Category: Finances

  • the reckoning

    It’s been a year.

    Not in the whole chronological sense….I mean, of course I am aware that in general, a year has passed in my life.

    But I mean…. it’s been quite the year, in an emotional journey sense.

    2025 has been hard.

    This has been the year of the financial reckoning. I was burned out and floundering and not doing well mental-health-wise which led me to close down the photography business. But also: the photography business was an unsustainable financial venture, and keeping it open greatly added to our debt every month.

    I’ve been through our budget time and again over the months. We’ve used YNAB for years– since 2012– and all this time, I’ve kept track of where our money goes. It’s just that most of the time, I overlooked credit card spending. I was focusing more on the emotional wants and feeling like I needed to spend both to quell the overwhelming terror and urge to figure something out professionally, but also to stuff the overwhelming sense of boredom in my life.

    And all that messiness came out in gross overspending.

    And so here I am, and it’s the last days of October, and it’s month five of actually attempting to be responsible.

    I spent a grand total of $22.39 this month on nonessential fun stuff for myself. That’s major progress. I bought a couple of skeins of yarn and some more antique resin cameos for necklaces and rings.

    It’s not enough. Not spending is not enough to clean up this mess.

    At this point, if rent were not so astronomical everywhere, if we hadn’t bought our house with a 2.875% interest rate and if the real estate landscape were not pretty atrocious right now, I’d probably be trying to figure out how to get our house on the market, to pay off our debt, because that’s probably going to be the only way out.

    Not an option at the moment. We couldn’t afford to live anywhere else.

    We need more income. I need a job.

    And I’ve sent out tons of applications. I had an interesting offer last week, but the whole operation reeked of shady, and I’ve learned that I have a pretty stellar intuition about people so I said no. It was interesting not in the “this would be a fun job” sense but in the “I’m not sure this is a legal operation” sense.

    At the same time as the financial reckoning, I’ve been seriously working on my mental and emotional health.

    I’ve been facing some long demons head-on.

    It’s not been easy. Progress is not linear.

    I went to bed afraid of someone last night and didn’t sleep well, waking up unable to go back to sleep at 3:45 AM this morning which is why I am drafting this post at 5:30 AM.

    That’s just my life.

    Jared and I have been talking about the what-ifs of life lately.

    Like, what if I ever had to live in this house on my own, without him.

    And Jared is not sure I could do it, because I am so fearful.

    And he’s right– I like to think I wouldn’t have to leave the house to go live with family or someone else, but I don’t even like to turn out the lights in the house for the night by myself.

    My fear is that intense, and it’s always worse at night than during the daytime.

    In the daytime, it’s manageable.

    But at least this morning, I can cry, which is progress.

    Because there are times that I’m so emotionally numb– most of the time, actually– that the tears don’t come.

    And while trying to clean up the financial front of life, I’ve also been attempting to dissect, at the most very basics of levels, the trauma bonds that have kept me in bondage for most of my adult life, since last December.

    It’s been messy, and honestly it’s been a miracle at times that I haven’t landed in a psych ward. That’s all I really care to say about it.

    Except and this morning, I am angry, and I feel hurt, and slightly stupid, and I want retribution that will never come.

    But, I do know this: Karma is a bitch.

    So, I bide my time. And heal what I can, as I can.

  • hair story these days

    Me in June of 2021

    ***This post contains affiliate links***

    Time for some shallowness and navel-gazing (not that all my posts aren’t mostly navel-gazing)….

    The photo above is me in June of 2021. I’d shaved my head in July of 2020 after I bleached my hair beyond repair the month before. I was probably also 50 pounds heavier at the time.

    Just so people know…..if you decide to ever shave your hair you might love it. But also know: working through the first little 3 inches or so of grow-out phase is really, really, really hard. Which is why I was mostly bald and had super short hair through June of 2022. Just saying.

    It’s been a process, honestly probably, shaving my hair was an awesome thing to do because in the process, I learned how to cut my hair myself.

    I’ve had probably 4 professional haircuts in the last 3 years total…..I had one in June of 2025 and the one before that was in July of 2024.

    Just so y’all know….Justin Hickox on YouTube is great for videos on how to cut and give basic small layers in fine hair like mine.

    I picked up some regular cutting shears, and some texturizing shears. And while my hair was super short I was still using Jared’s trimmers on my neck.

    Secret fact that’s not so secret: I still mostly use the trimmers sometimes to cut my hair, especially now that I mostly want a blunt cut. It’s a lot easier to get a straight line in the back holding the mirror.

    Layers can be cute for short hair but the last time I had nearly shoulder length hair my hair looked so thin and I know now it was because it had entirely too many long layers in it. That might change if my hair gets beyond shoulder length, but not holding my breath on that. I’m aging and my hair is thinner and graying in odd places, which also makes it look thinner.

    As far as products, it has been an evolving system.

    For a long time I was using the entire L’Oreal Professionnel Pro Longer System.

    Now, I use plain V05 shampoo from Walmart (I think it’s $1.99), and Trader Joe’s 3-in-1 shampoo, conditioner, and body wash. I wash once with the V05 and once with the 3-in-1.

    My hair tends to look greasy fast with heavy conditioners. I do use the L’Oreal Pro Longer conditioner every once in a while since I still have some….but probably not more than once every two weeks.

    I’ve never been one to really use leave-in conditioners, but I picked up some Mixed Chicks leave-in conditioner at Publix and I do actually kind of love it. My hair is mostly straight but as it gets longer it has a sort of wave in the underside of it. But regardless, the Mixed Chicks conditioner is by far the lightest conditioner I’ve found.

    Now, I use the Mixed Chicks conditioner most days, and I mostly focus on the hair below my ears.

    Very occasionally I also do still use L’Oreal Elvive 8 Second Wonder Water in place of a conditioner, but I do this even less often than I do the L’Oreal Pro Longer conditioner at this point. I like it and it takes only a very tiny little bit with with my hair still being just below chin length, but I just don’t feel like I need it very often.

    I’ve stopped using most of the L’Oreal Pro Longer line, but the one product I will continue to use daily is the L’Oreal Pro Longer Heat Protectant Cream. It is pricy but it is a 10-in-1 and I love the way it makes my hair feel. I mostly focus on the hair below my ears with this too, but I am less worried about it with this product.

    I will say, with both the Mixed Chicks and the L’Oreal Heat Protectant…a very little bit goes a very long way, which is why I don’t mind the higher price.

    Now that my hair is longer I am also back to using Kenra Sugar Beach Spray 7 as a texturizing spray instead of a salt spray. I like the way this make my hair feel too, and it adds a little body.

    Best of all: I was a militant curling iron user from my teen years clear through adulthood.

    I wish I’d stopped long enough to pay attention to my hair’s natural behavior to see that all I have to do is point the hair dryer at my ends and my hair curls under naturally. I don’t really even have to use a brush to get it to look that way. I guess it’s the natural wave, but it’s way easier on my hair than the curling iron is, for sure.

    My goal for this season is to resist trims until after Christmas. That’s the issue with having the hair cutting tools and knowhow at home: It’s really easy to just pick up the shears and go at it, but that means less length over time. It’s why despite letting my hair grow since 2023, it’s still just under chin length.

    So anyway, that’s the hair story these days.

    If you’re new around here, you can read about me here. Have a great day!

  • going team bare windows

    Drastic times call for drastic measures.

    We bought our current house in 2021.

    This is the only house we have purchased that I actually picked out.

    And…..I have struggled mightily with my mental health in this house.

    It doesn’t get a great deal of light. Well, I mean, the ginormous living room actually does get great light, but it was outfitted with equally imposing dark royal blue blackout curtains. Here they are, this morning:

    And yes….the blue curtains in the living room perfectly matched the shade of the blue valances (and wallpaper) in the dining room.

    At least the people who designed our 1994 house, which this is all original to, had stellar taste. Everything still looks fabulous 30 years later.

    But….. I struggle mightily with my mental health, which is likely known to you all at this point by now. And when we moved in 2021, we moved from a house that I moderately despised because of its stairs.

    But what I loved about that Holmes Drive house was its light. That house had fantabulous light, in both the kitchen and the main living room.

    So, this happened today:

    The photos are not the greatest representation of how much better the light is in the house– I took them this morning just after taking the curtains down and it was overcast. And I am sort of rebelling against my camera gear at the moment, so all I did was phone photos. I might take better photos once the job is all done.

    The dining room photo above is after the work in there too– there were paper shades over the windows in there prior to about an hour ago.

    If I had my way, we would be team bare windows in the entire house. I am not much worried about privacy.

    But, we are taking down the paper shades throughout the house, in favor of brand new sheers. They arrive tomorrow, so tomorrow’s project will for sure be taking down the eight other shades in the windows of the house.

    The paper shades were my solution to the extremely off-white, very thin metal blinds that came with the house. I hated them and they came down as soon as possible.

    And they have served their purpose, and we certainly got what little money we put into them out of them.

    But many of them in the boys’ rooms (and the ones in the dining room, actually), had been torn by the cats, and Oliver’s in particular are in very bad shape because Mow, his cat’s scratching post is right beside one window and she has gotten it all furry and bent out of shape.

    So, I will not be sorry to see the shades go in favor of sheers.

    And honestly, I’d worry more about security, but our alarm systems, both furry and actual, are fantastic.

    I just desperately need natural light.

    The good news is, taking down the curtains in the living room has made me not feel like the room needs to be painted quite so much. I do love a basic white wall.,

    And we are not taking down the hardware fast, as I am keenly aware that the blackout curtain do actually do quite a lot of insulation in the winter.

    But…that is when I need the light the most.

    Regardless: I feel better about my house, and I feel better about my life. Which makes me more invested in both.

  • not a soul-sucking day

    Just outside Newberg, Iowa last February

    Picture of vastness nothing Iowa cornfields that I took last February because it’s pretty akin to a desert, and I am kind of in that sort of mindset right now. It was a cold day.

    I’m not exactly depressed but not exactly vibrant and bubbly like I prefer to be.

    Nancy is better, and she seems to be eternally grateful to be alive. For once, she is very loving and interactive, which we are taking to mean that she understands that we did quite save her life (or at least her tongue) by getting her to the vet the other night. No more black drool or black crusty stuff around her mouth, and she’s eating and drinking as she should.

    We are not holding our collective breath that Nancy’s change in disposition is at all permanent.

    We put Nancy in Porter’s room, and moved Bess in there too, along with all their litter boxes, and have been feeding them canned food since that is what Nancy needs for at least the next few days. They both seem to appreciate the treat, and probably the respite from chaos of the dogs.

    And, I have gotten beyond my frozen action on cleaning the house: Today I cleaned the entirety of our guest bathroom in our laundry room. I cleaned the floors, baseboards, toilet, corners of the room, and sink and toilet. And dusted off the top of the intercom even though we never use it, and cleaned the top of the trash can even.

    The whole endeavor took me about half an hour.

    If I can spend this kind of dedicated time on even a section of a room in the house each day, then the house will be relatively clean in a few weeks.

    That is encouraging.

    I have also started budgeting more in earnest. Or rather: I am making a concerted effort to not spend money we don’t have right now.

    While Jared and I went on a date to Gallery Row tonight, we are not likely to do that on a regular basis.

    I did try a little photography today. This is a cameo ring I made for myself; I have several of these cameo rings I made. I had planned to post them on Etsy but honestly, I am not feeling it a great deal as far as Etsy stores go right now. I missed focus on the girl in the cameo and had to clean it up with Topaz Photo AI. This was with the GFX camera and the 37.5mm Super Cinelux lens– it’s. a great macro lens.

    I do not know how old this bird is; Sarah Belle gave it to me when I was in third grade but she said then that she had had it since she was a little girl, and she was born in 1920.

    And tonight, I am going to bed with hope for the future. I am almost ready to seek out more regular volunteer opportunities. I am ready to reinvest myself in our home, which I did quite fall in love with in 2021 when we found it.

    And today…..today was a good day.