Year-end.

Lots going on today to get ready for tonight and also the wedding this weekend... but also in the mix is planning and goal setting for 2010. It's a big ritual for me and the hub - we are big goal setters. So we don't necessarily do "resolutions" but we set goals and daydream about the new year to come.

OK but on a funny note - I just printed out our Quicken report for all of 2009. Anyone want to take a gander on how much *I* spent on clothes in 2009? That means clothing, shoes, accessories - the whole 9 yards. Well, drumroll, please...

I spent $183.59. Of that, $79.70 was for my bridesmaid dress for Lucky's wedding this weekend. And $58.32 was for the shoes to go with that dress (which I really did need, by the way - I had no black dress heels, believe it or not). So that leaves a measly $45.57 that I truly spent on myself just because. Of that, $38.16 was at the Old Navy $2 tank sale, and the remaining $7.41 was for a necklace from J. Crew (after my gift card amount was applied).

I think it's safe to say, this shoptastic spender has been REFORMED!!!

Santa never fails.

I hope you all had a fabu Christmas! We certainly did. Santa loaded us up with some fun goodies. I am loving my new Kindle!!! I just ordered a pink case for it off Amazon so I can keep it safely tucked in my purse and with me all the time. We also got a Keurig coffee maker and are loving it so far. We had the Senseo one for years but it was about to crap out on us. Besides, the Keurig has a LOT more variety as far as coffees and teas you can brew. So fun!

The hub also got an air popcorn popper - something he's been wanting forever. I think he eats more popcorn than anyone else on the planet. Seriously. I guess there could be worse vices. At least I don't have to buy Costco size boxes of microwave popcorn anymore - that'll save us some bucks!

We spent Christmas here in Atlanta with my family and then drove up to Knoxville afterwards for a couple of days with the hub's family. We got more goodies up there, including my requested Lady Gaga CD from SIL. She is my not-so-guilty pleasure. Funny thing is, I saw her open for NKOTB like 18 months ago and I remember turning to Lucky saying "Who the hell is that?!" Fast forward to December 2009 with me blasting her CD and singing along while driving to work. It's a great CD too, girls ("The Fame" - her first one, pictured below). It's one of those rare CD's that you can pop in and let it go. Not just a few hits and a bunch of filler shit. It's all good stuff - I'm loving it!

Here's a litte *Christmas Collage* of some of our loot - we must have been good this year!

After a whirlwind Christmas, I'm taking most of this week off from work. I did go in for a few hours yesterday to make sure there weren't any fires to put out, but I'm off now. And I have all these things around the house I need to be doing, yet I have no motivation whatsoever to do any of them. But I'm terrible at doing *nothing* so I find myself playing on the computer when I need to be doing laundry and cleaning stuff. Hmmm...

Plus this weekend - I can't believe it - is Lucky's wedding! So I'm also getting geared up for that. I'm putting self-tanner on my legs so they don't blind everyone at the ceremony. Dear me. I don't do hose, so that's not an option. But no worries - I won't be orange. I use this brand a lot (Loreal) and I just do a couple of "doses" a few days out so I'm not quite so pasty. I'm not actually trying to look tan. Just less ghost-like.

Oh and get this - I'll be doing my own hair. Everytime I get my hair put up by a pro I think, yeah that's nice but was it worth $90 or whatever? Yeah, no. I'm pretty decent with updo's - certainly decent enough to save me $90. As long as my hair cooperates, it'll be good. I'll try to remember to snap a pic for you to assess my skills. I've done other bride's updo's before - just not my own.

Now I'm trying to figure out what to wear to Lucky's rehearsal and dinner...

Oh and let's not forget New Year's Eve... want to take a guess at what we're doing? Our crew might be the only ones there over 18 and I'm hoping I don't hurt myself. Any guesses?!

(P.S. This spacing thing drives my perfectionist self INSANE! Does anyone know how to fix the double spacing or whatever the hell it's doing?! Insane, I tell you.)

Christmas Prezzie...

From my parents - I've wanted one of these forever!!!
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Sweet Treats

Mmmm... Chocolate covered almonds in the making. MERRY CHRISTMAS!
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Now onto wrapping...

Forgive my short-but-sweet posts... Santa's had me on a tight schedule lately. Finishing up my wrapping here while watching Elf and Christmas Vacation. Over and over. And over. Love it!
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The roast is in the crockpot...

Merry Christmas Eve!
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Call me Scrooge.

I know, two posts in one day.  Crazy, right?!

 

Truthfully, I'm not sure I can say any of this without coming off as a total good-for-nothin' Scrooge.  But does anyone else feel like people are tugging at your wallet left and right to give to this and give to that this season? - like exponentially more than in seasons past?  Yes, I know about the economy and all.  I know that has a lot to do with it.  Charities and organizations are hurting more than usual.   I get that.  Families are hurting - here and everywhere else.  I get that.  We do what we can - the hub and I are big into giving.  It's seriously our favorite thing to do with money.  But we're just not in a position to do as much as we'd like to this season.

 

And yeah, I know everyone says that.  But I really know this to be true because I'm a budgeting fool.  I'd like to say we could skip eating out a time or two and instead give that cash to a needy family.  Well, we don't eat out.  I'd like to say I could not go shopping this month and instead put that cash toward gifts for children at a shelter, but um... haven't bought myself a THING in over a year.  OK yes, dear readers... I did partake in the Old Navy $2 tank sale a couple of months ago.  Yes, yes I did.  But $40 over a 15 month period is pretty damn good.  Tank tops are my #1 wardrobe essential next to jeans.  (Do I need to keep justifying this?!)

 

Our Christmas spending this year was very well thought out and carefully crafted to obtain maximum dollar value for as little cash out of pocket as possible.  And I kicked some major ass this year.  We got over $1,100 worth of gifts (retail value), but only spent $370.  That's a personal record for sure.  And oh, how I laugh thinking of *old* me, who would've probably spent that much on myself while shopping for others!  hahahaha...  wow, have I changed. 

 

The hub and I do not get gifts for each other.  If you're broke, it's pretty ridiculous to, if you ask me.  A homemade card and making googly eyes at each other across the table have sufficed for all birthdays and holidays over the last year or so.  Last year we did actually adopt a kid at a local shelter and spent what we would've spent on each other, on her.  That was SO fun.  And so much better than any gift we could've gotten each other.  Now don't get me wrong - I love birthdays, I love Christmas, I love Valentine's Day and everything inbetween.  I love any reason to celebrate anything.  And I LOVE giving and getting gifts.  But we're just not in a position to do all that right now - so we're forced to get a little creative for the time being.  That's truly been fun.

 

And the budget's extra tight right now because the hub is on the job hunt.  We think he's getting really close, but it still makes for an uber tight budget for us till he's got something nailed down.  Which is fine - we're managing what we can and trusting God with the rest.  But it is what it is - which brings me back to my beef on people asking me for money left and right...  I ain't got none.

 

It's hard for me to say *no* sometimes to these kinds of things, but this year we've just had to.  Though I'd love to say *yes* to  ALL those who ask, we can only say yes to a few.  But for real, it just seems like we've gotten a flood of requests this year...  whether it be from church, small groups, work, friends, neighbors, the Publix check-out lady...  it's everywhere!  I so wish I could do it all.  But I can't. 

 

Some you can ignore (like the random blurbs in your neighborhood newsletter), but others you can't.  Like this week I got an email where someone actually assigned part of a gift for me to go out and buy for this family.  And they of course said "if you can't do it, no problem, let me know."  But I feel like a total Scrooge for saying "I can't."  And geez, does that mean someone else in the group has to pick up my slack?  Am I "that girl?"  Goodness.   But seriously, I'm all out.  We've given what we can give this month and we're out.  You've got my prayers but the ole wallet is empty.  God tells us to take care of our own household first, so a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.  (I gotta eat.)

 

But for real, have y'all felt like the amount of "requests" for donations and gifts, etc has like quadrupled since last Christmas?  I don't expect that to change.  But I know our situation will... and I can't WAIT to be able to give like crazy when it does.  Seriously, there's nothing more fun.  It's one of the things I look forward to most about being debt-free!

Two weeks till Christmas!

Happy Friday!  I love Friday.  Just popping in to say *hello*...  busy, busy as usual.  Work is keeping me busy, of course.  And this weekend we've got a couple of Christmas shindigs.  In other news, I'm also trying to get back into my routine of taking my basal body temp every morning, taking my prenatals, eating right, taking my baby aspirin, bleh bleh bleh, since we're planning to do another IUI in the next couple of months.  But I'm seriously having a hard time getting back on the wagon.  I started tracking my calories again this week - doing pretty good with that.  But the last 3 mornings I failed miserably in the attempt to get my temperature.  Once you get out of the habit with that, it's really hard to get back on it!  We'll try again tomorrow.

 

Oh and that plan to have all my gifts wrapped before December?  Yeah, fail.  I'm now envisioning a wrap-fest on December 24th.  It's a combo of other distractions and pure laziness.  All I want to do when I get home at night is plop myself on the couch.  Goodness.  And the fact that it gets dark at 5:30pm does NOT help.  I totally operate by daylight hours and my brain just shuts down along with the sun.  I turn into a vegetable.

 

Alright...  piles of work await me here.  Hope you all have fabulous weekends filled with holiday cheer!  Back soon...

Wow, it's December!

Hope you all had a fab Thanksgiving! We sure did. I took a few pics of our "buffet" - I'll post them when I'm at my 'puter. And of course the long weekend was wrapped up with a beautiful we-beat-Georgia-Tech bow! Oh man... I feel redeemed! Our record is AWFUL this year, but if I could only choose *one* game to win, it'd be the Tech game.

And speaking of Georgia... can you believe PETA is after UGA for its treatment of Uga? OMG. I'm a huge, huge, HUGE animal lover but PETA drives me insane. I do think some of their positions are sound, but give me a break. A robotic dog to replace Uga? First of all, NO. Second of all, Uga is arguably the most popular collegiate mascot of all time. He's been on the cover of Sports Illustrated. He's been in movies. And for the love of dogs, Uga is treated better than most humans! I've personally been INSIDE his custom dog house that he sits in during the games. It's like a doggie spa. Seriously? If this is your top "concern" right now, PETA, then I'd say things are going pretty well in the animal world. A robot dog. Seriously. You obviously DON'T get football either.

Anyway... geez. So this weekend I've got a couple of parties lined up. We've got a couples' shower we're attending for Lucky and then I'm co-hosting our annual girls' Dirty Santa party on Sunday afternoon. It's a yearly must! And that's *dirty* as in the claws come out during our gift exchange (the gifts themselves aren't dirty). I'm sure most of y'all have played this in some form or fashion, but here's how we do it...

Guests are instructed to bring a wrapped $25 gift (one worth fighting over!). These are not gag gifts and we prohibit giftcards and bath gels. Yeah, we're pretty serious about it. Also we have everyone bring a dish to share (this makes it a very inexpensive party to throw!).

For the game, we draw numbers and the rules are as follows:

• The girl who draws #1 chooses a gift to open.
• Girl #2 can either open a new gift or take #1's gift. If #2 takes #1's gift, then #1 chooses a new gift to open.
• Girl #3 can take #1 or #2's gift, or open a new gift. If, say, #3 takes #1's gift, then #1 can either take #2's gift or open a new gift. Once a gift has been stolen in a "round," it can't be stolen again till the next round (i.e. #4's turn starts the next round).

So ideally, you want the highest number because you get to go last and have the pick of ALL the gifts. I know some people play where #1 gets to go again at the end, but we don't do that. If you draw #1, tough shit. Better luck next year! And a lot of people also put a limit on the number of times any one gift can be stolen. We don't do that either (except within a round). It can get pretty heated - it's so fun - especially being all girls. There's usually one or two gifts that get stolen round after round and it's a fight to see who will ultimately end up with them! Good times...

Alright, off to get some more work done. Just wanted to say *hi* while I munched on my Lean Cuisine here. Back later!