Saving Money is My Main Money Focus in 2010

21 January, 2010 | dcfemella | Comments

The Piggy Bank

When I was in my twenties, I had the worst credit, and I didn’t know how to save money. I would spend and spend on anything that I wanted, and live paycheck-to-paycheck. It wasn’t until 2007 when I started getting serious about getting rid of my debt and start saving for short-term and long-term goals. I picked up a bunch of personal finance books and started reading away.

By 2008, I had paid of all of my debt, minus my student loan, and saved money to buy a place of my own. I did. I felt empowered and free. Living paycheck-to-paycheck, having tons of credit-card debt, and not having anything in savings is huge stress. Therefore, I was glad to have eliminated it.

I started following Dave Ramsey’s plan to financial freedom and it helped. Now I plan on following it again because I have some new short-term and long-term goals that I want to become a reality:

Short-Term Goals

  • Go on three international trips
  • Save $1,000 a month
  • Increase my retirement contribution
  • Make more money

Long-Term Goals

  • Buy a bigger place in 2011
  • Pay off student loan
  • Have 3-6 months in emergency funds

Goals are the best way to ensure that you maintain on track. I love eating out, so I know that is something that I need to keep in check if I want to be able to succeed in making these goals a reality. Here is a great video from Dave Ramsey on how to set goals, especially when it comes to finances:


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Meditation Busts Stress and Restlessness

19 January, 2010 | dcfemella | Comments

Meditation

Overanalyzer, thinks too much, calm down, relax, control freak

Those are words that I’ve heard from time to time from various people. It’s something that I have gotten better at, and I continue to improve on. One thing that helped me was when I was taking Body Flow. It’s a workout class that combines Tai Chi, Yoga, and Pilates. At the end of each workout session, you lay in a Dead-Body pose, close your eyes, and relax. During this time, I would let go of any thoughts that I had. By the time the instructor would tell us to awake, I felt alive and was able to clearly think about what I needed to focus on, instead of the 1,000 things I was thinking about.

One thing that I have been trying to do is meditate for 15 minutes a day. I preferably want to do it before the day begins, but I shouldn’t let it deter me from doing it if I forget in the morning. The best time for me to do this is in the shower. I close my eyes, watch my breathing, and let the warm water embody me. By the time I open my eyes, I feel like I can conquer the world. However, I only meditate for five minutes because I start getting restless. I need to get to the point where I can relax for a few more minutes

The Dead-Body pose is great, and I want to start doing this before I get out of bed. I also tried Bikram Yoga, and this was the only pose that I could withstand before getting frustrated. I don’t know why it’s easier to relax when someone else tells you to. It’s time that I tell myself to.

Meditation is a practice that can do wonders for you, especially someone who has her mind going a mile a minute at all times. There are times that I am thinking so many things at once that I jumble my words. This will be a way to calm my mind enough. It could help with the migraines I have noticed are starting to come back.

Just Breathe


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Donate to Help Aid With the Haiti Earthquake Relief Efforts

14 January, 2010 | dcfemella | Comments

womancrying

As everyone knows, Haiti has been devastated by an earthquake. Even as I type this, they are still feeling the aftershocks. The world has come together to aid the people of Haiti in many ways. However, everything starts with people. Even if you can only donate $5, please do so. It would help with the efforts to help. Watching the devastation that has occurred has broken my heart, as so many others. We were put on this world to help one another, so let’s start now.  Here are some information that I have compiled for everyone to donate, view videos, read news articles and tweets about Haiti.

How to Donate to Haiti

  • Doctors Without Borders – Has setup clinics to help Haiti. They are there trying to help and are asking for donations.
  • American Red Cross – If you go on their site, you can donate money, volunteer, or give blood. The Red Cross pledged an initial $1-million, and they are also giving people the option to send a $10 donation by texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999
  • UNICEF - Is providing humanitarian efforts, and also have a page for donations.
  • Yele Haiti Earthquake Fund – Wyclef Jean has setup Yele to help with the earthquake efforts.  You can also donate $5 by texting 501501.  I think that it’s great that Jean is helping his Haitian people. There are so many times that celebrities forget their roots.  I’m glad that he hasn’t.

Tweets About Haiti

Videos

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Related Articles

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Confession Time: I Still Co-Sleep With My Kids

13 January, 2010 | dcfemella | Comments

passeggiata

Every morning, there are little feet that titter tatter to my room and jumps in my bed. It usually happens when I am heavily asleep, so I don’t notice until I get up and see a bunch of brown curls next to me. A little girl is attached to this pool of curls sleeping away. Sometimes she is joined by a boy with way too much hair who is sleeping on my other side.

Since Cebastian was born, he has slept with me. I would stay up for hours staring away at the little person who had come from me. Then it was followed by Isabelle, who I stared at for hours as well. Since then, I’ve tried to get them to sleep in their room. Cebastian usually does, but Isabelle still sneaks in. To curb this a bit, I’ve tried to allow them to only sleep with me on the weekends, but that they have to stay in their rooms during the week. It hasn’t worked with Isabelle.

Secretly, I love that the kids still want to sleep with me. I feel warm, protected, and happy. My family says that I need to stop this behavior because what if I find someone? I honestly am at the point that I don’t think I will find someone, so does it matter if they still sleep with me? Logically I know that I shouldn’t allow this, so I need to do something about it.

I know that I should return them to their rooms when they come to my room. The only problem is that I don’t notice until it’s morning and time to wake up. I do need to talk to Isabelle, and make her understand that she needs to stay in her room. But, how I do that when I love that she doesn’t?

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Weight Loss Plan: To Lose 25 Pounds

12 January, 2010 | dcfemella | Comments

Erica - fitness model

Yesterday I headed to the doctor’s office. The first thing they always want you to do is jump on the scale. I felt lighter and was confident that I had lost weight. To my surprise, I was ten pounds heavier than I was last year. It was a major downer for me, and I couldn’t help but obsess with it the rest of the day.

I know one of the reasons why is that I didn’t exercise much this past Fall due to the project I am on. It was deadline after deadline, so I never had time to head to the gym. Also, my ex became more MIA, so I couldn’t go do outdoor activities because the kids were with me all the time. However, there is no excuse because you can always do something at home.

I planned on losing 15 pounds, but now I’m upping it to 25 pounds. Before I head to Las Vegas and Panama in March, I want to have a tone and sleek body. Here is what I’m doing, so I can reach my goal:

Food Intake

I will lower my food consumption. Due to the holidays, I have definitely been eating way too much. It’s time to stop. I used the About.com’s Calorie Counter to figure out how much I should be consuming:

  • If you reduce your current caloric intake to 1605.7 calories per day you will lose one pound per week without exercise.
  • If you exercise for 60 minutes each day, you will be able to reach your goal weight with 2496 calories per day.

Water consumption is something that I have not been very good at. I definitely need to start drinking 8-10 glasses of water. Lately I have been drinking so much coffee, and I need to stop. I will also start drinking a cup of green tea.

Exercise

I only want to lose 1-2 pounds a week because any more weight than that, and it is not very healthy. I will exercise 5 times a week. On April 11th, I am doing the Cherry Blossom Ten Miler, so it gives me motivation to do this because I have to be ready to run ten miles. I want to have a faster time than the Army Ten Miler, so I know that this will help keep me on track.

MyFitnessPal

I’m going to start using MyFitnessPal, a fitness site. I’ve tried others like it before, but they are kind of hard to navigate. This one is easy to use, and I prefer it. I do need friends, so I hope others are using it.  Here is a link to my profile, http://www.myfitnesspal.com/dcfemella, and my weight loss badge:

Calorie Counter



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