One Month Completed

If you look at the date of this post and compare it to the calendar, you will notice that it is NOT Sunday, February 5, 2012, when I am writing this post. It is Monday, February 6, 2012. Blogging was not an option yesterday.

This past weekend was great! But, it didn't lend itself to providing me with available time to blog! That's okay. I don't regret nor feel guilty at all that I didn't post a blog this weekend!

January 2012 has left us! What a nice winter we are having!!! I wasn't disappointed or depressed that the groundhog saw his shadow on Thursday morning. Six more weeks of this type of winter weather -- bring it on! It's been fabulous!!!

So, you may wonder, how'd you do last week with working on those goals? Well, thanks for asking. Let me tell you....

1. Finances -- I was nervous this week that our discretionary spending budget would be a "bust." I knew that I was going to spend money in Chicago during the upcoming weekend. When I bought groceries on Monday, I was surprised at the amount that I spent. Oh no, I thought, almost half of the week's budget is already gone! Then, Tuesday, I had to purchase a tank of gas because I was driving to a conference in Lansing on Wednesday. After the gas purchase, the budget was over 60% gone! YIKES!!!! Parking at the conference cost me another $10.

Heading for Chicago on Saturday, I kept reminding myself, you only have $67 to spend. $67! $67! When I got to Chicago, I met up with my two favorite residents, and we immediately headed for The Cheesecake Factory. YUM!!! Three pieces of cheesecake purchased for $25. Down to $42. And, I hadn't yet purchased our supper! When suppertime rolled around, we decided to get hamburgers & fries from a local bar & grill as take-out. Total cost for three of us was $40. $2 left!!! Way to go! "You did it!" I thought to myself. Then I talked to my husband who told me that he was eating Sir Pizza. I knew that meant he had spent $14 on that pizza! Oh, dear! That means we shot the budget by $12. But wait, the $10 for parking at my conference will be reimbursed so I don't have to count that. And, I'm sure that since I usually round up when keeping track of the spending, the remaining $2 over the budget could be simply from the rounding.

Thus, I declared that we met our financial budget for the week, and I hung up the week's budget on our study wall.

As you might remember, I started working on our tax returns a few weeks ago by organizing the paperwork. Since we have now received all of the necessary tax forms, I need to work some more on the returns. I need to calculate my husband's officiating net income and then start plugging numbers into the tax returns. This will be my project for the coming weekend. Hopefully, by the end of the weekend, I will have determined if we have to pay or if we will be receiving a refund.

2. Spiritual -- I was back on track this week. I successfully completed the January memory verses by the end of January. February's verses are already fastened to my computer monitor -- the first step in successful memorization. PLUS, this is a leap year, so I have an extra day in February to accomplish this task. It's like Bonus Baseball!! :)

I was consistent in Bible Study this week, finishing up my study in Galatians 4. In addition to the phrase, "Children of Promise" -- of which I blogged in my last post -- I wrote about Galatians 4:18 (being zealous) and Galatians 4:15 ("What has happened to your joy?") in my Journal. On to Galatians 5 this week!

3. Personal -- As you probably noticed, blogging was WAY down this week. That's okay -- the busy weekend definitely contributed to the reduction of posts. And, I focused on my most important goal this week -- maximizing the time spent in God's Word. Got the priorities right this week!!!

I was very pleased with the class time this week in my college course -- learning actually occurred during class time!! YEAH! And, I successfully completed my first news story, of which I've given permission to be used in the next edition of the ECHO, Olivet College's newspaper.

On a side note, sometimes it is an advantage to be the oldest person in class. When the grammar skills were needed this week, I think I was the only student who had ever diagrammed a sentence in his/her lifetime. I knew why you shouldn't move the adverb, "only" in the sentence we were discussing.

And, I was pleased to learn that the old editing marks are still in existence! While the rest of the class is just learning them, I'm all set because I've used them for...um....decades!!

Overall, a great week! On to the first full week of February! Looking forward to continuing to work on my 2012 goals!

Next post: New Experiences