “snowflake” money and send an extra $165 above and beyond my $130 to my current debt snowball focus, so that took that credit card to 55% paid off now!  That’s a nice feeling.

Still feels like we’re way behind though and I don’t like that feeling.  Hopefully once we sell the Ebay items and get the cash for those and put it towards some debt I will feel better.  I just feel like things are out of control, even though they really aren’t.

Gosh, it’s almost the end of October.  Time to start getting serious about Christmas shopping…(really just need to buy supplies to make homemade jam and gift basket items).