Tag Archives: savings

Working On Money (or A Prosperous Heart Update)

Posted on August 17, 2017 | Comments Off on Working On Money (or A Prosperous Heart Update)

I wrote before about how the podcast I work for was going to do the 12 week journey in “The Prosperous Heart”. We just got to the end of the 12 weeks and I figured it was time to do an update.

I’ll admit that I did not follow the 12 weeks as strictly as I did with “The Artist’s Way”. The main thing I did do was the morning pages. I struggled with the morning pages when I did “The Artist’s Way” and I really didn’t enjoy them. They became something that annoyed me at the end of that journey and I really was not enjoying having my mornings start off on such a negative note. So I decided that for me, doing the morning pages wasn’t going to benefit me the way that it should so I didn’t do them.

I know that some people will argue that I didn’t really do the 12 week journey this time if I left out doing the morning pages, but that’s ok with me. I have to do what is right for me and I would rather try to do the journey the best that I can instead of not doing it at all. I did do the weekly reading and the questions at the end of the chapters, so I feel like I did a majority of the journey.

The biggest thing about this 12 week journey is to track every single penny that you spend. Since I already do that with YNAB, I figured it would be pretty easy for me to keep doing it. And fortunately it was pretty easy for me. The only annoying this was with credit card spending. I track it in YNAB and it was a bit weird to have to track it in a second location as well (for “The Prosperous Heart”, I tracked everything in a little notebook). I didn’t like having to do everything twice, but it was a minor issue.

But while I track all my credit card spending, tracking cash was a new thing for me. I was looking forward to seeing how being extra aware of my cash spending would help me out. And for the most part, I got much better about being more cautious on what I was buying. There were a few times I forgot to track my cash spending (mainly laundry money or parking meters), but I would say I tracked all but maybe 10 times I used cash. It’s not perfect, but I’m pretty happy with being close to perfect.

I think that many people in our group weren’t as into this 12 week journey as they were with the other one. Some of us felt like the book didn’t speak to us the same way. Some people felt that the chapters were repetitive and a bit disconnected. It was not easy for us to admit that we didn’t enjoy this journey as much as the other one since we all felt so great after finishing “The Artist’s Way”. But it’s important to admit to yourself when you don’t feel like you are getting what you want out of a book/class/lecture.

We tried to encourage each other to stay on top of the weekly chapters and the lessons, but this time the group online wasn’t as active and sometimes it felt like we were each on our own journeys instead of doing it as a group. It’s not bad to do it alone, but it was different. And I don’t know if I preferred the group version or being a bit more on my own. Each journey was so different because of what was in it, so it’s not easy to compare them to each other.

Now that this is done, I’m going to keep some of the lessons and challenges going but I’m not going to keep all of them. I might continue to track cash spending, but I think just having the extra awareness I have now will be helping me so much. And for credit card spending, I already track that and I have noticed that I haven’t been charging as much stuff as I did before. So it’s nice to know that I did learn something and that I’m not spending as much as I did before. I’m not saving as much as I’d like, but it’s baby steps toward that.

Overall, I’m glad that I took this journey. Even if I didn’t do everything that was supposed to be done, I feel like I have made a change and I’ve learned new things about myself. I’m hoping that I can continue to spend less and focus less on things that cost money and look for things that are free that I like to do. I know that I need to get my credit card debt paid off and I really want to get it done soon. I just need to buckle down and work harder toward that. And hopefully the lessons I learned from “The Prosperous Heart” will help me over the next weeks and months to accomplish that.

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Another Monthly Challenge Down (or The Prosperous Heart)

Posted on June 1, 2017 | 2 comments

A new month brings the end to one monthly challenge and the start to a new one! I’ll admit that last month’s challenge was much more challenging than I thought it would be, but I’m glad that I got through it.

I originally wanted to do the plank challenge to help connect myself to my body again. It’s been weird feeling so disconnected and I had high hopes that this would help bring things back to normal. And this challenge didn’t do that at all. Sometimes, it almost made things worse because I was comparing myself to how I could do planks 10 years ago and the lack of core strength that I have now.

But even with this challenge not doing that, I finally do feel more connected to my body again. It had nothing to do with the challenge, but through just getting back to life I feel more like me again. I think I needed this challenge to force me to work on connecting with my body again, it just wasn’t the thing that did it. But having something push me to work on it was good. I might try another one of the fitness challenges in the app, but I’m not as concerned about doing them as I was before. But I’m glad that I tried and that I made it through.

And for this month’s challenge, I’m actually going to do something that I started earlier this week. The membership of the Inside Acting Podcast has done some fun book club type things this year. At the beginning of the year we did the 12 week process of “The Artist’s Way”. I’m glad that I did it with the support of the membership because I’ve never been able to complete the entire 12 week journey before on my own. I didn’t love the entire process, but I learned a lot and I’m seeing changes in my life because of it.

And this past Sunday, we started our next book within the podcast membership. This time, we are doing another book by Julia Cameron, “The Prosperous Heart”.

There are a lot of the same concepts in both books, including the Morning Pages. I didn’t enjoy the Morning Pages before and I’m not going to stress myself out doing them this time. But this book is much more focused on money and financial things.

I’ve been tracking my budget for a while now using YNAB. Using a budgeting app has been really great for me. Even though I’m still struggling a bit financially, I feel much more in control of things and understand how to pay down my credit card debt now without feeling overwhelmed.

Part of this book is to track every single expense you have. This will be pretty simple for me since I’m already doing it, but I’m going more detailed now and that’s what my monthly challenge will be. I’m not only going to track what I do bank transfers for or when I use my credit card. I’m going to track every single penny that is spent.

A lot of times, I’ll get cash at the beginning of the week and plan on using that for random things. But before I know it the cash is gone and I don’t know where I spent it. Or I don’t know where all the quarters I got for laundry went when it seems like I just went to the bank to get a roll. Some people don’t spend as much when they use cash, but for me using cash has become mindless since I don’t track it in YNAB. I need to stop this because I want to track my money better. And using this as my monthly challenge is a great way for me to get into this habit.

More often than not, my monthly challenges become something I do all the time. So if I take this month to work on tracking my money better, I have a feeling that I will be able to continue to do this and hopefully it will only help me in my money management skills. I know that I’ve been doing a lot of great work with money, especially in the past year or so, but I need to do more and this might be the perfect thing for me to do.

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It’s Taxes Time (or Seeing My Hard Work Pay Off)

Posted on March 7, 2017 | 1 comment

I don’t think that anyone is excited to do their taxes and owe money. Because of my jobs, I know I will owe money each year. None of my jobs take my taxes out for me, and even though I do my estimated payments like I need to they are usually not enough to cover what I owe. I know this is the situation I’m in so I am as prepared as possible for tax time. I save all my work related receipts (and there are a ton of them) and I save money out of every paycheck to use at tax time. But even with that, I’m always nervous that the news is going to be bad when I get my taxes done.

I went to Daphne at Chuck Sloan and Associates again and I’m so glad I did! First of all, everyone at Chuck Sloan understands actor and creative type taxes and the unique situations we are all in. They aren’t scared by dozens of jobs and the forms and all the weird deductions we need to do. And they understand how stressful tax time can be for us all. But I’m so happy that I have Daphne doing my taxes because she’s extra awesome! We bonded the last time she did my taxes over Disneyland and since I was going to Disneyland after doing my taxes with her I knew we’d talk about that.

Last year, Daphne showed me the worst case scenario with my taxes before she put in all my deductions so that I would feel better about how much I had saved up. I had asked her to do that for me again and once again it was less than what I had saved for my taxes. That’s always a huge relief because I know that no matter what I will have enough money to pay what I owe. But since now I’m feeling more comfortable with that, it was all about how well I tracked my work spending and tracked my deductions.

I like to think that I’m a pretty organized person and that I did a good job tracking expenses in 2016. Since I had my taxes done by Daphne once already, I knew what I should be aware of and what can be deducted. There are so many accountants that let you deduct things that aren’t totally on the up and up, so I’m glad Daphne is very careful in her work and tells me when things look weird (like how I accidentally tracked buying my new computer twice). I’m sure that there is more that I can deduct, but I’m still learning how to do the best that I can.

And even though I thought I had done all my tracking without missing things, there were a few things that I totally forgot about and I’m so glad we went over any other expenses I might have had in the year. I forgot that I got a new phone (which I do have to use for acting and my research job) and for some reason I never tracked the money that I spent to produce “Single Parent Date Night”. This is another reason I love having Daphne do my taxes. She knew to ask about these sort of things just in case I didn’t remember to track them on my paperwork (I’m sure anyone at Chuck Sloan would do the same since they know to look for these things).

In the end, I owed less than half of what I had saved for my taxes. This is so much better than I ever could have imagined! The money left over is going to be saved for another trip to New York that my sister-in-law and I are hoping to take next year. I still have more time to save more money, but I think what I have left over from my taxes savings should be able to cover pretty much the entire trip! I was only hoping that I would have about half of what I needed for that trip leftover so having this much is a big surprise to me and it making me relax a bit about how I will be able to afford that trip.

I’ve already written my checks to the IRS and sent them off so I’m now totally done with doing my 2016 taxes. It’s nice to get them done early enough so there isn’t a huge rush to do them at the last minute. And I’ve already started planning on what I can do this year to make the taxes easier next year. I will be paying more in estimated taxes, so that will help how much I owe. But I also now will be tracking my expenses even better because I learned where I was slacking last year that caused me to miss out on some potential deductions.

While it was nice in the past to be very uninvolved in my taxes, that’s not a luxury I can afford anymore. I know that with my current jobs that I will always owe money at the end of the year and I like being able to sit down with Daphne and go over everything so I understand why I owe what I do. I can see what deductions took off what and where I could have done better. I guess being more involved with all of this is just something that is required when you want to be more responsible and acting more like an adult.

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Looking Forward To Some Big Spending (or Needing New Technology)

Posted on September 30, 2016 | Comments Off on Looking Forward To Some Big Spending (or Needing New Technology)

I’ve written before about how I really need a new computer soon. This realization hit me hard when the new iPhone came out. I discovered that the new iPhone (at least the most expensive one) has more storage on it than I do on my computer. The fact that a phone could have more room on in than my computer is sad and a sign that I’m getting desperate.

I’m still waiting on the announcement of the new MacBook Pro. I’m not going to buy an old computer which is my only option now. So I have to wait until whenever Apple decides to release a new one and I’m sure that there will be an insanely high demand for it so I will possibly have to wait before I can get my hands on one. I’m still hoping that a new computer will be released in the next few months because there are more and more projects I want to work on that will require a better and faster computer that has more storage than what I have now.

When the new iPhone came out, I thought that maybe I’d look into it since my phone has been acting a bit off lately. Nothing was too bad but I’ve had this phone for 3 years (sadly, that’s pretty long in iPhone life) and it was something I was thinking about. I was hoping the new iPhone would be a smaller size (like my 5s), but the new ones are still pretty big and I don’t really love them. Plus, since next year will be the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the iPhone, everyone is saying that one will be a huge overhaul compared to what we have now.

A few days after the new phone was released, my phone started acting up more. Now, I have an average battery life of 3-6 hours (that’s with only using it for maybe 1 hour total). The standby time on my phone should be much longer than that and it’s pretty bad. My phone battery will show that it is at 70% and a second later it goes down to 1% and shuts down. This isn’t the end of the world, but it is an inconvenience. I have one external battery that gets me a full charge on my phone, but I just bought another external battery that should get me 2 full charges. I’m also looking into battery replacement as a possible fix.

I also have an older iPad that has not been able to upgraded to a new operating system in a while (I think I’m using an iOS that is 2 or 3 versions ago). But I’m totally fine with my iPad for what I use it for right now so I’m not too worried about it.

I’m aware that I probably sound really spoiled and should be happy with the technology I have now since it is more than what many people have. And I am so grateful for everything I have and in no way am upset that I don’t have the latest and greatest. I don’t care for the best, I just want stuff that works.

If my phone was able to hold a charge for more than 6 hours on standby, I’d have no concerns and would probably keep the phone for another year or more. If my computer wasn’t flipping out on me on an almost daily basis, I would keep it because I love my computer. It’s just that technology doesn’t last forever and it seems like all of my stuff has decided to reach the end of its life at the same time. I’ve got the money saved up for a new computer and I’m ready to spend it the second I can on the new one when it is released.

I’m not sure I’m totally ready to spend money on a new phone (nor do I have that money really available to me right now), but I’m realizing that it is time to start saving for that and for possibly a new iPad. I don’t love the idea that I’ll potentially be spending a ton of money on new things when I know that any money I save for them should really be going toward paying down my debt. But I guess this is what I get for working from my phone and computer and needing everything to work in order to be paid.

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Budgeting and Spending (or Sharing YNAB With A Cashier)

Posted on July 14, 2016 | Comments Off on Budgeting and Spending (or Sharing YNAB With A Cashier)

This week I did a bit of shopping to prepare for my trip next week. I got a couple of things I needed (travel toiletries) and a couple of things I wanted (a new purse and hat). While I did need some of the things I got, I still was very careful with what I was spending. I’m trying to do much better with my budgeting plan and starting over in YNAB so I could start fresh with a better budget idea has really helped me. I’m much more on top of my expenses and income and I’ve been able to make larger payments toward my credit card debt than I have in the past (although I’ve had a small setback in that because I had to put almost $1000 into fixing my car last month).

The current version of YNAB is a very different set-up than what I signed up with. I haven’t wanted to make the change yet (it costs more with the new version and I’m happy with what I have), but I’m still trying to be a very involved user and whenever possible I add my spending in the app as it happens. It’s pretty convenient to have the app on my phone and entering my expenses or income takes so little time. Compared to other budgeting apps I’ve tried to use, this one seems to make the most sense to me and doesn’t intimidate me especially with having income that can vary a lot.

One of my shopping trips to prepare for my trip was to Nordstrom Rack (they’ve always got some amazing things there!) and when it was my turn to pay I handed over my credit card and then asked again what the total was. The cashier told me and I immediately got out my phone to enter what I spent (it was within my budget so it’s all good).

The cashier asked me what I was doing and I mentioned that I was entering my purchase into YNAB so I could make sure I don’t overspend what I’ve budgeted for this month. She mentioned how smart that was and how she should do the same thing. I have a feeling that she probably downloaded the app that night because she seemed really excited about it.

Budgeting may never come easily to me (unless I have an unlimited amount of money and don’t actually have to budget), but I’m working on it. Being open about budgeting has helped because it takes away the shame I’ve felt in the past about the money issues I have. I’ve been told that I’m very irresponsible for having a credit card balance that isn’t paid off in full each month. I felt awful about that and didn’t want to tell anyone else about it. But when I opened up about it, I realized that a lot of people I know have debt of some sort and there’s nothing wrong with it. And a lot of those friends have been using various budgeting apps to help bring down their debt so I want to follow their example.

It actually felt really great for those brief moments I was talking with the Nordstrom Rack cashier about YNAB. I had no feelings of shame sharing that I needed help to track my money and to make sure I’m being responsible. I felt like even if I am not in a perfect financial set-up right now, that doesn’t mean I don’t have advice I can share with others and hopefully help them get into the best financial shape possible. You don’t have to have everything figured out and settled to be able to share with others what may be able to help them.

I know that I’ve got a long way to go with my budgeting and debt payoff, but it’s the small steps that will add up and make a big difference in the end. And hopefully in the not so distant future I will know that my credit card debt will be paid off and then the budgeting will shift from debt payments to savings and I can hopefully do more fun things more often.

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A Fresh Budget (or Starting Over With YNAB)

Posted on June 3, 2016 | 1 comment

I’ve been budgeting with YNAB for almost a year now. I’ve been pretty good about entering every expense and paycheck into the system (I’ve even had some fun laughs with friends when we are out to dinner and we both pull up our apps to enter our expense when we pay the bill). It’s been good for me to be accountable with every dollar that I spend and to have a more realistic view on how much money I’m making.

But even though I was doing all the work, there was a serious disconnect with me happening in my budgeting. I have no clue why I was so disconnected, but something wasn’t right and I couldn’t shake the feeling. I had been trying to figure out what was wrong, but I just kept feeling like something was wrong and I couldn’t fix it.

I started to download a bunch of other budgeting apps. There are dozens of free budgeting apps and some of them seemed ok, but none of them were fitting what I needed (the biggest issue was finding one that didn’t expect the income to be a steady amount). YNAB has actually changed a bit since I got it and the new version is more of an online system (instead of it connecting via Dropbox) and you pay a monthly or annual fee instead of paying for a 1 time purchase. I don’t want to get the new version yet because I want to feel comfortable with the version I have and I really don’t want to have another expense added to my life right now.

So after a few weeks of feeling lost and frustrated, I finally decided to get rid of my current budget in YNAB, delete everything, and start completely over. When I started over I also re-watched all of the videos online about setting things up and how to use them efficiently. I learned things that I missed the first time and I was setting up my budgeting categories into things that make sense to me.

YNAB Categories

I kept the debt, monthly bills, and everyday expense categories because those are pretty basic and they haven’t changed. I still have monthly bills, everyday expenses, and my debt to pay off. But the rest of my categories have gotten more specific. I’m breaking down my expenses by different aspects of my life and the priorities I have with them. Some of my acting expenses can be sacrificed for my day job expenses (classes aren’t as important as paying my estimated taxes). Splitting the expenses in the categories does help me see where I need to save and spend versus where I want to save and spend.

I know that some people have very limited categories in their budget, but I think for me the specifics are really going to help me. Sometimes, I forget about the annual expenses that I have that add up all the time. I only pay dues for WIF and one of the casting submissions sites once a year, and I don’t want that amount to shock me anymore. This way, I can save a little bit each month for those annual expenses and I will see exactly what I’m saving it for (compared to before where I listed it as annual acting expenses).

So far, this new budget is working out well for me. I’m feeling more connected to my money and I’m more aware of what’s happening. I’m trying to set up my monthly savings for my annual things, but I’m still working on how I want them to be organized. In the past, I probably would have just given up with things got hard for me to figure out. But now I really do want to make this work. I know that budgeting has helped so much this past year and that it can be doing so much more for me. And once I get that figured out, hopefully I can start paying down more debt and start saving so I can take another amazing vacation sometime soon.

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Working On Money Priorities (or What’s Worth The Splurge)

Posted on April 29, 2016 | Comments Off on Working On Money Priorities (or What’s Worth The Splurge)

I’ve really been working lately on spending less. I know it’s important for me to do this because I need to use that extra money toward my credit card debt (and not creating more debt). And obviously, there are some costs that I can’t avoid (bills and stuff), but I’ve gotten more serious at taking a look at my fun expenses.

I’m sure it sounds like I spend a ton because I go to Disneyland pretty often and now I have a pass to Universal Studios as well. This Disneyland pass was pretty much half paid for by recycling ink. That option won’t work for me in the future (the loophole that let me do that was fixed), but pretty much what I paid out of pocket was the same as 2 days at Disneyland. And my pass has the parking so I’m not paying $18 each time to park. I know I’ll go more than 2 times in a year so it’s easily worth it. And my Universal Studios pass was something I got at Costco for almost the same price as a 1 day ticket. The issue with my pass is that you can’t use it on weekends at all, but since I will probably only go on Mondays that isn’t an issue for me as well.

I am still spending money on other fun things, but I’m really trying to limit them to fun experiences like my season tickets to the Pantages or other shows (I just got tickets to see “The Little Mermaid” live at the Hollywood Bowl soon!). And when I do tickets like those, I’m working hard at finding good deals or making sure what I’m paying is a good value (like the season tickets being about $300 for all 7 shows). Part of why I love going to so many shows is it keeps me busy. And when I’m busy I’m not focusing on food.

And speaking of food, one of the biggest savings I’ve had lately is food related. I set the monthly challenge not to order any delivery food in March, and I’ve been able to keep that up so far this month too! I’m not doing as great about cooking from scratch, but even getting microwave food from the grocery store is cheaper than delivery food. When I’m not cooking, I’m going out to eat and that tends to be with friends so it makes it more of an outing than just eating. My grocery bills have gone up a bit since I’m eating at home more, but the amount they have gone up is significantly less than what I was spending on delivery food so that is a win for me.

But I think the biggest savings for me as been shopping. Mainly buying books, but I’m trying to be better about shopping in general. I used to buy a lot more stuff. Now, if I’m buying things online it tends to be household stuff I need or workout clothes. I’m not buying as much “normal” clothes because honestly I’m not in “normal” clothes that often. And even on non-workout days I usually wear my workout pants because they are more comfortable to work in.

But my book spending was pretty bad in the past. I used to be a huge library person, then there was an ordeal with my library card not working (I don’t know what happened and neither do they). Instead of doing the easy thing and just registering for a new card, I took advantage of how easy it is to get books on my Kindle. My old e-reader was much more difficult to get books on so just being able to press a button and order a book was so fun! But the spending was adding up. And while most of the books I buy I love and read over and over again, there were some that I got because they were on sale for $0.99 that I’ve read once and that’s it.

So recently I finally got a new library card and I’ve been taking advantage of it so much!

Library Card

It is so easy to get books on my Kindle from the library. Yes, I have to use my computer to get them. But then they are sent wirelessly to my Kindle and are on the device for 21 days. So most of the time I can read them more than once if I want to. I actually went a little overboard with putting Kindle books on hold from the library and had to delay a couple of holds (I had gotten 8 library books available at once). But I’m starting to find my groove with the library again and I feel like an idiot that I waited so long and spent so much money. I can’t go back and change it, but I’m glad I’ve changed now.

I know that there are still a few more places I can save money in my monthly spending. I want to get my grocery bills down a bit more as well as my household stuff (cleaning supplies, paper goods, and those things). I’m going to do some price checking between stores near me and Amazon and hopefully I can figure out the best options for me to maximize my money.

I’ve got a lot of fun things coming up this summer and a lot of them will involve money. But hopefully with the cutting back that I’ve been able to do I will not put myself into more debt just to do them.

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Tax Time (or Happy To Owe The Government Some Money)

Posted on March 8, 2016 | 1 comment

I just had my taxes done last week and it was a totally different experience than I’ve ever had. So I wanted to share it with all of you in case you are still looking for a tax preparer.

In the past, I’ve always had my parents’ accountant do my taxes. When I lived at home (when I was working in high school), my parents just brought him what I made and to be honest I have no idea if I ever owed anything. Those jobs were pretty part-time and if I did owe something, maybe my parents helped me out. Once I moved to LA, I got a tax preparation packet from the accountant in the beginning of each year. I’d fill it out, make a list of my deductions, and stick all of that plus my W2 and 1099 forms in an envelope and mailed it to my parents. They brought it in for me and everything was done. I’d get a letter in the mail a few weeks later either saying how much I owed or how much I’d get back.

It was fine, but I realized last year that I needed to be a much more active participant in my taxes. 2015 was the first year that all of my income was 1099. And while I did pay estimated taxes (although I’d learn not enough so I still had a penalty), I knew I’d owe more money. I was prepared to owe money and had been saving about 1/3 of every paycheck I got. But I was still worried that it wasn’t enough.

So many of my actor friends recommended going to Chuck Sloan and Associates for taxes, so I made an appointment there. They are cheapest if you go in January or February (although they are always pretty affordable), so I made my appointment for the last day of February. Even before my appointment, I became a fan of the office. I had to change my appointment time a couple of times due to conflicts that came up, and they never seemed annoyed or bothered by that. They just gave me a new time and seemed happy that I’d be coming in.

Since I work from home, I wasn’t sure what the rush hour situation would be like on the freeway (the office is in the valley). I gave myself a little over an hour to get there, but made it in 20 minutes! So I sat in my car and listened to podcasts while I waiting for my appointment time.

Chuck Sloan

I was assigned Daphne as my tax preparer. And even though I know I was assigned to her randomly, I felt like it was fate that she was helping me. She totally got how nervous I was about everything and we chatted a bit about our mutual love of podcasts before getting down to business.

I had explained to Daphne that while I had saved money and paid estimated taxes that I was so worried that I would still owe more than I could afford. So instead of doing everything at once, she entered all of my income, unemployment information, and health insurance information to show me the absolute worst case scenario I could be in.

And even that was less than what I had saved!

I was so happy that I wouldn’t have to figure out where to get extra money to pay my taxes that I burst into tears. I was crying out of relief from the stress I had felt from the past year and from the joy knowing that the first time I tried to be more involved in my taxes that I did do something right.

Daphne was happy to explain all the deductions that she entered for me. I was terrified to put down a home office because I’ve heard that is often a red flag for the IRS. I do work my jobs from home, so it is totally reasonable for me to put down a home office on my taxes. It still makes me a bit nervous that I did that, but Daphne reassured me that when you work as a virtual employee (like I do), it’s expected to have a home office on your taxes.

After everything was entered, explained, and double checked; Daphne showed me my total tax bill. And it ended up being less than half of what I had set aside to pay my taxes! While I wish that I was getting a refund or owing even less than that, anything less than what I had saved is awesome! I don’t have to worry about borrowing money or figuring out a payment plan with the IRS. I just sent in my checks and it’s done.

I really cannot thank Daphne and the rest of the employees at Chuck Sloan and Associates enough. They worked together as a team to make sure that I was getting all the deductions that I deserved and that everything was perfect before it was sent it. They dealt with my craziness, my stress, and my tears without looking at me weird. And they made me excited to get my taxes done! I doubt most people could say that.

When Daphne was working with me on my taxes we went over a couple of ideas of how I could organize things better for 2016, and I’m working on implementing those now. It mainly has to do with organizing things by type and not by month since the IRS doesn’t care about when things were purchased or paid for, just what category all of that money goes into.

I know that I’ll be going back to Daphne next year for my taxes since she was the first financial type person I’ve worked with who didn’t look down on me for how little money I had, got the weird things I spend my money on for work, and totally got my organizational system. And having someone like that on my team is invaluable for me.

Taxes By Daphne

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Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff, Saving, Tough Stuff, Work

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Another Year Of Disneyland (or No More Ink Money)

Posted on February 5, 2016 | 1 comment

I just renewed my Disneyland pass for another year! I’m so happy because I think you all know how much I love Disneyland. And because I have a double grandfathered pass (my pass level is only available if you are a renewal now and I have the parking add-on that doesn’t exist anymore), I have to make sure I renew before the pass expires each year. I don’t mind having to do that each year, but I do make sure to get to Disneyland before the expiration date because of this.

I knew my pass was expiring soon, but I didn’t have a Disneyland day planned before the expiration date. And since paying for my pass is complicated (more on that in a minute), I can’t renew over the phone. So on Monday after my workout, I drove down to Disneyland with the only purpose to renew the pass.

I’m glad that the drive was super easy this time. I was on the tram from the parking lot to the parks in under an hour after leaving my house. It was so empty at Disneyland that I was a bit sad that I really didn’t have time to stay and go on rides (I had errands to do at home that afternoon).

Once I got to the ticket counter, it was time to deal with the complications of paying for my pass. Because I recycle ink for my mom, I was able to get a bunch of Visa gift cards and Disney gift cards from Staples. I also had gotten some gift cards for my birthday from friends. All together, my parking add-on was totally paid for by the cards plus about $50 of my pass. It’s a bit weird to pay this way because the cast member helping me has to set up the payments to be as if it was on a payment plan so they don’t accidentally charge one of the Visa gift cards the full amount of the pass (since they are each only worth about $25). It took a little bit of time, but I got everything taken care of and I was on my way.

I was super tempted to go into the parks because of how ridiculously empty it was, but I figured that if I did that, I would stay there too long. So I just took a photo at the gates and headed back toward the parking lot tram.

Disneyland

I made a stop at the Disney store since I never really go in there and of course I got distracted by all the really awesome Disney stuff. There were some kitchen things I was super tempted to buy, but I didn’t have the money to spend $60 on something. Then, I was intrigued by the dog toys and found the perfect thing to get for Tucker!

Disney Dog Ties

They only had the ties in XS/S, but I saw that all the girl dog things also came in M/L (which was the size Tucker needs), so I grabbed the ties and brought them to the register to have them order the larger size for me (Disney is usually awesome like that). Sadly, they only make the boy dog things in XS/S and there is no way that our 70 pound dog could fit in something that tiny. So I left Disneyland empty-handed (well, I guess I did have my renewed pass to bring home with me).

While I’m super excited for another full year of Disneyland adventures, I’m a bit sad because this looks like it will be the last year I can use my ink recycling money to help pay for my pass. You used to be able to use Staples Rewards for gift cards online (but not in stores), so that’s how I got my gift cards. But sometime recently they changed the rules (or started enforcing rules) and you can no longer get gift cards with Staples Rewards money. I understand the reasoning behind it now that I’ve done some research on how gift cards sold from third-party retailers work, but it still stinks for me.

Having a few hundred dollars in gift cards really helps to make my pass affordable. I have no plan on letting my pass expire in a year. There are other options for me to pay for my pass. I can use the Disneyland payment plan which doesn’t have interest and can be paid off in advance if you have the money. Or I can figure out other ways to save for it (or just ask for only Disney gift cards for my birthday or Hanukkah). I’ve got a year to figure it out.

But I can’t let the end of the ink money bring me down. I’ve got an entire year to make more Disneyland memories and I have a feeling that my park adventures are going to keep getting more and more amazing!

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Posted in Celebrations, Fun Stuff, Saving, Shopping

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Work Time Family Visit (or Already Preparing To Renew My Disneyland Pass)

Posted on April 24, 2015 | Comments Off on Work Time Family Visit (or Already Preparing To Renew My Disneyland Pass)

My parents have been in San Diego again recently helping my grandma. They drove back yesterday. And since my house is on the way, they stopped by.

They usually don’t stop when they are doing that drive. Their preferred method of driving down goes around LA, so it would be tough for them to make the detour. But this time, there was a reason they drove through LA.

First of all, my mom still had the wine that I bought in Napa. I couldn’t fly it back with me (since I only had a carry on), so the plan was always for my mom to drive it down for me. I was originally going to try to meet them in San Diego while there were down this time, but that didn’t quite work out.

Also, I had gotten my dad his Hanukkah present insanely early this year. I knew exactly what I wanted to get him in January, so I didn’t think I would want to wait until Thanksgiving to give it to him. And I knew that he would want to use it, so their detour to my house was also for my dad to get a gift.

And as always, I had a few things I wanted to fix in my house and my dad is a pretty awesome handyman.

So yesterday during my work shift, my parents (and dog) came over for about 45 minutes. Fortunately, my job was pretty quiet while they were here so I could focus on them.

The projects in my house were pretty simple. There was a drawer that was broken that needed a new screw and my toilet paper holder was falling out of the wall. Both of those things were done within minutes.

Then it was time for me to give my dad his Hanukkah present. I had been giving him hints for a while, but he had no idea that I got him a TRX Strap system! My dad had used TRX straps when he worked out with me at Orangetheory before, but the gym that my parents belong to don’t have straps that can be used without an appointment with a personal trainer. So now he has his own set of straps that he can use at the house (my mom has already said that she wants to use them too).

But one of the coolest things was something my parents brought me.

Recycling Ink

They brought me ink to recycle! As I mentioned before, I use the money I get from recycling ink to help pay for my Disneyland pass! This will definitely help me when I renew my pass next year. And I’m sure I’ll get more ink from my parents over the year as well (my mom just saves them all for me).

While this visit was only 45 minutes, we really did get a lot done. And since I had just seen my parents a few weeks ago, there wasn’t too much to catch up on (plus, I talk to my mom pretty much every day on the phone). I’ll probably see them again in a few weeks when they come back down to San Diego too.

Even though this visit was super quick, I’m so glad that my parents were able to stop by. Any distractions during my work day are appreciated and this was a really nice distraction.

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