Tom and Syanna

This year has been a busy one. Tom is just about to finish up his summer classes, which will leave him with 3 semesters left before graduation, and should be his last summer of classes. I can't even with how excited I am. I am thankful for disability accommodations because he has been able to work through the reading for 2 of his fall classes this summer which is going to make this fall so much less stressful. I am so happy about this because he didn't get the "no school - relax the brain thing" this summer, so any little thing to make the fall better is a much appreciated thing.

This past week has been a busy week for our country. Last Friday marked the beginning of the Trump administration. Saturday marked a history-making worldwide event: The Women's March. Monday marked the opening of the Utah State Legislative Session and the Utah Women's March. There have been a lot of opinions about the marches: some has been positive and constructive, others have been negative and riddled with ridicule. I thought I'd take a minute to share why I marched and will continue to march. I marched, not just because Trump won but because there are issues I felt dearly about prior to the election and they just suddenly became so much more critical or immediate because I honestly don't trust that man not to back-step rights and values that I hold dear. My journey began when I first saw Equal Means Equal (available to rent on Amazon Prime or the purchase if you are interested - please read "comes highly recommended). The documentary is described as follow...

First, at some point I will address the election results. But today, this week, it is too raw, there is too much I feel I need to do, and I'm so tired  from working through what little I've managed this past week. So, on to lighter stuff. I promised an update on the No-Spend November experiment. We have done pretty good. We did spend $6.35 Wednesday when we took ourselves for a post-election pick-me-up. We didn't feel too bad though because we were able to get two items for the price of one thanks to a really handy coupon calendar that we got in the mail about 6 weeks ago. And the good news is that we have enough rewards points for another buy one, get one free deal that we will probably use sometime next month for an FHE activity. Tom also, suddenly, really wanted to see Doctor Strange, so we did. I'm not counting this against our no spend attempt because we didn't use any additional money for it, nor did we have to use additional money to keep food on the...

One of those "useful things" I've always tried to do and never been terribly successful at it meal planning. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of it, helps with grocery shopping, saves time each day because you already know what to make, etc. I just have never been good enough at following through. But no time the present to try and be better. I was reading an article today where the author was claiming that they were feeding themselves and their partner on only $120.00 a month with food planning. No I don't think for one minute that I could get us down to 120 a month because, well, sometimes I need convenience food and cheese. But if I could even shave off some of our normal monthly food expenses I'd be a very happy person.  Below is the plan for the month of November. I'll report in later in the month on how it is going, if it goes well I'll try again for December. 1: Skipped 2: Skipped 3: Cafe Rio Salads (this went okay - need to fi...

We just finished out October, which is full of extra spending for us because of the candy and our decorations. We did opt to make most of our decorations in an effort to spend less money and end up with a product that would last longer then a season or too. Here are the pieces we made: These 3 are actually ones that we copied from Old West cemetery's. I also got a head start on some of Tom's presents for Christmas. This year we are attending a show for one of Tom's favorite stand-up comedians in December and that is making up the bulk of our "Christmas" budget and is our "joint gift". As such, we are each just responsible for some smaller items to go under the tree. However, this all left me feeling a little wallet poor by the time midnight October 31st rolled around. So, we decided to try No Spend November, which is a small financial fast from things that aren't essential expenditures. For this exercise essential is being defined as our...

A couple of weekends ago Tom and I took a long weekend and headed out to Denver for my brother's wedding. We drove out Thursday after I got off work and spent the night with Uncle Ben and Aunt Vickie. It was SO fun. We had some amazing french toast and other breakfast food for dinner and some really great conversation. I'm glad we have yet another reason to spend time in the Denver area. Friday we headed to the airport in the morning to pick up mom and Tom from the airport. After that we headed to Mark and Lisa's for some lunch and to help get everything packed up so we could head to the cabin up in Frisco. Okay, I have to take a minute to tell you all that I have the best SILs in the world. They, every one, are amazing, passionate, and kind. They have different interests but they are each just so genuine. I love that I get to add these 3 amazing women to my sister-group. Because my two sisters are the best. I love that all told now I have 5 of the best women in my cor...