New Car Envy

  By E.M. | April 22, 2014 - 10:35 AM |
35 Comments

What is it with people around me and new cars? My aunt and uncle just leased a brand new Mazda 5, my cousins leased a new car, and then my co-worker’s fiance traded his car in for a gently used Hyundai Sonata.

I guess after a brutal winter some people wanted an upgrade!

new car envy

When new car envy strikes

My co-worker couldn’t handle it, though. Her fiance had just started working from home, and she wanted to take his car everywhere. Apparently he was a little hesitant to let her drive it, so I’m not sure if she got around to doing that. This caused her to have some new car envy. So much so, that she was considering trading in her 2009 Toyota for something in the 2010-2011 range.

What?!

Let’s back up a little here. Her fiance works with car dealerships, and one of them was willing to do an even trade-in. They valued her car at around $10k, so this seemed like a no-brainer to her. She could upgrade to an SUV to handle the winter better, and possibly get a newer car with lower mileage.

She … Keep Reading →

Being Grateful: Twenty-Third Edition

  By E.M. | April 20, 2014 - 8:41 AM |
26 Comments

Hello everyone! I feel like I’ve missed out on so much after being MIA for a week. I feel terrible about not being able to read my usual blogs, but researching apartments and areas to live took up a lot more time than I thought it would. Thank you to all of you that stuck with me through the move and wished us luck!

A quick re-cap of my week:

Sunday: Slept at my parent’s after an eventful move that took us 22 hours. We were exhausted, but we left for the hotel in NC at around 8pm.

Monday: Woke up early to arrive at the storage unit. My parents drove the truck up, and we placed everything in storage. R went to work for a half day, I treated my parents to lunch, and then took a nap until R got back to the hotel. Unfortunately, we both had stomach aches from something, so we didn’t even get to go out and explore.

Tuesday: Looked at a few apartments based on R’s coworker’s recommendations. Continued to research as we didn’t want to jump on the first thing we viewed. Of course, the first apartment we saw was very nice!

… Keep Reading →

Moving: Part Two

  By E.M. | April 18, 2014 - 6:30 AM | ,
17 Comments

We left off with the truck breaking down on us and having it towed to the nearest Penske facility. We were surprised to find them open as we had been told it would be another hour of waiting, but someone had been called in. This was great because it allowed us to start the whole packing process right away.

Packing again

MovingSomehow R got a second wind here and was vigorously transferring boxes and furniture over to the new truck. To make it easier, my dad backed the trucks up to one another so we could easily cross between both.

It wasn’t a happy time, but we didn’t have any choice at this point, so we made the best of it. I believe it only took us about an hour to have the other truck ready to go. This was mostly because my dad is awesome at packing things to fit well. I can always count on him to find a way, which also came in handy at the storage unit!

On the road again

We left renewed and ready to try and hustle our way to the storage facility. It … Keep Reading →

Moving: Part One

  By E.M. | April 15, 2014 - 7:28 AM |
36 Comments

Hi everyone! I’m sorry that I’ve been a bit MIA since the move. Things have been a little crazy, and not entirely in a good way. I figured I owe you all an update at least on how the actual move went!

Since we ended up being on the road for 22 hours instead of the 14 we thought it would take, I’m breaking the updates up into two parts.

Physical Move

I have to say, none of this would have been as easy if my dad and R weren’t there. They did the majority of the lifting and hauling stuff out to the truck. My grandma also came to help, which was really nice. My mom did the majority of the packing, but she was still transporting boxes to the truck. R’s mom stopped by to say farewell and helped out a little as well. Me? I was at work!

When I came home, the truck was loaded, but they had taken a break from packing the rest of the little things laying around to make dinner. This would come to be a slight problem later on. After dinner my parents went to sleep. We needed all the rest … Keep Reading →

Being Grateful: Twenty-Second Edition

  By E.M. | April 11, 2014 - 7:43 PM |
26 Comments

It’s Moving Day! I can’t believe it’s actually here. I have to say, it still hasn’t sunk in that I’ll be in a different state by tomorrow. I feel like I’ll still be waking up to go to work. In just a few hours we will be on our way.

While I’ll be closer to my parents, I am leaving the rest of my family and friends behind. I’ll even miss my coworkers. The nice thing is that one of them is getting married in July, and my mom and I are planning to fly up and attend together. I’ll be able to visit everyone then. After that, who knows!

being grateful

I have so much to be grateful for this week. It’s been a long and short week all in one, with all the packing we did and the counting down. I still feel like it’s Tuesday!

I am grateful that we got to see our friends one last time. We also went to a fun trivia night at a bar not too far from us. Each table got a free pizza, there wasn’t even a cover charge! That’s hard … Keep Reading →

March Budget Review

  By E.M. | April 9, 2014 - 6:30 AM |
32 Comments

This is the week of reviewing, apparently! I know it’s a little late; I honestly can’t even remember much of what happened at the beginning of March. I’m a little ashamed to say I had to question a few things on our statements. “What the heck did we spend $60 on at WalMart?” Not good. We threw out most of our receipts since R was cleaning out the drawers, so hopefully my memory is correct!

March felt like a really long month and I’m not too pleased with our spending. What’s done is done, though I don’t feel as good not knowing what this month will look like at all.

March Budget Review

march budgetI finally joined the $1,000 club in terms of my student loan payment! This is kind of thrilling to see. Normally, I can’t contribute this much since I don’t make a whole lot at my job, but with my tax return, it was possible. I now owe just $2,267 on my smaller loan. I really want to knock this out, but I’m holding off until after the move. Unfortunately, I won’t have any income once that happens, so … Keep Reading →