Sunday, December 24, 2006

XMAS Holiday Budget $300

Well, did we live up to the $300 budget?
We made our monthly trip to Costco (sometimes bi-weekly) and spent about $350, at least half of which were our regular monthly dry and bulk goods.
Let's assume about $150 was for Christmas.

Last night we spent another $45 on last minute food items at the local super market.

All in all $195 or so - not bad.

This included everything necessary for Christmas dinner, etc....

Now if we include the $100 Christmas tree, the $30 in varous long hanging ornaments, we're about $25 over budget. Still not that bad.

Then again, our guests failed to show up for dinner - my friend's wife contracted food poisoning from lunch earlier today - seems like she'll spend Christmas Eve doing something other than eating - poor girl - maybe we could have saved $40 on food.

Oddly, having Christmas with just the family: kids, us, in-laws, was really very nice. We had fun, joked around, watched five months worth of family videos and made special wishes for each other.

The highlight of the evening was when one of our diaper training young children, didn't quite make it to the potty (after four false alarms) and tried to walk with a pair of full underpants -imagine a toddler with arms spread, like an airplane trying to take off, waddling, slowly, with legs spread apart to avoid feeling the unwanted material in his underpants. Perphaps you needed to be there.

In central Europe there's folklore that says what you do on Christmas Eve is what you'll do for the rest of the year. I wonder what that says for my friend's wife, my child's potty training and...well, I should probably wake up my wife...we still have two and a half hours....

Have a wondeful holiday,
makingourway

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