Window treatments on the cheap

Well, this comes at a good time since the curtains mentioned in the previous post are the kind that you need the fancy pants curtain rods and not the cheapy metal ones. We didn't want to spend money on new curtain rods so I thought we'd just suffer with the ugly ones utnil we found a deal on the nice ones.

Over here at Thrifty Fun.com, someone posted about how they created curtain rods from PVC pipe, drapery rod finals (decorative ends) and drapery brackets. Then they painted it all with a metalic paint, and viola! - curtain rods that look super nice, but were not near the cost of the real thing.

Great idea - I'll let you all know when we end up doing this.

More winterizing

Finally got the insulated curtains up in our living room (thanks dad!), and also put up two more sets of insulated curtains that I bought used online for a stellar price (thanks LadyTS!)

The house feels warmer already!

Amazon Price Drop Policy

Saw this on Lifehacker this morning.

Apparantly, Amazon.com has a policy that if you buy something and the price drops within 30 days, you are entitled to a refund! You can go into your Account to view purchases made in the last month, and if you find that the price has lowered, go to this page and request a refund. That simple.

Good timing on this - now you can take advantage of all the after Christmas sales even now!

Back to normal

Hope everyone had a great Christmas! iDid! ;)

I had to work two nights third shift and now I have vacation until Friday. No big plans yet for Saturday/Sunday - just regular church, so we can't really go out of town or anything.

Well I thought I had a lot to say, but I guess I don't.

Budgetting for 2006

I've been working on our weekly budget again, in preparation for 2006. Fun, I know.

I started a new way of budgeting our bills a few months ago and it's working really, really well. We used to have to drain our savings account every few months, but not any more.

First what I did was write down every monthly bill we have, every yearly bill we have (like car insurance), and anything big we are planning to spend our money on (like Christmas, or car tune up, or a PS3, etc.). Then I divided everything up by the week. For example, our phone bill costs $23 per week, and our car insurance bill would cost $15 per week. I did this by the week because that's how often Brent gets paid, but you can do it depending on your pay schedule. So I added up all my weekly calculations and came up with about $175. We would have to spend $175 out of each of Brent's checks in order to pay our bills this year, and save up for some fun stuff too.

Secondly, I set up a fake account in Quicken. I didn't actually set it up in a bank, it's just in Quicken - named Budget Account. Then I set up a reminder to pay our Budget Account $175 every week. So once a week our Budget Account grows and our Checking Account shrinks. But the money is not actually coming out of our bank, it just looks like it is. So we may actually have $500 in the bank, but our checking account says $100 because the other $400 is sitting in the Budget Account, waiting for bills to pay. This is the important part for me, personally. When the checking says we have $500, I'll forget about the new tires we'll need next month or sister's birthday that is coming up - we'll just spend it. But if the account says $100 then we'll be more frugal about our spending because the other money is already earmarked for something else. Does this make sense? I feel like I’m doing a poor job of explaining. Oh well.


Anyway, right now I’m working out what we'll have to save for each week in 2006. We are getting rid of cable so that can be taken off the list, but we're hoping to have a baby next year so that is $2500 we have to save for a home birth. It's kind of exciting looking forward to the new year and planning what may come to be.

A Month of Reusing - Reuse Books

Reuse books. The library is obviously the best resource for this. But, if you simply must buy the book, you can always buy it used on Amazon, and then re-sell it at the same place when you're finished with it. Or, there are places like Bookcrossing.com (n. the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise.) and Titletrader.com (a book swapping website) that you can send and receive books for the price of postage.

A Month of Reusing - Reuse Water

Reuse water. If you're anything like me, you go to clean the house and you will find eighteen different half-full glasses strewn about the house. Why dump that down the drain? It takes energy to recycle water, just like any other resourse. I have a pitcher that I keep by the sink that I dump 'old water' in - when I gets full, I use it for watering my plants or soaking the nastier pots and pans. There are so many different things to reuse the water from all your water-using appliances, but since we rent and don't own our house, we can't very well go around replacing and rewireing everything. But maybe you can.

Happy Winter

Sorry about the lapse in posting - blogger was giving me some problems. Thank you, Josh for fixing this for me. Here is an article for you, Josh, and anyone else who lives in NYC right now. Booo to transit worker strike!

The Homer family is furiously getting ready for Christmas, both at home and at church. All the gifts are purchased and almost all are wrapped - I'll probably finish that today. Brent is working day and night on the Christmas Eve service, and then his body decided to revolt on him and he got a nasty cold. I'm sure he's sick of all the soup I've been feeding him.

Since it's the first day of winter, here is an article about how to lower your heating costs. I'm still not done winterizing. I tried to plastic the windows yesterday, but I found that the roll of plastic was too narrow for most of my windows, so I don't really know what to do. I guess I'll have to buy some different stuff. I'm also looking at buying some thermal curtains from a friend, so that will be helpful too.
Stay warm everyone!

A New Endeavor

My latest pursuit has been becoming the unofficial webmistress for my church's website. I really, really enjoy working on it, although it takes up much more time than I thought it would. I'm learning so much - about Photoshop especially.

Please check it out, and if you're ever in the Sheboygan area - come visit Praise Fellowship some weekend!

A Month of Reusing - Reused Building Material

Reused building materials. Habitat for Humanity has stores where they sell used and surplus building materials for less than retail cost. The profits go toward building more houses. Win-win situation for all. Find out if there is a store near you here.

Menu of Hope

Chez Pim started the second annual Menu for Hope just a few days ago, and already raised over $4000. Menu for Hope is a chance for all her readers to donate money towards a good cause (last year was the Tsunami victims; this year is the victims of the earthquake in Pakistan and India), and for every $5 you donate, you are entered a ticket in a raffle with prizes donated by herself and other food bloggers.
This is no ordinary raffle, either. Some of the prizes are making my mouth water already. Chez Pim has donated a $200 gift certificate to Manresa in Los Gatos, California. Other generous bloggers have given a variety of food gormet food baskets, books and gift certificates.

I'm definitely entering.

Day late and a dollar short

Since we were out of town, I didn't get to update the carnival listings on Monday, so here they are, a couple of days late.

Carnival of Personal Finance hosted by Wealth Junkie

Carnival of Debt Reduction hosted by Blueprint for Financial Prosperity

Carnival of the Green hosted by Jen's Green Journal

And, the first ever, Festival of Frugality at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity

I've got a lot of catching up to do!

A Month of Reusing - Reuse your cell phone

Reuse your cell phone. There are dozens of different charities that will take your used cell phone and donate it to someone else to use again. There might even be a drop off location at your cell phone store. Otherwise you can go to wirelessrecycling.com to find a drop off point near you.

A Month of Reusing - Reuse your wedding dress

Reuse your wedding dress. Well, hopefully you're not reusing it your second wedding…. Remember how much you loved your wedding dress when you first saw it? Someone else will feel that way too. You can donate it to a few places that will resell it and also give some profits to chairty also.
The I Do Foundation This place will give 20% of the dress profit to a charity of your choice.
The Bridal Garden All the profits from the resale of your dress will go to supporting Sheltering Arms - a charity focused on helping disadvantaged children in NYC. This is where I sent mine.
Making Memories.org The profits from the sale of your dress will go toward breast cancer research.
These three places are only a few of many places that will use your treasured wedding dress for another cause.

Carnival Listings - December 5, 2005

Carnival of Personal Finance hosted by Frugal Underground (woohoo - my first carnvial sumbission here)

Carnival of Debt Reduction - hosted by FreeMoneyFinance.com

Carnival of the Green - hosted by The Greener Side

A Month of Reusing - Reuse Christmas Cards

Reuse last year's Christmas cards. They make lovely gift tags, or you could cut them up and make your own original Christmas cards to send out this year.

A Month of Reusing - Reuse anything

Reuse anything. Goodwill, Salvation Army, St. Vincent de Paul - all are great thrift stores where you can give your old things, or buy things for yourself. You will be surprised at the things you can find at these stores - practically anything you need.

December - A Month of Reusing

If you can't reduce the stuff that comes into your home, you can always reuse it after you are finished with it, or maybe someone else can reuse it for another purpose. Send me your reusing tips and I'll post them up this month.

"We are not to throw away those things which can benefit our neighbor. Goods are called good because they can be used for good: they are instruments for good, in the hands of those who use them properly."
Clement of Alexandria

Socially Responsible Investing

Brent and I filled out paperwork for his 403(b) yesterday. A new benefit at his job, starting next year. Brent's employer chose AG Financial for their investment company. They chose that company because their investment strategies fall in line with what they believe in. From their website:

A/G Financial investment strategies screen out those companies that are predominately known for and/or derive significant revenues from abortion, alcohol, gambling, pornography, or tobacco. The MBA Fixed Income Fund provides the financing to plant, build, and grow churches.

Brent and I also started a Savings Account (through payroll deduction) with them. The Savings plan money goes to fund loans taken out by other Assembly of God churches and employees (maybe even our own church). Again, it's something we believe in.

Our business loan is through a bank that notorious for helping out small community businesses. Our checking account is in a credit union run by my employer. If you only ever drink Coke products, why would you want to invest in Pepsi Co.? If you're a vegan, why would you want to invest in the Texas Beef Council? Invest in what you know and love.

The bad news is, AG Financial's investments and savings plans are (as far as I know) only available for employees of the Assembly of God church. The good news is that there are hundreds of other socially responsible investment options. Here is a link to a list of some socially responsible investments. There are many more, if you just look for them.

Happy investing!