A new appliance - yes this is a post about being frugal and saving money

Of course our dishwasher would kick the can on the week where I declare we are tightening the belt and committing to pay off our $64,000 in debt over the next 4.5 years. When we moved into our new house, we brought along our fridge from our old house (the one kitchen appliance we had needed to upgrade from the hand me downs we received). Our new house came with the kitchen appliances so we inherited a newer gas stove and a dishwasher that we assume is as old as the house (10 years). We gave the surplus fridge to our in-laws for their cottage to replace a 1950’s fridge. Below is a pic of our inherited dishwasher ready to go for scrap. 

Over the past month DH and I have been talking about how upgrading the dishwasher would be nice but isn’t really a priority. The original owners did not opt for the kitchen upgrade so we have a very generic but functional kitchen. Our counter top is hideous by my standards. Not just the horrible green colour, it has a gouge out of it in the corner. Who knows why the previous owners did this. There is also some “gunk” build up that just cannot be cleaned fully around the sink. Thus my first priority for this kitchen would be a new counter top. However, as fate would have it... we were forced to get a new dishwasher instead.

 I was completely pumped and feeling very mustachian when my hubby called to say that he had fixed the dishwasher’s electrical component problem, only to find when I got home that the seal had also rotted off which meant that water from the load poured out all over the floor. GAH. Remembering a post I had read recently about Mr. Money Moustache picking up decent used appliances for his rental house off of Craigslist, I suggested to DH that we go that route first so he got down to business searching for a used dishwasher on Kijiji (similar to Craigslist). Score. We were able to find one for $80 which is much newer than our 10 year old dishwasher. The sellers were getting rid of it because they had bought a whole set of new appliances for a kitchen renovation. $420 adverted (the average cost of a dishwasher is $500 around here). I know you can get one for about half that price. I know this because we bought one for our old house for $250. It worked fine but was mighty loud. Just another one of those lifestyle trade-offs I guess. I am happy to say our new “friend” is quieter than our last dishwasher and MUCH quieter than our $250 generic brand first dishwasher. It even has a time delay which will come in handy since we have time of use electricity pricing. *Note the lovely green counter top :o) 

Debt free by 30

I have been reading a lot..and I mean A LOT, of Mr. Money Mustache’s Blog lately. I am intrigued by his lifestyle and though I am in no rush to retire – I’ve finally started my career job doing something I love – I am ready to stop paying for money spent in the past.

I can’t really complain because we have been living rather “luxuriously” on mostly one income for the past 5 years, complete with: 2 cars (albeit they aren’t anywhere near new), an upgrade from a $150,000 1200 sq. ft. 1920’s fixer upper to a $300,000 10 year old 2200 sq. ft. house with a huge – by city standards – lot size, rather new appliances, a couple of Apple products, cable tv, designer clothing, and a part-time Montessori education for our oldest son. All of these were choices we made based on the happiness having such things provided us with. Long story short, we acquired $64,000 in debt along the way. Believe it or not, we made plenty of tradeoffs. I cannot imagine what our debt load would look like if we had taken the alternative route. Some of these tradeoffs included:

• Having older vehicles, each under $5000
•  Spending 3 years renovating our 1920’s fixer-upper in the evenings and weekends – gutting completely and rebuilding it ourselves with much blood, sweat, and tears and plenty of knowledge gained. We did everything with the exception of mudding and taping, tying everything into the electrical panel and hooking up to the natural gas line. 
• Furnishing this old house with mostly hand me downs until they broke or no longer served our needs and we were forced to upgrade bit by bit.
• Thrifting for good used clothing and baby/kid items and shopping only sale items
• Not taking many vacations or dining out

Since I began working full-time in September (also still in school full-time so have the added bonus of loan repayment delays and interest-free periods), my additional income means that we have the ability to quickly pay down the $64,000 of debt, increase our savings, and make some upgrades like buying some new(er) (to us) vehicles if we make wise choices. If we follow some “mustachian” principles, we may well pay off our debt by the time we are 30 (4.5 years) and then go onto pay off our mortgage by the time we are 35. 

I am taking some inspiration from a couple of bloggers I admire. Firstly, from Kelsey over at Rising/Shining. Like her, I will be posting shortly on our income and budget figures - open book finances as she calls it. Money talk is always so hush hush. I think sharing is liberating and I’ve enjoyed comparing what others who do share earn/spend to my own family numbers. It helps to show where you’re doing well and where you could be improving. Secondly, like Sarah at Sleeping is for Losers, I will be sharing my goals in the hopes that it will make me more accountable. She has been seriously kicking butt with her weight loss goals.

Let the games begin?

With Thanks.

Yesterday we arrived home from Thanksgiving weekend at my in-laws cottage up north. B and I both brought home colds while N sported a fat lip from falling into a chair and puncturing it with his tooth and R was sore from building a new dock. Though the weather was chilly for the most part and even dipped down to -1(!), it didn't feel so cold in the midst of the warmth of campfires, family, and laughter.

This year I am thankful for:

- My two beautiful and busy little boys
- A husband that would move mountains for me
- Having a great job that I actually enjoy going to every day
- Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel for grad school
- Health - after a long time, I'm finally starting to feel like "me" again

Onto Halloween I suppose.. my awesome sister took it upon herself to help me out this year. N will be a green dragon ($10 off Kijiji...tags still on) and B will be a blue ninja. This year I had little energy to think about putting together a costume for him with work and school and everything else going on. We got out the Party City catalogue and he chose the ninja costume. He tried it on this morning and was pretty impressed. He looked so cute..almost worth the $25...

Fall Routine

When I switched jobs I instantly gained 10 hours/week back from commuting time. However this meant that I lost a lot of my twitter/blogging time. I think I'm finally back and all settled in with my new routine. I have been trying to prep meals for the week on Sundays and choose easy meals for during the week. I have also been planning and setting out my outfits for the week in the closet so I don't have to think about what I am going to wear in the morning.

Here is what our schedule has been looking like on a typical day when B goes to school.

6:30am - Wake-up
6:30am-7:30am - Breakfast and getting ready
7:30am - My sister arrives at the house to watch the boys or just N depending on the day
7:35am - Walk B to the bus stop
7:40-8:10am - Finish getting ready for work and making coffee (there is no Starbucks on my way to work so $ has been saved!)
8:10am - leave the house for work
8:30am - 4:30pm Work
4:50pm - Arrive home
5:30pm-6:00pm - Dinner
6:00pm-6:30pm - Cleaning up/Preparations for next day
6:30pm-6:50pm - Baths
7pm - N goes to bed
7-7:30pm - B gets ready for bed, bedtime story

The rest of the night I have off so I have typically been catching up on emails, working on my major research for my Masters, and watching all the tv shows I PVR'd over the summer. DH goes to bed around 8:30pm since he wakes up super early for work so we generally don't get to spend too much time together in the evenings during the week but at least we have an extra hour after work now together that we didn't have before.

School Boy

The first baby is officially in school. Awhile back we were mulling over the decision to keep him in Montessori or to switch him to public school for kindergarten. We decided to send him to our local public school and we couldn't be happier with our choice so far.

His first day went really smoothly. It was a 3 hour trial morning. He goes part-time but full days - either 2 or 3 days/week. He is in a split JK/SK class so not too much different than his Montessori Casa class with 3 different age groups. His teacher sent home this sweet little note in his backpack the first day:

I was at work that morning so I didn't get the pleasure of picking him up from his first morning but the teacher told my sister when she went to get him that he had a wonderful morning and that he followed routines well. My sister mentioned that he had gone to Montessori from about 18 months. The teacher said it showed and mentioned that she may have to give him some SK work to do. I'm so happy she is willing to do this for him.

After that trial day, he took the school bus for the very first time. He has a bus buddy who is a few grades older who lives in our neighbourhood that walks him to and from the bus to his class. While many parents have a hard time seeing their child go off to school for the first time, not to mention riding a school bus alone, I wasn't even a smidge sad. I was so excited for him. We waved excitedly at each other as the bus pulled away and I knew he was ready for this next step. He has been unhappy lately at home all day. Now, every day when he gets off the bus he gushes about how awesome his day was at school.

One thing I did find surprising was his homework. Each week he is to read 3 books and the parents are to fill out a reading log. This isn't too much trouble since we've been reading each night since he was 2 but remembering to fill out the log has been a learning curve. He also has one sheet of writing to do each week - tracing letters and colouring pictures that start with that letter. Over the summer I started to try to work on writing his name with him and he got frustrated often so I didn't push it. He is much more confident when we work on the writing sheets together. He is really happy to get stickers from the teacher. It's the little things I guess!

September Check-in

Seems fitting to do a check in with my 2012 goals I set out in January. Here is how I have been doing!

• I want to continue to eliminate clutter from our lives and improve our financial security. I got a job! I started on Monday. It is in my field, 15 minutes away, and pays decently. So far I'm totally loving the work which is challenging and the people are so nice. Though the job is contract, it looks promising that it could turn into a permanent position. I think we are well on our way in terms of meeting this goal. In light of this new job, I also reworked our budget which I am hoping to share (eep!) with the world soon!  

• Continue to find meaningful ways to give back to my community. I feel like I have gone above and beyond my own expectations in this area. With all I have on the go between now and next Spring, I think I will ease back a little on my community commitments. 

• Immerse myself in my thesis research and give it my all. YES! I am furiously trying to clean up my research proposal and secure an advisor. All of this will be done in the next couple of weeks and then I'm into actually doing the research. I wanted to do meaningful work and I think I have pretty much nailed that since my research is going to be heavily based on the community in which I live. I guess this will further contribute to my previous goal.  

• Cherish the little things - The daily bests journal is back on. I really like it. B went to kindergarten today and absolutely loved it. I'm so happy I got to drop him off and I called him this afternoon to see how it went. I've also been spending extra time with the boys. Usually I am out a couple of nights/week but since DH is away on a 10-day trip with his dad, I cleared my schedule and have spent lots more time with the boys in the evenings and on the weekend. I even took B to the Canadian National Exhibition last weekend, while my sister watched N, and he had an absolute blast. 

• Act on the fact that "life is short". I have been spending a lot time with friends lately and I'm really happier for it. I've also been making an effort to put aside other work and technology and just focus on family time when I'm with the family. I really notice a difference in the quality of time spent together. And finally, I have been making time for the things that make me happy. Scheduling them in  so they are obligations rather than nice-to-do things. 

The Week of the Friend

A couple weeks ago, elbow deep in my latest read, I got sentimental and thought about my good friend S and our escapades at the beach when we were teenagers. One afternoon while we were tossing a frisbee back and forth at the beach, we saw a couple of guys in their late twenties/early thirties (back then that was old) having their own frisbee toss. They were really going hard. After a few retrieved frisbees from both parties, we agreed to play together. We had a great time and coincidentally met up with these guys on a couple of other occasions in the same spot and played again. I half jokingly sent S a text that we should go to the lake and play some frisbee for old times sake.  While we never made it to the beach, we did hang out last Monday night on the deck in my backyard (without kids) and talk about how much things have changed since the good old days.. and then drove to get coffee and decided on the fly to catch a movie (The Campaign) - very much like old times. S assured me that I would be home by 11 since I was hesitant at staying out late on a "work night". Yep..the more things change, the more they stay the same.

On Thursday, I met up with one of my lifer friends for dinner after work in the city. Our parents met in pre-natal class so she truly is a lifer friend. We went for fabulous greek food on the Danforth.

Earlier during the day on Monday, I received a text from my university roommate, M. M was following up on dinner plans we have been trying to make for nearly 6 months with a few gals from university. We haven't had much luck with since we can't seem to coordinate around all of our schedules. She suggested that coming weekend. Doubtful, I checked with our friend A and she checked with our other friend S and success! I guess all it took was some last minute planning. Another friend was also able to make it so the 5 of us gals went and had dinner in the Beaches. There was also a certain pie place we were dying to try for dessert. However, when we finally made it back there they were closed 5 minutes early. So we stood on the sidewalk in front trying to decide what to do next while staring in the front window of the shop like a bunch of creepers and after making some attempts to get the storekeeper to open up shop for us, begrudgingly settled on frozen yogurt instead - which sadly I couldn't partake in.

Though 3 nights out in one week was a bit much, I'm glad I was able to make time to hang out with some great girlfriends. I also don't feel so bad since I'll be single parenting it for the next 10 days. But I've also managed to arrange a night in with the bestie who is back in town from out West for a wedding. Wish me luck with my solo parenting gig!