Category Archives: Tuesday Tip

Goal Setting: “S” Through and Through

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I am epically bad at setting goals–long-term, short-term, daily, weekly…I sit down to try and come up with things I would like to do and my mind goes utterly blank. This seems odd to me because I’m such a planner and love having things spelled out. My layman’s psychoanalysis theory is that it’s because I’m an “S” on the Myers-Briggs spectrum. According to one description, this means, “I’m concerned with what is actual, present, current, and real” and that “sometimes I pay so much attention to facts, either present or past, that I miss new possibilities.” On the flip side of the spectrum is the “N” personality type, who is “interested in new things and what might be possible, so that [she] think[s] more about the future than the past” and even “sometimes think[s] so much about new possibilities that [she] never look[s] at how to make them a reality.” I don’t want to use this as an “out” to simple excuse myself from trying to create goals for myself, but I do think it’s useful to acknowledge that it might be harder for me than for others. I don’t think I have a visionary bone in my body, because if I even start to let myself dream I end up getting caught up in the steps it would take to get to that dream so quickly that I can’t get excited about it!

I love this infographic about what makes a good goal:

Source: moneysavingmom.com via Laura on Pinterest

And I also love these two lists of questions I found from Simple Mom:

I haven’t done it yet, but I’d like to spend some time thinking through these questions and using the SMART tactic to try and give myself some structure for moving ahead. Most of the bloggers I respect and enjoy reading are excellent goal-setters and I love following their progress as they strive to achieve dreams, make practical advances, and have fun new experiences. I also love the concept of having a word or two that you’re hoping to let define your year; for example, Money Saving Mom’s word for 2013 is “margin.”

I don’t know my word.

I don’t have New Year’s Resolutions.

But I do have a few thoughts of areas where I’d like to focus more and perhaps eventually set some goals (can I say that I have a goal to set goals?!):

  • learning (more on that to come in a subsequent post)
  • relationships
  • organization

Specifically, in the area of relationships, I want to think about cultivating and continuing friendships I already have as well as expanding relationships I’m beginning to build. I’ll do the first by being intentional about making phone calls and by sending frequent texts whenever I’m thinking of someone. I really hate talking on the phone, but every time I convince myself to call a friend or to pick up when a friend calls, I find myself engrossed in our conversation, and I inevitably hang up the phone thinking, “Oh yeah! It’s really nice to talk to people you love!” I think for now I will aim for having an extended conversation with at least one far-flung friend a month. And on the text message front, I’ve realized it’s SO, so easy to shoot someone a text. And while it may seem a bit impersonal, it’s better than nothing! And often, a simple text can encourage a chain of texts, or an email, or even *gasp* a phone call.

As I build new relationships in Atlanta, I want to continue meeting with my book club and potentially attend other events with the women in that group. I also want to try and have a monthly girls’ night out with some people. This has been happening sporadically, and we always have a great time, so even though planning the outings often proves difficult, it’s well worth my while to send a few emails and calendar invites. Finally, I think I might go WAY out on a limb and ask a select few people if they’d like to run together occassionally. I went for a run the other day on the Beltline and had a blast; it may turn me into a runner yet! And if it’s already something I’m trying to do, why not involve a burgeoning friend in my efforts and kill two birds with one stone?

As far as organization, Andy and I will be staying put in our apartment for another year (at least as far as we know at this point), which is fine, but I want to purge and re-organize as if we were going to be moving. We live in a fairly small space. All of our stuff fits, even with all the shopping I’ve done in the past year, but I think we definitely have more than we need, and the things we do need could be organized more effectively. I think it’s healthy to evaluate your possessions on a regular basis, and since it’s been awhile since we moved, I’d say it’s time! Hopefully we can make a few bucks selling some of the things on Craisglist, eBay, or Amazon. I also think this activity will help me be content in our living situation–we love our neighborhood, and I love the majority of the stuff in our apartment, but when things are crammed in and disorganized it’s easy to become frustrated. I’m planning to set a weekend soon to do this with Andy, so I’ll report back and let you know how it goes!

Do you have any resolutions or goals for 2013? What’s your process for planning for the future? 

LevelUp: The App

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It’s been well-established on this blog how I feel about credit cards, as I’ve commented several times on the Dave Ramsey cash envelope system. Andy and I recently started using an app called LevelUp. At businesses that use it, you simply open the app on your Android or iPhone (which is linked to a credit card of your choice), hold it up to their space-age looking LevelUp scanner, and you have paid. My immediate thought the first time I used this was that Dave Ramsey would have a field day. It is scary easy. And if Andy and I didn’t keep such close tabs on our spending, I might be very, very nervous of it.

But it has a lot of cool features. For one thing, you can unlock a lot of deals with it. For example, at the coffee shop in our apartment complex, once you’ve spent $30.00, you unlock $3.00 of credit. That’s a free cup of coffee! From the app, you can choose to donate a portion of any savings you receive to a cause you support. And it’s accepted at a lot of places like food trucks and the mobile popsicle cart that lives in our neighborhood. I like the thought that if I’m out somewhere and for some reason don’t have my wallet, I could still pick something up at one of these places. Plus, there is less to fumble with at the register!

The app keeps track of all your transactions, and it also emails you a receipt immediately when you make a purchase. So as long as you’re savvy, it’s no different from using your credit card. Plus it’s secure: Andy tried to change the card linked to his account, and coincidentally he ended up trying to add that card that is linked to mine (which is a joint card). LevelUp wouldn’t let him do it, and it sent me a warning email that someone else had tried to link my card. Obviously, I wasn’t freaked out because it was my husband, but if it had been an actual case of attempted fraud/theft, I would have been relieved that it was nipped in the bud!

It obviously isn’t a viable method of payment everywhere, but the app can locate you and tell you what businesses near you accept LevelUp. I would venture to bet that more and more businesses will be going this direction soon. If you’d like to join the trend, you can use my referral code (230291) at https://www.thelevelup.com and we will each get $5. (Since we would both benefit, I don’t feel skeezy offering this at all!) Check their website to see if enough merchants around you offer this as an option to make it worth your while! $5 free money never hurt anyone…

A Few Stolen Minutes

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After years of angst about what my hair looks like, lately I have stopped doing anything to it at all.

Let me back up. Both of my parents have good thick hair with a bit of wave, which I inherited. But for years, I swam so much that my hair was dry and unhealthy, and I never liked how it looked. As I progressed through school, I learned the beauty of hair straighteners and curl gel/mousse/cream, and once I crossed that bridge I never went back. Even if I was letting it air dry, I scrunched it to death with some kind of product. And most days, I blew it dry and straightened it, because that was the way I could make it predictable. Unfortunately, I never mastered the art of using a round brush to make it blow dry nicely, so the straightening was a necessary second step.

I also went through a phase of coloring my hair. After an unfortunate experiment with “auburn” from a box (read: RED), I started going to a salon. But I was inconsistent about my visits so I almost always had roots showing. Plus I let my already thick hair grow long, and the combination of color, chlorine, and length made it look dry. To me, my senior portrait from high school is the epitome of what I don’t want my hair to look like!

I go all over the map on length, with a tendency toward keeping it about chin length with an off-center part, but again, my salon laziness means that it sometimes gets to shoulder length or a bit longer before I finally do that. Now that I don’t swim regularly, my hair is no longer dried out, and in fact tends to get greasy after a day or so, meaning I don’t like to use any product in it. So I’ve been exposing my hair to heat for years.

One recent Saturday, I took a late afternoon shower and, since I wasn’t planning to leave the apartment, decided to just leave my hair alone. And wonder of wonders, it actually looked kind of nice! It had a subtle curl to it and not a drastic amount of frizz. So I tried the experiment the next day to similar results. And now I am hooked. The extra 15 minutes or so that not drying and straightening my hair frees up in the mornings feels revolutionary. It may not look awesome, but it looks good enough for me. Plus it’s on the long end of my haircut spectrum right now, and I have a feeling if I get it cut, it will have even more bounce to it.

I’m sure I’ll pull out the straightener on days I have some extra time or on days I want my hair to cooperate, but for now I’m enjoying this change. Instead of rushing to dry my hair, I’m sitting here enjoying a cup of coffee and “talking” to you fine folks!

What are your tricks for freeing up valuable minutes of your time? Do you change up your hair routine occasionally?

it’s the little things

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I drink a lot of water, which is a good thing. But for some reason the other day I got to thinking about how much it might cost if every single drop of water I drank came from a plastic bottle!

Andy and I have one of these guys in our fridge:

 

It’s a bit of a pain to keep it filled, but it’s so handy to be able to fill my 32 ounce Nalgene bottle and drink out of it all day. (In fact, I actually drink 2 Nalgene bottles full every day, along with extra glasses of water.)

I started wondering how much money we saved by not buying bottled water. My decision to not drink bottled water every day is more about the eco-element of not using so much plastic, but I bet we save some money, too. I know a lot of people don’t like the taste or the chemicals that can be found in tap water, but the filter takes care of those for us.

We replace the filter about once every 3 months, and we buy them in multi-packs, usually from Amazon, for around $20.00.

A 24-pack of bottled water was on sale at Kroger this week for $3.69 (and I have no idea how much the normal price is, or how that price compares to other brands). Given the amount of water I drink, I would go through at least 4 of those bottles EVERY DAY, meaning the 24-pack would last 6 days. And that’s not including the fact that Andy also drinks water! In the 3 months that our filter lasts, we would have to buy about 15 24-packs of water, costing us at least $55.35. SO, by using our fridge filter and refilling bottles, we save about $45.00+ over er 3 months, or $15.00+ a month (and again, this is assuming that only I am drinking the water). I know we spend some on the water from our tap, but I’m pretty sure that it’s not $15.00 of our water bill.

It might not sound like that much, but it’s the little things that add up. I know I could likely use coupons and get the water for cheaper, but the bottles would still incur a global cost of recycling the plastic that is not exactly measurable.

So the next time I’m ticked off that the filter pitcher is empty just as I want a glass of water, I’m going to remember that $45.00 (though I wouldn’t mind eventually replacing it with a faucet-mount filter so I could have instant gratification…)

Do you have any money-saving or eco-friendly tips? What kind of water do you drink?

Controlling Magazine Clutter

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I’ve been on a pretty major spring organizing kick lately, to the tune of all of this going to the thrift store:

(Actually, there ended up being even more than that: a file box that was too big for our bookshelf, a bag of Andy’s t-shirts, and a bag of miscellaneous picture frames and decor.)

I honestly have no idea where all of this was hiding in our little one-bedroom apartment. It ended up filling the entire trunk of my car! I say good riddance…the next time we move I will be glad not to have that trunkful.

As I sifted through our stuff, one major clutter element I had to confront was my magazines:

I love getting magazines. I get excited every month when they come in the mail, and I enjoy clipping recipes and coupons. Most of these subscriptions I’ve gotten either as gifts or for very cheap during a promotional sale. I always save them thinking, “Well, I might need or want to look back at that later.” But if I’m honest with myself, I never, ever do. Even if something piqued my interest, I probably forget about it and never try to find it again. I’ve taken to marking pages for action immediately and just clipping/scanning/pinning right away. So really this giant stack was unnecessary.

I tried to find someone to give them too, but alas, most of my friends are reasonable and admitted that they had their own stash of magazine clutter! I took a few to work, as we have a small pile of magazines that people will sometimes flip through as they eat lunch. Someone on Facebook suggested that I donate them to a salon or doctor’s office. We have several of each of those right around our apartment, but I just honestly felt like it wasn’t worth the effort. And plus, they might want 1 or 5, but probably not all of these! So, even though it hurt my heart, I walked them down to the recycling bin. It felt like I was throwing away money. But I rationalized it by telling myself that if I clipped one good recipe or got one good piece of advice from each of them, then it was not a total loss.

My solution to keep the stack from getting this crazy in the future was to buy a fun colored magazine holder. It conveniently fits right between our end table and the couch!

(Yes, the floor underneath our end table has become a de facto bookshelf. Hey, it works!)

My rule is that I can keep this holder’s worth of magazines and no more. So, when it’s full, I have to decide which ones go. I feel like I might be more likely to find people who want 1 or 2 than to find people who want my giant stacks. Plus, even if I do end up recycling them, it will feel less wasteful to get rid of a few than to get rid of all the ones I just did.

I’m all about having a place for everything and keeping everything in its place, so I think this system will work well for me. It has felt SO GOOD getting rid of all this stuff and figuring out ways to tame it in the future. Sometimes it just takes being a bit brutally honest with yourself about what you use and how you actually use it.

Have you done any spring cleaning lately? Do you have any ingenious storage tricks that you’re particularly proud of?