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Every year I make up a food preservation plan, which is an overarching pantry plan, really.  I keep the previous year's plans so I can see what I planned before, what I actually achieved, and what I might want to do more or less of.  This includes a canning plan, a dehydrating plan, a freezer plan, and a long-term staples plan.  It's really quite in depth and when I make them up, I feel like I've got a really good handle on things for the coming year.
This year...
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Well, it was a day.  I had to replace my car battery, wiper blades and cabin filter ($304), and while I was out, I shopped at Aldi ($89 -- how did I do THAT?), and picked up another bag of fluids ($12).  If I keep the car repair cost in variables, it is already up to 83%, and I'm not even two weeks in.  We'll see how it goes.  I hate to take it out of savings., but that's probably what will happen.
As others have mentioned, it is bitter cold and snowy here...
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Boy, the Midwest is in a cold snap and I don't like it too much.  This is after a week in Southern California with a daily temp in the high 60s/low to mid 70s.  Daily life is still no smell and no taste, though my energy is finally returning.  Seasonal Affective Disorder symptoms are manageable.  I've given up caffeine and the insomnia has lessened since I'm on a schedule and I am taking melatonin as needed.
Financially, it's still cash poor and paycheck-to-paycheck...
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Yes, it's my least favorite month of the year, and we have a long cold snap.  Oh yeah, and everything else that's going on.  COVID has hit our circle hard--My best friend has lost her mother-in-law, two work colleagues have lost parents, and Friday my aunt died.  In between those, we lost two friends to colon cancer.  Man, I'm cheery, aren't I? 
So we keep on keeping on.  Work is fine for all of us.  DD is very busy with online classes, and my...
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Do you ever go back and read your old entries? I am surprised by how much has changed since 2014 when I started the blog here at SA.  7 years ago I was unhappy where we lived so we changed that.  We had been planning on staying and buying a different house.  Turns out we did buy a home instead of our townhouse.  But it's a completely different town and we paid a lot more than we had expected to at that time and got still a small house.  BUT I love it. ...
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So my spouse and I are dreaming of retirement and travel. We still want to put good and kindness out into the world so we're thinking about traveling and volunteering. I expect that some of this we can do before retirement but also after. Do you have any experience or knowledge of good organizations that help with this both domestically but also internationally? We are both educators so that's are employment skillset, if that matters. 
I think it's possible to retire in 5-8...
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Well as many of you know we have been looking for a rental for the last 7 weeks...looking at the advertisements, some of the exemptions for tenants is just ridiculous, some of these are
can't use the sheds on the property
can't use the jets in the bath
can't use the alarm on the house
can't use the speakers in the house (wired in)
can only use half of the shed
can't use the deck outside
these are just a few we have seen this week...they are not for tenant use...so do you...
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Well we will be moving in the next 10 days not sure where yet but if we don't have a house then it will be to put our stuff into storage...we will pack up the house but we will use movers to pack/unoack our stuff, we have friends that will help us do the outdoor stuff,  and we will transport our tvs/computers etc in the cars with us...I am hoping to do the cleaning and yard work myself have been trying to start it now to get a head start on it so less to do later...next couple...
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So it's only tuesday and we have already had 4 house rejections this week and have a couple more to look at this week...we are down to 10 days before we have to have to be out of here, so if we don't get a house it looks like we would have to put things into storage and see if we can get a furnished rental until we get a house...it is so frustrating...have written to our local councilwoman and asked them what is the govt going to do about the housing situation in SA...if they are...
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A lot of people on SA want to work to keep busy.  They are fiscally responsible and enjoy it.  But I'm the one planning on retiring early and want to be done.  My DH I can tell will not want to quit. But here is my perspective and take.
I don't know what the future holds and I believe the One More Year (OMY) syndrome could easily happen to myself and DH.  We could be easily able to retire in 10 years or less.  But will we? I don't know.  I mean postulating,...
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Not a whole lot of new stuff to report. Been doing the cooking/cleaning/crafting circuit mostly. 
I am spending more and more time in the kitchen it seems because for some reason, we eat. OK, kidding aside. In order to keep things moving along, I am challenging myself to try and do different things. For example, yesterday I made orange marmalade. I had some extra oranges and two extra lemons and a box of pectin and some sugar, so why not? I was pleased with the results....
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It was a bad week, followed by a good week for our retirement accounts and we ended up $1039.39 ahead.  $660 of that was contributions from us and $110 was contributions from DH's job.  That means $341.35 in interest.  I'm sure it would have been better without all the hedge fund nonsense with Gamestop and AMC stock.  It usually is.  Personally, I don't think hedge funds should be allowed to exist, I find them unethical, but I don't want the stock market...
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Not only have I paid off my credit cards, for a short while I actually had a negative balance as I paid more than my balance. I just did my own Dave Ramsey yell at home.
LivingAlmostLarge had another great survey post. I am resharing my answers below for posterity.
My parents retired with 2 pensions. One for 20 years active duty military. They were able to pay all bills with his military income while earning another pension of 20+ years working with the state. They didn’t...
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January 31
NSD
Dinner:  Chili (slow cooker, tried a new recipe)
Odometer update (January):
Hybrid: 300 miles
Electric: 575 miles
I probably roughly split the cars 50/50 for commute, plus we had an emergency out-of-town trip earlier in the month.
MM(17) seems to be resuming normal driving.  They are having track practice every day, so is same as when he drove to school every day.  I asked him to let me know his odometer number.
I did end up discovering a useful...
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I did manage to put a little into the Emergency Fund this paycheck.  Having to save for the handicapped ramp is putting a damper on how much I can put in probably through March.  But I am happy I at least put in a little.
$11,251.02 Previous Balance
+__,_71.96 Amount Added
---------------------
$11,322.98 New Balance
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We did that pop up craft/vendor sale today for my wife's sewing business. It wasn't fantastic but wasn't a total loss either. She made a few sales and got one custom order for a bag. Several people took her card and showed interest in some of her custom items so you never know if that might generate a purchase in the future.
We signed up to do it again on March 20. Hopefully the weather will be better then and there will be more customer traffic. These pop up events are relatively...
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As you all know by now, we garden.  And it saves us a lot of money.  For the cost of a large packet of green bean seeds, I grow and can enough green beans for the whole year.  I grow enough corn for fresh eating and some for the freezer to have later in the year.  I grow and freeze enough zucchini most years to have it once a week all year.  And I grow enough tomatoes to do 52 pints of diced canned.
That's all well and good, but I need to grow enough for...
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I went to Walgreens (not mine, but one not too far away) to get my first Moderna shot yesterday.  I arrived WAY too early (fearful of things going wrong), so I ended up sitting a long time.  Other than that, it was uneventful.  Today I have a bit of pain and swelling at the site, nothing bad.  I am SO glad to have this under my belt, and I consider myself very lucky to have gotten an appointment when so many are struggling.
Afterwards I picked up a few groceries...
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I'm dead and my body is killing me, but we managed to make it to 3 grocery stores.  I was really careful to just get what was on the meal plan that I didn't already have, plus some gluten free desserts for the freezer.  I took $100 of the grocery budget and put it into the Beef Fund and that left me with $300 to spend during a two week period.  We have lots of meat in the freezer, so I barely bought any.
First up we went to Haggen and bought 3 tortilla chips, 2...
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It hasn't been too bad getting used to less money coming in.  We are definitely being more disciplined with the budget and still not eating out, but we have adapted okay to having 15% taken out for retirement instead of 5%.  I honestly thought it would be harder than this, especially with so much more coming out for medical this year.
$271.23 Tithe
_500.00 Utilities
_300.00 Grocery Envelope
_100.00 Beef Fund
_300.00 Medical Fund
__75.00 Household Envelope
_118.17...
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