July Goal Made!

Can you hear my long slow sigh of relief?

So, how did I boost my income by $878.78 in two days? Simple - two windfalls for over $400 each.

Windfall One:

The security deposit from the apartment. I've been waiting on it, but afraid to count on it. On my last apartment my landlords nicked me for $125.00 in "cleaning fees" even though I left the place spotless. So this time, I wasn't sure what to expect. Granted, me and a friend cleaned this place top to bottom (even sitting on the refrigerator to clean the ceiling fan in the kitchen) but still, I hate to count chickens before they are hatched. Also, landlords here have 30 days to mail your deposit. I hoped I would get it in July, but there was always a possibility of it not hitting until the first part of August. I lucked out though, it came last night!

Windfall Two:

A very happy eBay sale! My mother had given me a Baker Furniture footstool she had purchased awhile back. She had told me that I could expect it to get around $100-$150.00. The auction just closed an hour ago or so and to my shock it actually sold for over $400!! I had to quick call and tell her! She told me she wished she had warehouse full of them for me to sell - hee! Me too!

Still as great as this is, windfalls certainly aren't something that I can count on. In fact, this month was not looking so good until today. That tells me that I can't rest on my laurels - I have to keep pushing. There may be times ahead where I won't come near my goal. If I can plan ahead, so much the better.

In fact, this month (all 17 days of it) was looking a bit rough for me for a number of reasons. For one thing, I have had a harder time tracking my spending than I did last month. Writing down everything that I spend is really hard for me and for some unknown reason, this month I haven't been able to do it at all. I am pretty good at collecting receipts, but when I am using cash it is a real problem. I have a little notebook just for the purpose, but somehow I find it easy to forget. Or worst yet - I think I will remember... then I forget. I have to do better over the next two weeks, just so I can get on track again.

My other issue is that I have finally come to the conclusion that I need to buy a lawnmower. I borrowed Catie's weedwacker the other day and was able to make my lawn much flatter - which is all I was really looking for. (As you can tell, my lawn is really small if I can do it with a weedwacker!) It looks a tad rough, but far better than it did with the weeds growing in it! I am looking at a couple of options, but in any case, I expect it will run me over $100. I hate spending that kind of money, but I don't want the mailman to get lost in my jungle of a front yard either!