All posts by Erin Land

Life

I need to cheer up

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Life has been a struggle so far, and I've managed to bend but not break. My husband lost his brother and job this month. Our car broke down and had to be sold for scrap, and my kids have been brats.

 It's stressful being the only one with a job in my household but we will survive. Buses in Phoenix suck too especially after an 11-hour warehouse job on your feet all night.

I Needed some encouragement so I found a photo of a puppy on a boat. SO CUTE!!

The photo is perfect, as is that beautiful little pup. Happy adventuring to you, pup!

Life

I hate renting my home

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I hate renting my home. Usually, our landlord is pretty good about getting things taken care of and is a nice guy. However, the fact I live in a house located inside a trailer park and the same amount of money for rent that regular homes in my area are going for is quite ridiculous.

The last month and a half and probably much longer we have not had any gas service since they have been using the cheapest labor available and often it seems like some of the workers have no idea what they are doing. There are two gigantic trenches in my backyard making it pretty much unusable. Also, the fact we can't take warm showers or use our stove is really getting to me. I'm not even sure this is legal since our lease does state the landlord would provide gas service.

My husband is no longer working and unfortunately at the moment we are without a car so moving isn't an option. However, a family friend may be allowing us to rent to own one of his homes in Laveen, Arizona once he is finished fixing the issues as last tenants caused before they were evicted. While this house would be a long bus trip to work the monthly savings would make it worthwhile. Also, plan on purchasing a used car once we get our tax return back in February.

That's how my life is currently going but, I do promise I will start posting on this blog a lot more.

Life

New year, big changes

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As usual, it has been forever and a day that I last updated my blog. Let’s start with what is new with me: I quit my old job and started a new one. So instead of working from home for an internet moderation company, I now work in a warehouse. An Amazon Fulfillment Center. It’s a physically demanding job and I have been working it since October, other than some blisters in the beginning and coming home exhausted I find the job pretty enjoyable. I get a minor discount for being an employee.

I have also purchased a new desktop, not only for my Silhouette Cameo (which is currently not working) and for the future 3D printer. It also has been used by my son since we have enrolled him in an online academy. His previous public school had an incident with a couple of bullies that have done nothing about it, even though they had a so-called ‘zero tolerance’ for it. It was handled poorly and we felt he would be safer going to a different school. He’s much happier about it now. His grades actually soared with the current structure.

With the slightly higher pay and more hours with my new job, we are actually making some headway in paying down some of our debt. It’s a slow process since we are still going thru what works for us as far a budget goes.

One thing that I seem to not make time for is the weekly Facebook meetings that I enjoyed so much from before, and my weekly planning in my planners. I have yet to figure out when to actually make proper time for it. It has been so hard to keep up, but I do not want to stop.

So that’s what is going on. Not sure how often I will be able to update my blog, but the plan this year is to try and do YouTube videos and make them coincide with my blog posts. Here’s crossing my fingers and hopefully making this work.

Happy New Year!

Home

Big Plans !!!!

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Let me preface this first by saying that the last time I have been to an interview was well over seven years ago. Seven. Years.

I have been given an opportunity to come into headquarters to a multinational company and interview for a position. I am so very excited and nervous at the same time. It won't be the end of the world if I don't get it, but it will definitely be a good thing for me to be able to get used to the process again. I had submitted my resume several months ago directly with the company instead of a staffing agency, deciding that an extra source of income would help boost our monetary intake. 

I have no plan on leaving my currant job, since I don't work that many hours at it. If I do get hired, then it would be a blessing, although I am not much for using that phrase to be honest. It may mean that I would need to up the budget on gas, but it will be worth it in the long run. 

If I don't get hired, then there are other companies that are similar but more localized to my city. At this point I am crossing my fingers that they find me suitable for the position because it's something new and exciting. 

OMG!!!
OMG!!!

Home

Solar Energy

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I had originally written this, but due to my inability to hit the save button, I lost the first post. That was my mistake, that being said, here is what I understand about it.

With all the pollution going on, I have been interested in renewable energy for several years. It hasn't been until recently that solar panels and solar panel kits have been made more affordable. I have seriously considering perhaps getting a small kit to help offset our electricity needs, I researched for several hours how it works and what components are needed to be able to use it in our rental. 

The panels produce energy which you then put into a regulator and into batteries. Marine or Golf Cart batteries would be best, and when it's not charging the batteries it goes into a converter that then can be put into the home, offsetting electrical usage and lowering the cost of the energy bill. Now, I know that there are different panels in different sizes that produce different outputs and that it dictates as to how much energy goes into your home. During the sunshine days it produces a different amount doing the shady days, the point of the batteries are to put energy into the home during the night. 

My plan is to try and put more energy into our kitchen and living room area since they have the more energy hungry appliances. I don't plan to mount it to the roof, but have it in the yard where they would be easier to maintain and move with the sun. I know that this sounds labor intensive but to maximize energy production, I am willing to do it. There are also energy converters that you can simply plug into a regular outlet and it deposits the energy into the home. 

Family, Home

Irritated By Empty Promises

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Getting ready to rip my hair out!
Getting ready to rip my hair out!

I have been given multiple promises that the site manager would install the hookup for our new washer. For the last two months. What's worse is that I have been promised since before I got the washer. 

I have been asking at least once a day as to when we will get the hook up and always get the same answer "I'll talk to the owner today." 

I have already invested the money to purchase the washer because he said it should be easy to do. If this keeps up I'm going to save up the money and pay a plumber myself and deduct the cost from the rent. I will see if that will get his butt in gear and make him follow thru with his promise. 

What would you do?

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Not In A Good Headspace

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It’s been a few months since my last post and I have no excuse for that. I haven’t quite been feeling myself as far as sharing goes. While I am still actively working on my planners I find that blogging, even when I put it on my to do list, is something that quite honestly, I dread.

 

What do I write about? I think that perhaps that I need to break this down into something I understand better. I need to stop comparing myself to other’s works and do what I want to do. I will do my best to update at the very least two times a week, if i do more than that then wonderful!

 

I’m still working on many different fan fictions and they are nowhere near completion or publishing worthy.

 

I definitely will post planner related content as well as as budget related content. Other than that everything is just up in the air.

 

Family, Home

Planning for the Future

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The last few months I have been watching different YouTube videos about budgets and whatnot, then I stumbled upon a few that have these really nice planners and I was fascinated. The more I watched the more I found that I wanted to do the same thing and use a planner. I researched the different planners available and the one that got the most reviews was the Erin Condren which is the most popular, but the most pricey.

 

Continue reading Planning for the Future →