Aside from my full time job as a web systems engineer as well as a freelance writer on the side, I’m also starting a small catering and events planning company. In addition, this year my daughter and I started a non-profit called JessiCakes Project, where we use our love of baking to help raise money for my daughter’s favorite charities. With all these things that I’m doing, it’s important that I have the latest gadgets to help keep me organized and up to date with the trends. My full time job already provides me with a robust HP laptop and an iPhone4. However, I would really like to get my own personal touch pad.
Just a couple of months back, my husband and I bought our daughter her own Samsung Galaxy 10.1, which she uses for studying and fun. We opted for this instead of getting her a new laptop since she has a desktop that she uses for her online schooling. I’d like to have a similar one for my business. However, since we’re in a budget conscious household, buying big ticket items such as tech-savvy gadgets takes some planning. Aside from researching what brand to buy, we often discuss when to buy and how we can save enough money to buy the item on the target date.
I’m targeting early quarter of 2012 to purchase either an iPad or Samsung Galaxy. I need a big space, at least 32 gigs, so that I can install apps that I need to run my business and to multitask with my other jobs. I’m budgeting between $700 and $900 to buy my gadget, which includes software that I need to install to perform my tasks as well as virus protection and accessories. Since only two months remain before 2012 hits, and I plan to purchase around March or April, I would only have roughly five to six months to save up.
I plan to save money by writing more articles than I used to. I’m hoping that I can knock off at least 10 articles a week so that I can save enough and still pay some of my current bills. Aside from writing, I plan to provide catering and events planning services after hours, probably start taking in one client a week instead of one client every two weeks. I may also moonlight for other companies that need a techie to make some extra cash. It’s going to be rough, but I intend to meet my goal since it is a necessity. Besides, I hate borrowing from my daughter whenever I need to look at an idea or design that I want to use as an inspiration for my next project.
I’m hoping to accomplish this even with my busy schedule. I do at least 50 to 60 hours at my full time job, and then I put in a few hours a week to write. I spend my weeknights and weekends baking and creating edible works of arts for our charity. Then, in a few weeks, we’ll start with our events planning services. Can I do them all? I have to be honest…it wouldn’t be easy, but I will try my best. Aside from the additional earnings that I plan to make, I’m also cutting down on my personal expenses. Instead of having my hair done every month, I will let my hair grow and get my hair done once every six months. This will save me roughly $20 a month.
We’ll also have to cut down on some entertainment. Instead of eating out four times a month, we’ll limit it to twice a month, saving us roughly $100 each month. We’ll also limit watching movies to just once a month or watching only whenever we really cannot wait for the rental video to come out, saving us at least $60 a month. Speaking of videos, we’ll limit purchasing videos to only our favorite movies to add to our collection and just rent the rest that we want to watch, but don’t need to own. My husband and daughter are both gamers. Often, they watch out for the new releases. I’ve discussed with them that we need to cut down on only their top picks and then rent the ones that are not. In the end, with all the savings we make combined, we may not only save for my touch pad, but may be able to buy a bigger flat screen TV or take an overseas vacation that’s long overdue.