My Financial Plan UPDATE!!

So if you have been a follower of my blog for awhile you will remember the post about My Financial Plan. This post got me so excited after I finished writing it I immediately started getting my financial situation together. Well I hadn't read the book when I wrote my last post, but after I shared my thoughts with you all I got on the ball and starting reading Dave Ramsey's book, The Total Money Makeover. 

It is a very inspirational book to read, because he gives us all hope. After I finished his book,(in just 2 days), I set myself goals and budgets to get myself out of debt. I can say my 1st step in the Baby Steps is complete and I feel great knowing I have a little security blanket just incase of an emergency. 

As a college student I am stressing of finding a way to pay for all my college expenses, but budgeting has been a lifesaver! I am learning what my money is being spent towards and when I can't afford it, I simply don't buy it. I am so grateful as well that I have such amazing, and helpful parents have been helping me with minor costs, because without them I'd be in way more debt then I already am. 

So as I continue on with Dave's plan I am working this school year (something I have never done before) to have a little extra money to save up, so when I'm out of college good-bye school loans. :)

I am thinking about making a separate post to explain Dave's Baby Steps for you all and a way to be organized and give you all a little inspiration and hope, because we can do it. We shouldn't have to be in debt all of our lives, so join in and follow up on My Financial Plan and Dave's Baby Steps.

If you haven't already become a follower of my blog and leave comments I love getting new followers and reading what everyone has to say. :) Have a happy Friday!

Random thoughts & Smash Books

This week has felt so long to me. Work went so slow and today I got to leave early because we ran out of work. At least it is Friday, so that just meant I got to spend more time with my boyfriend. It's been a very relaxing day today wish is very nice. Haven't been busy with much today. Me and Clay, my boyfriend, went to see one of his friends houses he is renting out and for being an old farm house it's not to bad. Makes me want to hurry up get my RN and be on my way to making money and settling down. 

I am so in love with looking at homes and planning how I would love for each room to look. I'm thinking about making what's called a SMASH book and taking clippings from magazines and putting all of my ideas in one place. I saw something like this on Pinterest, but never really understood the point, but thinking about it a few days ago I thought why not start my own SMASH book.

SMASH BOOK IMAGES :)

 I think it's a great way to put together all your ideas its a messy but beautiful way to organize clippings. It's like a scrapbook without your own pictures, but of ideas or writings. Anything you can think of really.

More images.

These smash books are super cute! I can't wait to create my own. I will defiantly have to share it with you whenever I make one.

This post is just some random thoughts that I wanted to blog about. Hope everyone is enjoying their start to their weekend. Have a safe one!

Vacation

Tomorrow is finally the day I've been waiting for. I leave for Minnesota for a week! I can't wait to relax on the lake, fish, and have some quality bonding time with my boyfriend and his family. I'm stressing a little because I have not yet packed my bags. Ooops. I found a really awesome pin on Pinterest that I plan on using when packing my suitcase. I always struggle with trying to get everything to fit nice and neatly in my tiny suitcase, but with this pin I have found the secrets to stuffing in a weeks worth of clothes and more!

Source

I was just amazed when I read this article. Cant wait to get my packing on!

Her finished product. 

Hope everyone enjoys the week ahead of them I will be taking a little break from blogging and enjoying my vacation. 

My New Planner

Planners, Planners, Planners. I just love PLANNERS. I'm excited to show you my new planner that I got yesterday. It's all from Staples. Martha Stewart has her own line in office supplies and Staples is carrying it. I went a little crazy with her products. I love Martha and office supplies.
I love my new planner. It's portable, colorful, and fun. This is great for me because it is hard to find a planner that isn't bulky when you want to add in other areas of your live. Such as maybe Menu Planning or like in mine I have my Workouts, To Do's, and Budget.

My New Planner! I am in love with this color.

I got these (Mr. Sketch) markers from Amazon.com. They are great for using in your planner. They don't bleed threw either!

Love the rainbow colors!

Here are my planner supplies I picked up from Staples :)

There are different sized binders. I just got the smaller binder so I can carry it in my purse since I use my planner everyday. The size of mine is a 5 1/2 X 8. Something like that. All I know is its the smaller one and its portable! I liked that you could pick out what you wanted to fill your planner with so I got a little bit of everything (that I would use).

Here is what the inside of my planner looks like!

Decorate your planner with whatever you feel is for you. Make it so you want to open it up and use it. I inserted a picture of me and my boyfriend (from 2 years ago). I could have used something recent, but I like this one :)  These little sticky notes are perfect to! You can jot down anything important you want to remember for the week, month, year, or just because.

Here is a look at what the calendar looks like.

 The calendar filler is monthly. It goes from January 2012 to June 2013. Mine is a little bare now but in time will be completely filled with my busy schedule.

This is a section in my planner dedicated to workouts. 

I have labeled 5 tabs for the most important sections in my planner.

Monthly-Calendar Section

Workouts

To Do's

Goals

Budget

This is probably one of the simplest planners I've owned and am really excited to use it because its very portable. I take my planner everywhere I go, it makes me feel so much more organized. 

Would love to see what everyone else's planners look like.

Link up if you like and share what you use everyday to organize your life :)

Gardening

Hope everyone had a marvelous memorial weekend. I know mine was full of celebration. My baby brothers graduation was this weekend so we celebrated that as well as got the family together for a pool party since its been hot here. Along with all this heat our garden has sprouted up and getting big! This was the first year me and my boyfriend have had a garden and we sure did a great job.

Gardens are a great way to save some money at the store as well. Growing your own fresh produce is great because you know where and what is happening to it as well.

Here's is what our garden is starting to look like.

My boyfriend and I have planted a variety of vegetables this year and we did pretty well. Mostly everything came up. We have all kinds of peppers from hot to just green peppers for flavoring. We've also planted cucumbers, squash, beans, onions, spinach, and tomatoes. It's funny because the whole time we planted our garden we were being told we weren't doing things right, but we must have because we have a garden in progress!! :)

We've decided that this will become a tradition of ours and one we can continue when we have children in the near future. We are both excited for the lives we have planned for ourselves. Since he is getting is degree in the arts of culinary a garden is perfect and a money saver. In the long run there won't as many trips to the grocery store for vegetables, since we can go outside and pick them right off the plant. Can't wait for it to continue to get bigger and start eating a lot healthier as well. 

Relaxing Weekend..

Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend! This weekend has been so busy and eventful for me. It's that time of the year, GRADUATION!! My little brother is graduating from high school next weekend, so I've been busy helping my family clean our home. Hope if you have read about my financial plans blog you are getting more information on the Total Money Makeover and are making a change in your life! I'm taking on the challenge with you.

On Friday me and my boyfriend to a trip to the city and enjoyed the day by walking the trials. It was a great way to get fresh air and enjoy the outdoors. We walked a beautiful trail and the canal in our city. We had so much fun and the time flew by. After we arrived back to our vehicle we went to grab a bite to eat at Olive Garden. It was so nice to have a sit down dinner for a change. We shopped and looked around at Target (one of my favorite stores) for awhile to kill some time then headed back home.

Yesterday me and my family went to my cousins open house and had some dinner with the family. It was nice to see everyone.

Today is just a relaxing day with my boyfriend. Got some lunch then came home and are watching the basketball game. Such bums :)

Hope that everyone is enjoying themselves and hope to have a great post on organizing or crafting in the next couple of days! 

My financial plan

Taking on the Total Money Makeover

A couple years ago my cousin sent me a book called "The Total Money Makeover" by Dave Ramsey.

 I can't say I have read it yet, but going into my 3rd year in college with $5,500 in student loans & a car payment I'd figured I should learn the ropes on how to get out of debt now before I create more debt while I'm in college. I hope to learn that I won't need to find myself in anymore debt once I'm debt-free. 

Im ready for this change of habits, because I love to spend money on things I don't need, but come on what girl doesn't. I can gladly say I have zero credit card debt though! Thank GOD or I would be that irresponsible college student who just swipes it for anything and everything. Which I have heard multiple stories from my mom who's colleagues children have done just that. My problem is I have school loans & a car payment that have me in the hole. My car should be paid off in about 6 more months! :) but I need a change! 
Some background about my family!!
This is a very recent picture of me and my family from Christmas in 2012.

My family and I are very close and are very supportive no matter what the situation. My mom is currently battling breast cancer, which she found out in Nov. 2012. My aunt is also battling cancer, but hers is lung cancer which she found out the same time my mom did as well. My mom's medical condition hasn't stopped her. She loves her job and hasn't lost hope through this obstacle in her life. With that our financial times could be better but we make it work. I have learned a lot from my parents and how they manage the money they live off of. They have taught me to be a hard worker and to never pass up an opportunity, which leads me to my current job. 

I work at a local factory that pays a whom-ping $8.50 an hour. It helps in the summers with my retail splurges that is for sure, but working only a few days during the week while I'm in school mostly helps with the gas from my commute. As I started reading the book yesterday I couldn't put it down. Dave is so inspirational to me, because he tells it how it is & lets his readers know about so many topics you might not have really thought about when it comes to money. Im not that far in his book, but I am learning so much already and cant wait to be debt free before I graduate college!!! (Hopefully :) )

I will post more on my total money makeover when I finish the book and share with you how to create your cash envelope system and become debt free.

Happy Mother's Day!!

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY to all the moms out there!! :)
I made this for my mom. She defiantly loved it!

Weight management and the ugly truth.

     Today my brother had his county invite for golf and was that a rough morning. I had to get up around 7:30 this morning and my body is definitly not use to that. It was a nice morning though got some great shots of him playing golf and sure got in my exercise walking the 18 hole course with my parents as well.

   Exercise...not my forte but this is something I have thought about blogging or keeping a journal of my progress for quite some time now so what a great time to start!

      I will be the first to admit that I need to lose weight it has always been an uphill struggle for me. When I graduated high school 3 years ago I wasn't extremely slim but I was probably in the best shape I had been throughout high school and then college came. The first year wasn't bad on me, but this year I found myself having some pretty bad eating habits. I love fruits but ice cream has become my weakness especially the Ben n Jerry's "half-baked" kind. It is so mouth watering and delicious and has become a bit of a problem. A BIG PROB!

     Today I am giving up junk food!! Everything that is on the list will be easy except for ice cream. I mean it is getting close to summer. I know here in Indiana it gets pretty hot and miserable during the summer so a cold treat always helps cool off a little bit. As well as a dip in the pool :).

I would also like the stick to a workout plan. I have multiple fitness games and activities to do its just hard for me to actually stick to it for more than a couple weeks.

     If there are people out there who are having a hard time getting motivated I have found a great app for my iPhone that helps me keep track of the food I consume and the type of exercises I do. This app is MY FITNESS PAL. It's great because you and your friends can help motivate one another and congratulate each other when one is making progress with there weight loss.

     I would love the help and support from my readers to keep me going through this journey as I challenge myself this summer and the rest of my life to get on the healthy track! We all want to feel healthy and beautiful so let's take the challenge together!