Last night, boyfriend and I did some grocery shopping at Costco.  Between us we spend $75 (me) and $110 (him). $75 of my food will be deducted from my food/gas budget. Items in Pink are fixed costs while the items in white are added on/already spent expenditures for the next two weeks.

I checked my citibank to see if the personal loan went through and it had, but there was still $141 dollars on the account. I needed to pay that off immediately to close the account. And yes, All is set. CITIBANK SAY GOODBYE! You will not be getting my money with your rate hike to 29.99% No sir!

I also stopped by TJMAXX to pick up my nephew a gift, boyfriend a few more gifts and a few little things for the brothers, and a few things for the apartment. Total spent was around $70.00. That went on my AMEX and will be need to be paid off on January 1. Woops.  Slight mistake spending close to $20 on apartment stuff. But I do have my TJMAXX addiction a little more under control than I did this time last month.

It makes me happy At least I;m not blowing it on department stores and full prices!

Last night I was looking into getting the boyfriend’s parents Radio City Rockette Christmas Spectacular tickets to the show in Charleston. A Whopping $160 for two. Thanks to ticketmaster tacking on an additional $40 some dollars in fees (facility fee, convenience charge, print fee, some other random fee.) It’s got to be criminal. I couldn’t afford to pay for it so I almost went to dig into my credit cards, at which point boyfriend flipped out and sternly warned me to never go in there. It’s not like I can anyways, it’s locked. I tried briefly before he stopped me and the box wouldn’t open! Rarg! He ended up paying for it and I owe him back. As always.

The boyfriend is wanting to go somewhere for New Year’s. I had to put the brakes on and say I will not have money since my credit cards are being held for ransom. Yes, it sucks. We will just have to find free things to do for New Years. We are thinking of backpacking in NH. That could be way fun. Maybe a quiet evening home with each other and a bottle of wine would be sufficient.

I’m driving home to Philadelphia too. That will cost $. I haven’t totally budgeted that in, but allowed an extra $25 in my food/gas/entertainment budget for the end of month. I have around $273 for food/gas/entertainment. Seeing as how I don’t need to buy anything else for the apartment, I should be okay with that. The trip to Philadelphia will cost around $60 in gas and $25 in tolls. But once I am home I should be eating free. Might spend around $20 total in lunch on the go returning from Philadelphia. That leaves me with about $173 for the remainder of the month. If I plan well, maybe I will have a little extra money to spend on NYE.

We shall see.

CitiCard: $9,017.66 at 17.99% (last week I “consolidated” this loan to a personal loan through a local credit union that will give me .99% less on my APR. While it isn’t much, it’s saving me from the 29.99% APR rate hike that Citicard plans on putting into effect Jan 1, 2010 right before the Obama credit card laws go into effect.)

FIA Card: $6,308.08 at 9.99%

Discover: $1,533.20 at 16.99%

I have given my boyfriend all of my credit cards except for my American Express card. He keeps them hidden from me to avoid my temptations. He’s helping me stay on track.

The past two months I have paid off Vicky’s Secret at $548.43 and Juniper Visa at $1000. I used the debt calculator to see what I needed to pay towards credit card monthly to get out of debt in one year and five months. This is my result:

That being said, $1078.58 is hefty amount to pay towards credit cards a month and leaves me barely any room to live my life. Can I crack down and pay this off in that time? Can I pick up a second job outside of work?

I already bring lunch to work everyday and rarely eat out or go out for drinks anymore. In fact, I cannot remember the last time I went out for lunch over a work break. Sometime before the Belize trip I think. I realized back in June what it saved me to cut down on eating out for lunch, when I was budgeting for a trip to Belize. Some tips I wrote about:

“Some measures I have used to cuts costs and save more are:

1. Packing a lunch to bring to work everyday. For me means bringing a can of soup and a bag of chips from the grocery store. I’ve gotten sick of eating soup almost everyday for lunch this past month so I divulged and made some chicken salad this week. Next week I’ll probably get lunch meats and make sandwiches. Typically I would spend $6-$12 a day eating out over lunch break at work. This saves me $30-$60 a week on lunch. That right there is the weekly $25 Courtney suggested. Monthly that is $120-$240 a month on lunch. Wow.

2. Cooking meals instead of eating out for dinner. Every night is different depending on what I am cooking, but this saves heaps of money. And it gives me a chance to show off my domesticated side to Courtney.

3. Not boozing it up. This should be a no brainer. Instead of going out to a bar or two in Boston on a weekend night and spending about $40-$80 a night in cab/alcohol/cover prices – I am able to pocket that money. Instead, lately, Courtney and I have been doing movies with friends or we stay in and get a bottle of wine, make a home cooked dinner, and watch a movie. And I have to say, it’s quite nice. It’s really nice to wake up the next day and feel alive and alert and not to be hurting from drinking the night before or staying up entirely late. This allows us to also do things to enjoy the summer and weather- like going on day trips to the beach, kayaking, volunteering, jogs, etc which are very inexpensive activities to do but they involve exercise and are good for the mind and body.

4. This is a handy little trick I use about once or twice a year. I go through my closet and clean out my name brand clothes that I don’t wear or want anymore. I then list them on ebay. Usually I can get back 60-80% of what I paid for the clothing. This is much better than just giving them away and it’s a great turn around on the clothes. I listed a few things last month and was able to pocket about $300. I also sell other used items. For instance, I listed two old used cell phones that have been sitting in my drawer for well over a year. The one sold for close to the value they are listed for, and I got it for free do to a two year activation. Granted I only used it for 5 months and it was in good condition- but I would have NEVER used that phone again and that will pay for a full day of activities right there.”

That being said, I have managed to stick to that plan. I have to admit though, the death to be all is having TJMaxx right down the street from my work.  I sometimes fail miserably when I hop on over there during a lunch break to “pick up a few things.” Most trips turn out to be at least $50-$100 a pop. 4-5 trips a month and you see where my extra money is going. Bad news bears, but it’s much better than having a shopping habit at a department store.