Crystal G

Not many of them, and not very good quality, but here ya go.

From Thanksgiving 2008

The trend in the blogosphere today is to post a list of things you are thankful for. And boy do I have a lot to be thankful for in 2008.

1. My dad never has to worry about where he’ll end up. Being that my father has no retirement, savings or a silver dollar to his name, I am very grateful for the ability to be able to provide him with the security of a home, and knowing that he will always be taken care of, even if I had to work 3 jobs to do it. I’m just grateful to have the best dad one could ever ask for. One that respects my beliefs, supports my dreams, and puts up with my inanities

2. Devoted friends and even people who aren’t really close to me, but felt the need to support my father and I in our time of need. All of the people that raised the $7,000 we needed to get our home, some of which I know very well, and others of which I don’t know at all. I’m very grateful for all of you.

3. The house, how can I not be grateful for the house? It’s an awesome home, it came at the perfect time at the perfect price and in a perfect location. To go from living in a condemned home to being homeless to owning our own perfect home, I couldn’t ask for anything more. I’m grateful that I had the strength to pull myself together when all I wanted to do was crack, and all I could do was cry knowing that we were about to be homeless. I am grateful that we were only homeless for two months.

4. I am grateful for my Aunt that let my father and I come into her home to live while we got our bearings together to find our home. The most self-less act you can give, is to offer your life and home to someone else.

5. I’m grateful that the blinds over my eyes regarding finances were pulled off, and I’ve come to realize that all of the clutter and unnecessary crap laying around was just unused money left to rot. I don’t need all of these things, and I don’t need to buy anything new.

6. And I’m grateful for the sweetheart for his constant amazing support, and all of the people I’ve become close with over the last year. You’ve all become a part of me.

7. I am grateful for my job and having the best bosses and co-workers that I could ever hope to have. They’ve supported me and encouraged me, and gave me a chance despite not having a college education. I hope I serve them well in return.

8. I’m grateful for the opportunities and chances I’ve been given over the last 3 years since I started reflecting on my life. I know now that everything that has happened had a purpose, whether not being able to buy a used car, to finally buying my mustang, to not having a penny in savings, to now having a respectable emergency fund and a house. To having a 525 credit score in 2005 to a 690 credit score in 2008. To just knowing that I have the ability to change whatever it is I don’t like about my life, and all the bad things that happen. I look forward to the challenges in 2009 and hope I grow and learn from them just as much as I did in 2008. Afterall, no one else is going to fix them but me.

I was playing around with Gmails new custom themes, and though I was torn between the mountain and tree version, I decided on the tree. What’s neat about this particular theme (and I am unaware if the same affects display on other themes), is that the scenery changes based on your local weather.

When I installed the theme, it was sunny outside, so the background environment was bright and sunny. Today, however, because it is cloudy, the background environment is cloudy. The same happens for when it rains, it will adjust so that your email is being rained on.

It’s pretty neat, actually. I’d like to design a Wordpress theme that does the same type of thing someday.

Google Fan 4 Lyfe.

I just got an e-mail from ING that says they are going to give away $5,000 to some lucky saver that makes 5 purchases of over $10 with their ING debit card for the month of December.

I’m all over that. With a $5,000 bonus I could pay off my dads loan in one big swipe and spend 2009 paying back all of my wonderful friends that loaned us the down payment for this house. My father would be almost debt free, with just his medical bills left. What an amazing feeling that will be for him!

John Chow is holding a new contest to give away $6,000 in CASH. $5,000 would go to the charity of your choice and $1,000 will go to you to spend however you want. If I win, I would give the $5K to Helping Hands of the Wounded Knee, which is a charity that helps make the lives of those living on the Pine Ridge Reservation easier by giving them food, clothing, propane, etc. For those unaware, Pine Ridge Reservation is one of the poorest areas of the United States with an average annual income of $3,000. The Oglala Sioux Natives that live there have a high suicide rate, infant death rate, and crime rate due to the poor conditions of the Reservation.

I would put the $1,000 given to me into paying off my dads medical bills. I wouldn’t keep any of it for myself.

The contest is being sponsored by XR.com. XR.com is a tiny url service that is quick and easy to sign up for, and allows you to shorten the length of those pesky long wrapping URL’s. Sign up for an account and check it out.

Incidentally, if you want to verify that your charity is legit, The Consumerist recently posted an article about researching charities before handing over your cash.

So part of my financial plan for the next year is to pay off my dads loan, which is currently at $5000 with 24% interest rate (ridiculous!). I’ve come up with a plan that will allow me to have it paid off by September of next year. Though I did run into a snag this morning when trying to transfer the balance to my credit card.

HSBC (or technically a subsidiary of theirs) apparently only accepts checks or cash as a payment method, which I don’t have since I’ll be using my credit card. So I called up USAA and they said they could provide convenience checks which would allow me to send off a check to place the balance on my credit card. Normally this would cost me 3% transfer fee and use my normal rate of 16%, but they have a “promotion” that will waive the transfer fee and bring my APR to 4.4% for 12 months.

I’ve decided to go ahead and take this in order to get the loan paid off, but then next month or the month after I’m going to get a 0% APR for 12 months card to transfer the balance again.

Then the amount my father was paying on the loan will then be paid to me, and once my car is paid off in February, I will have put $1300 down on his loan, bringing it down to $3700. Then I will start adding my car payment to his payment, bringing it to around $500/month we are paying towards the remaining balance.

$3700 – $500/month payment means it will be paid off in about 7 months, which should be around September of next year.

I’ll probably continue to put the $500/month away for an extra 3 months and pay off his medical bills balance of $1300, assuming he doesn’t rack up anymore hefty medical expenses.

Then my father will be debt free, and I’ll just have the remaining balance on what my friends have loaned me for the house, if I haven’t paid them off by then. Plus the house, naturally, but since that’s a long term investment, I don’t really consider that immediate debt at this time.

Technically the first time home buyers tax credit needs to be paid back as well, but you have 15 years of interest free to do that. So that’s about $500/year, which equals out to about $42/month with no interest. So that’s easy peasy.

So tomorrow my dad and I are putting up a chimney. I will start taking pictures of this later today or tomorrow morning. Dad has already poured the foundation, now we just have to drill the hole through the wall, and lay the block with the floo. And somehow get the stove over here from our neighbors house. Then we will officially have our wood-stove back, and I will be WARM.

The cost for the block and the cement and the floo was going to run us about $200. Floo’s are generally expensive but my uncle is giving us one for free. My dad’s friend Buzz was getting the price for the block and cement for us, but apparently decided to go ahead and order the block and the cement and pay for it himself as a housewarming gift.

So the cost for installing this chimney? $0. A savings of probably $2,000 if we were hiring someone to do it. Maybe more.

Not that I didn’t have this issue while living on the edge of Westminster, but I’ve noticed that living in Gettysburg does have downfalls as far as location. Many stores I’ve needed to get to have been far away in other towns, such as Lowes or now Walgreens. When living in Westminster, at least on the -other- side of Westminster a lot of these things were still accessible. Also living on the edge close to Eldersburg/Sykesville allowed me to also travel to those cities when I needed to get to certain stores. But a lot of things aren’t near Gettysburg at all. Which in a way is a good thing, but also makes it less desirable for travel.

Like now, I have to plan a trip to Walgreens to get my sister the gift I mentioned before so I can teach her about financial responsibility. But the closest store is in Chambersburg PA or Eldersburg MD (which would have been fine if I were still living in Westminster). I do need to get a few other things at Walgreens, so I can combine all of this into one trip, but it’s still a damper. This particular gift I can’t purchase online either because it requires exchange of information.

In other news, I attempted to call up Comcast yesterday to pay my bill, as I do every pay period. But when I finally go through their automated system, I was told that there is a $4.95 fee to pay by credit card over the phone. I usually pay through the website but have mis-placed my password for it and getting a new one from them is like pulling teeth.

So I’ve resorted to sending checks for free through ING, which granted takes longer, but it’s free. I’m somewhat disappointed in Comcast for now charging to pay over the phone. Capital One was the same way when my car loan was still with them. I guess whatever way they can make money. Fortunately since ING will mail out checks for free I don’t have to worry about these retarded extra fees.

Friends and family have asked for a housewarming wishlist,and I wanted mostly practical stuff, so here we go:

LAMPS – We need quite a few of these as there is insufficient lighting in the house. One room doesn’t have any light at all . I have registered with Target since they had the best selection of lamps. I don’t expect people to buy these expensive ones, these are merely to give you an idea of the style I am looking for. Obviously not a big brass 70’s lamp

Picture frames – Also on the target wishlist Hopefully matching!

Front porch furniture (used is PERFECTLY fine, if you can find some sturdy stuff on freecycle or something). We’re particularly looking for some nice rockers for out front. All preferably wood, no plastic.

Solar candles for windows (something like these, approx 10 needed.)

Cushions for our dining room chairs (preferably plain dark brown or plain beige, organic fabric if possible)

CFL Lightbulbs (normal, flood lights, and 3-way bulb, can never have too many of these)

Lowes/Home Depot Gift Card (always useful for our upcoming projects)

Pur water filter for the kitchen sink.

A reusable mob (no sponges, no swiffers) preferably made of natural fibers that we can wash in the washing machine.

New cookware set, preferably glass or stainless steel (no teflon), and if colored, at least maroon or steel. We have sufficient cookware now, so this is not high priority, it’s just all of ours are mixed from various sets.

Organic cotton table clothes, nature colored but holiday decorative are fine. All preferably organic cotton or some sort of organic linen. A nice brown or sage runner for the dining room table would be good too.

Mats for front and back door (I like this one especially for the front door, but I also like ones with leaves and things).

A new biodegradable toilet brush

Bamboo Blinds (at least 5 for the upstairs.)

Bamboo or organic linen shower curtain for dads bathroom, preferably plain white or beige.

Detachable shower-head with built-in filter, one for each bathroom. These are hard to find, but not impossible. Filter should be on the head of the nozzle, and a few extra filters would be nice too There’s a list of some here.

A juicer for me

Pyrex Storage Bowls

Glasses with lids (no plastic cups, please)

A metal cleaning pale, no plastic. This is for putting cleaning supplies in to carry around the house, etc.

Media storage cabinet. Used is fine, but I’m looking for a bench style cabinet, not a tall one. Should fit under the windows. We have nowhere to put any videos atm. Even an old beaten up antique that is a bench with shelves behind doors that we can store videos is fine.

Keep on the lookout for a natural wood (not dark) headboard (this style.) Used is fine. Queen sized. (uncle is building this)

A gift card to Kennie’s Market or Giant to help us out on restocking the kitchen.

Metal trashcans for feed and storage. Plastic ones get eaten through by squirrels and things. Larger the better.

New broom. I’d like one of those old traditional brooms.

Dining room placemats, preferably rooster or native american themed, or just plain beige. Organic fabric if possible.

2 new dust pans. I like the copper looking ones.

Glass storage jars for kitchen. Something like this or this is even better. This is for storage of seed, flour, cereals, etc. No plastic!

Wooden Hangers for our closets, now that we finally have our first closets! I got one set from Target here. I’d like the same natural looking hangers.

Clear lamp oil for our lanterns.

Corner Cabinet

2 smoke detectors

1 carbon monoxide detector

Two memberships for me and my dad at Better World Club

A new blender

This bathroom set for my bathroom

An apothecary cabinet

Glass Canisters for the bathroom

Basket to hold toilet paper in bathroom

Baskets for the office

A set of Hermes Plates

This year I’ve cut our holiday budget in half as sort of an involuntary experiment.

When we were hit with the house crisis in July, I poured my excess savings, including my holiday funds into getting the house. I did not, however, touch my emergency savings, that stayed right where it is, to serve its purpose when we got this house. That purpose being any emergency fixes we had to do, or any other absolute emergencies that needed to be taken care of -now-.

So I had to start over my holiday fund after that, which brings me to about $300-$350 to spend on the holidays, as opposed to the $600 I saved last year. Prior to last year, I didn’t have a holiday fund at all and was always rushing around at the end of the year trying to figure out how to pay for the holidays. Starting up my holiday fund in January of 2007, and adding a little each month took -all- the stress away from the holidays for me. What a relief that was.

This year I’ve cut the budget in half (which I had been wanting to do anyway, as $600 seems overly extravagant), and now I have to figure out how to divvy it up between our normal holiday traditions.

Last year my totals were as follows:
- $200 given to my father to buy gifts
- $300 for me to buy gifts for my father, the sweetheart, my soon-to-be step-daughter, and my sister
- $100 to buy the christmas tree and to get my dad his christmas cards

This year I’m thinking of the following:
- $100 for the tree and dads cards, which include inserts with our new address and information on it for relatives
- $100 to my dad to buy gifts
- $100 for me to buy gifts for my dad and sister and my cousin Landon. The sweetheart will have to do without unless I find some good bargains. He’s difficult to shop for anyway, and knows that sending him gifts just isn’t practical right now since he’s planning on moving.
- $50 excess to catch any overflow on gift-buying or possibly stamps for the cards or holiday food

Not entirely too much difference, just in the amounts. I normally try to have all of my holiday shopping done by October, but given the house crisis for July/Aug/Sept that just didn’t happen this year. I have no idea what to get people, but I know it will all be practical/useful items. For my sister I was thinking of getting her one of those pre-paid Visa cards, and start teaching her about financial responsibility.

I’m actually looking forward to seeing how far I can stretch $350, and see if I can accomplish a well-thought out holiday with such little money. I hope to try and focus on home-made gifts as much as I am able, and I -always- wrap in extra fabric from around the house, or newspapers. I’ve developed a hatred for expensive wasteful wrapping-paper.

Thinking ahead, I will most likely continue to do the $600 holiday fund after this year, given that our gift receivers will be expanding. I still plan to not use as much of it as possible and tuck the rest into an extra bill payment or a charity donation at the end of the year. But Christmas with my father is a very ingrained and enjoyable tradition for me. I’m certain there is a way to remain financially responsible while still partaking in the secular frivolities of the holidays.