easy come, easy go

Vacations, no matter how well planned, usually includes hidden costs. A forgotten item, a gift shop purchase, a meal out....Whatever it is.

I have a Ford Expedition. I love, love, love my car. However, it is not cheap to fill her up! I take advantage of gas reward points programs but...the most I can get off a tank here in CA is a mere .20! However, I will take what I can get.

So during a stop to get gas, I was shocked to find a different offer from Safeway...we got $1 off a gallon! Gas was already super cheap compared to So. Cal but to get $1 off as well? Heck yeah! (Picture above is CA prices with discount. Picture below is AZ price with discount)

While driving into the Grand Canyon, Ben informed me that we had to pay a $25 fee for park entrance. As we pulled up though, we saw this sign...

See that line on the very bottom? Yep, not only did we get the day free, we got a whole year free! We congratulated ourselves on saving some more money on our trip.

At the end of our trip, Ben said to me, "Have you ever noticed how when we save money
on something, we usually end up finding it somewhere later?"

Uh yeah. Unfortunatley. After one more stop at Sonic (this was a must have), we decided not to eat out or spend any more money until we got home.

Upon arriving home, we were getting everything cleaned out of the car, and getting back into the swing of things. But then...we realized that one of the freezers in our garage, had had the door left open.

Everything was ruined. EVERYTHING. I had to throw it all away. It made me sick to my stomach to throw all that food out. I had carefully wrapped meats, frozen produce, whole chickens...ugh. All of my hard work down the drain.

I was already in a bad mood because of all this. I went out to the garage to get something out of the car. When I clicked the garage door button, the door went up and I heard a shattering sound. The lift gate on the back of my car had been left open. When the door went up, it got caught and the whole thing shattered.

After many, many tears, and a bit of chocolate, I called the insurance company. Thank heaven for good insurance. After parts, labor and paying extra for them to come to us instead of me going to them, we were looking at a little less than $500. Ugh. Do you know what I can get with $500?!

While the windshield was being fixed, I went to Costco. My husband insisted that " there is nothing good to eat" and that we needed some quick & easy foods. That "little" trip, knowing that I had to replace some of what was lost, put me back a lot of money.

Yet another kick to the gut.

Such costly mistakes that could have been easily prevented.

It was an expensive, expensive couple of days. Lots of lessons learned.

Now I am trying to re-stock my freezer with good deals...and of course, buying a lock for the freezer!

spoiled rotten

I often look around my home and see an abundance of:

food
clothes
toys
dvds/cds
video games
video game consoles

Some other things I see (although they are not in abundance) are:
cell phones
ipods
computers
tv's
dvd/ blue ray players

What it all boils down to is, our family is spoiled rotten. Now I am not saying that my husband doesn't work hard to provide for us. He does. It is just that, compared to some, we have soooo much.

My children however, see us as poor. Yep.

"Mom, do you have $50?" asked one child who will not be named
"Yes."
"Do you have more than $50?"
"Yes"
"Then you can get us the video game because it is only $45. You have enough money."
What that child fails to realize is...I CHOSE NOT TOO!!

My kids have so much to learn! So when the opportunity arose for us to provide some service to others, I jumped on it. Normally, I don't sign up for things because Mason usually makes things harder and I feel like we don't really help, but make it worse.

However, this time I brought him. We went with a group from our church and participated in Mormon Helping Hands. We worked with Food Share and spent the morning harvesting cabbage. It was hot and dirty work, but not one of the kids complained.

Later we were told a story about how, people call the Food Share and say they have nothing to feed their children. Their cupboards are bare. It is hard to believe that our family has almost a full mini mart in our garage, while others have nothing.

I hope the lesson sunk in for them. As we were driving home, my son said, "Mom I have a really good feeling in my chest."

"That is good. When we serve others we have a good feeling inisde."

"No it's not that, it is just because I ate a lot of snacks and I was really hungry."

Sigh...