I have gotten so much accomplished today

I have all my bills separated and categorized. I have medical bills separated to ones that are in my name and in my ex husbands name. While I listed his on my budget breakdown I do not plan on paying them.

I created a sheet for each bill - even my monthly bills except for rent.
At the top I listed the company I owe the money to along with the address and whether I pay them online or by check. I then added the total balance due (including any past due amounts). If I have made any payments since the beginning of April I took that into account and added that to the paper also.

I managed to toss another couple handfuls of duplicate bills also. I now have a pile about 3" thick if that.

I also filed the bills into an accordian file holder with the debtor account sheet in front of the bills I have for that debtor.

My rent is due this week as is the kids insurance payment. Once I get those covered and paid I can start the envelope system. I have heard it works and Dave Ramsay uses it. It sounds like a good idea to me so I will try it out. I think if I have separate envelopes with the money needed for it for that particular bill in there it will be harder to spend as I know I will have to just put it back in there later and cut myself short on a different bill. Something I want to avoid.

I will be very glad when I am caught up and current with my regular monthly bills. That will make the debt snowball go that much quicker as I won't have to play catch up. I am behind on 3 bills: Cable, Phone/Internet, and Electric. Cable will be caught up in the next 2 weeks as will the phone bill. The electric bill will take a bit longer but will be done by mid-may. YAY

I also need to pay the cellphone bill next week. I hate this playing catchup crap. I really do. I hate knowing I have to pay this RIGHT NOW because I couldn't/didn't pay it when I should have.

I also took the engagement ring from my ex and brought it along with the wedding band and a couple other rings I inherited down to a local consigment shop to have them appraised for what they think I could get for them. If it is reasonable I will consign them with the shop and put whatever money I get towards my emergency fund. That way I won't have to take my regular paycheck money to add to that and I can just focus on the debt snowball. Keeping my fingers crossed it will be a reasonable and fair amount.

I also had some great news today. I had a set of rings stolen by my neighbor about 8 yrs ago. He pawned them and the pawn shop lost the rings!! For 8 YEARS! So the pawn shop called the police today to see about filing charges. I figured the statute of limitations had run out (I was correct) by now. The police office that showed up is a good family friend and when he saw that the pawn shop had had them for 8 YEARS and that they had lost them and dropped the ball he told the owner - just give her her rings back and write it off since you were the reason it has taken so long to get this settled.

SO I GOT MY RINGS BACK!! I wanted to save them for my daughter but I am now thinking it may be a good idea to sell these as well so I can get out of debt. I am not sure yet. I haven't made up my mind on this one. Hard decision.

For the next two weeks I do not plan on doing any major grocery shopping. My daughter and I are going to use up as much as we can from what we have on hand. There will be trips for milk and fresh veggies and the like but no meat buying etc as I have a freezer full of food. That will help with the cost of groceries.

I need to take an inventory of what we have and plan some meals around that so I am not tempted to go out and just buy dinner for lack of planning.

I am hoping that by next Tuesday I will have all bills and income into understandable excel spreadsheets that I can post here.