{{Time to Get My Butt in Gear}}

So I have been thinking and thinking about my finances. 

The numbers keep running and encircling my mind today.  When you are a single mom and it is just your means accounting for the family, it is interesting. 

I need to get myself back on track like I used to be with the exception of my utility bills.  That has never been on track! I need to be better about paying my bills on time.  Don’t even ask me why it is so hard for me to sit down and pay everything by the time the due date has come around.  Here is my problem- to this day a bill will come and I sit it down thinking, “Oh I will set it here for when I go pay the bills.”  Then next thing I know, it slips my mind.  It suddenly has disappeared.  The dog might have eaten it… So I wait until the next bill, because calling the company is just too much work.  And the vicious cycle continues until OH CRAP I have a disconnect notice and I better pay it NOW or it will be turned off.  One would think I would have figured out a good bill paying system a long time ago, but here I sit years later still repeating over and over again this stupid cycle I keep putting myself in.  Remember this post I posted over a year ago?  Well, yeah I just seem to never learn. 

So I am revisiting my dilemma today.  I am going to get serious about it.  I am tired of all the stupid fees I keep paying for late fees.  It is so dumb on my account to have not already sat down like a normal grown adult and gotten it together by now.  STUPID! No other way to read it. 

My plan of attack: I am going to Target on Friday after I get paid and get one of those accordion style binder holders.  I will organize it in months so I can just slip the bills in there and document the due dates.  I am so good about paying my mortgage and phone because I know they are both due on the 1^st of the month, but I really must get everything else in order. 

My credit score is in need of repair.  I won’t get into the details of it.  I just know my goal is to get it up and worked on. 

So this year I have a few big goals to work on.  No, I didn’t say resolutions because I know I just throw those out the window pretty fast.  I mean real goals. 

• My main one is to improve my credit score.  I will work really hard this year to accomplish that.  I have a lot of work to do. 
• Obviously as you read above, I need to work on my monthly budget and bill paying. 
• I want to save the money to take the kids to Disneyland.  I have been wanting to take them for such a long time, but due to lack of resources to do so… uhhhh yeah we sorta haven’t gone.  But I definitely want to take them this year. 
• I want to do more traveling with the kids
• I want to start saving for a trip to visit my family in Wales.  Long story behind it, but I have an entire side of my family over there that I have never even met.  How crazy is that?  I want to meet and visit with them with my kids one day.  Hopefully within the next few years.  It is going to take a long time to save up to do so, but I sure want to go there. 

So there you have it guys.  Time to get working on it all.