Well, you may have noticed that I decided to add a couple of new pages to our blog! I decided that since I am really starting to get into this photography thing as a hobby, and I plan on doing even more since I have a lot to learn, I started two different "Photography" pages at the top of our blog. I also decided, that since I have gotten a lot of emails and comments about the budgeting and simplifying and organizing stuff, that I would dedicate a new page to the upcoming Simple Mom Project Simplify! A lot of my friends and family are new moms and whenever we get together we end up talking about the exact same struggles and challenges that we face. I by no means have any answers to any of those challenges, but I can at least document the challenges that we have as a family and talk about how we are handling them (good or bad).

All of the posts will still show up on the Home page, so you will just have to ignore the ones you aren't interested in haha, but these extra pages are just places to help keep information on different subjects. I probably won't post quite as much on those pages, especially with the new addition on his way, but I have learned a lot through other people in both being a new mom and photography so I thought why not try something new!! I am by far a professional photographer, and I clearly have TONS to learn, so those pages will be more about my start in Photography and things that I am learning along the way and things I hope to learn. I have really enjoyed it as a hobby and thought it just might be fun to share!

Budgeting in February = FAIL

So I am going to go ahead and call our first attempt at budgeting a FAIL. Ha! Since January was more of a "spend and then see" month, I was hoping February was going to be the month where we did a little better in the areas where we realized we were spending too much. In some areas I think we did, but in others, we didn't blink again. DOH!

Observations/Notes for Month Two:

• I am very glad that we started this whole budget thing early because it's clearly going to take a few to get used to and get the hang of.
• Just like January, we had a few changes that happened in February that took a little to get used to or wait to see the affects of (for example, getting my yearly raise, had to wait to see what that would look like and what that meant for my paycheck each week, etc).
• We ended up with a little extra income in February but not much, partly because we overestimated some of our "extra" income, but ended up getting some more from selling my piano.
• We had a few big expenses again in February, some of which we were planning for, some of which we knew we would transfer money for and some of which we didn't plan but decided to go for anyway (which is why I am calling it a FAIL for this month).
• As far as our expenses went for February, here is a breakdown of  how close we were to our estimates...(although this is probably WAY boring for you, it helps me figure things out in my head by going line by line...). :)
• Mortgage / Rent / Etc- Exactly what we expected. 
• Dog Walking/Sitting - Actually spent less than what we budgeted for.
• Cell Phone - This was something new. A long story but basically we are switching from our family plan to an individual plan on a different carrier for just me. Since Wes got an phone through work, he uses that more often than not, so it didn't make sense to keep our family plan. It was a little more expensive up front since we had to cancel early, but this will help lower our monthly payments in the future.
• Credit Cards - Overall we came out pretty close here. I'm not going to break these out but basically we paid a little extra on some to get them close to being paid off, and some we had estimated more than we had to pay because of paying off more in January. In March, it looks like we are going to be able to pay several off completely!
• Car Payment / Insurance - Exactly what we expected.
• Tolls (EZ Pass) - Budgeted $50, only had to renew once for $25.
• Gas - I think because of all of my extra doctors visits, this was a little higher then normal, so we ended up over our estimated amount, but not by much, so not bad!
• HOA Payment - Exactly what we expected. 
• Home Phone/Cable/Internet - About $15 higher than we budgeted for.
• Daycare - Exactly what we expected.
• Groceries - About $30 more than we budgeted for.
• Pet Wellness Plans - Exactly what we expected.
• Gas & Electric - About $4 more than we budgeted for. Ha!
• Netflix- Exactly what we expected.
• Student Loan - Exactly what we expected. 
• Parking & Costco - No parking or Costco expenses for March! Woo hoo!
• As far as our "unplanned expenses" went for the month, based on January, I put together a budget for these as well for February...which I guess technically means that they are no longer unplanned. :)
• We had another unplanned vet bill because Shamus needed two rounds of antibiotics and we found out Arby is beginning renal failure so is now on prescription cat food.
• We also spent some money for Jackson's room and the playroom which we were expecting to do, but didn't necessarily budget for.
• We still have medical bills rolling in from my late sonograms in 2010 when we were under my insurance.
• The two last categories are where we can make a big difference I think, and those are eating out (including weekly lunches) and general purchases. Out of our "eating out" line item, over half of that was spent on eating lunch when we didn't get to make lunch the night before or have time to get it ready in the morning. We also spent more in our general purchases than I had budgeted for.

Lessons Learned from Month Two:

• I still need to take better notes on the general purchases that we do and figure out the best way to handle these type of expenses where its easy to spend money that you don't budget for. Maybe once we establish our budget for the month, Wes and I take out cash to spend for the month and when it's gone, it's gone!
• The more flexible we are the better! I think this is something that is going to change on a monthly basis, for example, things like raises (Wes's will come this summer), or changes in daycare costs (we have a big update there to come at a later time), etc. So having a tool that is easily changed and updated really helps keep track.
• It's also been working well where at the end of the month, I take a few minutes to print out our bank statements and go down line item one by one to make sure I caught everything. Although this takes time, I find that there are always a few expenses that I missed during my weekly checks.

Notes & Changes for Month Three:

• There are a few increases that we need to watch out for in March like the final Sprint payment on top of our first AT&T payment, daycare costs will go up for the month of March specifically, swim class for Emma potentially, and we really don't know what having a baby is going to do to our monthly expenses with this new insurance!
• I seem to be doing a pretty good job at the estimating part (so at least that part isn't a FAIL) but now we really need to concentrate on what a budget is supposed to do, help you cut back. So now that we know exactly where we are spending our money, and can pretty closely predict what's going to happen next month, we need to actually work on reducing those monthly expenses (which is the hard part). :)

37 Weeks! Full Term! (Again) Ha!

Well, today marks Jackson's official 37 week Birthday and he is now considered to be full term!! Just a few short weeks ago we were convinced we weren't going to see this day pregnant but here we are!!

I had my regular weekly doctors appointment yesterday and nothing big or exciting came out of it (which is a good thing these days)! Jackson has been moving and grooving up a storm lately, as if to make sure he stays out of Labor and Delivery for a while haha. Of course Mommy is hoping for the exact opposite at this point!!

I was going back through some of my blog posts with Emma around this time and things are happening pretty much exactly the same! This is just about when swelling started with Emma (which is absolutely happening with Jackson), the bathroom trips at night doubled (yup....same here), I was even craving orange juice at this point with Emma too (Jackson can't get enough)! It was just a few days short of me turning 38 weeks with Emma when she really dropped and I remember feeling a lot of relief pretty much the moment that happened. I'm not sure how I am going to feel when Jackson finally drops since I feel like he is sitting so low already. I do have a lot more pressure than I did with Emma because of that and overall I think I feel more uncomfortable then I did with her as well. I am starting to think that this little man isn't going to be so little after all.

In one of my previous posts with Emma, I wrote this...

"Daddy still tends to give me the :::side-eyes::: whenever I talk about wanting to have Emma any day now. He still thinks Emma should wait as long as possible. Of course, this is coming from a man who has NOT been caring around this child for the last 9 months...ha."

...and I could have easily written that exact same thing today!! I told Wes that I will give him one more week, until I turn 38 weeks, and then Operation HAVE THIS BABY will be in full affect!! :)

I don't know where they get these pictures from, but apparently, today, Jackson is Swiss Chard!

Jackson is now considered "full term," even though my due date is three weeks away. If I go into labor now, his lungs will likely be mature enough to fully adjust to life outside the womb. He weighs about 6 1/3 pounds and measures a bit over 19 inches, head to heel. Many babies have a full head of hair at birth, with locks from 1/2 inch to 1 1/2 inches long, but if he is anything like his big sister, we have a while before that happens! Ha!

Project Simplify!

If you happen to check out one of the blogs that I follow (list on the left of my blog) called Simple Mom, you may have seen that she is kicking off Project Simplify starting a week from today! It couldn't have come at a better time and is exactly what I need to keep my New Year's Resolution going!

Here is the quick description of Project Simplify...

With spring right around the corner (it can't come fast enough if you ask me), it's about that time for spring cleaning and although I have already started to try to get myself on this path of picking one area at a time to organize, I think this is just what I need to keep going. For five weeks, starting on Monday, March 7 to Friday, April 8th, I (being guided by Simple Mom) will be tackling five different areas in our house. Now, obviously we are going to be having a baby right in the middle of that window, so we will see how far we get at first, but it will be a good project to continue and hopefully complete during maternity leave. Every Monday, Simple Mom will announce the week’s “hot spot.” That Friday, we will share before and after photos.

If anyone else is interested in participating, all you h ave to do is post your “before” and “after” experience (photos are a must!) on your own blog, then link to it on Friday’s Simple Mom post. Or you can just follow along with me and I will post about what the hot spots are from Simple Mom and hopefully keep up with it! I think the hardest part will be that the weekend's aren't really involved, so all the organizing will have to be done during the week. With small projects it may not be too bad, but if Simple Mom rolls out like the entire kitchen, that may have to wait until maternity leave!

So stay tuned for more!!