Sorry readers, assuming I have any that is, I did not mean to go for a week without posting.

Topic for today is Christmas and Birthdays.

This year my fiancee and I set a firm budget for our gifts.  Amazingly, it looks like we both will be meeting our goal.  Even though I did spend a lot of money on her this year, I was also able to save a bunch while doing it.  Remember, we are working on the assumption that this money has been set aside and WILL be spent.  What I ended up doing was deciding what I was going to buy and then just kept watching for sales and such, as well as price-matching an Amazon purchase.

For her actual birthday we saved a ton of money from what we did last year.  Last year we went on a weekend trip to Duluth which ended up being way more expensive than I thought that it would be.  This year we had a vacation at home.  We locked ourselves in and watched TV and movies.  It may sound lame, but it was actually really fun.