Each Monday for the next 4 Mondays (including this one), I’m going to put the following things at the top of my list

• Write down goals & plans for the work week, as best as I know them
• Write down goals & plans for any personal commitments
• Copy my online running schedule into my notebook (so I can access it anywhere)
• Make sure we have enough food for dinner and lunches – ideally, we’d already have gone grocery shopping over the weekend.  But if not, it really should happen on Monday.
• Take 5-10 minutes to reconcile spending tracking with online transactions
• Do strength and/or core work

Nothing here is that urgent or time consuming, but if I put it all together, I have laid the foundation for a good week.  The food one is the biggest one, but it all adds up.

What do you do to stay organized and keep your weeks from getting out of control?  Anything important missing on my Monday Must Do list?

What brings this on?  I want to increase our savings rate AND I just did a little bit of a January wardrobe refresh to the tune of… well, more than I want to say here.  So that’s saying something!  About half of the purchases were boring & necessary replacement of work wardrobe essentials, and the rest was just some fun stuff.

Here’s the rules:

• No new clothes until I’ve worn (or donated) everything in my closet (excluding formal dresses & business suits) – credit to Paranoid Asteroid for the idea!
• Personal care items are limited as well.  Allowed haircuts,  replacement cosmetics only, and general grooming upkeep (occasional eyebrows and nail clean up)… but no gel manicures, no fun new make-ups, etc.  This isn’t a usually a big deal for me, but I don’t want to cut one area only to ramp up another.

That’s it.  We are trying to cut back on eating out as well, but no specific rules on that yet.

To keep things more fun, I’ve also been taking daily photos of my outfits.  If I do it right, I should end up with a photo of everything I own!  These are for private use only – sorry guys!  (Not that I really think anyone is disappointed!)  It not only gives me a glance at my wardrobe, but it also lets me see how crappy my hair looks and such.  I’m hoping this will help me to improve.  :)  But really, I promise, I’m booking a trim tomorrow!

Have you done shopping bans?  Do you find them effective?  Or do you just budget carefully year round with no need to ban?

We went to Europe last year AND the year before.  The only reason it was even on the table for 2012 is because  T is going to Switzerland for work this fall and I thought I could turn it into a trip.  I really want to go to Patagonia (or South America in general) or Nepal (Annapurna) for our next big trip, but these trips are too long and expensive to be possible this year.

Still, I was daydreaming about Patagonia, looking at flights and itineraries and drooling over the stunning pictures of the mountains.  I am in love with mountains.  But then it dawned on me… If what I really want this year is a stunning mountain/wilderness vacation, how about Alaska?

I did some quick checking and yes, it will be MUCH cheaper to go to Alaska, and probably would be equally amazing to me.  T enthusiastically agreed.  So, Alaska it is!  That’s all the further I’ve gotten in my planning, but I’m definitely going to Denali, we are definitely camping at least a couple nights, and I definitely want to do some mountain biking.  And probably do some glacier walking again.

So, who has been to Alaska?  Was lodging/food expensive?  What did you do?

(But Patagonia and Annapurna, and while we are at it, Kilimanjaro, are still on my life list.)

When I first graduated, my total student loan balance was about $27,000.  This was a mixture of private and federal subsidized loans.  I paid off the higher rate private loans pretty quickly, consolidated my federal loans, then left them on autopilot ever since.   When I went to grad school and reached half-time status, the government stepped back in to pay the interest on my subsidized loans. When I graduated, they went back on autopilot.  As of today, nearly 6 years after graduation, they are just a hair over $15,000.

However, at tax time my student loans always pop back up onto my radar.  I claim the student loan interest deduction, which helps with the taxes but also reminds me that I’m actually still paying interest.  I made $1500 in payments in 2011, but roughly half of that went to interest!

Mathematically a low-interest tax-deductible loan is definitely NOT the #1 place for us to be putting our funds.  I’m not really anti-debt, I’m more anti-being-dumb-with-money.  Yet it bugs me still.  I know the math answer and I know the emotional answer.

So, I’ll probably give into the emotional part of me this year, at least a little.  If we did our initial math right, we are expecting a rather large tax refund, about $5,000.  Interest free loan to the government aside, I’m thrilled.  I talked with T about sending $1,000 of this to my student loan.  It isn’t huge, but it will make a nice dent.  Once T starts a “real job”, we might make too much money for the student loan interest deduction anyway.

There are a few caveats.  I’m getting this information from Yodlee, which means (for example) if we paid $500 for a group cave tour and everyone paid us back, Yodlee still thinks we spent $500 for that because I didn’t do something special to correct it.  It also neglects some of T’s spending , though aside from rent (which I included), his spending on his personal card is quite low.  I also wasn’t diligent about categorizing gifts, so if I bought a shirt for a gift, it probably just showed up under clothes.  And most of my Amazon.com spending is thrown in to “hobbies”, because I didn’t categorize it as we went.

ANYWAY, here is approximately what we ended up spending in 2011, in order.

• New Car – $26,300 (with registration, taxes, etc.) for a new VW Golf  TDI
• Rent – $19,000 for a one bedroom half a block from the beach
• Travel – $7,000 (mostly euorpe, but also backpacking and trips home).  This number is highly questionable but in the right ballpark at least
• Groceries – $5,400 Includes alcohol and various household supplies
• Restaurants – $3,500
• Insurance – $1,900 mostly car ($1400) but also renters/jewelery
• Student Loan Payments:  $1,500
• Hobbies – $1,400 (includes gym, race fees, running shoes, amazon purchases)
• Fuel (diesel)- $1,400
• Entertainment – $1,200 (includes a kindle, amazon purchases that I think were books, tickets to various events, bar nights)
• Electronics – $1,200 for T’s new computer!
• Clothing – $1,100
• Personal Care – $900 Hair, eyebrows,  nails, Sephora
• Netflix/Internet – $620
• Car Expenses – $400 (mostly dent repair)
• Gifts – $400 (as mentioned above, this is much lower than it really was)

The rest of the categories were <$300 each, plus some cash spending that I have no idea what it went to.

Needless to say, this is not as accurate as I would it to be.  This is why I’m committed to tracking my spending for 2012!

The book itself was a good read, though it seemed repetitive at times.  Seth made his main point early on and spent a lot of time going over the same ideas.  This is excusable.  His ideas were worth repeating.

There is a lot of good nuggets in this book, but one that jumped out at me was this one on passion, a topic that pops up every now and then in the personal finance community.

Does your job match your passion?  Or does your passion match your job?  Conventional wisdom is that you should find a job that matches your passion.  I think this is backwards.  [...]  Transferring your passion to your job is far easier than finding a job that happens to match your passion.

Originally, I advocate that loving your job is not nearly as important as loving your life.  I still think that is true, and I also think it is hard to love your life if you are in a job you hate.  Hating your job is not an option, but loving it isn’t a requirement either.  At least that is true for me.

However, as I’ve gotten more and more invested in my career I’ve realized that when you start emotionally investing yourself in your job, your job can become a passion.  It is amazing how exciting and rewarding that can be, and how independent it is from what your job actually is.  The technical content of my new job is interesting, but relatively small compared to the content in my old job.  However, my ability to make an impact and to really make a difference feels so much larger in my new job.  I’m happiest when I’m making a difference (and being recognized for that), and I think my job is happiest when I’m striving to make a difference.

My career goal is to be a linchpin.  I know that isn’t very specific, but it is all I have at this point.  Now I just need to put on my brave face and start throwing myself into all the stuff that I have no idea how to do yet!

So what do you think?  Do you think you can create passion for most any job by investing yourself emotionally?  Or do you have to work in a job that aligns with your innate passions?  Or don’t you really want to do either?  I think this is a really personal choice and there is no single right answer.

In November, this changed.  I went with a friend to try out a gel manicure.  They promised me 2 – 3 weeks of no chip polish for $35 + tip.    The polish selection wasn’t huge, but it was sufficient.  I picked out a dark purple color and they went to work.  The process took about the same time as a usual manicure with several coats and little UV drying lights  in between.  When it was over, the polish was already completely dry.  There was no messing up my nails waiting impatiently for it to dry!

My color lasted exactly two weeks before my first chip, which was pretty amazing.  By the time I got back in to get it removed a few days later, there were several chips and it was looking pretty horrible.   That’s the big drawback – you have to go back in to get it removed.  You can also do it at home if you have acetone, but it was a lot easier just to have them remove it.

Since I was in there anyway, I got another color… then 2.5 weeks later, another color…  It really does look so nice!

However, at ~$40 a pop, I knew it would have to just be a holiday splurge.  I finally went in and just had it removed and old-fashioned nail polish put on.  I couldn’t afford the upkeep, and I didn’t like that I had to come in every 2 weeks if I wanted to maintain it.  I’m just not willing to spend $80/month on my nails.

Are gel manicures worth it?  In my opinion, they are good for a trip or a special occasion.  I would do it again if I had a reason to.  On a regular basis, they are too expensive to keep up with.    Have you tried one?  What do you think?

Financial Savings:

You can see what I proposed here.  Essentially, my goals were to max out our retirement accounts and to increase our savings to a “TBD” amount, and the TBD was never actually determined.  On one hand, not properly setting goals was kind of a fail and I think we are worse off for that.  I’ll do better in 2012.  On the other hand, since I set such crappy goals, I think I can call this a win!  Ha.

Financial Spending/Minimalism: These go hand in hand with the savings goals, but I’d like to break out a few specific challenges

1. Don’t eat out in January, except socially (which we have been doing so often that it shouldn’t even be that hard) – Pretty sure we failed this.
2. Buy no new clothes in February. Failed this one (dumb, because how hard is that?)
3. Keep total clothing spending under $400 January – June.  DONE
4. Sell one bike (we have 3 in our home right now!) DONE

The moral of the story in this category is:  “Don’t set goals you don’t really care that much about.” Alternatively, it could be “If you set a goal, make it a point to care about the outcome!”  Either way, I have some thinking to do on this category for next year.

Fitness:

1. Run 1000 miles in 2011! Despite my fail at tracking in the sidebar, I am at about 920 miles.  Fail, but still a great effort!
2. Complete first marathon, injury-free DONE
   
3. Improve 10k race time by 5 minutes – Wow, that was ambitious of me.  No, I only improved by about 2.5 minutes.
4. Take yoga class 2 times  a month – no, running was my priority
5. Run 6 races, including a trail run –Yes!  Two trail races, two half marathons, a 10k, a 5k, and a marathon.
6. Try a new sport/activity – Yes!  We went caving for the first time!  And glacier hiking.  And rock climbing, once.

Travel/Hiking: 

1. Visit Yosemite front country. Done!
2. Go on 8 day hikes – Yes!  Nine!
   • Sycamore Canyon in May
   • Mt. Baldy attempt in May
   • Hike near eagle rock
   • Mist trail in yosemite (to nevada falls)
   • Hike to the top of upper yosemite falls
   • Hike to Mt Floyen in Norway
   • Hike from Urkein to Floyen in Norway
   • Half Dome
   • Linoes Trail
3. Climb Mt. Whitney as a backpacking trip - OMG, YES!  Amazing!
4. Go on 2+ other shorter backpacking trips - No, just one other this year.
5. Catalina Island!   Nope, it just wasn’t a priority.

By the way, we went to Russia, Norway and Sweden, which were not in my original goals.  I killed the travel goals – you can see where my true priorities are!

General

1. Read 20 books. Yes!  I read 30!
2. Blog about 6 new recipes. Hmm, forgot about this.  I shared a few, but not 6.
3. Consolidate finances more (close extraneous accounts).  We did move in this direction, though there are a few accounts that could still be closed.
4. Be open to new adventures. I’ll go with yes.  It turned out T wasn’t ready to graduate yet, so this wasn’t as applicable, but I was open to whatever life threw at me in 2011.

http://stackingpennies.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/dual-career-some-news/

• Long Term Savings: increase from  $15,000 to 35,000
• Emergency Fund:    Stay at $25,000

Fitness

In the spirit of setting goals I actually care about, these are running focused.  I eat relatively healthfully and drink lots of water, so no food/diet goals this year.  And while I believe in the philosophy of lifting heavy weights, I just don’t love it enough to incorporate it into my routine.  Same with yoga – I enjoy it, but it has nothing on running for me.  There is only so much time, and this is what I want to do in 2012.

1.  Train for and complete the L.A. Marathon – and PR!
Yay!  I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to PR since L.A. is a million times flatter than Big Sur.  Train for means that I’ll do 90%+ of my runs (temporarily derailed by the holidays).

2. Run a sub 2 hour half marathon
Now you know roughly how fast (or not!) I am.  I’m hoping to do this in the next 2 months (have 2 half’s planned), but I won’t be able taper properly for them, so if that doesn’t work out, I’ll have to do it after

3.  Run 1000 miles
Absolutely achievable if I run all year long!  I made it to about 920 in 2011, but I barely ran all summer.

4. Incorporate more strength, core, and stretching work
I know it is important, but it is sometimes hard to fit in.  I’m going to track how much I do, and really, doing this with any consistency is an improvement.

Life and Adventure

1.  Push myself professionally I’m not putting specific professional goals on this list, even though that arguably will be my biggest focus in 2012.  Starting a new role will be a big learning experience and challenge, and I’m going to keep challenging myself and expanding my skills as opportunities come up.  But I have nothing specific to say here.  I just want to get better.  Better at my job, better at networking, better at not being afraid.  That isn’t a goal, that is just life, right?  So while I have no specific professional goals, I’m going to keep on pushing.  I’m adding this to remind myself to keep reflecting on this.

2.  Read 25 books, including at least 5 from this list.
I read about 30 books this year, and this is slightly less.  I know if I just put a random high number I’ll avoid harder books and read easier fluff more often.  I just want to read a lot, and to me, reading 30 books was plenty (especially since most of these I read in the past 6 months).  I’m not currently considering business school, but maybe someday I’d do a part-time MBA while working.  Or not, you know?  But I still want to get some more business knowledge.

3.  Backpack and Hike and try some new things
We want to do at least 1 “good” backpacking trips with ~4 days of hiking then 1-2 shorter ones (that don’t require me to take vacation).  I’d like us to do a few day hikes too, but we’ll play that by ear.  I have some ideas for the new things (kayaking, paddle boarding, snowshoes) but I will play this by ear too.

4.  Give more
Money and time.  I tried to get involved on a regular basis with an organization last year, but the timing hasn’t worked out and the organization seemed to have more interested volunteers than they knew what to do with!  I doubt I’ll be able to pursue that opportunity while marathon training, but maybe after March.  And I’ll keep my eyes open for other ways to give back.  At minimum, I want to give at least $500 in cash donations throughout the year.

5.  Travel
This is less of a goal and more of a priority in my life right now…  But I want to see somewhere new this year, make time to see my family and friends, and seek out a little adventure.  My current travel ideas for 2012 are here.

July – Boston for one of T’s conferences (maybe)
$500+ (mostly flight)

August – Sierra Nevada backpacking trip
We want to start near mammoth lakes and backpack ~30 miles to yosemite
$400 (Assuming 1 night in hotel)

September – Switzerland and ?
This is for another conference of T’s.  The “?” part is yet to be determined.  I know I said my next international vacation would be to South America, but it is really really hard to pass up going somewhere where one of us gets a free flight.  So I’m looking at options for this.  And Switzerland was gorgeous, so… it would probably be OK if the “?” part wasn’t anything other than more of Switzerland.  But the strongest contender (currently) is northern Italy (focusing on cinque terre).  If we can stay in a friend’s flat in Paris (unlikely, really) maybe we’d go there instead.
This trip is still tentative.  I’m not only counting chickens before they hatch, I’m counting them before their mother has even laid any eggs!
WAG total:  $5000

December – T’s parent’s for Christmas
Maybe we can get some flight deals or something, but typically $400 each is a good price for holiday flights.  We’ll also get to meet a new niece or nephew!!!  Kids make the holidays SO much more fun.
Flights: $800

Just looking at this list, I think I’ll pass on Boston.  I know, I know, Boston is totally worth visiting, but I typically have more fun on nature trips than city trips, and…  I’m OK with passing on it.  I’ll save the cash for myself or for a trip to see NYC while T is on the east coat.  I also have a friend who might be getting married, though she hasn’t said when or where yet, so I’ll leave that out.  I wouldn’t mind sneaking in another trip to the midwest at some point… but again, I’ll leave that out.

There will also be a fair number of trips to visit T wherever he is staying (starting in July), though most likely he’ll come back to L.A. because we’ll have much better living accommodations here.  While I definitely have to consider this, this is a separate issue.

Total without Boston: approximately $7000