How Much (Money) Do You Eat In A Day?

Jen and I were literally just talking about this in the break room as we heated up our pathetic  lunches. How much do we eat in a day? Money wise. So lets take a look at today, which is basically the norm:

Breakfast: Hy-Vee (Iowa grocery store) brand instant oatmeal. $2.09 for a box of ten packets. I eat one for breakfast so that equals about 21 cents per packet. 

Lunch: Spaghetti. AKA rotini noodles with marinara sauce. I will err on the side of caution and say I can get 4 meals out of it. Box of pasta $2. Marinara sauce $1. What we're poor remember? so each serving is 75 cents. 

Dinner: I  keep my dinners light usually like a PB&J Sandwich with a yogurt. Yogurt isn't as cheap as I'd like it to be. Usually around 65 cents a piece. Loaf of bread is $2.50. I can get like 10 sandwiches out of that so that is 25 cents in bread per sandwich. Jelly ( or preserves in my case, no sugar added of course) is $3.50 a jar. I can easily get 20 sandwiches with a jar. That's only 18 cents per sandwich. We'll assume the same for peanut butter too. So for one PB&J Sandwich it's 61 cents. 

Lets recap shall we?

Breakfast: $.21

Lunch: $.75

Dinner: $1.26

Total: $2.22 

That's it. Really puts things into perspective. Before I was buying frozen meals at $2 a piece because they were pre-made and convenient. However now after doing the math, I don't think I'll go back. Lean Cuisines will now be considered a treat. We get paid tomorrow (Woooo!!!!) and I know I won't be going grocery shopping with my usual list. Give it a try and figure out how much (money) you eat in a day. 

Cheers

Marisa

Merry Birthmas!!

Say what? Well for those of you that don't know me from my other blog my birthday is Christmas Day! So I'll be on hiatus until Tuesday when I get back from the Twin Cities. I'll be turning 27 this Sunday (yikes!) and while I'm not where I thought I would be financially, at least I know I'm on the right path and will be able to celebrate my 30th birthday debt free. Which will be the greatest present of all. So happy holidays everyone, see you when I'm 27!

Cheers!

Marisa

And the winner is.... Jason's Deli!

So the best lunch ever was to... Jason's Deli!  We got hummus AND guacamole as appetizers then I had soup and Marisa had a wrap.  We felt the need to document it because, quite frankly, it will be awhile until you see these two girls out at a restaurant...

So here's us getting there!  Marisa raced ahead because she wanted that wrap bad... lol

Here's us trying not to inhale everything before it hit the table...

And here's the "before"

And the "after"

Yes we left the crumbs on the table... although it definitely took self restraint :)

Happy (almost) Friday!

<3 Jen

Poor Girls Lottery

So today the Poor Little Rich Girls hit a jackpot!  It falls under a small victory, perhaps, but it was monumental in turning the week around for us both.

So we work for a pretty small branch office of a much larger, global, engineering firm.  But for being small we have a pretty diverse group of people so we often support larger offices as the need arises.

Anyways late Monday night one of the Project Managers that I've worked quite a bit with in the last 6 months sent an email to my boss's boss letting him know how awesome me and another employee in our office had been to work with and how he looks forward to teaming with us in the new year.  We were each copied so we knew he sent it.  I was kinda like hey cool, well hopefully when they review Quarter 4 performance my name comes up for a bonus.

Nothing else came of it on Tuesday so I didn't really think anything more about it.  Then today my boss came and congratulated me on the email which was cool I guess.  Then Marisa and I went to Target over lunch (heaven knows we weren't going out-out to lunch) and when we got back I had an email from my boss's boss.

This is quite a compliment.

Take a friend to lunch and expense it

Thanks for all your efforts

Soooo we spent the whole rest of the day super pumped to go out to lunch tomorrow :)  Back when money grew on trees (or magic cards) it would have been like eh, cool.  Nice to be recognized always but at the end of the day it's just lunch.  Now it was like OMFG WHERE ARE WE GONNA GO????  THIS HAS TO BE THE BEST MEAL EVER!!!! It's amazing how going awhile without indulging makes going out to eat seem like the most amazing reward on the planet.

So maybe it wasn't quite the lottery but today for us it might as well have been.

<3 Jen

Snowballs and Envelopes

No I'm not putting snowballs in envelopes. Because we have no snow :( However, I am toying with the idea of adopting these two strategies. I've known about them for a very long time and have always thought they were fantastic, but never actually implemented them. Probably would be a lot better off now if I had. Hindsight is 20/20 right? Anyways what am I talking about? First off the envelopes.

Frugal Dad wrote about this system in 2008. Yeah told you I knew about this for a long time. Basically the strategy being, when you get paid create a budget for say, food, gas, entertainment etc...and take out the necessary cash and put it in an envelope for each category. So instead of being out and about spending willy nilly, if you're wanting to go to the movies, you have to take out exactly what you need from the entertainment envelope. This will prevent you from going crazy at the concession stand and getting the jumbo popcorn, extra large soda and boxes of candies to boot. Your pants will even thank you for this one!

And now snowballs...

JD at Get Rich Slowly introduced me to the Debt Snowball maybe a couple years ago. I have to agree with him, it's the little victories that keep you going. So instead of organizing your debt from highest balance to pay off first to lowest, reverse it. Start with the smallest. It gives you a greater sense of accomplishment faster and helps keep your momentum going to tackle the next debt. 

I'm now wondering why I never adopted these strategies back in the day. Probably because I felt I had to keep up a certain lifestyle and would be too embarrassed to say "sorry guys, the entertainment envelope is empty. No bars for me." Now, if I have to skip the bars to stay on budget and pay off my debts so be it. Debt free before 30 here we come!

Cheers

Marisa

Oh the financial titanic as it heads for the visa iceberg...

So I made the mistake of looking at finances over lunch.  New rule.  No looking at finances over lunch.  Nothing is going to change from noon to 5 and quite frankly chances are nothing good will come of it.

Needless to say doing so totally ruined my day.  Why?  Well first off, when I was going through our final joint couple bills I asked for $800 to cover 1) his portion of the Chase Visa bill + 2) joint couple expenses from said Chase Visa bill (which he was nice enough to open in my name with him as an authorized user) + 3) moving expenses that he offered to split.  Needless to say after we filed he decided he didn't owe me $800, he owed me $400.  Regardless of what the numbers might suggest otherwise.  Since we had already filed all the paperwork there really wasn't anything I could do...

So here is the irony.  If I zeroed my checking account to pay the Visa bill and all my other bills for January (this takes into account next paycheck) the balance on Visa would be almost $400 exactly.  Irony right?  Also take this for irony.  Vet bills and other things hit after the statement date, so what will I owe on that card (including the forementioned $400) $800.  Almost exactly what my tires+oil change cost this month.  Oh irony.  Someone out there is laughing their ass off right now...

I've been trying not to let myself freakout but it's pretty hard.  I'm seriously considering looking for a part-time job for a while to recover.  If it stopped with the $800 iceberg that would be one thing, but because we added him as a line on my phone contract when we got married I'm stuck paying that bill and paying to close his line (you'd think he was the one planning to leave the way he kept his name off everything).  So add another few hundred for that... as you can see this is quickly becoming a sinking ship.  I thought about taking a cash advance on my credit line to zero it out and lower the interest a little but we'll see.

I just need to keep remembering that in the long run this is all for the best.  I didn't accrue my debt by myself regardless of what the other individual might think.  It's borderline horrible uncomfortable right now but it would have been far worse to stay in a relationship where being taken advantage was a forever reality.  Once I recover things will be wonderful and I can go on to live a happier, more balanced, life.

Thanks for reading.

<3 Jen

An Introduction

Hey it's Marisa. Welcome to my first post! So a little about myself and how I got here. In 2010 my 4.5 year relationship with my boyfriend ended and I moved out of our house into my very first adult apartment. (with a roommate) Being single for the first time since I was 20 well.....I went a little crazy. Lots of partying, lots of traveling, lots of shopping for NON home things. By the time 2011 came around and I had settled down the enormity of what I'd done to myself financially set in. Well, mostly because I needed some very important car repairs and I realized then that I hadn't any real savings (turns out you can't trade in your Kate Spade handbag or Michael Kors shoes for repairs) and definitely took a blow or two this summer financially. So after that rude awakening, I decided the party was over and it was time to get my biznazz in order.

Ironically enough (and happily enough) I started dating someone new this summer....who is a financial God. No really, his business is money and futures and the stock market and things that I still don't understand. So it's a bit embarrassing to be dating someone who can plan out their finances FIVE YEARS in advance and I can't even plan mine out five days in advance. Motivation anyone?

So join me as I learn at the ripe old age of 27 how to actually manage my money and not stare at it in my shoe rack/closet. 

Cheers

Marisa

Jen's first weekend on the wagon...

So a tiny bit of backstory on me then a quick overview of my first weekend on the wagon.  Recently separated from my husband I just got an apartment on my own and will be living by myself for the first time ever.  Although far from impossible, switching from 2 incomes to 1 will take some adjustment.

Of course with moving comes lots of added costs ($$) then add on needing new tires before the brutal Iowa winter ($$$) and some unexpected vet bills ($) needless to say I'm having a rough December.  Since my finances weren't exactly stellar going into the month there definitely needs to be a change, in the very least to recover and build up a rainy day fund.

Since last weekend I have not gone out to eat.  Not once.  This doesn't sound like much of an accomplishment but there is an awesome burrito place 5 minutes from my apartment and I pass it everyday.  When I first moved in I think I ate there 3-4x a week so not eating there at all is a total accomplishment.  Especially because today I wanted to but I reminded myself that I bought contact solution instead (both ~$6) and that I had a lot of food at home.

Today instead of going to brunch we had a "Poor Girls" brunch with Andre Champagne, Target OJ, and homemade pancakes.  I'm gluten free/vegan so we used the gf Bisquick mix with vanilla almond milk and egg substitute. They turned out really good.  And one accidentally looked like a ghost/snowman.  Ghost of Christmas past anyone?

Spending in general for the weekend was pretty good.  I needed a few things for the apartment but I had some bed, bath and beyond gift cards so I did my best to maximize those.  I made a giant batch of brown rice and got indian food packets to pair with it.  Also I stocked up on a bunch of soup for the week.  The first couple months I need to be more stringent then things can become a little more lax once I recover.

Staying in (so far) isn't so bad.  I've spent a lot of money on fun things that I haven't full enjoyed to date so there's plenty of "free" fun at home.  I'm sure in a couple weeks I'll be singing a different tune but right now, I'm good.

That's all for me this weekend!

<3 Jen

Poor Girls Brunch