Getting Real...

I am soooo sorry I have been MIA lately. I'd love to tell you all about the lovely Christmas... about the Murder Mystery that we did for New Years Eve... and about what life is like lately, including the scare that landed us in the Children's Hospital for 3 days thanks to a certain 5 month old... but I am too drained for that.

I know that I try to avoid personal topics on here, excepting the occasional rant. Why? Well, mostly b/c a lot of you know me. And you know my family. And the last thing I want to do is say something here that can be brought up again in casual conversation... because.... well... I hate talking about personal things. I like this blog to be a bit of a sounding board... a Dear Diary if you will. I like being able to get things off my chest and feel like I have told someone but at the same time I kept the personal, well, personal.

But today I'm gonna get real with you... no feedback necessary.

I was doing our monthly bills... forecasting our financial month. And we were hit hard. We haven't ever missed a payment on anything. In a world where neighbors are letting their house foreclose so that they have a little more spending money, we buckle down and pay everything in full every month. We don't need a gold star... but it's the right thing to do. And this month... we have waaay too much month at the end of the money. And not enough to cover things that we need covered.

I still don't know how this happened. Well, wait. I do. Remember the first paragraph of this post... the holidays? The hospital? The end of the year happened. And it added up... fast. And hit us where it hurts.

So, I am going to take this month to dedicate my blog to how we made it work... when the checkbook says we will be overdrawn at the end of the month... Where we cut back, what we did differently, what we ate... and what we are going to do to make sure this doesn't happen again.

This morning, I took $40 that I keep in the kitchen in our SOL Jar... for days like today. I bought the following at the grocery (we were pretty much out of food anyway):
-2 gallons milk (2% and Whole)
-8 lbs of ground beef
-1 pack tortillas
-2 loafs bread
-6 lbs bananas
-2 blocks cream cheese
-3 cans diced tomatoes
-1 pack freezer bags
-2 jars spices
-vanilla

I split the meat into 3/4 lb packs rather than the 1 lbs I normally do, and made 1 lbs worth of meatballs. I put them all into the freezer. I also sliced 3 lbs of the bananas and froze them for smoothies/protein shakes.

I have a credit for Costco and will head there tomorrow for the last of our staple items... but odds are that I won't be able to grocery shop until 2/1 or we get our tax return... whichever comes first.  So... essentially, we are now feeding 4 (ok... so Corbin is still nursing) on under $50 for the rest of the month.

... it's time to get real.