February 1, 2017

January/February Goals/Results

I decided to group goals into two months this year instead of one. Sometimes one month isn't long enough and a season is too long for me. Here's what worked and didn't work. So far.



1. Yoga challenge.


2. Watch all the Star Wars movies. 1 1/2 more to go. I got to multi-tasking during Return of the Jedi the other day.


3. Play chess every day. This is a long story but Scott is really good at chess, and he won't play me until I "get better". So I play several games a day on my phone.


4. Read 50 pages a day. This is hard to measure on a Kindle. I originally set this because I was plowing through a stack of library books. My overall goal for the year is 75 books and I did 7 in January, so I'm on track.


5. Track spending in January. December is always a bit of a hemorrhage. I haven't been buying much in January, other than necessities. It's not always about saving money; it's more about knowing where money is going so I can realize my habits. Obviously, the Kindle book-buying got a little out of hand, but that's okay. Note: I haven't actually read any of these books I bought but it makes me happy just knowing they're there.

Key:
Unnecessary things
Kind of unnecessary things
Food
Necessities

Teachers Pay Teachers $5
Groceries $150
Safeway $13
Gas $20
Starbucks $9 (it was a gift)
Chewy $50
Rodan and Fields $80
Audible $14
Safeway $11
Target $25 (book that was a gift gift + headbands for ball)
Printer ink $42
Panda Express $14
Commissary $99
Safeway $31 (included buying a gift card)
Car wash $9
Gas $20
Books $6
Post Office $2.26
Safeway $10.98
Dick's Sporting Goods $132 (birthday money)
Dentist $19 (oral cancer screening; the regular check/cleaning is free with our insurance but the screening was extra)
Gas $20
Payless $23 (clutch for ball)
Panda Express $13
Commissary $125
Mardel's $14 (new lesson plan book in hopes of motivating myself to do...anything)
Walgreen's $14 (cold medicine)
Commissary $132
PX $25 (HDMI cable)
Gas $20
Chewy $50
Book $3
Safeway for dog food (because this is me we're talking about and I didn't order from Chewy in time) $13
Vet $53 (Because this list wouldn't be complete without a vet visit)

Notes: I realize it looks like I spend a lot on food/groceries. I buy paper products, toiletries, etc all at same place, so it all gets wrapped up into the grocery bill. So vitamins (I buy a lot of vitamins) go into that too. Just the other day I bought new razors ($9) and something else and thought, Wow, that makes the grocery bill seem really high, when in fact, it's all necessities that get clumped together. Plus, I buy $12-18 worth of dental bones for the dogs every two weeks, so that adds onto the bill. Pets aren't cheap.
"Chewy" is the dog food company. It's about $45ish every 3 1/2-4 weeks for a bag of food, but if you spend $50, shipping is free. So I usually throw in a toy or treats to get total up to $50. I'm either going to pay $5 for shipping or get something for that $5.
Filling up my gas tank always costs around $20 so I round to that.

Also, I feel like I may be missing something. I was trying to keep track really well, but being sick last week threw me off for a couple of days.

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I may or may not add onto this goal list before the end of February. I think of things every day that could/should be on the list, but I always ask myself if it's something I actually want to do or can do to begin with. This also goes back to maintaining my perspective of things and how I perceive situations. This is also my solution to New Year's resolutions. You'll see no "Eat healthy!", "Exercise!", or "Read more!" on this blog. Vagueness is not the friend of success.

How about you? Goals? Resolutions? Progress?


8 comments:

  1. This month is brutal in terms of bills because December purchases are just wrapping up and my property tax bill came in with it so it was a real punch in the gut!

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  2. We have been focusing a lot on financial goals as well, we are focused on paying off my car this year. Based on the budget I have created we will be able to do that and it makes me incredibly happy.

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  3. Do you get reimbursed as a part of your classroom money for the TpT? I know some schools hate that teachers use that site (a few in this district are on that list) but I think its a good one.

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  4. I like your sorting method of necessary/unnecessary/ and in between. Angel's school closes for a week in December so January is always a 'slim' month as far as the budget is concerned, but it's kind of good that not much is going on so there's not much temptation to spend money anyways!

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  5. Have you heard of Scribd? For $9 a month you get 1 audiobook and 3 ebooks. I like it but don't use all my books every month. You can carry over to 9 books and 3 audiobooks total. Plus they always have 5-10 audiobooks for free. I don't know how it compares to audible but it seems like a good deal. I can send you a referral link if you want. That would give both of us a month free. I can't even with our budget. I just don't want to know :( Great way to approach life, huh?

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  6. This is pretty good with the tracking! I'm not tracking spending so much as making sure I don't spend at all in certain categories. Though I do track spending with YNAB so I guess I'm doing it both ways.

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  7. One of my goals this month was to track my expenses as well. Most of my purchases were not necessities- a lot of eating/going out. Looks like I'll need to reign it in for February. I only learned about the vagueness not being a friend in the last few years, so I try to be very specific too.

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  8. I want to do this spending tracking thing. I also really want to do an intense study of time tracking one week (perhaps a week that doesn't involve a move/settling in but then again I guess life is always going to be there, huh?). I think we need to get back on the Chewy.com train. I keep running out of dog food and it's embarrassing. And yes, pets are NOT cheap.

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