hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[NH Homesteader]

Gas is insane right now!! My new car uses premium gas too... I paid like $3.53 a gallon the other day and it was awful !

So awesome what you're doing with the kiddos. My daughter educated her cousin (who's 3 years older than her) about meat animals.... He was horrified, lol. He had no idea people ate animals (yeah... City kid, I know) I can't wait to see what he thinks when I show him how to milk a goat!

 

[hqueen13]

Me too, @baymule As much as I don't want to dump the money into it right now, I'm happier to not have to run the dinosaur of a unit that was there. I am SURE that the new unit will pay for itself quickly, if not this summer, then definitely by next summer for sure.

We spent Saturday lazing around. It was still sticky humid and rained on Saturday afternoon again. We ran some errands in the morning and had brunch together, which was fun. We stopped by Home Depot to get the new ridge cap ordered to fix the chicken coop so we can get the blasted thing SOLD. I want the cash and I'm so ready to move that thing along! We finally got home after errands and then took a nap after we ate some lunch. We woke up way too late, and then ended up going out for dinner, which I didn't want to do, but we went back down to one of our restaurants that we used to frequent before we moved, and it was great to see all of them. We know the owners fairly well, and they were all worried about where we had been. They also had home made fettuccine noodles made by Grandmama and they were AMAZING. The best noodles I've ever had. Seriously, they had so much flavor, very different from boxed noodles.

Sunday I got up and headed out to do chores, then came back home. We managed to get the vacuuming done, and got some things cleaned up. I headed out to check on Cowboy and Coyote and then ran by the grocery store to grab a few things for the week while the BF got dinner started before I got home. We were in bed early, which was really nice. Most of the afternoon we had soaking rain again, and I think it must have rained more overnight, too. It's cool, so that's a good thing!

It's supposed to stay pretty cool for the rest of the week, which makes me happy. GH and SH get home tomorrow night late, so I will actually be able to go about my life like a normal person for the rest of the week. I won't have ANYWHERE to go on Wednesday, and I can't wait! I'm so stinking excited!! The BF is going to take my truck to work to do some work on it, and I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to sleep until I wake up, and I'm going to take my time with my day and do things that make me feel good! I need to catch up on the financial tracking for last month and then work on some other biz stuff, too.

So not much going on this week, and I'm TOTALLY ok with that! Hopefully the BF can start work to get the old unit out of the attic and removed so that he can get a jump start on getting the new one installed as soon as we get the funds together to get it!

 

[baymule]

I have lived without AC before and while I did ok, it did get hard to sleep with sweat rolling off. Glad you at least have a AC in the window. I am like your BF. Teach me what to do, then get out of my way. Shut up, go away, and i'll get it done. Micromanage me and I'll quit and go find another job. Now, I'm retired and I do what the hell I want--which I've done all my life anyway.....

 

[hqueen13]

@baymule so far so good, and we've gotten more rain, so there's that!
Talked to SR last weekend while mom and I stopped by the farm, and he said that we've received our annual average precipitation NOW. So the next six months is surplus over the average.

Mom and dad had a great visit. They got here last Friday, and left this past Saturday morning early. We managed to do quite a bit of fun stuff. We went down to the Guinness plant which is now open for a tasting. It's the only US plant that they have. They make about a dozen different beers here in the US now, but of course, the classic Guinness Stout is not made here, only in Ireland. My mom fell in love with Guinness when they were in Ireland, so we knew we had to go taste to see what it was like. She said that what they have there is as close to the real thing that she's ever tasted. So now I guess we know that we've got to make a trip there whenever they're in town. I also discovered that I don't mind REAL Guinness, but that they have a Barrel Aged Antwerpen dark beer that was AMAZING. I'd drink that! It was like dark rich coke with alcohol in it (11.5% to be exact!)

We did a little puttering around the house, and hanging out, and then I took my parents for salt floats as a gift from my sister and I. She and I decided way back before mother's day that mom and dad could use some relaxation since they'd been under so much stress. The original house design that they had was going to cost an astronomical amount, and so they had to scrap everything and start over. Then my grandmother got sick and passed away, and they're still dealing with house details (though it is back on track, they broke ground just before they got up here). So my sister and I thought that doing something relaxing would be great. The salt floats were AWESOME. I can't recommend them enough if you ever get a chance to do one. The ones we went to were in "cabins" which was like a room that was a bathtub. It has a ship's door type thing to get into it because the "pool" takes up the whole space, there's no edges. It has about 1600 pounds of epsom salts in a 10" deep pool that's about the size of a full size bed. It's saltier than the dead sea. You can't not float. And ya'll it was amazing. I don't float, ever, and I floated in here and it was crazy!! The tub has lights, and there's pretty little lights in the ceiling that look like stars, but you can turn those off if you want. And of course, if you do, it's complete blackness. I didn't have the courage to turn them all the way off, lol, but I kept my eyes shut most of the time anyway. It was such a wild experience, I actually fell asleep floating the first time we went. I kept twitching myself awake, when you twitch in water it's a bit of a surprise, LOL. The second time I don't think I fell asleep quite as much but was zoned out in some kind of meditative state. I don't really remember much, but it was amazing. The interesting thing is that you have to learn to trust the water and really relax in it. You don't have to take any effort at all to float, but our bodies take a little while to get used to that notion. The second float was better than the first, and I expect that any others will be even better after that! I can't wait to go back, I'm trying to figure out how to get it into my routine, even though it's expensive. It was so freaking amazing though. Can't say enough good stuff about it!

We also ate at some fun restaurants, including a place that has home made pop tarts. It was to die for. The BF took this past Friday off, and we went out to some wineries which was a lot of fun. It took forever to get out there, but it was delicious and they had a LOT of really awesome wines, so that was a plus. Mom helped me with horse chores when I had to do them so that helped things go faster which was really nice for a change.

Speaking of the barn, I'm a wee bit ticked right now. Last Tuesday the girl that takes care of stalls and brings the horses in in the morning sent a text in the middle of the day and said something to the effect of "the horses didn't come in until 11, so whoever is coming this evening can come later if you want." That to me sounds like it's a "favor" that oh, you can come later. There's a couple problems with this... first, TM has a rule that the co-op horses have to be in by 9am, and the horses are required to be in for 8 hours so they can't go out before 5pm if they're brought in at 9. Second, she wrote the text like a favor and not an APOLOGY for running late and potentially messing up the evening schedule. TM and I chatted last night and she told me she was hoping I would have said something in the group text. Trouble was my parents were here, and I was focused on other things. And frankly, *TM* should be handling it, not ME (in my not so humble opinion). So I told TM I'd check in with her and make sure this Tuesday wasn't going to be an issue. So I sent her a quick text and asked if it was going to be an issue to have the horses in so that I could get them out by 5:45. Keep in mind that's 45 minutes AFTER the 8 hour mark. Well she got real crappy with me and offended that I would think my schedule is more important than anyone else's. I don't think my schedule is MORE important than anyone else... but I DO appreciate when someone is aware that their choices after affecting other people. I have a class at 7 that I have to get to, and it's not a stroll in late kind of thing, which means I'm depending on the AM person to get their crap done in the correct timely manner.

Just another reason I want to get Storm home.

Speaking of getting him home... while my dad was here, we worked on trying to map out the property. Holy canoli that did not go as I expected. My dad, being super smart and an architect and all that stuff, helped me figure out how to stake out the property lines. Actually, he did all the work, and then I did a lot of walking with a tape measure and little flags. So we finally found the pin on the one side of our property, next to the neighbors that don't say anything. Seriously. I've spoken to them twice in the 6+ months we've lived there. And that doesn't count the stories I've been told from the sisters. Anyway, I'm glad the pin is on THAT side, and so we measured across. Then dad did some fancy math to figure out how much of an angle the property line goes off of the road at and used triangles and more math stuff to figure out where the line went. So we started measuring... And the first thing I noticed was how far behind my awesome neighbor's house the property line goes. I feel like our fence is going to be in their back yard! He came out to say hello while we were working, and reassured me that it was correct (which made me feel slightly better... but still). So then we measured back across the property toward the quiet neighbors.... and discovered we had somehow lost about 8-9 feet. So somewhere along the way either our math and tape measures weren't quite as straight as they should have been (which means that we should be even further into GH's back yard than I thought we were...) OR the quiet neighbor's fence isn't in the right place, which means that we have a few more feet on that side than we thought. And frankly, we have such little grass space already that I'm going to take ALL of the space that is ours. What's interesting is that their fence is ON the property line, which I don't think is legal per the set back requirements) and we know they didn't pull a permit to install the fence. Of course who does, but at any rate, if there's a set back requirement then they should have followed that in the least if they didn't want to have attention drawn to anything late on down the road.

So now I'm thinking it's going to be smart to have an official survey done, which is gonna cost more $$. But after the crap today with the other gal in the co-op, I'm just ready to say screw it and put it all on my credit card. Tomorrow while I'm in the office by myself I think I'll be spending a fair amount of that time on the phone getting some more questions answered so I can try to move forward with this. I want him home before the winter sets in because I'm not interested in fighting the ice and snow again to do chores for a bunch of people who can't help themselves out of a hole in the ground.

 

[Britesea]

That's great news from the lender! If you can reduce credit card debt- that should be a priority. Paying interest is just throwing money down the toilet. We have one credit card with a minimal limit on it (they are constantly trying to encourage us to up it). I only use it for emergencies, and I try to pay it off each month. I think I've had to let some ride a second month 3 times in the last 3 years. We also have a second credit card that is specifically for medical... if we have to pay over $200 (pretty much any visit to the doctor or dentist these days) we can take 6 months to pay interest free.

The second thing we did that helped us resist temptation was to go to a cash-only basis for all our purchases. It's amazing how much easier it is to not spend money if you don't have it in your wallet! lol. I take enough out of the bank to cover all expected expenses for the week- like food, gas, and any bills that I can pay without mailing the payment. If we want to buy something else, we have to make a special trip to the bank, which means thinking about it and making the time for it. I've found that more often than not, I decide we don't really need whatever it was-- and that becomes an easier decision to make the longer we've been doing it. I'm rootin' for ya!

Cooking from scratch doesn't need to take a lot of time-- One of our favorite meals is something called "Dump Chicken"-- you can find it on Google I think. You just put a few pieces of chicken in the pan, dump 3 more ingredients on top, and bake. If you find yourself with a little extra time, you can put chicken and extra 'dumpings' into some ziplock bags and freeze them to make it even quicker on nights when you know you will be tempted to do takeout. One example recipe:
Dump Chicken Sticky Chicky

2 Tablespoons Oil
1 Tablespoon Soy Sauce
3 Tablespoons Smooth Peanut Butter
3 Tablespoons Ketchup
4-6 chicken thighs

For immediate cooking: Pre-heat oven to 350 F. Place all ingredients into a large baking dish, turn chicken to coat. Bake until chicken juices run clear (45-60 minutes for chicken pieces, or 20-30 minutes for chicken breasts).

For freezing: Place all ingredients into a 1 Gallon freezer bag. Lay flat in freezer.

To thaw and cook: Take the bag out of the freezer the night before, make sure the baggie is completely closed. Place the Bag on a shelf furthest from the freezer (It works best if the bag is laying flat, although this may not be the best option with a side-by-side fridge/freezer). Preheat the oven to 350 F. Empty the contents of the bag into a large baking dish and bake until the juices run clear (45-60 minutes for chicken pieces, or 20-30 minutes for chicken breasts).

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks FEM, hope your weather improves soon!!

We had gorgeous weather for the trip, warmer than the average temps for this time of year, but also no rain even though there was a 50% chance on Saturday afternoon, and in the mountains it's highly likely that it will! We had a fantastic time at the Chihuly exhibit at Biltmore, and were able to see it both at night and during the day. We got to spend time with my parents, and see the house they're building, and lots of time with my sister and her husband and kids. And we got to relax, and drive the Blue Ridge some and go walk to a waterfall, too. It was delightful, and I'm just bummed I'm home again, LOL. I slept great in our own bed last night, though. We got home at about 6 after a really long 10 hours in the car. That's the part that is no fun at all. We did manage to get all the clothes at least into the washer (one load all the way through, the second load in the washer before we crashed into bed). We just threw a frozen pizza into the oven for dinner so that was easy. I'll have to buy my lunch today, and then we'll go out tonight because we have our dental appointments tonight. Nothing says welcome home like a dentist appointment. I'll catch some extra hours in the office today because my appointment isn't until 5:30 so I can stay a while longer which is helpful for the pay check! We didn't over spend as much as I feared, either, which is awesome. We did buy a few things, but not as much as some trips. And the fact that my parents paid for all our meals when we were out was really sweet, too, and helped to keep us in budget!

So that's about all that's happening around here. Now I just need to get back into the swing of things again.

 

[hqueen13]

I'm SO SO SO proud of the BF for all his hard work creating better spending habits. It's really paying off for him, especially combined with the couple of helpful windfalls recently. The 6 month lump sum of the car insurance should come out of his account today. At this moment right now he has more money in his account than he's EVER had since I met him, with the exception of the tax returns at the beginning of this year. His net work report is better than it's EVER been as well. I'm SO proud of how much he's been able to change his habits in the past year. He asked me if he could get a router table for his wood working stuff, and I told him I'd have to work it out. I've prepped for some bills for next month, and the registration is due again on the black truck, if it we're for that he'd easily be able to get it. I can probably squeeze it out if I shuffle the money for the bills that I've allowed for, but we'll see. I think he said the one he wanted wasn't on sale anymore, so he might want to wait anyway. I'd prefer that just to get more of a buffer in place, but I'm also willing to make it work out if he really wants it because he's worked so hard, and he's actually asking instead of just blowing the money!
I didn't get much cleaning done yesterday, but I did have a great call with my biz coach. I think we have a plan together for me to put get a course out there to sell. I just need to stick to the plan to make it happen now! I also need to figure out how to rehire her so that I can keep working and making things happen!
I'll have to work on the cleaning when I get home today, which shouldn't be too late thankfully. I woke up early when the BF was getting ready, so I went ahead and got up, and so now I'll get to leave a little early and still have all my hours. I need to vacuum, and I have to get the guest bedroom cleaned up so that JS actually has somewhere to sleep! The office needs to be straightened up, too, so we can get the massage table put up in there for her to work on people. I need to vacuum the basement since that was never done this weekend, either. Fun times. Hopefully the weekend is smooth and easy. Friday afternoon JS and I are going to go for a salt float. It'll be her first and I can't wait to see what she thinks of it. I can't wait to do it again. Then I need to figure out how to afford another package of floats because I can really use it a lot more often!
So things are going ok, just chugging along, and trying to stay ahead of the game!

 

[hqueen13]

He got them done! I was so pleased that everything came together just right. His brothers and dad loved the beer caddys that he made them. I was even able to find 2 bags that his brothers could go in, and then we found a box that fit the one for his dad. His mom's shelf wasn't finished, but that was ok, he just took it over there without wrapping it, and she was still thrilled.
It was a fast holiday, as per the usual. But we were so blessed. The BF loved his presents. I got him a laser measuring tool, which is cool, you just stand there and put it against a wall, and point it at the other wall and it tells you how far away it is. We now know exactly how big everything in our house is. I also got him a work shop radio, and he's thrilled with that, too. He got me a corset, and some of my favorite pens, and the traditional ornament that he gets me every year. After we opened gifts at our house together, we went to his parent's house. His brother made breakfast, like he does every year, and then we opened presents. His mom really loves to have lots of gifts to open, and she goes all out. She gave me a beautiful scarf, and a fox pin, a cheese tray, and a bottle of wine, and a gift card to Kohl's. She also gave the BF and I some money to help with the hot water heater. So that was a nice thing. It was a really lovely Christmas, but of course we had to go over to his uncle's for dinner after that. I was just tired of socializing and didn't want to really be around people at that point.
I feel really blessed, and grateful for all the loving support that we have received this holiday.

 

[hqueen13]

Yes, the social thing does get old for me. I'm glad to take a break now for a while.
We had a nice weekend. His parents, brother, and the girlfriend from Estonia came over for dinner on Saturday night. I made chili and mashed potatoes and corn bread and it turned out really nice. I was pleased with how everything turned out, and we got the house cleaned up in time. We busted our butts on Saturday morning to get it done. We got up much later than I wanted, and after breakfast I headed out to get down to Cowboy and Coyote, and then stopped at BJ's and the grocery store. It was busy but I was still mostly able to sail in and out. The BF stayed at home and cleaned while I was out. He gets distracted so dang easily, but he still got a lot done. We managed to get everything finished JUST in time before his family got here. I do enjoy entertaining, I just don't feel like I'm all that good at it, and I end up preparing at the last minute (i.e. cleaning like crazy and barely having enough time to cook) before people show up. If I could manage to keep things cleaner I might not have that issue... Hopefully I'll be able to do so in the new year. We'll see.

This year has certainly been more challenging than I expected, but we've survived, and done pretty well when you look at the bigger picture. All the bills got paid on time (except for when I was a day late on the credit cards cause I forgot... but beside that!), and we never couldn't pay a bill. We refinanced the house, and managed to pay the car insurance in a lump sum. We also replaced the air conditioner. We managed to pay off quite a bit of debt, mostly through the tax return from last year, and didn't accumulate TOO much more through the course of the year. We were gifted enough money at Christmas to be able to replace the hot water heater (depending on what he decides to do) and probably get some insulation for the hot water pipes and windows to help seal up the house a little better to reduce the heating costs. I purchased a new to me vehicle, and have kept up with payments while still juggling my other bills. My business is still in existence, and while I haven't "turned a profit" it continues to pay for my horse, and a lot of other things. I've made some investments in my business for me, and that continues to help me grow and get in a better position.

I do need to make some investments pretty quickly in 2019 I expect. My boots are about to fall apart, and I think they're already leaking. My computer is barely gimping along, and that hinders my ability to work in my business because I can't use programs the way they should because it's too slow. So I will need to figure out a way to make those things happen, but I'm hopeful that my tax return will help.

So here's to more onward and upward in 2019!

 

[hqueen13]

Yes, @baymule I'm very hopeful we'll be able to make some more headway without sliding backwards. We continue to make small improvements, and while it never feels like it's huge, it is making changes.

I saw an official report that we had over 71" of rain last year. Our average is 41". And we're starting off the year in the same pattern. Rain expected Friday into Saturday again. I don't want a drought, but this is excessive too! I'm a bit grateful the horse hasn't been with me because the mud would have been HORRID, and I don't think I would have had the funds to do anything about it, and I would have likely missed out on quite a few lessons because it was POURING when KN was here. So it goes.

I managed to mostly get the financial tracking finished for December. That always makes me feel good. The BF brought home about $3000 more than he did last year, and I brought home about $5000 more than last year. Of course, mine was pretty much eaten up by my truck payments, but that's ok. We hung in there, even if we didn't pay off as much debt as I would have liked.

Interestingly in my business I grossed just over $14,000. I'll be expensing just over $15,000 worth of mileage. More mileage expenses than I actually made income. I made around $10,000 in farm sitting alone, which was primarily from Cowboy and Coyote's owners. I need to go back and double check, but I believe when I was running the boarding business I was bringing in right around $30k, so to be able to make half of that on mostly farm sitting and a few other things makes me pretty happy. I did come up about $2600 in the red in my business, which I can say was primarily from business coaching. Needed expenses, but over and above all of the necessary stuff. Now to get my new business really cooking and I'll be doing really good!

So my financial goal this year is to get rid of my personal debt. It sits right at $1700.00. I don't want to add any new personal debt, and I want to try to eliminate it as much as possible. I have one credit card that is charging me interest, and that one has about $1300 on it, so I'll be focusing on that first. I'll be getting an extra $50 bonus from my bank for putting $500 on my bank credit card in the month of December, so that will go towards that card, as will any other extra funds. I'm hoping that my tax return is big enough that I can eliminate a BIG chunk of that, but we'll see. I'd LOVE if my tax return was enough to pay it ALL off, but who knows. So I'll keep chipping away at it. If my tax return doesn't make a dent in it, then it will likely take about 2 years to pay it off, unless my personal income increases (which I WILL be asking my boss for a raise again... it's been 2 years since we've had this conversation and it's high time that we do!), which would help pay it down faster, and help keep me better balanced to be prepared for everything else. Since I've been using my budgeting software for over a year now, I need to go back through and figure out some averages to see what I need to put away on a monthly basis in order to keep things covered better. Hopefully I can begin to work on that so I'm not so stretched all the time.

So here's to bigger and better in 2019!!