I skipped a December review and January goals. I’m really on my game this year, huh? Anyway, January was actually quite productive in terms of debt payoff. I’m going to reformat these reviews to hit the basics (extra income, debt, goals, etc.)

Extra Income
Slow month. The husband originally ‘quit’ his part-time job. Then recently the boss begged him to come back. After a payroll snafu was seemingly resolved, he began the evening shift on the 28th. This will run Mon-Thurs for the next few weeks. After that, I’m not sure. With that said, for January we managed to make $460.01 in extra income. Not that great, but certainly better than zero.

• $125.00 – ING Direct Sign-Up Bonus
• $25.35 – Etsy Sales (after all fee’s and shipping)*
• $12.00 – Pinecone Research
• $297.66 – PT Job

* USPS Rant: About 70% of my sales on Etsy are international, and those rates have increased by as much as 105%. What once cost me $2.19 to ship via first class international, is now $6.16. A buyer’s recent order came to $5.90 including $4.00 for shipping. It was a 1 ounce 6×8 bubble envelope. Last week this would have cost $2.19. Today it cost me $6.16. Needless to say, I was disappointed. After fee’s I lost about $4.00 from it. Not the buyer’s fault, so of course I sent it, but I did have to go through and re-adjust all my shipping prices again. I’m afraid the expensive shipping may deter future customers, time will tell.

Debt Payoff
We paid off a total of $2,301.73 this month! Nearly doubling our $1200 per month goal! $1207.62 of that mount paid off a credit card in full. One debt down! The rest was split up between two other credit cards, mortgage, car payment, and paying off medical bills that keep showing up in our mailbox.

Goals
Didn’t set any for January.

Other Updates
January was a busy month for me. And I like bullet points & lists, so…

1. We received a settlement from the insurance company for my husband’s car accident in October. This is staying put in savings until the last {biggest} hospital bill arrives, should be any day now. I will update about this soon, including a scenario I really need advice on.
2. I posted that I reopened my etsy store earlier this month. Sales haven’t been great, but are slowly picking up.  I’ve been working very hard on keywords, SEO, pictures, and listing frequently.  I’ll continue to track my progress here!
3. I worked on this website. Updated the about and links pages, added a debt page. Still in progress!
4. I completed the itemization for my friend’s business – 12 months of receipts – 16 hours of work! He is also referring other people to me! Potential $$! I’ve been seriously looking into freelance writing gigs, or data entry/bookkeeping, to earn some extra cash since I thoroughly enjoyed this side job.
5. I finally started to get my anxiety {and ‘moderate’ depression} under control.  I now realize a bulk of my unhappiness is currently my job situation.  While I still have a lot to figure out, I do want to give a shout out to my awesome friend Nicole for her daily support.  Sometimes just an email makes the day easier.  Plus she takes badass photos, so go check out her site.
6. I splurged and used some of my ING bonus money to purchase Quicken Deluxe 2013.  I’m new to it, but so far absolutely love it!!  More to come on that.

That’s it for January!  I have a few goals for February, I’ll get to those soon.  In the meantime, here’s a picture of me and the kid.  He was having his 123248349th tantrum of the day and I was frustrated!!  I thought it was a cute picture, and it sums up this week rather well.  {I always like to include pictures, even if it’s completely off topic.}