I am so organized!

It's not even Advent yet, and I already have all but one Christmas present planned. I don't know who of my family reads my blog, so I won't say what they are, but I am quite pleased with myself anyway. A lot of them are hand made, so they will probably be slow in the making, but my goal is to get all the bought ones bought by the time Advent begins.

However, all is not sunshine and roses over here. I am halfway done a paper due tomorrow, which I had really hoped would be done by now. Also, yesterday I got a paper back. I misspelled my professor's name all the way through. How humiliating. I guess this is God's way of keeping me humble!

Just about four or five more weeks of balancing schoolwork with regular life, and hopefully next semester will be a little bit less crazy. Hopefully.

Nominate your favorite charities

Hi all!

As part of my budgeting kick, I am trying to organize my charitable giving. I would like to organize it by the works of mercy, so I am trying to find a charity for each one. I would like your input! I'm especially looking for your suggestions for charities for places where I have holes, but if you have a really good suggestion for a space I already filled, toss it out anyway! Here's what I've got so far:

Feed the hungry: The local food pantry
Give drink to the thirsty: I have heard of charity:water. Are there other similar organizations?
Clothe the naked: Little Dresses for Africa
Harbor the harborless: Habitat for Humanity
Visit the sick: ?
Ransom the captive: I want this to be some sort of charity that opposes human trafficking. There are a huge amount of them, though, and I am having a hard time evaluating them. Anyone know of a good one?
Bury the dead: The monks who make child coffins for grieving families.

Instruct the ignorant: The Catholic University of America
Counsel the doubtful: The Gabriel Network
Admonish sinners: ?
Bear wrongs patiently: ?
Forgive offences willingly: Retrouvaille
Comfort the afflicted: Project Rachel
Pray for the living and the dead: Nashville Dominicans

Anyone have anything to add or change? It would be greatly appreciated!

(Note: I'm not going to donate money to charities that advocate positions that are contrary to Catholic teaching, even if they do good work in other areas.)

Seagulls

I have been having a good few weeks. Life has slowed down enough that I am no longer going insane. Although I am not budgeting scrupulously, I am managing to save while having enough spending money to enable me to buy coffee and the occasional milkshake.

However, there's not much that's very interesting to blog about! So instead, you will get some pictures I took at the beach a few months ago. There were other pictures, mostly of people, but I hesitate to post pictures of people on the open internet.

 I love photographing birds. The beach is a really good place to do it, because there are a lot of birds, and not too many places for them to hide. The lighting can be a little tricky since the sun is so bright, though. Given that I tend towards the underexposed rather than the overexposed, I did not run into a lot of trouble!

 You can see straight through this guy's beak.

 Yes, sadly, that is our food. Or was.

 Did you know seagulls scratched themselves like dogs?

 A seagull feeding another seagull. I didn't realize they did this, and I wouldn't have expected to see it in September either.

Perhaps I'll do something more interesting one of these days.Perhaps I won't. We shall have to wait and see. Right now I'm pretty happy with the status quo of school, more school, work, and sleeping.

Budgeting

I am trying to set a budget and stick to it. It's rather difficult, because since I work on an hourly basis, my pay isn't constant from week to week. I also get paid on the 10th and 25th of every month, which offends my sense of order because I can't just have the two categories of the first and second halves of each month.

This first paycheck, which I just got, is also unusual because it includes my pay for tutor training--eight hours I won't usually have.

Also, my two different jobs pay different amounts! It all gets rather confusing.

To add to all that, I have four bank accounts. I have a checking and a savings account from my mother's bank, which I have had since the beginning of college. Last year, when I was going abroad, I got a checking account and a savings account from Bank of America, since they have better terms for people going abroad. I also have a credit card from them.

Here is what I'm thinking as a budget. Obviously, once I graduate and have to pay rent and utilities, this will all have to be reworked.

10%: charity
15%: general spending
15%: short term savings
60%: long term savings

I have got a budgeting app called EEBA. The app doesn't seem to like a flexible income very well, but that's ok. We'll see how it goes. Since this paycheck is unusual, I'll just track my spending for the next two weeks and see what I spend. Then I'll input my actual numbers from the next paycheck and see how it goes. If anyone thinks another app is better than EEBA, let me know!