Repair Fun

So 2 weeks ago we received the 2 parts to replace our washing machine-yay! My husband was astonished to find the belt a good 2 inches shorter than the one our washing machine had eaten. That and a new pulley had to be installed. After sweating and swearing for several minutes with both of us trying to stretch a measly half inch out of that very short belt, my husband was ready to throw in the towel and I slumped away, feeling yet again defeated by the bad luck cosmos.

However, once upstairs I heard a loud exclamation and bump and my husband came up and said, "It's done. It's fixed." Wow. I looked him over carefully, sure that when I'd left he must have turned green and hulked out in order to make that thing fit. But yay! It's done and that has been fixed.

Yesterday I picked up my car. I thought I'd be thrilled but I kept finding little things that just reminded me my baby was no longer brand new. The inside of the replaced door had a slight gap that wasn't there on the opposing door. There were dirty prints on the roof where I sat. The driver side mirror was fogged and once home I was unable to remove the film with any manner of cleaning agent. There were 2 scratches in the tint on the window of the replaced door-tint that was a Christmas gift from my husband and was only two months old!

I got home ornery and depressed. I felt like my car had been violated, held against her will for a month while she was beaten and bruised and then rinsed off and given back to me. And here's the kicker-they held it for so long and were so careful because I was related to one of the workers. However, that cousin told me that they weren't even going to look under the car which I'd told the other guy TWICE to check because the reflector was concave from driving over rocks the size of softballs when we were hit. My cousin had to tell them to do it. Apparently autobody shops cut a lot of corners in order to turn out like 40 cars a day, they need to beat the insurance rental coverage so they "hurry" things along. I'm not a car aficionado or anything but aside from the things mentioned, there were a couple other little things I noticed because knowing cars or not, I know MY things, as most women do. So, word of advice if you ever have to take your car in for repairs from an accident, know someone that works there, take someone with you that knows cars, or KNOW your car. The things I found will be fixed, as promised by the guy working there, but there we go, another day without my car when they had it for almost a month. Yikes! Imagine if I weren't related!

And the hits keep on comin'!

Wow, I don't think I've ever had so much bad luck in my entire life as I've had this year. In addition to everything else, there was some more damage to my car and the ETA for me getting it back (right now anyway) is the 15th. Originally they'd said 9-10 business days. I've been without my car for a week now (boy do I miss my car and so does my daughter who sadly keeps stating, "Momma's car broken" and it's looking like 2 weeks more. Let's just hope the car IS done by then because my insurance will only cover the rental until the 19th. Sigh.

On top of that, the washing machine decided to break yesterday. Oh yay, my day for doing laundry down the tubes as we look into finding the parts to repair it...another $100+ down the drain. It just gets better and better.

On the plus side, my daughter did have a wonderful 3 day 3 year old birthday celebration and we saw very little of Ms. Hyde...she did make a devil of an appearance on her birthday when it was time to leave the pool and go to lunch. In fact, I've never seen an episode like that since I watched Sally Field perform her famous freak out as Sybil! Ms. Hyde has been coming out semi-regularly though. She showed herself to my parents tonight when it was time to leave. Kicking, crying, fighting, the whole spiel. It's almost one of those moments where you think, "Is this where I call the exorcist?"

Lists Lists Lists

So I've always been a little OCD about planning and scheduling. It goes back to the last resolution I ever made to not procrastinate. "Don't put off till tomorrow what you can do today." What sage advice! So ever since then, I've been big into lists. I never did another New Year's resolution because that was something you promised for a single year and if you fell off the trend in March or April, you'd either hate yourself for failing or you'd shrug and say, "Well, we'll try again on next year's resolution!"

So instead I'd do weekly resolution lists. I'd plan my meals, shopping, work, cleaning, gym work out-everything. If I didn't accomplish everything for each day, eh, it wasn't the end of the world and hey, what about all those other days I nailed it? Well for this past weekend I'm so grateful for this OCD method because it truly saved time and stress. From planning the kiddo's kid birthday party at Jungle Jims on Saturday (with me running to fill balloons and buy the cake first thing that day), to the family luncheon the next day (with me running to buy platters after getting the crockpot soup going and putting up decorations) to today, planning fun activities like the pool and the zoo to make the day extra special for my daughter. Whew! Not to mention the beginning of the week I'd portioned out painting 2 coats of paint in the bathroom-walls and trim, cleaning the whole house-I'll say it again-whew! Everything came together Each day ON TIME and for that, I'll always champion the list making method. And my daughter even mimicks me when she has paper and a pencil, she'll make a little slash and say, "Check!"

The Terrible Two's

My mother says it's called the Terrible Two's because it lasts 2 years-from age 2-4. I've been pretty lucky with my daughter. She's very helpful-well as much as she can be at her age. She turns 3 on the 30th and I must say, the "terrible" has arrived. We will be having the best time and any changes, or time for end or any transition whatsoever causes a complete and utter meltdown. She'll randomly throw things, she kicks in play, even when I let her know it's not okay. She fights eating at dinner and she refuses to let anyone do anything but pay absolute attention to her. She used to be so mellow and so almost OCD in helping in cleaning or doing what was asked of her I must say that just makes this phase much more jolting. I'm very excited about the birthday plans we have for her this weekend but I must admit, I'm a little tentative as well. Will it be the angelic Janessa that comes out for the fun? Or will it be the Mr. Hyde version that freaks out in the middle of things? Being a planner, this is difficult because no matter what, you cannot plan how your children will behave, you just work with what they give you. And maybe keep your fingers crossed behind your back the entire time. :)

When It Pours, It Floods

So to top of my Rain it Pours blog, we had our 5th "2015 hates us and wants to kick us while we're down" incident. While driving my husband and daughter to a cousin's birthday party we were in a car accident. It was the other lady's fault but in Utah, it's always the fault of the person making the left turn (me) unless under a protected arrow. Never mind the fact that she'd slowed to stop, changed her mind, punched it and neither slowed nor swerved to avoid me even though I certainly swerved to avoid her. No brake marks showing she attempted to avoid to slow down or stop, nothing. But it's my fault now. I'm the one who got hit, I'm the one that has that on my record for 3 years and I'm the one that will have a fun time getting covered by insurance companies. Talk about victimizing the victims! After this incident I learned my brother-in-law when he totaled my old car-he was making a left turn. The guy who appraised my car had a daughter who'd just totaled hers due to a driver "changing his mind" at the last minute. A friend of mine had been in the intersection when the light turned red and other driver ran it and hit her-still her fault. What does this tell me? Not that it's unfair-hell, life is unfair. This a man made law and it is Wrong. Ultimately, the other car is hitting the left turner, not the other way around and not only that, the left turner gets penalized three fold by the system. Now I understand the line, "You can't fight City Hall." This also tells me that hey, if you're the other driver you can get away with Anything. Absolute B.S.

However, in my attempt to squintingly see a cloudy silver lining-no one in my car was hurt. My daughter's car seat is behind my seat because I've always anticipated that I'm more likely to be hit on the right side than the driver's. My swerve prevented the SUV from hitting the passenger door where my husband was and instead hit the back right door. The car is still driveable and will be repaired (hopefully in the near future) while I'm given a rental. My husband's starting to have the mentality that the "It could always be worse" just makes more bad things happen which is ironic as he used to be the blind optimist and even though he called me a fatalist I'm what Psychology books would describe as a defensive pessimist. Expect the worst, be pleasantly surprised but never disappointed. Of course, with the year we're having the defensive pessimist in me has thrown up her hands and gone into a corner to hide. :)

Here's to hoping my next entries will be less in the tales of woe department!

Competitive Pricing

So this is a great time to hit multiple stores for those killer deals. If you live in Utah, these are some the best prices per product for Reams, Maceys, and Smiths:

Reams:

• Ground beef $2.89 lb
• Sarah Lee Bread 2/$4
• Pepsi 12 pack 3/$10 (also available at Maceys)
• Chef Boyardee pastas 99 cents
• Coolaid packets 7/$1
• Yoplait 8 pack $3.99
• Cantalope 59 cents
• Large Ambrosia apples 69 cents
• Yellow Onions 5/$1

Maceys:

• Currently doing their fill a bag of select produce for $10-mainly apples, oranges, potatoes, onions, and pears
• Frito Lay Chips $1.99
• Jack Links Original Jerky 2/$6
• Tomatoes $1.29 lb
• Lay's Chips 2/$5
• Claritin 10 ct $9.99
• Keebler cookies 2/$6
• Tostitos Chips 2/$6
• Rockstar drinks 5/$5
• Baby Back Ribs $2.99 lb
• Grapes $1.89 lb

Smiths:

• Milk 2/$4
• Cottonelle Toilet Paper 12 Double Rolls 2/$10
• Kroger crescents/biscuits 10/$10
• Kroger cheese bars/shreds 2/$5
• Strawberries 2/$5
• Dial Handsoap 10/$10
• Simple Truth carrots $1.48/2lb bag
• Select bakeware 20% off
• Pork Shoulder Butt Roast $1.99 lb
• Kroger frozen potatoes select varieties $1.99

That's to name a few. Hurry out, sales end Tuesday!

Weak Trick

So not much in additional news other than a little trick that personally helps me and who knows, maybe it can help you too. I'm the one that does the bills in my household and it's always been that way because I'm a tiny bit OCD on getting things taken care of and when you have money coming/going and you can have your power turned off (had that happen once in the beginning of my marriage) because you're not paying close attention, well, you either get OCD or you get to move everything out of your fridge to somewhere cold before it rots.

Anyways, when we're getting near to the next paycheck, especially after coming off one that gets hit with the biggest bills, there's the money crunch/anxiety. This is where being the bill payer has its advantage. If you don't pay the bill and hit the ATM you may see a larger number in your account than is actually there-pending charges that haven't hit, bills that are automated but haven't deducted yet, but will before the next paycheck. I account for every single bill due for each paycheck as soon as that paycheck hits. I go through my account and use a super simple excel spreadsheet (no formulas even, I use the computer calculator to do my tallies-this also makes it hit home where your money is going) and I add the date of every charge that cleared already and make a rough estimate of the expenses we'll cover before the next paycheck.

This last weekend as the money ran tight I decided to be even more OCD (if that's possible) for every cent. After I did the bills, subtracted pending charges, etc, I typed the balance amount into my phone calculator. Then, any errand I or my husband made, I immediately went to my phone and deducted that amount so I knew exactly where we stood as we go. So much easier than running home to pull up my excel sheet. Lame but effective. That's my tip for the week. Such as it is. :)