Well it has been a while since my last posting. I am doing okay. Dealing very well with the miscarriage, I can even talk about it without crying!
Now as to the rest of my life, sigh, it is getting financially tight. My husband still has his job (good) but his hours are cut back (bad) which means our finances are not doing well at all. The conclusion of this is that I have to get a job. Up until today I honestly thought that meant a full time job, but taking a good look at all of our necessary monthly expenditures and holding it up against David's new income we should be able to meet our needs with out me getting a job, or taking our kids out of their school. However, a part time job on my part would make this much, much easier to do.
Without the job I would have to reduce our grocery bill to $500 a month...sounds not bad until you factor in two dogs, a cat, a guinea pig, 3 kids and that grocery includes all paper and cleaning products as well as food and that Nathan's goat milk alone costs $40 a month (more depending on how many Wednesdays are in a month). I'm not sure how to do that, but I am sure it is possible. People live on waaaay less than this and survive. That said anybody got any really good, doable tips for me on cutting that grocery bill down? On the plus side of this I could stand to lose a few pounds and this may just force me to do it!!
Oh dear it just hit me, this is the first time in my life (as an adult of course) that I have had to be financially savvy! We are dipping into the red every month and that simply just won't do.
In better much less depressing news, my children are still adorable. Megan has progressed to informing me when she is "stinky". Which means wet or in actuality stinky. One step closer to potty training (yay and boo!). She also sing songs "Let's go get my Emily." every day on our way to get Emily. She sure does admire her big sister, though that doesn't stop her from pushing Em's buttons!
Emily was emptying her backpack out today and said "Mom, can we keep my "m" paper? I want to remember how good I made M's." Very cute.
Nathan is doing so very well at school and is probably the best reader in his class. He rarely makes mistakes in math, is picking up science well, and his spelling has really improved this year. His cursive is still...interesting, but is much improved from last year and his teachers are super at pointing out all the letters that he has done really well instead of constantly pointing out all the letters he didn't do so well (though they do get a nod).
I love my kids and just thinking and writing about them has cheered me up incredibly.
oh hon, I don't think I even knew about your miscarriage... I'm so sorry! They suck (I had 4). Big hugs.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if you do it already- but there are a ton of blogs down there in the States about how to use coupons and such to save money and those ladies get a TON of stuff for free- all from coupons they print off the internet. You might want to search a few out for some good American-ized ideas :)
I understand what you are going through or at least some of it. Ollie's hours have not been cut back but we still have a hard time living on a military salary with three growing boys to feed and a morgage, plus all the other bills we have. Some of the things we do might help. We don't have it totally figured out. One of the first things we did was get the younger two kids on Wic. I was really against this at first because I thought it was going to be a huge pain but it really has helped. We get between 50 to 75 dollars a month. We get bread,milk,cheese,peanut butter,beans, fruits and veggies. It is really easy to get signed up and I just go and pick up my checks every three months. They only hard part is making sure we get the we get the right thing. There is a list that helps out though. Also we have started getting angel food boxes. They are like a co op and they have a diffrent menu each month. The groceries are priced much cheaper than they would be in the store. We have bought many boxes from them and the food is really good. I haven't found anything really that i didn't like. There are some really good things on the menu. The only thing bad about it in your area is the closet on to you is in white city but you could order it online and then just pick it up there once a month. You can look it up online to see if there are any other pick up sites.
ReplyDeleteNext I have started with coupons. I am not so good at this yet but I am reading the coupon mom book and she has a website too. Also I have a friend that is like the queen of coupons that helps me out some. I think laurie is really good with coupons. you should ask her about it. I know some places you can double up on coupons and even use other stores coupons.
Also we have been going through the dave ramsey finacial peace class. Well we didn't finish the class but we have the kit and are trying to put it into practice. Anyway that is my two cents. I hope it helps