Blogging Away Debt

As any long term BAD reader knows, I love to gamify finances. It keeps me motivated. And this year was no different.

I decided earlier in the year that my Christmas budget would depend wholly on my $5 bill challenge. I’ve been doing this $5 game for several years. And each year has been different. Here’s how I spent them back in 2022.

As we prepared to head to Texas this past week, I broke out my bucket and counted out my stash!

Drumroll please….this year, I have $215 to spend on Christmas.

Making It Stretch

Since I want to make it stretch as far as I can and provide gifts for my parents, siblings, and my kids, I’m going to have to get creative. And frankly, it’s been a long time since I got creative. Time to create my own Santa’s Workshop for the season.

Back in the day, I was an avid scrapbooker, but got rid of my stash a few years ago when I purged most of my homeschool supplies. So I don’t want to break the bank on supplies either.

A few weeks ago, Princess and I attended the local Harvest Fest where creators and crafters display their wares for sale. I was so inspired. And have a few ideas that I think I can pull off well.

Homemade and Personalized

I’m not going to share my ideas here yet as I believe some of my friends and family read here and I don’t want to give it away. But the goal is to create practical gifts that are personalized and don’t break the bank. The supplies I’m thinking are:

Boxes – shoe boxes, cigar boxes (I recently received 1/2 dozen of these for free from someone who knew my grandfather), small amazon boxes
Modge Podge – I can get a big bottle for less than $5 at a craft store. I am making a comprehensive list before I go so I don’t go overboard.
Paint – If I stick to just a couple of colors, I can buy big bottles and hopefully not have much left over that I have to store.
Clothespins – Great for creating personalize gift holding a picture or notecard. And with a magnet attached, they become handy as chip clips or refrigerator decorations.
Sharpies – thankfully, I have these in abundance, so no purchase necessary. Great to write on a variety of surfaces.
Construction paper – I have lots of coloring supplies, books, crayons, pencils, etc. Mounting a colored item on construction paper just ups the presentation a bit. And by coloring or drawing something, it allows me to deliver a very personal message or wish for the person I give it too.
Magnets – I don’t think a bag of adhesive backed magnets won’t break the bank. And allow me to turn my clothespins into an easy to use display.

I am looking forward to some music filled, candles burning, hot chocolate by my side, in my pjs, craft time at my kitchen table.

The goal is to create gifts for 15+ people with this budget. Challenge accepted!

Pictures to come.

Checkup – Revisiting 2024 Financial Goals

by Ashley

I just published a post about my 2025 Financial Goals. It’s nearing the end of the year, so it seems like a good time to reflect back on my 2024 Financial Goals and see how things have gone.

Short-Term Savings

I continue to use CapitalOne360 as a way to save money in short-term savings with lots of different accounts for different things (e.g., Emergency Fund, Car repair fund, Semi-annual fees, etc.). My main goal here was just to stay consistent with savings and I’ve done that.

In addition to Capital One, at the beginning of the year I opened up a brokerage account. I’ve been depositing a little bit of money here-and-there throughout the year (averaging about $50-$100/month). I wrote recently about how I plan to increase this for 2025 to closer to $200/month. Throughout the year, I’ve also started dabbling with some CDs to earn a bit higher yield on some of my savings. I still have most of the savings totally liquid. But I’ve established 4 different CDs, one maturing each quarter, so I have a rotating pot of liquid cash available.

I’d say I MET my 2024 short-term savings goal.

Investments

I increased my investments from $10,650 in 2023 up to $15,490 for 2024. And I’ve projected to increase my investments even more in 2025, up to just under $20,000 for the year. Note, this is not including my mandatory retirement account where I invest 7% of my salary that is matched dollar-for-dollar by my employer (for a total of 14% invested off the top of my salary).

Again – I’m going to give myself a check mark for investments. 2024 investment goal met (and it continues!)

Debt

I didn’t have a big, huge debt goal for 2024. My only debt right now aside from our mortgage is my student loans. I continue to make a monthly payment on those loans. Each year I submit paperwork to verify my employment for my eligibility with Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Right now, I have 24 remaining payments before I am eligible for PSLF. The loan forgiveness program requires 10 years of payments while working in the public service field.

Why is my eligibility date November 2026 instead of August 2025 (which actually marks 10 years at my current job)??? I don’t know. Navigating the student loan industry has been one of the most challenging and unnecessarily confusing things I’ve ever done. I swear the paperwork for buying a house is simpler and easier to understand! So I’ve resigned myself to the fact that my debt will be forgiven about a year after my initial predictions. I’ve still got two years to go. In the meantime, I’ll continue making my monthly payments. My goal (continuing status quo) is met.

Travel

One of my goals for 2024 was to travel! I went to Peru in February for work (but tacked on a weekend at Machu Picchu for fun). Hubs and I went to Italy in April/May. And we’ve had several short little weekend trips of all types – the whole family, me alone, me with hubs, me with my mom, etc. I really made the most of my sabbatical this fall. Another item from the 2024 Financial Goals list checked off!

Summary

Woohoo! It looks like I met all of my 2024 Financial Goals and then some! I increased my savings and investing even higher than I’d originally expected and I plan to make further increases for next year. I’m up for a promotion for next year and, if that goes through as expected, I’ll be eligible for a raise at the start of the academic year next August. That will help me to further increase my savings and investing and maybe by that point I’ll have hired a wealth manager or financial advisor to help us with some of our investing strategies.

Blogging Away Debt Our Journeys to a Debt-Free Life

The Christmas Budget is…