3 Is Just Too Much

Project goals that is. I thought 3 might be a good number to aim for, but apparently, for me, that's just too much right now :( That really bothers me.

I AM happy, and proud I took care of my yard clean up, mostly by myself. I did borrow Dad's truck, and Dad himself to go to the dump with me. I loaded it up the night before, in the dark, to keep myself from completely passing out from the heat. Then drove over to Daddies the next morning, to pick him up.

Of course, Daddy had to improve upon my securing of the branches. I don't blame him though :)

The red straps were my attempt, the yellow are the ones he added.

So. The yard goal was reached. I did also work on the crocheting project, however, I didn't complete it. I will continue this project in July. I am not even going to try to work on the basement ceiling tiles. For some reason, I just don't want to do it, or I would have done it already. Other projects are getting moved to higher priority than this one.

I'm torn between seeing if one project a month is a good goal, or going with two instead. I'll try two for this month. The crocheting, and at least ONE of my many photo projects. 

I DO need to work on a vision board. That should be my first project. I needed a scanner to finish up my photo projects. For some reason, I can't seem to keep a scanner working, on a multi-function machine, but really, who wants to keep a flat bed scanner all by itself. It takes up too much room, right? Well, I was at the thrift store last week. I decided to take a chance on a $5 scanner. Seriously. The thing was marked $4.99. I did a quick search on my smart phone and decided to give it a go.

It took about an hour of fiddling with the drivers (which were downloaded) in order to get it working, but I DID get it working, and scanned about 250 photos in the period of 2 days. I still need to search around the house to see if I have any left. After they are all scanned in, they need to be cross-referenced against what I already have uploaded to flickr. Then, and this is going to be major pain in the butt, I have to figure out a better way of arranging the photos ON flickr.

In other cheap news, I have been dabbling with going "no-poo" for a while. Not really committing, and then washing my hair with regular old shampoo when it got to the point I couldn't stand it anymore. I think that may be over! I decided to splurge, and get a $7 bottle of L'Oreal Sulfate Free, Silicone Free "Cleansing Conditioner". While I was there, I also got a 89 cent bottle of Strawberries and Cream Moisture Milks Alberto V05 conditioner. It's also sulfate/silicone free. Guess which one works better...

My hair is looking pretty fantastic. Nice and clean, soft and my curls/waves are really responding. That's the majority of the reason I'm trying to be poo-free anyway. I want my curls back!

I did get one other item off my to-do list over the weekend. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how you're looking at it. I have had "Defrost Basement Freezer" on my to-do list for probably 2 years. It's certainly wasn't a high priority at all. On 6/30 there were some pretty severe storms that hit the bat cave and surrounding area. The community I live in, just got it's power restored this morning. A full 6 days later. This is why the freezer got defrosted. I need to find a more level place for my freezer. It's in the corner, and leans about 2 inches on one side. I think this is why ice is forming, because it's only on that one side. Anywho, the two loaves of bread and one Lean Cuisine that was trapped in the ice on the bottom are now removed. Yay. I think I should give it a good cleaning, and just unplug it. I don't keep food in it. All that's there is booze, and that's really because there's no reason to keep that in the main house/kitchen fridge, because I don't drink enough for them to be there. I'll see how much the electric usage drops after I unplug it. No point in paying a bunch of money to keep liquor cold unless it's going to be consumed.

I did really well with my cash spending, right up until the last week of the month. I got a little sad, and decided to have fast food a few days in a row. That really eats into my cash spending. I still ended up with a full $20 left over from this months $116 cash spending. I am disappointed with how much needed to be charged in June, but, it wasn't stupid stuff. It was investments in the future. I'm really just trying to keep the mindless spending to a minimum (fast food, etc). With that, July will have a $100 cash limit, and $300 charge limit. I may have to bump the charge limit to $400 as I have a fridge and freezer to restock with food :(

I am Woman Hear me Roar!

I like to think of myself as a pretty handy gal, but there are some things that just plain scare me, like using a circular saw. I'm afraid I'm going to cut a limb off. Because of this, I am SO proud of myself for using my chainsaw to trim up some horribly overgrown things in the yard. The Holly out back, and a who-knows-what bush on the side of the house. Yeah. The bush was HUGE. You can see in the picture how big it was, because all the grass underneath it was dead. I would have cut even more, but there's a birds nest in what's left. The neighbor told me my tree looked good. HA! If it were to stay like this, and continue to look like a tree, that would be fine with me. This thing grows huge every year.

Holly got her hair cut too ;)

Before

After

There's still one or two limbs that need to be cut back, but I need to get underneath the tree to do it, and I was getting cranky by the time I got to this point.

Yesterday only topped out at 82 degrees. I took that as a sign to finish up the yard. I mowed the back lawn, used the blower/sucker on the back patio after I moved a few things to the shed, and weeded the two beds I had left (Front and right hand side of house). I had wanted to shape up the bushes in the front bed, but that will need to wait until fall, as I have to purchase some new equipment to do that. But at least the weedy vines won't kill them in the process, right?

Before

After

This months budget isn't going so great. It isn't horrible, but I neglected to factor in the fact I was charging my trip to a dietitian (separate post might be written about this, but basically, I'm making an effort to eat well, so I thought it would be advantageous to have someone tell me if I was on the right track or not), so I'm WAY over at this point, but, it's an investment. I AM proud of not charging silly things. I'm doing quite well on my cash spending this month. $86 left of the original $116 (I had overages from last month).

I also just signed up for a prep class for the certification exam I'm going to take. Didn't even think about that when I picked $400 as my budget. Oh well. These things are "investments" in my future. Gotta spend a little money to make big money in the future.

I also changed out the battery on my old car yesterday. Poor girl hasn't been driven in almost 2 years, but she started right up like a champ! Now, to get to the emissions station safely, and pass the emissions. I did a little happy dance at the car just starting. I'll do virtual cartwheels (because I can't do them in real life ;) when the car passes!!

I have been doing a bit of crocheting here and there, so I am slowly making progress on that goal (Remember, I had only 3 for the month). I haven't touched the basement ceiling yet. I plan on doing some laundry tonight, so I'm going to challenge myself to do the prep work while the first load is in. Prep work for this project is removing the staples. I'm thinking, in the family room, I'll rehang the tiles. I have enough to do that, but in the laundry area and bedroom, I really have to think about what is the best way to proceed. It may be easier to rip the ceiling down (large parts already are) and just hang sheetrock instead.