January Recap

Due to the terrible events of the past week or two I haven't posted much. So...I'll get back into the swing of things by recapping January's budget.

What went well: (almost everything)

• the cost-of-living increase in my teacher's pension was TO THE DOLLAR exactly equal to the increases in my bills: property tax, condo fee and insurance! Sometimes the system works. That allowed the increase in my Canada Pension Plan ($8.00 whoopdedoo!) to be added to my savings.
• Saving $1,000 per month is very doable. Tsf'd $1100 in January to savings. (Travel fund:)
• Overestimates in utilities put $46 back into my misc budget line. It's just not been that cold so far this winter.
• Didn't have to pay property taxes this month as I am on a 10 month schedule. Went to savings instead.
• Overpaid insurance so received a credit in January and NO payment til Feb. Extra went to savings.
• Received investment income. Rolled it over.
• Due to various bits and bobs my misc spending budget was $675 in January!! Out of that I saved enough to buy 250 pounds sterling! 
• Received GST refund ($105 4 x a year) put it into savings
• Came in under budget for gas $75/$100 & groceries $255/$280. Extra went to misc.
• Even with that I finished January with $31 in my chequing account. Added that to February's budget.

What didn't go quite as well but wasn't too bad considering!

• $60 for eye doctor because of Posterior Vitreous Detachment issue - have a checkup in a week which is also covered by the $60 payment already made. Don't feel too upset about that bill!
• $37 for a prescription

January was a great month!!

Misc spending covered:

• two meals out (Hong Ping with a friend & Swiss Chalet with my neighbour - an annual Christmas treat)
• Wine and Food Show
• Purchased Amazon Prime for a year which also includes Amazon Prime Video streaming. Comes to less than $7.00/month
• Art supplies ordered through Amazon (free shipping :) 
• added $ to my Tim's card and my Starbucks card
• Home Depot materials to fix electrical outlet
• Walmart - craft supplies (political sign-making)
• Google storage
• 250 pounds sterling

Stay tuned for February's budget recap when I proceed to spend twice what I saved in January!!

(Scotland trip is shaping up!!)

Money Madness

My budget would be in great shape IF it were the middle, or even better the last week of May! There is blame to be shared and the #1 culprit is SPRING!! 
I have a fever.....spring fever!!
Over the past week I have made several trips to Home Depot for these...

3 geraniums for the patio

My sister found this stand while thrifting and I have filled it with flowers!

I have always had a thing for yellow begonias!

I needed to replace a spruce tree that died over the winter. This
one looks good and healthy!

I didn't have to buy these - but they are in bloom so
just had to share.

Just love pansies so got a planter full for my
iron "garden chair".

There were other things I needed - instead of buying a new crappy hose every year I invested in a good one.  And I thought a couple of outside pillows would spruce up my love seat. And they were on sale :) at Jysk.

So I have somewhat overspent (let's not forget all the wine and extra wine and food we needed as Kazi's boyfriend was visiting from Detroit)!!
Mother's Day was lovely - I got to relax and enjoy the...

Thanks Kazi and John!

while the kids cooked me up some...

...pancakes with dark chocolate bits and blueberries and strawberries...and MIMOSAS!!

It was a really nice, sunny day so I had a nice wander in the woods and then I LAID on the couch and read my book before having a nice dinner of greek salad and chicken and pumpernickel bread and spinach dip!!

Then we all needed to...

zzzzzzzzzzzz!!

EXTREME WHITE

Received a couple of interesting comments this week regarding renovations:

 "I hope your flooring install goes smoothly. I am so chicken to do some house renos. We have the money set aside, I just go frozen when I have to make decisions like what kind of tile and where it should go (replacing the carpet in the dining room over to tile = who puts carpet in their dining room!)"  Living Rich on the Cheap

"I can relate to your post so much, especially with using the word "frozen". For me, it's the intimidation factor and the fear of looking stupid. My carpet is trashed and was due to be replaced about 5 years ago. On more than one occasion I have walked into Home Depot, start looking at carpets, and within 10 minutes my pulse is racing and I just leave!! I have noticed that in a few places in my house the carpet has lifted away and I told myself to just start ripping it up, and having the bare floor would be motivation for me to just get over my fear and either figure it out or swallow my pride and ask for help.

Here's my question to those of you who are savvy about these things: My walls need painting too. Is there a particular order that these renovations should be done? Walls first or carpet first? I have baseboards, do the baseboards need to be removed for the carpet to be laid? I assume that walls should be painted first so pain doesn't drip onto new carpets, but is that the only consideration? It's the baseboards that have me confused about when to do what". Freckles

The intimidation factor is huge! So many choices and what do I know?? Not that much! There are times I wish that instead of spending several thousand dollars on new flooring for my basement that I had just painted the cement floors instead. But then I think "resale".  And that's part of what is driving me right now. People want to buy a house that they don't have to put any money into so when the time comes to sell (if I sell) then I either put the price of the house lower or install flooring. So I bit the bullet. 

I picked Home Depot because they are close to me and are Canadian. And also because I could do everything from the website. I never set foot in the store regarding this adventure. It was all online and by telephone (hi Sue!) When I printed off the contract (at home) I noticed that the baseboard on the order were not the size I wanted so again, went on line, perused the selection of baseboards and found what I wanted...made a phone call to Sue who then changed the order and refunded $34 to my credit card because the ones I wanted were on sale! This is how I like to do renos!! 

**Sue found another error, something to do with the underpad which saved me another $130 - again she just credited it to my credit card. Never did I have to enter the store til the deal was done!! The selection of flooring is all online and I filled in a request form to get my basement measured and to receive a quote. Easy peasy and no stress, except for the part where I had to pay :( Once all was arranged I did have to go to Home Depot and pay. 

Regarding Freckles query: yes, baseboards do have to be removed to install carpet. Depending on what shape they are in they can either be reinstalled or you can order new ones. All the choices are on the Home Depot website. Painting before or after installation? I've done both. I've been working like crazy getting the basement walls painted with EXTREME WHITE and just finished a couple hours ago. I'm sure that after the flooring is installed there will likely be some touchups needed. If you wait to paint after installation you'll need lots of drop cloths to protect your new floors. 

So...by the end of next Thursday I'll have new flooring, new baseboards and fresh white walls in the basement!  I'm thinking it'll be worth the $$ and pain. (My shoulder's killing me!) I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that the installers don't have any problems - like cracks in the foundation or something....!!

Recent updates:

Flagstones in place of patio stones

This all had to be cleaned up to install new carpet - DONE!

Living with the subfloors during hardwood installation.

Mattresses etc in the living room - what fun!

I wonder where my tax forms are??

Those walls are now painted and the stairs
are covered in new carpet.

While painting today I had a deep thought. Yes, painting is one of those activities that puts me into my right brain - the creative side. I was thinking about my dad - he had a lot of anxiety and depression that he dealt with over several decades. What I came up with was this (and this has to do with the FROZEN problem.) A lot of the time the IDEA of something is more overwhelming than actually doing it. When I thought about getting the basement flooring done it was overwhelming - just thinking about all I would have to do-where to even start!! But the process wasn't that bad - definitely not as bad as THINKING about it. I'll let you know if that holds true after the installation is done!!

Next renos: foyer, bathrooms

Satisfying Sunday

I did all of my errands yesterday so that I could stay at home today and watch the final hockey game (YAY Canada!!) and closing ceremonies. The game started at 7am so I was up at 6:30am raring to go. What an awesome finish to the games for Canada. It wasn't really a nail biter of a game thankfully so I wasn't too stressed out :)

While I was out yesterday I stopped into my favorite store - HOME DEPOT!! I made a list recently of what I needed to get to finish my renos and I was able to knock a few things from the list - very satisfying! I bought 18 new handles for my kitchen cupboards, 4 for the downstairs bathroom and 6 for the upstairs bathroom.  I installed the kitchen cupboard handles but not the ones for the bathrooms as I plan to paint both vanities first.

Also crossed off the list is the wallpapering tray - I hope to get the wallpaper hung in the foyer over March break plus a whole bunch of painting so I am getting all the needed supplies in NOW so I won't be able to procrastinate once March break arrives. That's the plan anyways.

Recently I was in Giant Tiger getting a few things for school and I noticed they now sell quite a wide range of window curtains/panels and yesterday I found just what I needed for around my patio doors. I  was soooooo happy about this because I needed panels longer than the standard 84" and I found ones that were 96" long - SCORE!!  I also scored a nice drapery rod for my dining room window on sale for $8 and hung a satiny beige curtain I bought 2nd hand at Talize. I'm trying to do my renos/redecorating on a small budget and since I went over budget on all of the flooring (which still isn't all complete) I've had to be more frugal in other areas. This morning I hung a "new to me" curtain in the laundry room - also a Talize purchase. I'm trying to get at least 1 little job done each day so that it doesn't seem too overwhelming. So far so good.

I think I have a solution for the basement floors. There is laminate flooring installed now but it's slightly damaged from getting damp when the hot water tank leaked - I don't want to spend a lot replacing it and found on youtube that cement floors can be painted so that's another goal though I don't think there will be time on March break for that too - I may need to hire someone.

Well, the laundry is done (during intermissions of the hockey game) so my last job for today is washing floors and vacuuming but wouldn't you know Kazi came home after watching the hockey game at her boyfriends's house and is now sound asleep - I guess the vacuuming will have to wait. I know many of you would just go ahead and vacuum anyways - after all it is 2pm - but I like having a handy excuse for procrastinating :)

  Happy Sunday everyone!