January 13, 2020
Annual Lakota drive
Working on this project earlier in the year (scroll down to the Giving paragraph) worked out so well last year!
I wrote my update before the November 17th collection deadline. Donations had trickled to a stop, I’d ordered everything and confirmed the recipients all received them, we were pretty set. It seemed like a good time to wrap up the project and share how much good we’d done!
Then I was surprised with a couple healthy donations that same week. I happily went back to the drawing board and immediately bit off more than I could chew with the donated $250 and putting in another $50 out of pocket.
A big family with two parents, 9 children, and 2 grandchildren was in need of winter coats, diapers, and wipes for the grandkids. Yes, of course, that pick absolutely made sense with the $300 we had. Quite the bargain hunter am I!
I mused over the challenge with a visiting friend, still thinking I could outsmart the prices. They slipped me some extra cash. Not because they didn’t have faith in me but because they remain in touch with reality. It turns out they were right, I needed more than just $300 for 13 coats. I mentioned this on Twitter, and y’all seriously stepped up. Some folks sent a second donation, others sent their first, and we had soon enough to fill our biggest family’s needs!
Family 6 received: 13 winter coats – one for each member of the family. 2 giant packs of diapers and 2 cases of wipes for the babies. 2 shirts, a pair of jeans and a pair of waterproof work boots for the working parent in the family.
My heart swelled three sizes. Thank you all so much for caring and giving!
Bonus: One of the things I asked them to do when we figure out the matching funds is to create a “Warmth Fund” – a fund that can be drawn on to help families stay warm in whatever way is most suitable for their circumstances. This can be used to purchase blankets, firewood, space heaters, and so on.
For 2020:
I’d like to try something new this year: start collecting early, throughout the year, and make purchases for the Lakota-Okini families in the fall in the hopes that this would be helpful for a variety of budgets. I know that cash flow throughout the year often dictates what and when I can give. I do wonder if collecting throughout the year means it’ll mostly come at the last minute.
I am opening up contributions now through November 1st, 2020. Let me know in the comments if you’re interested in contributing and have an opinion about collecting all year vs just in a 6-week period like I did last year.
Edit to edit! Originally, I was going to shop in the fall but it’s still winter, the forecast is Bitterly Cold for some time yet, and people are hungry now. So as contributions roll in, it makes sense to help those who are cold and hungry right now, and through the year, instead of waiting until year-end. This will also distribute the work better!:
Edit to add: Last year we raised $2669.94 to touch a total of 27 lives. I would love to see if we can match that or do more in 2020.
Libraries, literacy and love of reading
I devoured library books as a child and was wretchedly grateful for every single book I could borrow because our family was too poor to buy books and Little Libraries weren’t really a thing back then. I used to stare at other people’s bookshelves like I was starving. We’d visit family and the people would simply disappear from my vision – all I could see was their books.
To this day I remain a voracious reader, and my birthday gift tradition has become a gift of money to our local library. My library allows directed donations and I support their ebook collection instead of buying books for myself. Accessible books for more people!
I’ve long dreamed of becoming rich and supporting rural libraries in a significant way but in 2020, I feel called to do what I can even if it’s just on a really small scale. I’ve known that rural counties simply don’t have funds for books, much less the kinds of extras I could not even have dreamed of as a child.
For example: tool libraries and health electronics that can be checked out, puzzles for kids, a massive selection of tv shows and movies! That’s just for starters. By contrast, rural libraries might maybe have bestsellers and discarded books from other libraries.
I’d like to help them out.
The best way to help them at this level is donations of cash. While I certainly have thoughts on the kinds of books and offerings that would be great, the person who knows best what their library patrons need and what they can actually manage to process and make available is the person who works in the library. They may need more of a specific category of books, e-books, new chairs, computers, keyboards or any number of things we don’t know about.
This year, I’d love to gift some money directly to two rural libraries: Culpeper County in Virginia and Chatham County in North Carolina.
Would anyone be interested in contributing to rural libraries as well? Like with the Lakota families, I will be allocating some of our annual giving budget to each library regardless of interest but if there’s interest, I’m happy to do any coordinating necessary to streamline it for the recipients. As y’all have shown me two years in a row now, we can do so much more together!
You can make contributions to ….
1. My Ko-Fi page (note: Ko-Fi flows through Paypal so they take fees out there since that’s my blog’s account)
2. You can send as a gift (otherwise PayPal will take fees out) to admin [at] agaishanlife.com. If you’re sending via PayPal on mobile, make sure to click on the arrow next to “paying for goods and services” to select “send as a gift” because that’s tripped up more than one person!
Edited to add: If you’d like to donate monthly (this has fees), you can use this donate link.
Whichever way you go, please A) specify what it’s for and B) if you want email updates.
Bonus: We can also get employer company matching for some of our donations though I am still trying to untangle the weirdness of their matching administration.
:: I’d love to hear your thoughts!
January 10, 2020
1. Though PiC warped the lid of our Pyrex terribly in the microwave, they honored the warranty and sent us a new lid promptly.
2. I’m really happy that my hands can handle Pyrex now – this time last year, it was not possible. This means our use of plastic wrap has gone down at least 50%, possibly more!
3. We traded drop-off and cooking shifts mid-week. Though it shortened my work day, I liked going to pick up JB and coming home to dinner being served. I don’t mind cooking 90% of the time, it’s what works for us normally, but a break from that job is really nice too!
4. We FINALLY got our replacement waterproof dog beds in! Seamus and Sera both like it very much.
5. We’ve finally committed to meeting with our contractor to see what kind of work we can get done this year. I’m narrowing down my Must Haves and hoping that we can break up our landscaping work into about three stages so that we can at least create one safe space for Seamus to enjoy before he’s too much older. He’s slowing down a lot, and having a safe yard space to roll around in would be so nice for him.
6. Good news: all the major events I was still waiting on dates for this year have been scheduled so now I can get to work on logistics. Bad news: Unfortunately the timing of both are terrible! We will make them work, but gosh they are such bad timing and are going to make for a tough summer.
:: How was your week? Do you have all your major events for 2020 set?
January 3, 2020
1. Talking to friends whose kids are in activities year round, I definitely feel like a slacker parent. The kids are in a year round sport (4 nights a week) plus a seasonal sport every season and they’re only doing all of this because the kids still have so much fun and love it all. They CAN do it because they have good health and a nanny and a whole lot of money between the two of them so I don’t feel guilty for not doing it before but I do feel like I might need to kick myself in gear this year and start taking JB to more than one 30 minute activity per week. That was always the plan but I only managed to add one activity last year on our budget and our time constraints. Maybe I could manage two this year? PiC does equal ferrying to lesson duty for the one activity so it’s not all on me. This is mainly to keep zir active and really I’d love to add another sport thing for PiC, I think he’d be happier with another sport hobby. But it’s all $$$$.
2. This year I’m working on somehow cutting out my intense feelings of worry over a friend’s domestic abuse situation that is only going to escalate from the Intensely Worrying stage to whatever is after that, so I can focus on being supportive without wrecking myself. Wrecking myself doesn’t help anyone. Is this possible? Let’s find out.
December 20, 2019
1. The NOT good thing is I have a huge pain flare up today. It woke me from a rare deep sleep, it was so bad. No idea if it was diet / weather / sleeping wrong related.
So this morning I am deeply grateful for heating options like my fabulous rice bag gift from my dear friend, my hot tea and the means to heat it (which I do not take for granted with the power outages of late), and my heat patches that got me through the first hour from 2 to 3 am when it was all I could do it just keep breathing.
2. I was lucky enough to have booked a massage several weeks ago for this week and though it was nearly impossible to get away on time, I made it to the appointment. My therapist got the pain down from severe to just below moderate. I can just about deal with that while also stressed to the GILLS preparing for the holidays. Now, I just have to kick the dregs of this cold. I can never be so foolish as to say “I’m about to kick this cold” because then it gets stronger and turns on me with a vengeance. The second round of the same cold is twice as evil.
How’s your immune system this week?
3. I always try to be done with the financial books before mid December so if there are any last minute transactions to be made, I can make them in the year. Reminder of that time I tried to do some tax loss harvesting and totally fumbled the ball – selling off the stock so late that the transaction processed in the next year. Whoops!
I’ve updated most of our spreadsheets for our rental property (thank you thank you thank you Past Me who took the time to update that sheet up through October), for our tax preparation including all our itemized deductions and miscellaneous income, and leading into 2020 for our day to day expenses.
Have you tackled your tax documents yet or do you have a good system for this whole mess?
4. JB’s friend lost a parent suddenly and unexpectedly this week. We were so sad to hear it and had to share the news with JB to see if ze wanted to attend the funeral. Ze did, and composed a really solid condolence letter as ze processed the idea that Mr H was dead and not even 100 years old yet: “Dear Xav, I’m sorry your parent died. I love you.”
Our writing lessons are bearing fruit.
5. I’ve always been a milk chocolate eater but I decided that Nicole and Maggie’s recommendation of very omigah dark chocolate (sugar free) is better than no chocolate and I’m adjusting to the bitterness. Each passing day the bitterness seems less so in a couple weeks I should be set with one little non painful treat?
December 12, 2019
1. JB had a play date without us monitoring for the first time! O_O
It was a huge step for me for a lot of reasons but it was with a group of kids we’ve known for a couple of years and parents that we get along with well, so … we gave it a try. It was a much longer visit than we planned. Ze was totally worn out but we had good reports: zir manners were excellent, when ze was upset by a scary bit of a show ze just went and asked an adult to sit with zir instead of emulating the behavior of a cousin that I can’t bear (screaming at the top of their lungs until the scene is over). We spent some time chatting with and laughing over parenting stories with the parents before taking zir home and I think that really made a difference. We like this group of kids enough to offer to set up a date night rotation so we can exchange free babysitting with them.
2. PiC was razzing me about always wanting to try the local Peruvian cuisine. There are two ingredients that feature heavily in Peruvian cuisine that he doesn’t care for, so he always focuses on them. But I have vision! At least when it comes to food. Peruvian is so much more than cooked tomatoes and plantains! There’s not much in the way of affordable Peruvian, it’s mainly the fancy places here, but I found a small hole in the wall sort of place to try and I sold him on their fresh chips and salsa. Once there, we were floored by the new to use dishes that were amazing: Sopa Siete (no carbs, no sugar, perfect for me!) and Tallerines Saltado Carne. This was a huge treat. As was PiC’s mea culpa for doubting me. 😀
3. It feels like it’s been a full year of intentional effort in building on our local relationships, particularly with each socializing encounter eating up a lot of my limited energy, but I am being hopeful that it will be worth the investment. PiC and I want to keep investing time and effort in our people and relationships, and I’m glad we’re on the same page.
In the past two weeks, we have had more spontaneous socializing than I’ve had in the entire several years before this: we ran into a friend at daycare and asked them over for dinner. We had a friend ask to drop by with a gift for JB and they stayed to lunch, no big deal. I’m not at the point where I can host like Angela does but I do like that within reason (I’m still a massive introvert after all). Say, one or two weekends a month sounds good.
4. I commented that I didn’t have time to do the laundry over the weekend as an offhand reminder to myself to do it during the week after I cleaned out the washer drum of fur. Because he was up early and rested, PiC remembered what I said and did all the laundry on Monday morning before I got up. BONUS: I was able to change into fresh from the dryer warm clothes! Best. Partner. Ever.
5. I love this from Terry Pratchett’s Dodger (bold mine): “Money makes people rich; it is a fallacy to think it makes them better, or even that it makes them worse. People are what they do, and what they leave behind.”
6. I feel CRUNCHED for time this week and next. We have a lot to prepare for various holiday cards and gifts for a lot of loved ones. Even keeping it relatively minimal (cards for most, photos as keepsakes to remember our time spent together), there’s still a whole lot left to do: putting notes in for some people, sorting out the 115 photo prints I ordered to gift to some folks, stamping them and addressing them. I know PiC would help but he and I have VERY different ideas of when these things should be done and it’s less annoying to me to do it than to rush him. I’d rather have him do other things that I don’t like and where the timeline doesn’t bother me. He’ll do all the food and car packing up when we travel, for example, or scrub the sink (hate), the toilets (hate), and maintain the cars.
:: How was your week? Are you ready for the holidays?
December 6, 2019
1. JB was treated to a movie at the theater, and we ran into quite a few of zir classmates (boys and girls alike, boy is that movie popular) which was bonus excitement for zir. I hardly remember the first movie but Frozen 2 was really quite entertaining.
2. With some help, I made a few jars of my “liquid gold” to give away to friends who I never know what to give in return for their food gifts. This is the only thing they’ve ever requested and I make this soup stock once a year, if that.
3. We hosted a mini Friendsgiving the day after Thanksgiving. A couple of friends who didn’t make a turkey came over and dined on our set aside turkey. It was perfect and then we wound up the night talking about emergency preparedness and what we still need. I broke out our water filter for the first time in 8 years, and we figured out how to put it together. We also may do disaster preparedness practice runs together – Emergency Food Fridays, anyone? I have been pushing PiC to do this because I want us to be totally prepared for emergencies and disasters. *Totally prepared = where it’s muscle memory and not us fumbling around trying to figure out how to arrange the basics: lights, clean water, heating up food safely indoors, staying warm, etc.
4. I deeply appreciate my warm sweatpants that fit. I could live in these. I have to fight the urge to go buy five more as an overreaction to many years of ill fitting clothes. Is this just me? Anytime I find something I like, I want one more in case I can’t find it again but I also wear things until their doom (usually at least 5 years, more like 8-10) by which point it’s possible my taste or standards may have changed so why not let it go and find a new thing?
This may be a deeply ingrained reflex from my pre-tailoring things to fit and pre-Petite sizes era. Back then, nothing ever really fit and if it did I wasn’t likely to get lucky again in that clothing group. I was always going about in oversized and poor fitting clothes.
5. While I tackled a page long To Do list on Sunday, with JB’s help at times, PiC cleaned the sink, vacuumed, did all the laundry, changed the sheets for our guest room to prepare for our next house guest and cooked dinner. I was so focused on all the things I needed to get done that I didn’t quite realize what he was doing the whole time. Naturally, I appreciate him like you wouldn’t believe.
6. I was in charge of ordering a ton of alcohol gifts for the family. I started my order over the weekend and happened across two stackable promotions to get 2 bottles of whisky plus a mini, 12 bottles of wine, and a whole case of beer for $187. Note to self, plan ahead. Next year’s supply of alcohol to serve guests and for gifts – buy on Cyber Monday!
7. I tried adding a half cup of baking soda to the wash drum + vinegar in the fabric softener dish for JB’s funny smelling sheets, and PiC’s workout clothes, and they don’t smell terrible anymore! Huzzah!
8. How is it Thursday already?? (Right now as I type this.) JB and I both went to the dentist and got our teeth cleaned and is there anything more dentally satisfying than a professional cleaning?? I love how clean our teeth are and I’m loaded up on advice for how to take better care of our teeth and gums. I have some gum recession 😭😭 and I’m more afraid of dental recession than a financial one these days. So, brushing and flossing diligently, as we’ve been doing, but I have to wear my night guard every night now.
:: How was your week?
November 29, 2019
1. More catalog removals: still trying to get ourselves removed from American Girl. How did I ever get on their mailing list? I have never liked or been interested in their products. Their site is also supremely annoying. The opt out is so dysfunctional it took 7 tries. They require a birth date to enter this part of the site, then it kept freezing, then suggesting there were errors in the address that I entered (there weren’t), and then freezing again. After 7 failed attempts, I had to just email them.
2. We managed to sign up for another month of swim lessons despite leaving it til the last minute. I’m assuming it was still open because of the holidays. Nevertheless, woots!
3. Happened to spot that a Twitter / blogger friend needed a helping hand late at night, and I’m glad to have spotted it because we were able to help. It’s nice when things come together.
4. We had a really rough Sunday so I’m extra grateful that my favorite relative being here for moral support and actual physical support with walking the dogs and cooking and all the things that make up our days. I hate that the thing happened at all, but if it had to, I suppose it’s helpful that it happened when we have some support.
5. I’ve had senioritis all week because we have a short week. That seems counterintuitive. But the short work week also means more stress because there’s no real way to pause my work so I’ll have to work a bit over the weekend.
6. Tiny dogs make good lapwarmers.
7. A visit from my favorite relative means JB has been in good spirits all week long. Cheeky, definitely, but generally very little grumpiness.
8. We pulled together another big round for our Lakota families and that was amazing. Update is forthcoming.
PONDERING 1: Should we keep my once-beloved SPG AMEX which has now become the Marriott Bonvoy? Our free night benefit isn’t so easy for us to use given our current constraints and the annual reward is usually how I justify keeping an annual fee card. I can still transfer points to miles if I wanted to go that route but that doesn’t address the annual fee. Thinking on this one.
PONDERING 2: I finally separated the cash from the rental property into its own savings account several months ago and it earns a small amount in interest every month. Like $5. I currently funnel all interest from our emergency savings account into our “Director” fund (the account from which I make all our savings and investing contributions and the occasional spending disbursement as necessary). We pay taxes on all the interest now, whether or not I keep it separated, but should I continue to keep it separate on a matter of principle? Seems like I should. Thoughts welcome!