Oh how things have changed!

Well, leave me away for a couple months and it's amazing how many things change! My hubby and I are offically homeowners now. So many things just fell into place, and it's been wonderful. We got the keys November 30th to our home... 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, awesome yard, and it's ours! It needed some work, and while my mom wasn't able to contribute to the downpayment at all (we did finance 100%), she helped in so many other ways... she bought all the paint for the house (we had to paint the whole place), new carpet in the family room and bedrooms, and she gave us beautiful hardwood floors to install in the kitchen, dining room, entry way, and hallway. My dad brought a bottle of champagne; it's amazing how different they are! Regardless, we couldn't be more estatic!!

Money has been interesting. As if now having a mortgage to take care of, I was laid off from my job in November (actually, my last night was the night before we got the keys to the house). They're pretty sure I'll start working again as soon as things pick up, but honestly, I'm not sure when that is going to happen. On the upside, work is continuing to pay for our internet and I did get to keep my computer. The whole month of December I was able to still get money flowing (severance pay and my vacation hours), and I'm now collecting unemployment while I figure out what to do. In addition, a good friend of the hubby's is living with us and giving us $400 a month to contribute towards bills (in addition to him buying most of the groceries and cooking dinners almost every night!). AND, I've started baby-sitting a friend's children two days a work. We'll see! :)

I need to sit down and come up with a new budget again. As expected, we have experienced many new costs in owning the house, and there have been plenty of things that we've had to charge. If memory serves, our credit card debt is back up, but not quite the highest it's ever been. The reason is we had to buy a new refridgerator for the house, and while we did have some money saved (about $2,000) I decided to charge it at a promotional interest rate and save the money incase we need it (car payments, etc.). So far so good, and I think we're doing okay!

I'll do some good old fashion number crunching here in the next couple days and start a new budget. I still can't believe this house is OURS! :O)

Wouldn't you know it...

So not too long ago I posted about wanting a house, bad. I said we were going to start saving mucho money for it. Well, we didn't. Instead all extra money went towards debt, and we've been doing a really good job.

So the other day I'm driving to my dad's house and I see this new development. Out of curiousity I drive through, and they're putting in new houses and townhouses. Mind you, this is the part of town Hubby and I have been DREAMING to live in, but houses are just way too expensive. Well, we could have a townhouse built in our budget. Nice new neighborhood, families starting out just like us, a park in the middle, nearly everything but the picket fence. We could live there for 5-7 years, and then when our daughter is older (we plan on having more children), we'll upgrade. Thing is, we have no money to put down. So I've been looking into first home-buyer programs, and because of the state of everything right now, no one is very eager to lend with 0 down. I feel crushed. I'm still going to try and see what we can do, but I just don't know what is going to be feasible. I'm telling you... it's perfect. Bleh....

Dr. Bills... Bleh...

I swear, they just keep coming in. I had my daughter 4 months ago, and we just keep getting more and more bills in the mail. Not as much is going to be able to go towards the damn cards this month because I need to start factoring these bills into everything too. I've paid down about $800, have about another $1400 to go, and that is WITH INSURANCE! I can't imagine having a baby without insurance. I love my daughter with all my heart and she is worth every penny and then some.... the bills just suck!

I'm $9 away from breaking $14,000 for our credit cards! That's awesome, and I'm stoked! Hubby isn't making as much because he's not doing the overtime, so that's about $500 less a week. On top of that, it's really slow at my work, so my paychecks have been close to $100 less a week. The timing sucks with the holidays coming up, but we're planning ahead. I also have a bunch of family birthday's around the same time, so I'm trying to start now with everything. Our daughter is young, so she won't know the difference.

Speaking of our beautiful daughter, she's going to be a fabulous pumpkin for Halloween this year! There was an adorable costume at Old Navy I've been eyeballing, and it was 50% off finally today so I got it for her. Not sure what we're doing, but it'll be cute to dress her up regardless :0) The pumpkin is going to be a tradition with our children... they'll all be a pumpkin for their first Halloween!

Things are progressing!

We've been doing a pretty good job lately if I do say so myself! :) Hubby is still working out of town, but no more 10-hour days. This means less money for each paycheck and more gas money spent, but it is soooo great to have him home again. Those weeks where his checks where large was awesome, cause any extra money we put straight towards the cards. I know I could tighten our budget more, and I'm working on it, but so far all my goals are working out. I'm not sure if we'll be able to meet the goal for credit card debt down to $11,000, but we're going to try. Once we get this debt down a little more, we're going to start some IRA's too... just in an attempt to plan for the future!

The housing market is crazy, so we're just hanging out for now. Each week we're continuing to put at least $100 into another account, which has been working out quite nicely. It's just so damn expensive here... makes everything harder it seems.

So far so good!

Nothing too exciting to report, financially speaking. Hubby is still working out of town, so me and the bebe are just staying home, which is saving money that I would spend otherwise. Hubby did a great job at not spending money while out of town too! Managed to put nearly $500 towards debt this week; would have been more but we got daughter's pictures taken and I didn't want to conserve since she's only this little once.

I'm pretty sure we've managed to put nothing, yes, NOTHING, on the cards this month! Whoo hoo! :)

I want a freaking house!

I've been looking at some stuff online tonight, and I feel very depressed. I feel like we'll never get a house. With the way the market is right now, we're going to need a hefty chunk of change to get in, and I feel like I'm in this moral delima of figuring out which to put money towards- debt, or savings. I think I'm going to continue to put $1000 a month towards credit cards, but work more aggressivly towards saving money. House and emergency fund are just becoming savings in general, and I'll figure out the other part later.

Bleh. The upside is Hubby was offered big bucks... 10 hour days, 6 days a week. This is huge cash for him. The downside? It's 2.5 hours away, so he's going to stay with a friend. He's been working down there for the last couple weeks and driving home each night, but a 10 hour-day is a lot different than a 8 hour-day, especially when you factor in the driving time. Looks like I'm going to experience single-motherhood, but the upside is I won't be doing much so I should be spending any more money.

Labor day weekend...

It was so nice to have a three-day weekend. Hubby and I had a BBQ on Saturday and a bunch of friends came over. As expected, it cost us a pretty penny, but there are just some times when you have to give in (maybe??). Sunday and today we just hung out around the house, and even sold my desk to a wonderful woman off craigslist.

Perhaps the most exciting news to me is that we got our new table... and also two stackable shelving units that I've been wanting for a long time. We still have boxes of dishes and what-not recieved as wedding gifts stashed in a closet, and it was time to get them out. I totally scored too... the desk was normally $299.99, but on sale for $199.99, and I had a 10% off coupon making it $179.99. The shelving units each are normally $139.99, but were on sale for $99.99 and using the same 10% off coupon, we go tthem for $79.99 each! Like I said, the whole thing was too good of a deal to pass up, especially since I've been wanting them for the last year. We're a little tight on money now until we get paid this week, but bills are good, and credit cards are on track.

All in all, a great weekend and after the BBQ (and table/shelves) we didn't spend a time. Heck, we didn't even eat out! Yay for us!