I Lied

Well....not so much a lie as I misinformed you.  I believe when I wrote about the Zaycon chicken that I said the pieces were individually wrapped.  I thought they were.  Instead of opening the package, I simply looked through it.  When I saw other plastic bags around other chicken, it really looked like they were individually wrapped.  I found out this morning, sadly, that they are not. 

I had brought the cases home and placed them in the freezer.  After opening the outside clear plastic bag, that the chicken is placed in three or four smaller bags.  So, now, I have to figure out how to divide that chicken into more usable portions.  Can I thaw and refreeze chicken?

So, please note, if you order in the future, they do need to be divided before freezing.

Another Financial Conquest

We take our kids out to eat at least once a month.  We feel that they need to learn to eat in public.  Just eating in the school cafeteria doesn't count.

We are an intimidating force, and I'm sure the host/hostesses FREAK out when they see us, but so far so good, and we've been doing this for years.

As you can imagine, it costs a small fortune to take our crew to a sit down restaurant.

Last night, we went out to a local Mexican restaurant.  We paid $19.95 + and $8 tip for our entire crew of nine to eat.  That ends up being roughly $3.11 per person.

Here's how we did it....
First, you go to restaurant.com and you sign up.  They send out emails telling of their deals and codes to get gift certificates for eating out.  I bought this particular restaurant's gift certificate last month when they had a code that made each $25 certificate $1.  So, I guess you need to add that dollar onto my total from last night.  That'd make it $3.22 per person.

One catch with restaurant.com is that they usually have some requirements.  For example, we were required to spend at least $35 at the restaurant last night.  So, check that carefully before you purchase.

When we sat down and looked at the menu, #3 asked me if I wanted to share the two chimichanga plate.  That particular dish is $9.99.  I told her sure, and two other kids did the same.  Honestly, after eating it, I can't imagine anyone eating two chimis on their own, so even if I'd ordered one plate for myself, one of those chimis would have gone home in a box.

The Warden bought an ENORMOUS enchilada.  That thing was so HUGE I'm surprised they had a plate large enough to fit it.  He split that with the baby.

So, there you go.  We all left happy.  A couple kids had leftovers, and I don't know if I could have made dinner for them at a much better price than what we paid.

I feel like we really won.

Zaycon

Have you tried this company?  I'm TRULY astounded.

A couple months ago I received an email from a very dear friend about buying meat through Zaycon Foods and what a great experience it was, so I decided to check it out.

They have "events" in which you can buy beef, chicken, bacon, etc. at AMAZING prices.  They send you an email when their events are coming up, so you can preview it and then they send you another one when you can order.

You order whatever it is.  For example, I just bought chicken for $1.49/lb.  I think I'm getting a deal when it's $1.99, so I was ecstatic.  These are fresh boneless, skinless chicken breasts that are individually wrapped.

So, I have to confess here.  One of my BIGGEST problems with having dinner ready for my family is that I base a lot of my meals around the main dish, which more often than not, includes meat.  When we run out of meat, I'm sunk.

With Zaycon, you buy whatever it is you're buying in cases.  I bought 2 cases of chicken breasts.  Each case has 40 lbs. of chicken in it.  Let's just say our family is set for awhile.  I'm feeling SO HAPPY about this prospect.

With the envelope system, I weighed things very carefully financially and figured because I paid for this last month, I will have more money to buy other items for the next number of months.  Chicken won't be on my shopping list.

So, the catch is that you have to go pick up your order.  They bring it to a location (they have A LOT of locations) in a refrigerated truck, you tell them who you are, and they give you your order.  SO EASY!  I opened the side door of the beast, a guy came out with plastic to cover my seat with, brought out two boxes (about the size of a case of paper) and put them on the plastic.

I'm not one to push a company on anyone, but honestly, I was SUPER impressed by this.  If you're interested, here's a link for you.

I will tell you one thing, though, the events sell out quickly, so you have to act fast.

Envelope System - 1 Month In

Today is payday, so I thought I'd better report on how things are with the envelope system.

In short, I LOVE it!  It's so nice to know clearly where we are financially at any given point in time.

How my children have viewed money in the past.

The kids, on the other hand, hate it.  Would it be heartless and cruel of me to say that I'm glad.  It's a relief to see that this is a bit of a struggle for them.  That they can't go into any given store at any given time and get any given item is nice.

These are hard financial times for everyone--some to more degree than another.  Learning to be wise with a buck is certainly not a bad skill to learn at any age, but in my opinion, the younger the better.  It's okay to struggle.

I guess, for us, this is a preemptive strike.  This is our chance to get things under control before we get taken under by the wave of financial disaster that's taking so many in it's course.

So, here's how it went down last month....
From my personal finance class, I learned about mint.com.  I went there and set everything up and created a budget.  Then I figured out which things were going to remain in the account and be paid via billpay and checks and which would be withdrawn as cash to have on hand.  I then figured out how much cash I would need and how many of which denominations I would need.  I wrote it all down, so I could simply present it to the teller the next day.

On payday, I went and bought three little filing thingies.  They're like very tiny filing boxes.  Someone told me to get one of those coupon organizers, but when I needed them, I couldn't find them.  Such is life sometimes, huh?  So, of the three, one is for me, one is for the Warden, and one is for money that will be used later but needs to be saved over time.  Knowing myself as I do, if I were to leave this money in the account, I would find some way to rationalize it being spent; thus the reason for withdrawing it and putting it aside.  I filled out the tabs and went to the bank. 

I gave the teller the list of the cash I needed.  I took the cash to the car and divided it into the boxes.  Right then and there, I drove to the Warden's place of employment and handed him his portion--I gave him gas money, a portion of the grocery money (he'll sometimes stop at a store for us on his way home), and some other money for spending on things he needs.

The only glitch we had was because of my poor memory.  Seriously, it's SO BAD!  I went on billpay early last month and set it up so I'd be on top of things.  When I set up the budget, I didn't remember doing that, so I set them up again.  By the time I figured out my error, the first payment had already gone out and the second one had just left the bank, so I couldn't recall them.  I had to take the money from savings, which was a bummer, but at least we had it there to take care of it.

So, we start out this month with many of our bills prepaid.  Not a bad situation to be in, but one of the goals with this way of doing things is to have spending be as consistent as possible each month.  Along these lines, I contacted those companies that we pay every other month, quarterly, and yearly and asked if I could send them partial payments monthly to even things out.  There was only one company that refused--that was our life insurance company that we pay yearly, so I'm holding that money in a different account to build up over the year.

There you go, that's the long and short of the envelope system so far.  Yes, the kids hate it, but in so many ways, I don't think that's a bad thing.

The Boy's Thinking

#6 was sitting in the car this afternoon, while we were waiting to drive the middle school carpool.  Suddenly, out of the blue, he says, "You know that money I have from my birthday?"

I respond, "Yes."

"Well, can I use that for the trumpet and give it to Mr. [band director]?"

The boy's really using his noggin.  So glad he's taking this so seriously.

That would be another $10 toward the trumpet if that's what we decide to do.