The Adventures of Alora and Robert: February 2013

Thursday, February 28, 2013

Work out Schedule

As you can see I didn't work out the first 3 days. But the key is too never give up, no matter how great the gap is that you didn't work out was.... keep going. I did a tiny bit of abs today, but will most likely do more later on.

This is the video I will be attempting (key word). I need to buy a stop watch have have Rob time me.

How to live off of $25k a year

Because I work at a Bank I constantly see people struggling with how to makes ends meet without always going into the negative. A lot of people do not know how to budget, or they do not keep a close eye on what they are spending, versus what is in their account. A lot of times we may think we have the money, when in reality we don't. Another issue that a lot of people struggle with is debt. I do have to admit, I have two credit cards with quite a bit to pay off. I lost track of what I had in my account as well. And of course, emergency situations make us rack up our cards as well. My dog seems to always have an issue as soon as I pay off her vet card. I use Care Credit, which allows me 6 months to pay off each visit I go to before I accrue any interest. But anyway, I am going to show how it's possible to make $25,000 annually ($20k after taxes and 401k gets taken out). It's pretty simple, and I usually come out saving about $400 a month. This month excluded :) I need to pay off my credit cards before I put anything into my Savings account!

Rule #1 Always live under your means!! I know I'm not rolling in the money here, but I will never ever spend a ridiculous amount on food, internet, or anything else if I can help it!

Rule #2 As soon as you get paid (I get paid bi-weekly) pay off all the bills that are coming out before the next pay period. Once all that is paid off, subtract what you have left (after bills), from your estimated food and gas money. I spend about $50 every two weeks on food. Once you have set aside money for food and gas, and any other necessity for the month, put the rest towards your debt or into a Savings account.
ex. Bills (566.76) minus Income (754.44) = $187.68 Now subtract est. gas and food money. Mine will be about $100 for the month. That will leave me with $87.68, which will go towards debt.

Rule #3 This one goes along with rule #2. Get all your extra money out of eye's view so you don't feel the need to spend it. Pay off debt or put it away in Savings.

***My bills are split between two peole for the most part. What you see is my portion. My food budget feeds 2 people for two weeks ($50)***

Here's my updated budget

As you can see on my savings plan, the ultimate rewards are reward points I get from my Freedom Card. I get about $15.00 back every statement. I love my reward points! I typically use my card to purchase all of my gas and food, except at Aldi since they only except debit cards, but once I use it on my Freedom Card, I pay down my balance within that day or so. Remember, get your money out of eye's view. If I left that money spent on food/gas sitting in my checking account, I'd think I could still use it.

So today is the beginning of the month for me. I paid half of my bills, and will have to wait until tomorrow to pay the rest due to the websites. I went to the grocery store and went a couple dollars over budget. I bought extras, like breakfast and sandwich items.

I went to Albertson's because they were having an amazing sell on Pork Tenderloin. It was buy one get 3 free. So I got a little over 9lbs. in meat for $18. I also found some Pork Chops that were buy 1 get 1 free, which I only pad $5 for.
*I only go here for meat. I don't like the meat I've bought at Aldi. I just stick to the basics and veggies at Aldi. They had an amazing deal on avocado's at Aldi this week. 1 for .29, where Kroger's is 1 for .70

My receipt from Albertson's was originally $81.00!!!! Then minus my coupon and the in-store promotion it came down to $24.46. I'd say it's an amazing deal. We'll be eating all this meat for a month or two.

My bill was at $81 before all my deals kicked in.

CJ had poor customer service! So rude.

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Future homes!

I've been a member of Pinterest for almost two years now, and my "Home" Board is packed full of images from every different kind of style of homes. That includes interior and exterior! I go from loving Traditional, to Eclectic, to some modern, and so on and so forth. I never could choose between all the different styles to know exactly how I wanted to decorate my future home, let alone my apartment, which is bare. The most I have in my apartment is some of my own art up on the wall and piles of books.

So anyway, I found this website that is kind of like Pinterest, but I believe only designers and architects post their works on it. I could be wrong though. You get to go through each different styles, and each different rooms and "pin" designs, and looks to your idea books. Through this website, I found out that my look is Traditional. I love everything about it. It looks expensive, well put together, and very clean. I think I would go for the more modern and eclectic look if I was single. But I am not! And I believe this look is what will suit our family.

Traditional Kitchen design by Raleigh Interior Designer Driggs Designs

Traditional Kitchen design by Chicago Design-build Oakley Home Builders

Traditional Bedroom design by Denver Interior Designer Chalet

Traditional Bedroom design by Houston Architect Maison Market

Traditional Exterior design by Minneapolis Design-build Landsted Companies, LLC

Traditional Exterior design by Chicago Architect JB Architecture Group, Inc.

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Healthy Meal | Yum Yum

So this is officially my first healthy meal. My grandmother gave me several Kraft Food Magazines when I first moved out on my own, and I have yet to make anything out of it. Surprisingly there are quite a few healthy meals in here. They just typically use their brands in the recipes, which obviously, as cheap as I am, will refuse to do! I shop at Aldi for most of my foods, except for meat and some vegetables. They have limited items, but for all of the basic ingredients I buy them at Aldi.

For this meal, I found my recipe in the Winter 2007 edition.

Saucy Stir-Fried Pork
2 cups White Rice (I used brown rice, for the healthier option) ($1.09 for a box at Aldi)
1/4 cup Kraft Zesty Italian Dressing (I got mine at Aldi for 1/2 the price) ($1.29 at Aldi)
1 lb. pork tenderloin, cut into thin strips (I used half a pound) ($7.99 at Kroger)
2 cups snap peas ( I just used fresh green beans) ($0.49)

Items I didn't use .
1 c red peppers sliced.
3/4 c green onion
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp. corn starch
1/2 tsp. ground ginger

Total Amount Spent: $ 10.86 for a serving of 2... but it's going to make me and Rob two meals.

I paired this meal with a home made peach tea. Yummm.

Schedules, schedules, and planners

One thing that I've always been commended on is my ability to organize and plan. I am the person that over thinks, over plans, and over analyses every little thing. It's a little thing I like to call "control". Taking control of every aspect of my life makes my life a little bit easier, and not as stressful if I didn't continuously do these things.

One of the things I've started doing this month is working out. I like to have a visual schedule of everything I have done in my workout regime that way I always feel like I've been making progress towards my goal.

Here is a visual calendar of my first weeks workout routine.

Another thing I obsessively need visual aid of is my Finances. I work in the Banking Industry and constantly see people making the wrong choices, over spending, and always going into the negative because they aren't watching what they are spending. I can honestly say that I do not make a huge income, but I always manage to save $200 - $400 a month. It was close to $600, but I opened an IRA, Life insurance policy, and started a 401 K. It's all still in "Savings" but I just can't always see it.

My friend has been asking me to start going to a 9 week program with her for getting out of debt and building a strong financial base. The program is based off of Dave Ramsey. She sent me a copy of one of the spreadsheets they use in the class. It's only a small sample, but here it is...

Here is what I have been using for the past year. It's a lot simpler and a whole lot less to look at!

It gets straight to the point, doesn't use any functions like on excel, it was just created on a word document.

After receiving the above document from my friend, I emailed her what I have been using, and I think we both decided to stick to the easier to view budget guide. The only difference, is I didn't enter in the MISC section like the spreadsheet has.

My suggestion to anyone trying to get back on the right path, as soon as you get paid, subtract the bills from your income, and only leave about $100-$150 in your account. The rest of the money transfer to your savings account and out of eye's view! Of course the above amount should be tailored to your own living expenses. I only spend about $60 in gas a month and the rest in food.

I Work Out

On Monday, coincidentally, me and my good friend Claudia started working out. I'm working out to tone up, and she's working out to lose weight. Either way I now have a work out buddy! We may not work out together but we both share what we did everyday and what we are eating to get there. We also have a common goal. This summer we plan on running some 5k races. The Color Run is by far my most favorite race. We both missed the 53% off discount on Groupon, so we are keeping our eyes out for others!!

I found a post on Pinterest.com for Running for Beginners. I'm going to try to stick to this and get myself ready to run a 5k. It's more likely going to be a run/walk though ;)

This post actually only gets you to run 20 minutes straight. So I'll probably run 20, walk a few, and run again.

Friday, February 15, 2013

Vacation | Colorado Springs

We're back! Sorry it took so long for me to update my blog. Our vacation has been awesome, and I've been trying to keep us away from out phones, nooks, and laptops for the last week. It's worked for the most part :) We didn't get to see everything we planned on. After driving 12 hours from Dallas to Colorado Springs, we decided that was enough driving for us :) And our hotel was amazing, and had the most comfortable beds you could imagine. Rob and I only stayed a couple days and then came back home. We spent way too much money, and couldn't stay away from our precious Lucy. So here is the list of pretty much everything we did and saw. We have a ton of photos of mountains, since that's really what we went to see.

The Beginning of Our Adventure