Budget 3/2 - 3/15

The extra paycheck plan is in effect. Since the month of March will have three paychecks, there's a little breathing room in this one....which has to go to my joint account for our joint debt and fun stuff pay off account....including the upcoming Mexico trip.

There's a lot happening that I haven't been able to write about yet. One of us may be getting a new job. We owe taxes. We have a list of wants a mile long and are trying to learn about patience and compromise. Sometimes we're really freaked out or frustrated about money. Welcome to married life, I guess. I will hopefully have some news really soon.

In the meantime, I figured I'd make myself accountable and do a budget post while I dream of Mexico, a trip that's still months away but already being paid for thankfully and not so thankfully.

Starting Balance = $1233*

Joint account - 400
Defaulted Student Loan - 260
Credit Card - 200
Groceries - 75
Health - 60
Gym - 33
Charity - 20
Misc. - 185

*Includes $45 being taken out after taxes (boo!) for my pension buy back.

Miscellaneous seems really high right now but I'm hoping to make an even bigger credit card payment. Just don't want to set myself up for failure.

It snowed today so I have warm happy Mexican vacation thoughts on my mind.

Budget 1/19 - 2/01

Woo hoo, my paycheck is $16 higher than the even higher paycheck I got last time. Still not sure why they decided to reduce Social Security contributions when they probably need them most, but that's not for me to decide.

And....we booked a trip to Mexico! Mexico here I come, baby! We have a family member's destination wedding to attend, and I'm excited because I've never been South of the Border. To go, however, we need diligent budgeting. Luckily, with this paycheck I should be able to pay the balance of our must-pre-pay room for four nights. We got a suite for a great price! It even has a jacuzzi and was only $20 more a night than a smaller room.

So far we can only afford to go for four days but the airfare may make more sense for us to go for a whole week. Still, we have a few months to figure that all out. Here's my budget with Mexico on my mind:

Starting Balance = $1268

Perkins Loan - 200

Mexico - 630

Credit Card - 200

Health - 85

Misc. - 153

I've already paid $500 towards Mexico today, plus the credit card and the Perkins Loan. The challenge is to not exceed $153 in two weeks of miscellaneous spending. I think I can do it! It will be worth it when I'm on the beach. Also I have $25 in my wallet from last paycheck (hee hee).

Trading Vacation Days for Cash

First: a warning. I know I'm going to sound like a whining whiner who whines, but I realize this and write anyway.

One of the great perks about my job is the generous amount of paid time off I get. And a lot of this time can be carried from year to year and used for a dream vacation, a maternity leave, or cashing out at retirement. I currently have 16 vacation days saved and that's after taking nearly three weeks off for my wedding and honeymoon in July. I accrue a new vacation day every two and a half weeks (or 4 weeks a year to be exact). On top of that I get a week of Personal time come January 1 of the new year. And I have 28 sick days accrued. There's more (overtime) but I'll stop bragging.

Anyway, I've always really appreciate this about my job and the fact that we aren't discouraged from actually using our time like so many Americans apparently are is something I don't take for granted. Sure, time off has to be approved but I've found as long as it's not during our crazy busy time of the year it is usually approved.

So when I got a notice saying that I could exchange 3 vacation days for $500 towards my my share of the health insurance premiums, I had to think about it.

First, I did the math. I make $1861 a pay period pretax. Out of that amount, $110 is taken out pretax towards my health insurance premiums for DH and I. $1861/10 = $186 a day x3 = $558.

Then, I thought, it's not like I'm actually earning more money if I'm working three more days a year for it. In fact, after taxes this will only net me like $10 a year if I consider the extra time worked. And isn't a vacation worth more to me than $10 a year?

I told all this to DH. He said I was using fuzzy math and I should take the money. When I pointed out that I could save up a lot of time for a potential two week African Safari in 2012, he told me there was no safari in our immediate future. :-(

Bubble bursted, I submitted the form to H.R. today.

I still want to go on that safari though, but DH is right that we have other financial goals we need to focus on instead.

Sorry lions.

Where it Went 2/17 - 3/02

I am happy to report that this past budgeting period was very successful. $100 in wedding spending on our Pre-Cana course and $500 in wedding savings, all the while being on target in every other category. As I've learned, if you transfer the savings out of your account immediately, you're pretty much forced to be on budget...because you have nothing left. Genius!

The Pre-Cana (marriage preparation) course went really well. It gave us a lot of food for thought in terms of planning our future together. Most of it was stuff we had already talked about but it was a good refresher nonetheless.

So here's how I did on the budget I set out two weeks ago:

Budgeted/Actual
Pre-Cana - 100/100

Groceries - 75/100

Wedding Savings - 500/500
Credit Card - 150/150

Sprint - 84/84

Law School Loan - 80/80

Perkins Loan - 93/93

Health - 65/40

Misc. - 163/160

We booked our flights to Hawaii for our honeymoon! Well, part of our flights at least. Now we have to make some decisions, save up some cash, and plan out the trip. I'm excited.

Stay tuned for my next budget - when I'm actually more awake and dressed. Right now I've been up for hours because I couldn't sleep.

Saving For the Honeymoon

What's the one thing people wish they had more of, even moreso than money? Time. While I can't make more time (drats!) my fiance and I have been saving our vacation time for our honeymoon.

Last I wrote about it, we were still on the fence about possible destinations. As the wedding approaches, we are more convinced that Hawaii is the place to go! There are some great hotels we can stay at using rewards points and it's someplace I've always wanted to travel to. (My fiance has been to the Big Island while on an extended layover trip but he was all by himself.)

Airline miles are getting harder to come by (and save up) as my fiance hasn't had to travel for work in a while - a good thing - but we have enough to cover one roundtrip ticket.

And the most important thing, after paying for the trip, is how are we going to be able to get away from work for an extended period? That's where vacation time comes in.

With my fiance's recent promotion he gained an additional week's vacation! Which means he now has three weeks a year. We will need to use a day or two before the wedding to travel and get ready, save a couple of days for two weddings of our friends in the fall, as well as the Christmas holidays. That leaves about two weeks for the honeymoon!

As for me, since I've been with my employer for over three years (though in different offices) I just received an increase in my vacation accrual! As of January, I accrue 5.5 vacation hours every two weeks. Right now I have:

Vacation - 57.75 hours

Personal - 35 hours

Comp - 15.75 hours

Since it's the busy time of the year I can expect to accrue at least 20 more comp hours in the weeks to come. By July it looks like I will have over three weeks vacation saved up, not including personal or comp time.

Hawaii here we come!

Where it Went 10/28 - 11/10

I had the day off work today (thank you Veterans!) so I'm posting my budget a bit late. But alas, here it is, time to face up with all the $$$ I spent in Sin City.

So here's how I did with my budget the past two weeks compared to my projections:


Budgeted/Actual

Credit Card - 100/100
Groceries - 75/0
Dentist - 25/25
Perkins Loan - 93/93
Law School Loan - 54/54
Laptop - 43/43
Vegas - 200/460
Wedding - 500/380
Misc. - 165/160



So yeah, Vegas was expensive. Where were all the cheap buffets and free entertainment I've heard about? Who knows. I had a good time, but my fiance was so busy with work that it was a lot of wandering around by myself. After a while I just felt guilty about spending money so I hung around the (very cool) hotel. I'm glad we got our flights and room for free because everything else in Vegas was pretty expensive.

And for the record I only bet about $10 on the slot machines as I don't care for gambling.

The good news is about $150 of the money I spent in Vegas was on clothes and a cute new clutch so at least that money wasn't simply wasted.

No more vacations for a while....well, for a short while at least. I love to travel but next time I will wait for a trip where my fiance doesn't have to work.

Budget 10/28 - 11/10

I finally got my COLA!!! Woohoo, $34 more after tax. I'm excited, particularly since I was hit today with an unexpected $25 fee to have my cavity filled with a white filling instead of a silver one.

As for the remaining $14 I don't have much of a plan for. I have a feeling this will be a spendy two weeks because....

I'm going to Vegas!

No, not to get married, unfortunately (wouldn't that be so much easier?). My fiance has a business trip and I'm tagging along. Everything is mostly free since the hotel and flight is paid for. Yet I am going to need to amuse myself during the day while he is busy.

More on that later. Here is my "rough" budget for the next two weeks.

Starting Balance = $1280

Credit Card - 100*

Groceries - 75
Dentist - 25

Perkins Loan - 93

Law School Loan - 54

Laptop - 43**
Vegas - 200
Wedding - 500

Misc. - 165

*I have been putting a few things here and there on the credit card and then paying it off every month but I should stop doing this soon as it gets way too tempting. I thought maybe they would increase my measly $500 credit limit if I did this but it ain't working.

**Now paid off!

I have the feeling I'm forgetting something. But this seems to be right. I will be posting more about Vegas on a budget soon. And don't worry, I don't gamble! I've just never been and I'm excited to go.

Where it Went 6/10 - 6/23

I'm home sick today and lack my usual witty energy to write about my finances but alas it's payday so accountability tells me I must. If it's any indication of how I feel, I managed to drag myself downstairs to put on laundry only to discover I had brought along fabric softener instead of detergent. Then I had to drag myself back upstairs to get the right bottle and back downstairs (no small feat in an apartment) and now two hours later I lack the strength to return to the basement to put said laundry in the dryer.

Oh well, here's where my money went over the last two weeks. I got a little off track due to the music festival - not so much money spent there but money spent in preparation for the trip - and as a result didn't pay old Aunt Sallie until today. Luckily my payment wasn't technically late.

Budgeted/Actual
Aunt Sallie Mae - 406/0
Defaulted Student Loan - 260/260
Nice Collection Agency - 125/125
Festival - 150/387*
Fiance Birthday - 100/105
Misc. - 62/80
Father's Day - 0/30

*Yikes, that hurt to calculate but about 1/4 of that money was spent on clothes I can wear again. $25 was spent on the requisite commemorative t-shirt. Looking back it was an expensive, but awesome time and I don't feel so bad about it. Life is meant for the living.

I ended up with about $50 left over as well which is rare for me but I will figure out a way to incorporate it into my next budget which will be posted really soon.

The fiance and I are done with expensive trips for the forseeable future thankfully and all focus will now be on wedding savings.

Budget 6/10 - 6/23

Even though we just went away to Orlando the fiance and I are hitting the road again tommorrow. A festival awaits our wallets but luckily we've already paid for most of this trip several months ago.

I am going to budget myself some walking-around money that's a little bit higher than I would normally allow myself, but since we won't need as much groceries hopefully everything will balance out.


My paycheck is still being lagged. It's sort of frustrating. What's the fun of getting a raise if you don't get to see it? I'm told that it should even out soon but here's what I have to work with for the next two weeks.



Starting Balance = $1113*



Aunt Sallie Mae - 406
Defaulted Student Loan - 260
Nice Collection Agency - 125
Festival*- 150
Fiance Birthday - 100
Misc. - 62



*My fiance actually owes me $50 that I've been holding out on collecting until this trip so I'll have more spending cash while we are away for 4 days.



It's also his birthday coming up so I'd like to do something nice for him but I won't spoil the surprise by posting about it here.



I'll be back next week and hopefully with my budget in tact!

Budget 4/13 - 5/27

The combination of my utility company telling me I owe them nothing (?) and the Sprint online access to my account not operating right now has made this budget a little sketchy. Also and here's the big thing: next week we're going to Disney World!!!! So here's my best estimate of my budget for the next two weeks (i.e. the things I know HAVE to be paid):

Starting Balance = $1113*

Aunt Sallie Mae - 406

Defaulted Student Loan - 260

Nice Collection Agency - 125

Perkins Loan - 93

School Loan - 54
Sprint - 64?
Misc./Disney - 111

*My paycheck is still being lagged $180 every two weeks. :-(

It really stinks that I haven't gotten my vacation payout from my old job yet. That $800 would have helped a lot on our upcoming trip! Luckily we're flying free, staying for free and have one free park day so it's not a super expensive vacation. Here's hoping that check arrives in the next few days but in the meantime I'm very excited to be going on vacation!

Hypothetical Hyatt Honeymoon

We haven't made any wedding plans yet...still waiting on getting rid of my apartment and my parents signing off on the date...but that doesn't mean I can't start fantasizing about a kick-ass honeymoon. Thanks to my fiance's business travel, we should be able to get one free airplane ticket to just about anywhere in the world, and have at least six nights accommodations in the Hyatt hotel of our choice. But where to go?!

The wedding will most likely be in July of 2010 but we may or may not take our honeymoon at that time depending on his work schedule and our budget. Since we're getting married in a bit of a resort town anyway, we may opt for a brief mini-moon after the wedding and have the full blown honeymoon several months later. Also, the weather in New York is already nice in July so there's less reason to skedaddle across the world.

We're pretty much ruled out the Caribbean since we can get cheap flights there most of the time and we've been to several islands already (separately and together). I would love to go to Southeast Asia (Thailand especially) or to stay anywhere that has those over the water huts. I also have always wanted to see Eastern Europe even though it's not as relaxing and romantic as some envision honeymoons should be. Unfortunately Hyatt has not caught onto the wonders of Eastern Europe quite yet so Berlin is the closest we can get.

So, I'm just starting to make a list now of places we can afford to stay at/travel to and it is exceedingly long. Figured I would take a poll of my readers for some more input. They all sound pretty amazing but any advice would be welcome.

Option 1 is Hawaii. Part of me wants to think outside the box and reject the nation's most popular honeymoon spot (especially since my older sister just had her honeymoon there) but then again Hawaii looks amazing AND I'd be supporting America's economy with my travel dollars. We could stay in Maui, Kauai, or Honolulu.

Option 2 is Greece. I want to go to Greece! ::stomps foot like an angry bride-to-be:: My fiance says it's too dangerous. Sigh. Maybe for our fifth anniversary but I'll be monitoring the travel web sites for some proof that Greece is a safe place to travel. We can stay in a fabulous hotel and casino in Thessalonoki. I know very little about Greece except for every time I see a commercial or a picture pertaining to traveling to Greece I am intrigued. Thoughts?

Option 3 is Bali. Who doesn't want to go to Bali? It looks like the most amazing place ever. I'm a little worried about being on such a long flight but I think it could be a trip of a lifetime. We can maybe stay a few nights in the super expensive Grand Hyatt and a couple at the also expensive Hyatt Regency.

Ok so I haven't even touched on Thailand yet and I've written too much to digest for one day. But here's the poll, if given the choices of a honeymoon in Hawaii, Greece or Bali, what would you choose and why?

Budget 03/18 - 03/31

Greetings from Unemployment Watch 2009! I only have nine days of employment left but I'm not too panicked. Hopefully I will be hearing from the potential new job soon. They made it seem like I was almost guaranteed a spot in the new office but I don't want to get my hopes up just yet.

Since April is a three paycheck month (gotta love the Extra Paycheck!) I am able to have a slighty modified budget since I will be paid again just in time for April's rent.

The Good News: I am putting $400 in Savings!

The Less Good News: $200 of that money is allocated for my upcoming Disney trip. Although if I do lose my job I'll keep the money in my Emergency Fund and we'll probably do one less park day.

So here's my budget for the next two weeks. It took me quite a while to figure it out and lo and behold the last of my student loans have come out of deferrment (more on that later) so I forked over quite a bit of moola today.

Starting Balance = $1156 ($13 more than usual, thanks President Obama!)

Emergency Fund - 200

Disney Trip/Emergency Fund - 200

Credit Card - 133 (paid off!)

Utilities - 205 ($85 towards Overdue Balance - paid off!)

School Loan - 54 (still paying extra)

Perkins Loan - 93 (boo!)

Sprint - 64

Festival ticket fund - 50

Groceries - 50

Misc. - 100

It's been a week since my apartment was first shown to a potential new tenant but according to my landlord they still haven't decided on it. He plans to show it to other interested tenants soon. The only way I can survive unemployment is to get out of that lease so I'm hoping April will be my last month paying rent.

It feels good to finally be adding money to my Emergency Fund, I've been lacking in that department for a while and I've got a whopper of a potential emergency on the horizon. Wish me luck!

Lake Tahoe On A Budget

Haha, you can't go to Lake Tahoe on a budget. Well we budgeted for it in advance by way of the Vacation Fund. And we were extremely lucky to have most of our expenses paid for my my husband-to-be's travel rewards, but still Tahoe stole our money. Here's how:

Flight - paid with points

Airport lunch - $48*

Two sodas at transfer airport - $6!

Car rental - ? I think it was $140

Hotel - paid with points

Dinner at the bar of the hotel - $40

Heavenly lift ticket (me) - $82

Ski rental (me) - $36

Heavenly lift ticket/ski rental and all-day lesson (him) - $160

Drinks and lunch on the mountain (me) - $44!

Fancy dinner where we got engaged - $200+ (I had elk. He had buffalo. It was amazing!)

Dog sledding! - $95 each

Cable car ride up the mountain at Squaw Valley - $9 each!**

*Though I decided not to save up any of my "own" money for the trip, my parents gave me $100. And I spent $88 on vacation (and $9 filing my taxes.) The items I paid for were our lunch at the airport and my lunch on the mountain.

**We got lucky at Squaw Valley. The cable car ride was supposed to cost $22 each but we bought a dinner package and got most of our money back when it turned out the restaurant wasn't open. So we spent several hours hanging out on top of the mountain for pretty cheap.

We ate all the rest of our meals in the hotel honors lounge where they give the VIPs free food. It felt good to hang with the VIPs and enjoy free eats and amazing views.

All and all it was an amazing place and I of course will always remember the trip for the moment in which a certain someone asked me to marry him.

BTW, if you ever have a chance to go dog sledding, do it! So much fun!

Budget 1/21 - 2/03

Ugh. My utilities are costing me an arm and a leg this month! I can't wait to ditch my apartment. I have my thermostat set at only 60 degrees yet I still have to pay $50 for heat because of the damned cold weather and the high price of gas. I looked back at last year's numbers and it looks like January is always the most expensive month so hopefully things will get better next month.

Anyhow, here's my budget for the next two weeks. I'm going to Lake Tahoe next week! Plane ticket and hotel were free. Lift ticket, meals and miscellaneous are courtesy of Boyfriend's bonus.

Starting Balance = $1139

Dentist - 25 (overdue, will mail today!)

Rent - 725

Water - 50 (still owe $300, ugh)

Sprint - 64

Utilities - 156 (including $40 towards Payment Agreement)

School Loan - 54 (upping payment according to 2009 Resolutions)

Misc. - 65

I'm very excited for our trip! Dog sledding here we come!

Birthday And Boyfriend Bonus

Happy Birthday to me! I'm 29! My parents gave me $100! And the news gets even better because Boyfriend also found out he got a $2000 work bonus. Woo-hoo! It comes out to $1400 after taxes and Boyfriend in his extreme benevolence has decided to use the funds to pay for our upcoming Tahoe vacation! And the money that's left over we would save for our Orlando vacation too - now set for February!

We are very fortunate that Boyfriend has been able to accumulate so many frequent flier points and hotel rewards. And even more fortunate that now we have a giant wad of cash to spend on our trips. Thankfully, despite the fact that most companies are cutting back, Boyfriend's business is booming. All these perks don't come without a price of course. When I first met Boyfriend and he explained that he would be traveling for large extent of time I was a little worried. But we've made it work. So I consider it our reward for toughing it out that we get to take a couple of vacations.

In light of the good news, we've decided I would devote the $100 I had allocated towards our trip to my Emergency Fund. $126 down, $1874 to go!

With the money my parents gave me I'm going to look for a new pair of ski pants (hopefully on sale). I can't wait for my first experience skiing out West!

Budget 1/07 - 1/20

Another payday, another budget. Luckily my birthday is coming up very soon so I may get some checks in the mail (crosses fingers). Without taking those into consideration, here is my budget for the next two weeks:

Starting Balance = $1147

Boyfriend - 40 (to pay off Emergency Credit Card)
Emergency Fund - 25
Aunt Sallie - 406
Defaulted Student Loan - 260
Nice Collection Agency - 125
Credit Card - 15
Hobby - 70 (two months)
Groceries - 50
Tahoe Fund - 100
Misc. - 56

I'm going to set aside $100 now for my Tahoe Trip so that I will have some money for fun activities on the trip. I still have one more paycheck before we leave so hopefully I will manage to leave with at least $200 in spending cash.

We need to buy groceries as I've been eating turkey and other assorted party leftovers for the last week straight.

I need to pay Boyfriend the money I charges on his Emergency Credit Card because late night G&Ts are NOT an emergency. I also paid the minimum to my credit card before it was due just to get it out of the way.

Thank you all for all your suggestions about Lake Tahoe! I'm very excited to go! We're going to try dog sledding and other fun in the snow activities. The resort we're staying at (on the NV side) has lots of cozy fireplaces and an indoor/outdoor heated pool as well. I can't wait!

I Need a Vacation!

Sorry I've been largely M.I.A. in the new year. Work has been a total disaster and unfortunately I still haven't head back from the potential new job. Sigh.

But onto happier news, remember how I was considering using Boyfriend's frequent flier points to travel to Reno? Well this plan has become a reality - except even better! Due to Boyfriend also acquiring lots of hotel loyalty points as well, we get to stay not in the Biggest Little City of the World, but the ultra chic and romantic Lake Tahoe.

We're going in just a couple of weeks and since air fare and hotel are free we hope to have a fun and frugal adventure. Well sure, an afternoon skiing at Heavenly will set us back and the casinos will surely tempt Boyfriend (not me - I hate gambling!) but all told, it will be a fun couple of days where we can escape our daily stress.

Hopefully I'll have exciting career news soon but in the meantime, I'm looking forward to my vacation.

Planning My Vaction = Full Time Job

It's no secret: I love to research new things. It's pretty much how I make my living as well as a passion of mine. If a friend of mine mentions they are interested in say, badminton, odds are I will go home and learn all I can learn about badminton that night. It's a little dorky but it's how I am. Research helps me plan my life, something I am fond of doing, even in the abstract. I don't like being unprepared, especially when I travel. It's a comfort zone thing partly but also because vacations are so precious to me that I want to make sure I tailor my experience to best fit my wants/needs. Boyfriend took me on an awesome vacation last year and I spent months beforehand researching the best restaurants/itinerary in travel guides and on online discussion groups.

Unemployment woes aside, we are going to Orlando in January. The air tickets will be free and the hotel stay is already paid for (at a deep discount). Provided we attend a 90 minute resort lecture - "no pressure" - we will also receive two tickets to the theme park of our choice. Now the only question is, what to do?!

As I mentioned before, I have been to Orlando many times but not in the past decade. Some things never change (though sadly Captain Nemo has been retired) but I have a fairly good idea of what to expect. There is so much to do and only four days in which to do it! So, I have, of course, begun brainstorming ideas.

One great web site I have found is Mousesavers.com which lists ways to save on all things Disney and allows visitors to post their tips and reviews. It seems like if you plan ahead, you should never have to pay the full gate price for park tickets. Their web site led me to the Disney web site where you can customize a map full of the things you want to see at any given park. Unfortunately after ten minutes playing around with the Epcot map I had selected 90% of the park and just gave up (oops).

I definitely want to visit Universal Studios for at least one day of our trip. A quick visit to their web site alerted me to their Meal Deals where you can prepay for your food and eat as much as you want all day long for about $20. You can only get one entree at a time and are limited to the lower end restaurants but this still may be a good deal. I'm not so sure we'll go with that option but I definitely like the all-you-can-drink soft drink cup for $8.99. I know, I know, you think I should drink water instead of soda but I'm a lost cause. And besides, I get SO THIRSTY when I'm walking around all day. Besides, me and Boyfriend can share it.

So, what have I learned after devoting almost two hours of trip-planning? I need more time! There's so many things I want to do/see/play with in Orlando.

But here's my list so far:

Epcot - whole day

Universal Studios - whole day

I love both of those parks and know there's enough to keep up occupied for a whole day in both of them. I know you can get the parkhopper passes and do multiple parks in a day but I have other ideas for the rest of the trip. Here's hoping we can do everything we want without paying a fortune. Still need to get past the all-important holiday season first (ugh).

Dreaming of Reno

Exciting news! Because Boyfriend has to travel frequently for work he has been racking up lots and lots of frequent flyer miles! This has left us with the exciting prospect of being able to take three roundtrip flights for FREE! After spending a chunk load of money on my flight to the Destination Wedding, this comes as amazing news.

But where to go? First, we are limited to destinations serviced by Southwest Airlines, which is fine since they fly to a zillion places. And we can only take domestic trips. Second, I earn 3.75 vacation hours every two weeks and currently have 37 hours available, whereas Boyfriend gets a limited amount of vacation days per year. Thus we are looking for trips that we can live it up the most in 4-5 days (thus not lose two whole days to air travel).

We've already picked one destination: Orlando. Call me a sucker but I love me some Disney. I've been to Disneyworld probably 10 times in my life but never with a romantic partner and never since I turned 21. I think we can have a completely awesome grown-up experience in Disney without breaking the bank. Also we have free/cheap accomodations already lined up for whenever we book the trip. One trip planned (sorta).

The second and third destinations are still up in the air. My first choice would be Ft. Myers since we also have free accomodation and it's a city than can be done well in a long weekend. New York winters can be unforgiving and getting away to the beach is something I would definitely relish. Also, how much money can one spend on the beach? My sister and I went to Ft. Myers a couple of years ago and the only thing we spent money on were drinks at the beach and some bar food. Also the flight is only 4 hours so we can leave Friday morning and be back at work on Monday after having spent 3 wonderful days on the beach. This is definitely a good option.

Second option for trip #2 is New Orleans. Boyfriend and I have never been and I've always wanted to go there. The flight is slightly longer (the oddities of not living near a hub airport) but it's definitely more authentic a place than Orlando and Ft. Myers. I would love to tour the cemetaries and taste some Gumbo. Oh but would that trip be a Budget Buster (when compared to practically free Ft. Myers). Who knows? It depends on how much free hotel points Boyfriend has earned but New Orleans is definitely on my list of places to travel to.

For trip #3 I want to go Out West. I've never been west of St. Louis and I'm anxious to change that. Out of the places Southwest flies, my top choices would be Salt Lake City, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Reno. Salt Lake City for the skiing. San Francisco because it just seems awesome and it's my parents' favorite city. Las Vegas because it's Vegas, baby and I've never been. And Reno because I think it could be a neat place to get a little big-city-gambling feel and still get to do some amazing West Coast skiing. I subscribe to a skiing magazine and frequently get mailers for affordable ski/stay/play packages in Reno. And, paradoxically, the flight is only 6 hours when compared to the other long flights out west (San Fran = 11 hours, Salt Lake City = 9 hours).

The free flights don't kick in until January and then we have 13 months to use them so it's not something that's happening anytime soon but it's fun to have some vacation planning in the back of my mind while the tempurature drops.

Anyone want to weigh in on my options? Is Reno the travel destination of our (affordable) dreams? Let me know what you think!

Let Them Eat (Wedding) Cake Part Two

Right after I got back from the Destination Wedding I attended I did an incomplete post of my time away and all the money I spent. And then I got busy with work and life of course so I left you all in suspense. Also you're probably not gonna like what I have to tell you because I spent a whole lot of money. But life is meant for the living, right? Not the scary zombie brides (Happy Halloween BTW!!!).

Ok so here is it and appropriate to the date, it's pretty scary!!!

As of my last post I was still on Friday and had spent $70 of my own money (see previous post for details).

Saturday I wake up hungover as all hell. I remember a hot tub. I remember the World Series being on really late. I remember deciding I was bored of beer and that it was a good time to switch to liquor. Hanging out with college friends must have made me think I could still drink like I was in college. Sadly friends, that is no longer true.

The Atkins girls had supplied a heartiful sausage breakfast. Eww gross thought hungover Sallie's Niece. When someone volunteered a supermarket run I jumped in to come. I immediately purchased a Starbucks Iced Mocha with whipped cream (a yummy $4), then proceeded to get a roast beef wrapped sandwich, a 12-pack of beer (my contribution to the house), flip flops for dancing (I forgot mine), a nail file (I forgot mine) and a toothbrush (yup forgot that too). All told I spent $35 at the supermarket (including Starbucks).

Back at the house I deposited a crisp $50 bill into my wedding card as a gift to my friend. Then we went to the wedding. Yay it was awesome. So happy for her. The band was great! We danced and partied in a limo. Pretty much your typical expensive best-day-of-your-life kind of thing. Going to a wedding stag sucks though and I'm one of the most independent women I know. I danced awkwardly next to other couples and finally snagged the cousin of the groom as my dancing partner. He was adorably southern and had hair that draped over one eye just so....but I digress.

The day after the wedding was a real Budget Buster. I thought I had secured people to come with me (and drive me) to the touristy things I wanted to do before my flight. I thought wrong. College Friend left for her honeymoon and I was alone in an oceanfront mansion. And bored. I called about ten dolphin tour boat companies and half of them were not operating because it was Sunday. The other half refused to take on just one passenger. Curse you!

I finally found a boat but it wasn't departing for several hours. So I took a cab to requisite touristy resturant ($20). Had lunch and drinks ($25). Bought souvenirs including one Christmas gift ($47). Took another cab to boat tour ($12). Went on boat tour ($15). Sat at a bar in the harbor until it was time for my flight ($10). Took yet another cab to airport ($15). Bought random snacks and magazines ($12).

So yes, I spent almost all of the $200 my Dad gave me plus about $150 of my own dollars. It was the most expensive weekend ever!

I had fun and I'm glad I got to be a part of my friend's wedding and everything. Looking back I should really have rented a car even if it was only for one day because though I was told it was a very small town the cabs were so slow and painfully expensive. I also really should have found a way to get Boyfriend to come with me because being on my own really really sucked.

I don't want to come off as anti-wedding and I know I definitely didn't need to spend as much as I did but the next time I get invited to a Destination Wedding it best be someplace really fun and affordable to get to. Hopefully there will be no more weddings for a while now.