The guy who said he’d buy our trailer for $300 down and then another $500 over 5 months has backed out because the landlord is an asshole.  So, after a few days of discussion DH and I decided to give it away.

I was sick today, some stomach bug or something but deinitely needed to be near a working bathroom all day (blech) and so couldn’t go work on cleaning out the old trailer like I’d planned. I decided to send 16 and her boyfriend over there to get as much done as they could. She said she got the living room and kitchen all clean, but didn’t touch the bedrooms which are what needed it the most of course.  While she was there I texted her to ask the neighbor who had backed out of buying if he would take the place for free.  We just asked that he’d pay April’s rent and give us one more week to get it all cleaned out and haul off the junk.  He said he’d mull it over and get back to me… he never called.

So, I put it on Freecycle.. or tried.  The ad never posted. I have no idea why.  So after a few hours I posted a short one and then sent the moderators an email asking why it was not approved and yes I really was giving away a 2 bedroom, 1 bath home.  Well, the co-mod wrote back and said she didn’t know why it was never approved, but now that she’d read about the place, she was interested in it for her adult kid who was paying too much for rent.  So I sent a very detailed email listing the stuff wrong with it and all the good stuff as well. It’s in an IDEAL location, (well other than the asshole landlord), and that helps a lot.  I mean hell, put about $5000 into the place and you could make it look like it was on HGTV. I know I could do it with that much anyway. heh. Well, she’s not replied either.  Maybe tomorrow will be a better day to give away a house.

Oh, and a couple days ago, DH had mentioned there was an email for him at work about bonuses and how to check what his would be etc.  He was set to get $3400…  but today he came home and said his store didn’t meat the goal to get hte bonus.  DAMN.  That money could have changed our lives.  It would have paid off his old medical bills and gotten us out of cash advances and right where we need to be.. a clean slate.  But no… we’re still a year behind on Dr bills and almost 2 months behind on electric.  I’m sick of having no money and  being so damn far behind.  I knew my ideas on money were really changing the last couple of times DH and I went to eat lunch together, I felt guilty. I know we need to pay these bills and get them off our backs. I’d rather have a PB&J sandwich and send the $20 we’d spend on lunch out to a Dr or save for his medication.

Hello again to those of you who actually read this blog! I am sorry I’ve been away so much.  Packing and moving and unpacking and trying a new sleep/awake schedule has made blogging pretty low on my list of daily things to do anymore.

I did however have to tell the tale of what’s happened so far today.. and it’s not even 9am yet.

I was talking to a co worker last night about how this morning was going to be busy, but should all go smoothly enough… well the problem was it all hinged on one thing – the bank’s computers. Today is 16’s Chorus Festival.  Her dress was taken to the dry cleaners Tuesday and we told them we’d get it Fri morning when they open at 7:30. The plan was this:  DH was to wake up 12 and 16, get 12 off to school on the bus. Then 16 was to get 6 and 11(she had a birthday) up and ready for school while DH put gas in the van and went back to the old trailer to find 16’s shoes for chorus because she forgot all about the shoes until last night. (We STILL haven’t gotten all our crap out of that trailer! It makes me nuts). Then he was to come back with shoes, get girls, take 6 and 11 to school, then take 16 to get her dress and pay for it.  Then 16 was going to take DH to work and drive the van on to school where she could change into the dress and shoes in time to do her door-holding task as the other schools arrived to compete.  This was all contingent upon my paycheck direct deposit going through and us being able to access it, because unfortunately even after the huge tax refund came and went, we’re back to living paycheck to paycheck.

So, here’s what really happened. At 11pm last night I checked the credit union site and my direct deposit was there, but the available credit was still zero. I kept checking it, but by the time I got off work and went to bed at 3:30am, it wasn’t available.  Well, when I woke up, DH was gone and 16 was doing a poor job of getting the kids out of bed.  DH had to yell at them when he got back. He also told me the gas station declined the debit card and his card wouldn’t work in our ATM. So he took my card and left again. The van must have been on fumes by then. 16 got the kids ready and after waiting and stressing on DH, she decided to take them to the bus stop and make sure they got on the bus ok.  (There’s been some morning drama at the bus stop with our 6 yr old, so we’ve been taking them instead of riding the bus normally).  So, anyway, DH got back and said the ATM wouldn’t give him any money.  So I went into Mom Mode. I got up and got dressed. When 16 got back, I got her phone and called the cleaners and asked if we could get the dress and pay for it when the bank opened, they said it would be OK.  16 wore black Crocs since she was supposed to wear comfy shoes to do door holding duty anyway. Then I took them both in the car which has plenty of gas – it just is missing lights and has expired tags.  I took DH to work, then went to the cleaners, got the dress, took 16 and dress to the performing arts center at the school and watched her walk into the building in the rain with horrible wet hair… praying she could borrow a hair brush from someone.  And now I’m back home.  The bank opens in a couple minutes and then even if the ATM doesn’t let me access my money, the teller will. Then I can put minutes on the phones, pay the cleaners, get cash for gas, come back and get the van, drive it to the gas station down the street and fill up the tank, drive to the old trailer and find 16’s black pumps – then text 16 to tell her I have the shoes and where to meet me outside the school…  then I go back to bed and try to get more sleep since I have now only had 3 hours of sleep.  Oh,… and to top it all off, my Mother in law is coming for dinner tonight.

Someone shoot me.

WARNING This is long and boring.

I have never been especially good at budgets.  Oh I can make one like a pro accountant, but I can’t stick to them. That has been our downfall over the past years and why we are still here. It sucks having that guilt on my shoulders, but the first step to recovery is admitting the problem right?

Well, I am facing this issue head on. I have tweaked and re-tweaked the family budget for the next 4-5 months and it’s going to work out just fine as long as we stick to it.   We switched to the high deductible medical insurance because it’s $200 cheaper per month, but it means prescriptions will be full price as will Dr visits until we get DH’s deductible met. It’ll mean the kids and my prescriptions will also be full price when they have any, but I was hoping that wouldn’t come up too often. (Now it looks like one will be on zoloft and one has a high dollar psohriasis prescription -sigh). So, I have to save money from the tax refund to have available to pay for his prescriptions and dr bills as soon as he needs them or get the bill. Thankfully presciptions count toward the deductible, so after about 3-4 months, they’ll have his deductible met and we can spend the rest of the year not worrying about anything but the low co-pays and the small % we would owe to Drs. That’s the plan anyway…  however…

There are other things we need/want out of this tax refund and our so-called disposable income.  So here’s a couple of options for the tax refund which we should get by the middle of Feb, depending on when we get the W2’s from one employer we both worked for early in 2007.

Tax refund est amount:  $4600

Option 1:
$400 16’s oral surgery
$500 Save for DH deductible
$200 my new desk chair
$2000 Medical bills
$500 Dollywood Season Passes (save $20 if ordered before Feb 25th)
$800 Remodeling the trailer
$200 DH iPhone

Option 2:
$400 16’s Surgery
$500 Save for DH Deductible
$2000 Medical Bills
$500 Dolly Wood season passes
$600 Remodeling the trailer and new desk chair
$200 iPhone for DH
$400 for down pmt on new car for 16 so she can get a job.

16 needs her back 4 molars pulled according to the dentist and after insurance pays their part, they say we’ll still owe $400 which has to be paid up front.  It’s only $200 if she doesn’t get anesthesia, but she wants it, saying she can’t stand the thought of being awake for it.  She’s a chicken and I’d prefer to stay awake, I hate anesthesia.  But I guess I need to be the good mother and get this done right. Good thing she doesn’t need braces. I’m not shelling out for those.
I *need* a new desk chair. I currently have an antique kitchen chair with two pillows on it and my ass still hurts after sitting here for an 8+ hour shift plus the time I surf the web and blog. In fact this week I had hemorrhoids.  NOT FUN! So, the chair is not optional, I must have one, and it must have arms, my arms are constantly poised on my kb or desk and I have to lean up and by the end of the shift I can barely move.    I also feel the Dollywood season passes are not negotiable. We used to go every year when 16 was little. It was always great cause opening weekend was on her birthday usually.  But we have not been back since 6 was born and she’ll be 7 this year.  Well, I take it back, we did all go ONCE when Brit and his g/f were visiting back in 2007. It had changed so much. It holds so many great memories for me and I can’t stand that our kids have not been able to enjoy those.  So, this year we’re going to go as often as we can and really enjoy ourselves.  Now, the remodeling the trailer is something that must be done.  This is for my own sanity. I may even take a week’s vacation to do it. We must get the front door replaced with a good door with a screen storm door attached. Non-negotiable.  Then the living room floor MUST be ripped up and all weak/rotten spots fixed – we can do this with a circular saw and a jig saw.  I might rent a nailgun – not sure yet.  They look dangerous.  Then we are laying down a good quality padding and then laminate wood floor.  Friend said he’d come help me install it since he’s done it before in two houses.  Ideally, I want to do the kitchen floor as well, but we’ll see how much the door costs first.  If I’m very very lucky, I can get all those things done and still have the money to buy a good used portable dishwasher.  There is one at the used appliance store in town where I bought my dryer. I’m hoping I can get a good deal on it, especially if I take in our old dryer (that’s pretty new actually and probably has nothing big wrong with it).  Then I’m ripping out one of the lower cabinets, and sitting the dishwasher in that space. It should fit just right. If all goes well, I’ll run the laminate flooring in there and it will go into the corner as well, so it looks finished and nice.    Now the last thing on the list of Option 1 seems odd and wasteful, but to be honest, DH never gets anything. He’s been silently doing without new things, even new underwear and socks when he needs them so that the kids get things they need, or I go splurge on something for the house etc. He has his check deposited into the checking account and often never sees any of it.  So I promised him that was going to change. His current phone is not holding a charge well and he hates that he can’t go to links he gets in texts he gets from Twitter. So when we went to look at new phones, he saw the iPhone and fell in love, and the thought of being able to put media on it straight from iTunes made it even better.  So dammit he’s getting an iPhone!  More than likely we won’t pass the credit check and will have to pay a deposit. I’m not thrilled about that, but I told him, we’d find the money for it somewhere – there is a budget for miscellaneous in the monthly budgets, so we may have to say up for it.  I’m sure we have to pay a month’s service ahead of time as well or something – that’s $99/month.

Now option 2 takes some money away from other things and puts $400 toward a car for 16.  I think this is actually the one we’ll go with, though it will mean waiting on a lot of my home improvements and budgeting more of DH’s deductible money and medical bills from our paychecks themselves.  I did some fancy moving around of numbers there let me tell you.  There is a lot of money coming in with our current jobs now, I’ve just never handled it well, so it doesn’t show.  So, I was able to budget money for more home improvements, the full $1500 of the medical deductible, the rest of the $2500 in medical bills and even have room for an iPhone bill and another car pmt (small one). – all by the end of April.  In fact, in May, I have a chunk of money that’s no longer going toward those things and is just sitting there looking at me…  So I figured whynot a vacation?

Dh and I have been thinking of going to FL to visit his grandparents so they can see the kids again.  I think it’s been 3 years since they saw them.  But he doesn’t want to go really.  He says he doesn’t want to see them as old and dying…  I think that’s incredibly selfish and I told him so.  But, we may just use the money and get a motel room in Pigeon Forge for a few days and spend all day in Dollywood or the motel pool and playing minigolf or something.  It’s not a lot of money, just about $500, but I think it’ll do for that.    Still undecided on that.

But anyway, none of that will happen if we don’t stick to the budget. I am so horribly bad at sticking to them, but this past week, I did really well.  I didn’t spend anything without checking the budget first, and even noticed, it was DH who kept asking to get this or that even after his allowance was gone.  He *really* needs to deal with taking his lunch and eating that.  He used to rave about what I’d fix him, but sometimes I don’t have the budget to always have fresh veggies for sandwiches and salads or anything but bologna.  And he hates his lunchbag,  he says it’s too big. I think he’s worse that a woman.  But anyway, point is, I didn’t go over budget, though some unexpected things have.  apparently I had signed up for a yearly  credit service thing last Jan and the yearly thing went through.  That sucked.  Even if I call and cancel now, it won’t remove the charge.  Of course last jan was right after we filed for bankruptcy, so I was worried about our credit – which is still in the hole thanks to not being able to pay off credit cards and keep them low.  But that’s another story.

Did I have a point?  Did I make it?  I dunno.  Stick to budget.. that’s gotta be my mantra.  Ok done rambling.  Until next time…

Ok, first of all, a few new things.  DH did indeed call the credit card company back which amazed me because he HATES talking on the phone.  But I had explained to him that we could NOT afford to make a $280 payment to that card, and that the website said the minimum was $105.  So he called and cancelled the 280 pmt and set one up for 105. Of course they had to charge a fee of $11.95 to set up the pmt…  right cause it actually costs them that much money.  Whatever. At least all the credit cards and shopping charge accounts will be paid current by Tuesday.

About the therapy,…  well after an altercation between 12 and me that resulted me in actually throwing something at her (not to hit her just to scare her – she’d been literally punching 10 and ran when I got close enough) and I ended up breaking the glass in the frame of my favorite picture – I told DH the child had to medicated or I did, and probably both of us.  I also told him he needed to find me a Dr and make me an appt cause I would not do it myself.  So when 12’s therapist appt came up, he went in with her and they talked about everything that’s been going on and how therapy is NOT working though we’re paying out the ass for it (or will whenever I get around to paying these medical bills piling up argh) and how she needs to be on something.  The therapist had recommended a light dose of Zoloft, but we read it can cause suicidal thoughts in children.  She said she’d never seen it in any of her patients and she has prescribed it to 7 yr olds (can you imagine??) … so we just have to set up a Dr appt for 12 with her pediatrician to do blood tests to make sure she’s healthy enough to take the meds. ….  then…

He talked to the therapist about me.  Seems they had already decided I needed help (the shoe thowing incident didn’t help my case any) and since this therapist already knew about the history with 12, said she could take me in on Friday. I am NOT going to her!  I cannot get DH to understand I can’t talk to this woman.  I was talking about it at work in the chatroom and oddly enough a lot of them have been in therapy and said it’s imperative that I find someone I’m comfortable talking to.  I don’t like this woman. It bothers me enough that 12 talks to her.  I am NOT going to her.  But I have no idea how to find someone else…

I was going to go see Friend today just to talk things out and use him as a therapist, since that’s what friends are for..  but he’s been throwing up since Monday and finally texted me to tell me this morning, after I’d already planned to drive there and everything.  But he was sick, so I guess it’s excused.  At least I didn’t go.  I have not slept since 3pm on Wednesday, it is now 9am on Thursday.  I have to pay 2 cash advances and renew them, pay the electric bill and water bill before they come to collect in person and charge the trip fee, and then deposit money back into the bank account to cover stuff that might go through today.  DH’s paycheck should get deposited tonight since Monday is a holiday, but I never know.  I couldn’t sleep after my shift this morning, and now I’m so out of it I can barely see the keys. I guess I’d better try to get a nap before going to pay bills…  I just KNOW the guy will come to collect the electric bill money today. Mark my words – he always comes right before I go to pay it myself. Never fails. … someday I want to be able to pay it as soon as we get the bill out of money in the bank not waiting on the next paycheck.  Hah that sounds so easy, yet seems to be so damn hard to accomplish.

So, off to nap, hopefully my dreams will not be of therapists and bill collectors!