24 years ago today I married my DH.

We took in a movie yesterday and tonight we are heading to Red Lobster with DD2. My parents gave us a $50 gift certificate and I also have a coupon so hopefully that should cover us all.

Movie was seen with $2.00 of each ticket with a coupon from our Entertainment book. We went to a matinee so they were only $6.00 each. We also split a popcorn and soda. DH went in to use the restroom and found $5.00 on the floor! He later used $2.50 to treat me to my favorite coffee drink since he picked the movie two times in a row. I didn't mind....movie was pretty good...actually anything with Hugh Jackman in it is pretty good

and turned the heat on. Our beautiful Fall weather has taken a break and turned to yucky clouds and rain. It has been chilly here the past week (in the high 50's) and the house was at 67 so DH decided to turn on the heat.

We have a programable thermostat and it is set to 59 at bedtime and when we are away for the day and at 69 when we are home.

It is suppose to warm up a bit so hopefully we won't be using the heat much over the next few weeks.

DH and I finally went and got our passports done last Friday. Gosh! It was expensive. DH had to replace his since he can't find it. We have torn the house apart and also checked the safety deposit box. We have no idea where it is. In the end, he may have ended up having to replace it anyway since is was approximately 15 years old. Not sure if it was actually expired or not but they said it probably shouldn't slow it down much if at all.

I know he had it on the last cruise we went on in 2004 but now it is nowhere to be found. At that time, you weren't required to have a passport for a cruise so I just used a certified copy of my birth certificate. Of course, now, you need it for any travel outside the states.

Feels good to get it done but I had no idea it would be so much. $110 each and then $25 each to the city for handling/sending it in. Yikes!

Seems like everyone else had roastbeef today!

It's still summer here in my neck of the woods as school for dd2 doesn't start until after Labor Day. We will be sending dd1 off to her second year of college this Saturday and classes start on the 29th.

We have had a pretty low key summer. Haven't done much since we have our big cruise coming up in April.

We did take two trips to Seattle for dd2's club soccer team. That was fun. First trip we hit Pike's Market one day and the zoo the next. Had great weather so that was a plus. Second trip didn't have time to do much. We ended up watching the World Cup as a team between games. I had forgotten how much I hate Seattle traffic....ugh it is horrific!

Dh and I managed a 2 day trip to the beach. It was lot's of fun and we had great weather. We were able to explore a part of the coast we haven't spent much time on.

We have done some local things too...hit the big Portland Saturday Market downtown a couple of times, went to our local zoo, and have seen many movies. We are planning on hitting the state fair on Sunday. We are bringing dd2 and one of her friends. That will probably be it for our summer adventures.

Kids have had an ok summer too. DD1 went on 2 short road trips with friends, some movies, a concert, and a weekend at the lake with her boyfriends family. DD2 had 3 soccer tournaments, a week at a lake resort with her best friends family, movies,soccer camp, and a day trip to a water park. They also came along with us to the local zoo and market.

So, all in all a pretty decent if low key summer...nothing wrong with that. We try to balance the expensive vacations with low key ones at least every other year if not more. Now that dd1 is in college, I doubt we will have many if anymore family vacations for a long time.

I am so ready for Fall and school to start. Really ready to get back into a routine. I find I am much more focused on everything when in a routine and not the lazy days of summer.

Making good progress on the suv loan. I miscalculated and thought a month ago we were below $10k....turns out now we are at $9500...not sure what I was thinking. Anyway, feels good to be under that $10k mark. Still sending $500 a month to Ford even though there are a few tight weeks here and there.

I guess that's about it for now. Good night all!

Are we headed for another recession? There was an article in our paper the other day that it looks as if we are headed that way. Personally, I am not sure I ever really believed we came out of the last one.

I know "the numbers" said we had but I can't imagine that people that lost their jobs and haven't been able to find a new one would believe it either.

Lots of money going out this month.

Starting out with DD'2 16th b-day. Spent about $100 on her gifts. She also had 3 friends over to celebrate. Part of the cost for the food was for myself, dh, and dd1. Got gourmet cupcakes $19.50 (coupon used), pizza $30.00 (Pizza Hut special) and a movie for 4, $32.00 (used Regal Entertainment coupons). We are also having a family potluck on Sunday so that will be low cost.

DD2 has a 4 day soccer tournament coming up the 25th. We will be heading out of town for 3 or 4 nights. We were hoping to avoid a hotel stay Friday night but it turns out their first game is at 8:00am on Saturday. Since it is a 2 1/2 hr drive we will have to drive up and stay Friday night. What really gets me is that for these out of town tournaments is that they force you to stay in hotels they have arranged.(The club that is putting on the tournament that is) The girls room together so theirs is a shared cost there, plus dh and my room, and we all have to split the cost of the coaches room. Is it bad to hope that only 1 of the coaches will come Plus it is a lot of meals out. We will have to see what is planned for that. Usually they like the team to eat together and do activities together. I am ok with eating together as long as we are not eating at spendy places every day. I know I am not the only one who feels that way. We won't have dd1 as she will be working Monday through Friday and won't be coming with us. We will have to see what kind of activities are planned as we only have 1 game a day Sat, Sun and Mon and depending on how we do, possibly Tuesday. We will be in South Seattle so a trip into town and the waterfront may be in the works.

We are ok with all of this though....playing club sports comes with a price....literally but we have made many friends over the years and lots of memories and we feel it is an investment in our kids. Well worth it (most of the time) in our opinion. It's not for everyone but it works for us

I also forgot to mention that we also booked our cruise! We are starting to pay for it now so when the time comes it will be all paid for. We have paid the $600 deposit, $80 in gratuities, and also travel insurance. After some summer expenses are over, we will have her run through more on the card so it will be fully paid for by the time we leave, including shore excursions which you can book online and pay for in advance. Just hoping we can get some good airfare!

A couple of exciting happenings in our household yesterday and today.

Yesterday day was DD2's 16th birthday....wow does time go fast! Took her out to dinner at Red Robin for a special treat. This weekend will be taking her, her boyfriend, best friend, and possibly one more friend to a movie and then back to our house for pizza and "gourmet" cupcakes. The 19th we will have a family celebration potluck style. Spent a bit on her gifts but we are going to end up taking one back. Got her a fancy dancy curling/flat iron but she doesn't care for it so we will exchange for something else. It was one of the rather expensive ones but hey....you only turn 16 once right? And in our house hair is very important Also got her a $25 gift card to Ulta so she can go buy things that I won't like super expensive hair and make up products

Today DD1 found out she got a job she had applied for. It it through the YMCA for summer day camps....totally up her alley being the sports nut she is. It's been a bit of a process....application and letter sent, job closed on the 22nd of May. Had to wait until the following week to see if she would even get an interview. Finally interviewed on June 4th...short one on one interview and then it was mostly group activities....everyone had to teach a "camp" type game and they all had to participate. Waiting all week to see if she got it. Got the e-mail this evening. They will have training from the 20th to the 23rd and then the weekly camps start on the 27th. She is available all summer so hopefully she will get called every week. Not exactly sure how it works, just that the more available and flexible you are the more weeks you will work. It's also great because it pays a bit more than minimum wage which is $8.50 here in Oregon. The hours are perfect....8:30 to 2:30 Mon thru Fri. She has been applying around town and may keep doing so to see if she can get something a couple of nights a week or maybe on the weekend. It's great also because the camps run right until the last week of August. She goes back to college on the 28th of Aug.

It's a happy night here in our house.

My oldest dd is in college about 1 to 1 1/2hrs away(depending on traffic).

She FINALLY received a phone call for an interview for a hostess position at a local steakhouse about a mile from home. She has been applying for jobs constantly for the past month or so hoping to find work for the summer. We were so excited!

Only problem? They wanted to interview her today at 3:30....ok...that works with her schedule but sucks to have to drive that far just for an interview. So home she comes....she gets to the interview and is there for about 2 minutes before the girl tells her "we don't hire only for the summer". Really? You KNEW where she was driving from (from the phone conversation), KNEW from her application that she is a current college student! And she had the stupidity to ask her if she was going to commute! She then said "oh I guess I should have asked you about that" (her location she meant)

DD called me at work in tears. I got home and she just started crying. I felt so bad. She drove all that way and had to put gas in her tank (we are now almost a $4.00/gallon). On top of that, she was going to stay for dinner so she didn't have to drive back in rush hour traffic and then ended up having to leave soon after I got home because she had to get back to school by 7:00 for somethiing to do with housing next year. She is also going to miss dinner at school because the dining hall will be closed by the time she gets there so I loaded her up with snacks.

Oh....I am just so angry....you can bet we won't be going to that place to eat....EVER!

Sorry for the rant....just had to vent!

Had been holding steady for a while now. On my way home from work I noticed several stations have hit $3.93

I just realized it's been over 2 weeks since I last posted.

We have been doing really well since we implemented the "low spend". The only money spent (other than regular bills, gas, groceries) has been on a few new clothes. I bought myself 2 new shirts 2 weeks ago. Our local Fred Meyer (Kroger) had a coupon for an extra 20% off clothing, plus I had my rewards coupon for 20% off 2 items of clothing that needed to be used before 4/23. Combined with both items being on sale, I got quite the bargain! Took dd2 2 weeks ago and got 4 shirts at Pac Sun for $42. We headed out today to look for a few more Spring clothing items and ended up at Payless Shoes and Old Navy. Had a 20% off shoes purchase and $10 off if you spent $50 at Old Navy. Was able to purchase dd 2 pairs of sandals and myself 1 pair of shoes (for work) and spent $54.00. Spent $42 at Old Navy on some Spring/Summer shirts for the 2 of us and got 6 items. She needs a few pairs of shorts but after that she should be pretty well set.

Oh, I almost forgot...dh bought new tires for his car and had it aligned. I guess you could call that a necessity He got a $100 rebate which he has already filed. Also received 2 free oil changes as they told him the car would only be there for about 2 hours and it ended up being there almost all day. He wasn't happy about that. He was going to need new tires anyway....I thought he was going to wait until summer but he found a pretty good deal so what could I say....he has to get work

So all in all, I would say we are doing well.

Hopefully we can keep at it!

Ugh....I've been draggin these past couple of weeks....been super busy at work and with the time change and all I will be glad to see this Friday.

Financially things are back and forth....last Friday dh and I hit Costco...$257 later we left......Saturday we took a short road trip to vist dd1 at college...went to an Air/Space Museum but only got to see the Air part....Space part was closed due to a food and wine festival....it was nice though that the admission was discounted since part of it wasn't open but we sprung for the IMAX movie so all in all I am not sure it really saved us any money...had breakfast (just dh and I) and lunch out but used a BOGO coupon on both...for lunch dd and I just split the sandwich and shared the drink.....we are cheap like that We also hit the college student store before we left.....dropped $85 on a couple of sweatshirts (50% off) a t-shirt for me, hat for dh and a couple of bumper stickers. Sunday dh and I went to a movie....had a free movie ticket (Regal rewards) and a coupon for $2 from the Entertainment book for the second ticket.....did spring for popcorn and a water though....absolutely cannot resist the popcorn.....I know.....bad, but oh so good All in all, a very fun weekend alebeit a spendy one.

Work has been crazy busy these past few weeks.....we have been short staffed for various reasons....staff members kids sick...vacations....someone was moving....ect....ugh! I am just exhausted.

I am looking forward to this coming weekend....dd1 will be home from college for Spring Break....I am taking Monday and Tuesday off and am spending it with my girls....we will try to find some free or cheap stuff to do but mainly just spend time together.

My last paycheck was a 9 day one...I hate those...most are 11 days with a 10 or 12 day one thrown in there here and there....I am so glad dh gets paid every other Friday no matter what....mine are the 15th and the last business day of the month...either the 30th or 31st.

I have more to write but at this point I am just ready to sit down and relax...have a nice evening!

Ugh! Saw a station today at $3.65 for regular! Yuck! I've seen prices anywhere from $3.37 up to the $3.65.....average is around the $3.50's....

Federal tax refund was deposited on Tuesday the 1st....we weren't even expecting it until at least the 4th....that's ok by us.

Also, for some reason, thought the refund was $2000......turns out it was $2600! Woo Hoo! Over to the cruise fund it goes.

Went and had our taxes done today.....I was a bit nervous thinking we might owe.

Well, we do owe the state about 130.00....figures, we always seem to owe the state.

The big shocker? Getting $2000 back from the feds......all due to the American Opportunity Credit.....our tax lady said to thank dd1 who is in college....without her and her college status we would have owed approx $600.

So, yay for us....this will go towards opening a new account to start funding our 25th anniversary cruise next year.

Now that the taxes are done, FAFSA must be completed....that is on my agenda for tomorrow morning.....ugh

After that, dd2 and I leave for a day of soccer....tournament on the other side of town....games at 2:30 and 8:30.....really....8:30pm? I am ticked....we probably won't even be home until 10:30 or 11pm.....then to top it off, we have to be back out there Sunday at 11:00 for another game.....if they place 1st or 2nd they will play in the final on Monday....of course, I have to work and so does dh. I am sure there will be someone that can drive her there and back.....

Have a nice weekend everyone!