Evolving Personal Finance » Archive
Weekly Update 21
Kyle and I are gearing up for our trip to Chicago next weekend. We have planned where we’re staying each night of our trip (only paying for one!) but don’t yet know what sights we’ll see/activites we’ll do each day (suggestions welcome!). We have a lot of research and planning and shopping yet to do, but at least our wedding attire is already taken care of. We have also started looking for a new place to live. Our apartment complex is raising our rent significantly so we wanted to research what else is available at what price ranges so we can either effectively negotiate with the leasing office or find something else we like. We need to make a decision in the next week or two about whether or not to … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
Obligations on Your Side Hustle Money
Kyle has been volunteering with the production team at our church for about a year, mostly running the slides and handling the video-playing. One of the men who runs the sound board is taking a sabbatical and they are looking for someone to fill his weekends. Kyle has wanted to learn how to run a sound board for a while so this is a perfect opportunity. Plus, we found out that it is a paid … Read entire article »
Filed under: giving, retirement, side income, taxes, values
Strategies for Paying for Vacations
Kyle and I committed to attend the black tie wedding in Chicago that I’ve mentioned a few times. In addition to attending the wedding itself, we are going to make it a long weekend to see some of our good friends who live there as well as sight-see as we have never been to Chicago before. We are excited to make some amazing memories! Financially, though, the trip is going to be a stretch. We haven’t … Read entire article »
Filed under: found money, luxuries, travel
Blog Statistics Update May – June 2012
This is my one-month update on how EPF is doing based on our May 16 – June 15 data. Probably only other bloggers will care about the statistics stuff, but I found the list of most viewed posts pretty interesting (two were from before this period) and of course comments are still welcome! I’ll definitely read and respond to them. Statistics People who listen to us, as of June 15, 2012 RSS subscribers: 66 (+13) Twitter followers: 51 (+18) Facebook … Read entire article »
Filed under: blogging, month in review
Weekly Update 20
I gave lab meeting on Monday (hence why Kyle posted that day!) and that went well. My advisor has been away for several weeks and seemed please with my progress when we talked. My research the rest of the week wasn’t so hot but I’m still riding high from that feedback early in the week. We went out to dinner (sort of) on Monday night to celebrate a friend’s birthday and then out again for a trivia night at a local bar on Tuesday, so that was a lot of restaurant spending for us in a short amount of time! This week I also met with a friend to coach her a bit on her finances. I’ve realized that I’m a problem solver – that’s what I like about science and … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
Budgeting, Tracking, or Neither?
I’ve added a new podcast to my rotation – Ric Edelman’s The Truth About Money. I don’t know how well-known RE is nationally, but he works in the area where my parents live so I’ve heard of him a few times. He has a totally different money philosophy than Dave Ramsey (low-interest debt is great!) so I started listening to it to safeguard against becoming brainwashed by DR. During last week’s show the hosts were discussing … Read entire article »
Sometimes I Don’t Eat. Is that Rude?
On Sunday, Kyle and I were invited to go out to dinner with about a dozen other people to celebrate a friend’s birthday on Monday. Kyle had a volleyball game scheduled near the start of the dinner so we RSVP’d that we would be coming late. Kyle stayed at school to be there for the game and I went home to have dinner. Because of a torrential rainstorm, his game was canceled, so we were … Read entire article »
Weekly Update 19
Slow week for us! I’ve been procrastinating preparing for my lab meeting presentation this coming Monday. The only out of the ordinary thing we did this week aside from returning from our trip to the NC mountains last week was to see West Side Story at our local theater. It was the first time I’d ever seen a live production of the show, and it was a lot more vulgar than I was expecting! Maybe the language and/or choreography has been updated. Also, much of the dialogue spoken and lyrics sung by the Puerto Rican characters was in Spanish, which was a bit surprising but I guess felt more authentic. However, since we’re not fluent in Spanish it was a bit hard to follow the longer/faster stretches – more like seeing an … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
Laying a Path from Here to There
I’m afraid of drifting through life – of letting time pass without accomplishing anything. Sometimes I feel like we’re drifting financially while we’re in graduate school because we don’t have several major monetary objectives toward which we are working. While I think goal-setting has been a bit overblown and doesn’t necessarily work well for everyone, I believe we all need to have a vision for our lives and to take steps to realize those visions. If … Read entire article »
How to Move Out on a Shoestring Budget
I admit it – I was a boomerang kid. It grates on me to admit that, since I boomeranged in 2007, before it was a big thing. I lived with my parents for about six months post-college before moving closer to my job. The long commute and close quarters with my family really got to me late in the fall, so I planned and executed my move within a couple months. I didn’t know nearly … Read entire article »
Filed under: transitions
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