Taxes are finally DONE!

Actually I finished them up yesterday morning, e-filing our Federal return. I had to wait for D's signature last night on the state return, though, because it annoys me WAY too much to pay $19.95 to e-file the state return. Besides, why do I want to pay them just so they can get my money faster???

I was amazed when I went to the post office this morning and found NO line. I was in and out of there in mere minutes, having seen my return postmarked.

High Finance

Money has been changing hands right and left the last few days in the owl household. M sold his old (less than a year old) iPod touch to A. Then M used said proceeds, along with allowance and saved money to buy a new iPod touch. If that wasn't enough spending, M and A each then bought a game - M one for the PC and A got one for the Wii. Plus A bought a 3 month subscription to an online game site.

Whew. You would think that would lead to 2 broke kids. Well, you would be half right. M is broke, but A is still flush with cash. Being on the cutting edge of technology is expensive.

Both kids are quite happy with their purchases however, so all is good. M declared today to be a very good day. His iPod touch arrived in the mail and we had a favorite dinner tonight.

Money, money

Yesterday was a good money day.  Our old van finally sold - yeah, hooray!  It had been sitting on our mechanic's lot for a month and a half and it finally sold.  We had him sell it, figuring that even with his cut, it would go for more than we would likely get for it.  And I think it did.

And A sold his old iPod also.  So he's got some more money and happy about it.  And my cousin is the happy new owner of an older iPod nano.

Unproductive Christmas shopping

I spent 3 hours in the mall today and managed not to buy anything. It wasn't that I wasn't looking to buy, but I just didn't find anything that I liked (and thought was a reasonable deal). I was actually trying to buy a certain Christmas present, but couldn't find anything that I thought the recipient would like - at any price. Hmph. I may have to go hunting online or branch out to non-department stores.

I even had a free $20 gift card from the mall, but didn't manage to spend it. I did buy a few things from stores outside the mall, but they don't take the mall cards.

D and I need to have a discussion on what exactly I'm looking for for the kids so I can have a better focus when I go out shopping again.

It was very interesting at the mall as it was getting downright crowded in some department stores by noon, even though it is the middle of the week in November still - and everyone is complaining about the economy. Some of the smaller stores, though, had very few people in them.

I expect I'll be back at the mall at least once before Christmas. Although, maybe if I don't need to, I could skip the crowds and use the gift card in the relative calm and bargain of January.

New Car!

Yes! We finally got a new minivan. The old one was just that - OLD. We bought the Dodge Grand Caravan when M was 4 months old. Not the best age kid to be test-driving cars with. But probably better than doing it with a 2 yo.

The Caravan had some good points. Like the built-in child seats. LOVED them. It was so easy. I always knew they were installed correctly, but when I had adults in the car instead, I could fold them up and no one was the wiser (well, unless they saw all the crumbs all over the seats). I had both kids in the built in seats until they were 6 years old.

But the Caravan also had its not so good points. Like the fact that it would not hold an alignment. just would not do it. 116K on the car and I had to have it aligned about every 18 months - and often a new set of tires too. I think I put about 5 sets of tires on that van - I don't think I ever managed to get more than 20,000 miles on a set of tires, even though they were rated for at least twice that. Ugh. And the AC. We completely redid the AC a few years ago - front and back. Had the van in the shop for the better part of 2 weeks. And then this summer the AC went out again. I've been living without the AC, but its not fun. And then lately, it was raining and fogging up the windows. Guess what - without AC, the defogger won't work. Definitely not fun and not too safe either. Combine that with a planned trip to visit the grandparents in VA over Christmas, it seemed like it was time to look at a new vehicle.

Evidently the timing was pretty good to be looking for a van. We got a great deal on a 2008 Honda Odyssey. It's silver. It's the bottom of the line, but it still seems pretty fancy to me. I guess not having a new car for 12 years gets you out of the loop as far as what to expect. We actually didn't want the fancier models. The kids wanted a DVD player (of course!), but I didn't. I know it would turn into arguments about how long a trip needed to be to use it. Easier not to have the thing in the first place. Our mechanic strongly suggested we not get the powered sliding doors. As he put it, "if you get those, you'll be seeing me to the tune of $1000. It may be sooner or it may be later, depending on the model, but they will break". Umm, yeah, with thoughts like that, I think the kids can open and close the doors themselves!

I'll have to get a picture and post it in a few days. Haven't managed to take one yet.

It was the easiest car buying I think I've ever done - though perhaps also the longest. I wished I'd taken a lunch. I was at the dealership for 4 hours. Internet quotes have done a lot to simplify the negotiating. Our dealers "best deal" was laughably higher than my internet quotes - like $4,000 high. So I pulled out a quote and they met it - though little did they know, but that they actually beat it by at least $450. The quote I showed them didn't include a documentation fee, but our local dealer didn't add one, so savings to me!

Easy money

I got my account all set up with ING just fine. Then when I was poking around, learning the site, I saw that I can refer people. Hmm - could I refer the kids? Called up ING and they said yes. So, if the kids can come up with $250 to start their account, they get a $25 bonus and I get $10. No brainer.

So, I sent off referral emails to them. And then promptly went and opened A's account because he had just over $250 in his old savings account. Bingo, he now has $25 more. And I have $10 more.

M doesn't have the $250 yet. He's at about $200-210. So he will have to wait until he gets the rest of the money to open his account. He is interested in earning money, but only if its easy. Not manual labor. But there's not much we can think of that he can do for money that doesn't involve manual labor. But if anyone wants to hire a 12 yo to do computer work, M's your kid!

If anyone is interested in opening an account, I can send you a referral - just let me know...

new way to handle allowances

I've thought of a new way to deal with the kids allowances and savings.  I checked with ING and I can set up accounts for the kids, linked to our checking account.  Then if they want to put money in the bank, they give it to me and I transfer money from our checking to their savings, electronically.  I'm hoping that this gives them a little more incentive to save - or at least they will be earning some money (albeit a rather small amount) while they save up.  

The kids seem to think this is a great idea and were disappointed that I have to wait until my ING account is open before I can open up theirs, probably Monday.  

About a year ago, we opened up savings accounts for both kids at the local credit union, but it was too much hassle to go up there to deposit/withdraw money, so we didn't do it much (umm, maybe 1 deposit and 1 withdrawal).  I think this will work better, and since M is still saving up for that iPod touch, he's all for anything that will get him more money - especially if painlessly!

Oooohhh, M will be all excited!  The iPod touch he's wanting has come down in price - by a good bit.  The 16GB that he's been wanting was $299 refurbished - now its $239.

Maybe not the best way to earn money

I "earned" $2 tonight - by virtue of M not taking out the trash. Hmmm... if it is worth $2 to him to not take out the trash, I guess I need to set the price higher. Though he drew the line at 25 cents per trashcan to put new bags in. So, first thing tomorrow morning he will be doing that - or owing me some more money.

I know I ought to have the kids doing more chores, but somehow it just doesn't get done. A couple of times a month I get everyone involved in cleaning up - but I seem to spend as much time doling out tasks as getting anything done myself.

I'm tired tonight. D's gone, so I've been kid-wrangling myself yesterday and today. And tonight is the 3rd night in a row that we've been out late - Scouts, Lenten program, and Scouts again. But now, A is the official recipient of a Bear badge. I have some pictures (not sure how good they are, most were taken by M, at a distance). But no camera battery tonight. So the battery is charging and I will try to put up photos tomorrow.

Not really worth it

We had a yard sale today. Or as the signs said - an estate sale or a garage sale. But maybe we should have said basement sale because mostly that's where it was. My mom's basement to be exact - with her stuff, her temporary roommate's stuff and my stuff (including stuff that was my dad's). Plus a little bit of stuff from my aunt and one friend. And we tried to keep track of stuff that sold that the kids would get the money for. All rather confusing and lots of work.

I was up just before 6 this morning - oh the horror, on a Saturday. When I got over to my mom's just before 7, it was really still too dark to put stuff outside - I couldn't see what I was putting where. So we concentrated on taking boxes out to arrange once it got light and clearing paths inside.

The sale was advertised from 8-2, but we still had people coming up until 4 or later - even as we were taking stuff back inside. We left a lot of it set up inside - that's easier for today, but its even harder to force yourself to go back through things later. I did box up a large box of stuff to go directly to G@@dwill though. It's in the car and ready to be dropped off (Monday, I hope).

By the time we finished cleaning up (as much as we did) and counting money, I had made a grand total of approximately $80. Not much gain for a full day's work. But, then again, I didn't really expect to make a whole lot of money on this sale. I was participating because I was needed - and if I was going to be there, I might as well try to make *some* money. Amazingly enough, for me the biggest money makers were my dad's clothes. I think we sold 5 sports coats ($5 each), at least 12 pairs of pants (3 for $5), a few shirts and one pair of shoes. Usually kids clothes sell better than adults, but not today. I think all I sold of the kids clothes was 3 items and one pair of shoes.

more on M and the walk-a-thon

M at the walk-a-thon:


M raised $168 (so far) for his school PTO. This is a big deal for him as he doesn't like approaching people. But he took the initiative and asked me to help him make a sign-up sheet (he had left his official form at home) at church on Sunday and went around asking people for donations. The fact that he can win prizes of cold, hard cash for raising money helps his motivation I'm sure!

New Dryer, Finally!

Since our dryer died, oh, about 2 months ago, we have been hanging clothes out to dry. We had a bad spell where it was humid and threatening rain for most of a week, when it was really hard to get laundry done. Of course, we're in a drought - it didn't actually rain more than 0.1 inches that whole week - but it certainly threatened to rain.

On Friday I went to the S*ears scratch and dent outlet store and looked at dryers. I had looked elsewhere and checked out C*onsumer R*eports and had some ideas about dryers. The dryer manufacturers change model numbers faster than I can keep up. And different stores have slightly different models - that may be the same or then again, they may not. Reminds me of shopping for mattresses - ugh.

Anyway, I was at the outlet and WOW, there were a LOT of dryers. Looked like more than were carried by my local S*ears, but maybe that's because there were multiple dryers of the same model at times. It was rather mind-boggling.

I was intending to get a fairly basic model dryer, not the bare bones model though. I wanted a no heat cycle and some sort of sensor drying. I didn't particularly want a touch screen. Well - here's what I got:



Yep, its got all sorts of bells and whistles - touch screen, interior light, etc. But it was too good a deal to pass up. Evidently it sat on the outlet store floor too long and it was a "manager's special". This dryer was priced way less than some of those basic models. It was roughly 1/3 the original price. WOW. And this for a dryer that was the best rated one I saw in CR.

Today was another of those overcast, humid days. So, I actually used the dryer for a FULL cycle. Well - I did pull out D's pants and 2 dress shirts about 10 minutes into the cycle so that they wouldn't get wrinkly while I was over at the school volunteering.

Every time I glance over at the laundry area, I think I must have left the dryer door open - but no, I'm just not used to seeing the inside of my dryer while its closed. And the capacity of this dryer is HUGE. It loooks like A would fit in there (NOT going to happen, but still). My full load of wash looks rather puny in the dryer.

How to make M happy

By getting an email from Apple saying that they have reduced the price of the 2GB iPod and they are automatically refunding the excess! To the tune of $10.70 (including tax). That is a princely sum to my M! It's almost 2 weeks allowance. And for a 2nd happy day thought, a little later came another email from Apple telling us that his iPod has been shipped. It should be here sometime the end of this week (or Monday at the latest).

Now I just have to figure out which of at least 3 different ways will work best to manage 2 iPods off the same computer.

Summer haircuts

It was finally time to trim the gory locks again. The weather is hot here, and looks like it will be staying that way for at least the next 4 months.

Both the kids were trying to dance around and keep me from taking their picture! Didn't work! hah


We haven't turned on the AC yet, but it will probably be sometime within the next month. I'm hoping to make it into June at least before it needs to go on.

Many if not most people around here have already turned on the AC. One way we stave off the AC is the "window dance". In the evening once it has cooled off, we open up various windows. At bedtime we turn on the attic fan (sometimes called a whole house fan). It pulls cool air in from outside and cools the house down nicely. It usually runs for a couple of hours. Then in the morning after everyone is off to school, I'll turn the fan back on to cool the house down even more. I would turn on the fan as soon as I get up, but the kids complain that then the house is cold, with the breeze blowing over them. I can often get the house down into the upper 60's. Then the fan goes off and the windows get shut, usually by 9 am, to keep in the cool.

In June, when we often would only need the AC for a few hours in mid-afternoon, we can go to the pool to cool off and between wet bodies and being past the heat of the day, we can manage to last another week or so. Anything to delay the high electric bills from the AC.

New take on the Nigerian scam

I don't get the Nigerian scam letters very often - maybe only a half-dozen in the last 3 or 4 years, so I'm not an expert on them. I was amused by this variant, esp the part "or we will be having to shoot you".

I didn't realize that Luxembourg was a big enemy of China, as this seems to imply.

MR WING CHING PING YING
THE FAR EASTERN AMERICAN COMPANY
1123 SOUTH MAIN STREET
CHINA

Dear Sir or Madam,

My name be Sir Wing Ching Ping Ying, and I have good business matter for you. I have client named a Mrs. Janet Cook who lives in Mongolia. She is my client but now she is dead, as she died in a plane crash over Nigeria. She left a large amount of her estate (a good sum of five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred Million Billion USD) in a bank in switzerland.

As she has no living next of kin, all of that money is currently sitting there in the vault with the dust upon it collecting. According to French law, in 5 years all of that money will be donated to Luxembourg. Being an enemy of Luxembourg, we do not want that to happen. We want you to be middle man for the taking of the money.

We want you to sign as next of kin so you will get all the money, and then you will give it to us or we will be having to shoot you. As a reward, we are willing to give you 25 per cent of the money in the bank. This is very good deal and we hope you shall consider it and response back with answer.

There will be more of the information coming in next letter. I hope to hear from the you soon.

Sincerely,
Mr. Wing Ching Ping Ying
Second Senior Co-Executive Director of The Far Eastern American Company

It's hard to save....

...when there are so many things you want. M is learning this the hard way. He had enough money for an iPod, briefly. After his birthday party last weekend, he had $82, just enough for a refurbished 1GB iPod. However they didn't have any of those in stock right then. In the meantime (5 days) he decided he really needed a subscription to a manga magazine. So, now he doesn't have enough money again.

We had (yet another) discussion about how his allowance takes care of his wants and Dad and I take care of his needs. Food, clothing, school supplies = needs. Toys, magazines, iPod = wants. We discussed how when he gets older he will have to spend money on his own needs. He was suprised to hear that an acquaintance of ours was out of money for the month already - I explained that meant he couldn't go to the grocery store or the gas station (without borrowing money from a friend) until the end of the month. I think that was a revelation to M.

M is just different than I was as a kid. I was a Saver. I liked having stuff, but I didn't like spending my money. I've gotten better, but I'm still frugal (sometimes even cheap). I don't feel comfortable without a decent balance in my checking account. I use a credit card all the time, but not unless I could pay for it right away.

My hope is that having an allowance will teach the kids how to manage their money while they are still dealing with small amounts. I hope they will learn to save. Actually A doesn't need to learn - he's a saver at heart. He needs to learn that its ok to spend money when you've got money - you don't have to save it ALL.

Taxes in the final stretch

The taxes are done, but not sent in yet. I have to copy and collate them tomorrow morning. No sense sending them in earlier than needed when you owe money, but that's not the real reason I'm doing it tomorrow. No, the real reason is that I finally finished them just before dinner tonight. Then after dinner I wrote checks and addressed envelopes. I have sticky notes galore telling me what to copy and how many copies. I can't wait to be finally done.

At least next year I won't have the estate taxes to do again. It felt good to be able to check the box for final return.

Things have been busy lately what with spring cleaning, hosting M's party, finishing taxes on top of everyday life. I have a list of other things that were waiting on the taxes, some necessary, some fun - now that the dreaded taxes are done, I can start on that list...

Birthdays celebrated

My mom and I celebrated our birthdays together yesterday. We had ice cream cake in the afternoon and presents. I got an iPod. Woohoo. Blue. It's tiny. I knew it was small, but I hadn't really realized how small.

So far, I've fiddled with iTunes some and put some podcasts on it and transferred 3 CD's worth of songs. It's amazing how much faster the computer will put the songs on the iPod than putting the songs from the CD onto the computer.

I got a new camera too. D and I have been discussing getting a new digital since before Christmas (and we tried to get one right around then), but he finally found and bought one - a Canon SD700. So far it seems pretty cool. I'm still learning how to use it, though, and haven't been able to get the photos from it onto the computer yet. I'll try on the PC later.

We promised my mom a MP3 of some sort too. We thought we'd show her some options of my iPod and the kids MP3's and see what sort of interface she wants. We thought it would make her training for the Atlanta cancer walk more interesting.

M is disappointed that I got an iPod and my mom may get one, but he doesn't have one. He thinks we should have bought him one for his birthday. We didn't. He's doing a good job of saving money to buy himself one - he's up to $50 and hoping for some gift cards from friends at his birthday party next week.

The kids each drew me really nice pictures. We're going to get frames for them. When I can get photos uploaded I'll post those - probably in a future post.

High Finance

I hadn't paid the kids their allowance since the end of last year, so they were due some serious money. We settled up yesterday. M got almost $30, after taking out money he owed me. Today, he managed to spend almost $14 of it - on Yu-gi-oh cards. He says he wants to save up for an iPod nano - and he calculated how much he would have by his birthday (including counting his "chickens" of money he thinks he will get). He figured he would have enough by then to get a refurbished iPod - but not if he keeps spending his money. M finds it hard to save if the money is there.

A, on the other hand, is a die-hard saver. He finally bought the Nintendo DS he wanted. When it came time to pay me back, we calculated how much he owed me - then subtracted the $60 I borrowed from him last summer, the $50 Target gift card (his prize for selling popcorn) and his allowance - he owed me a grand total of $3.50! Wow. And he still has a bunch of money. I think we need to open up a bank account for him. I wonder if I can find one that actually pays some decent interest (like at least 1%)...