It's been a little bit since I've been around, but things have been a tiny bit crazy.

I have a new part time special education teaching job that is only for this year, but I'm working three days a week from 8:45 to 2:15 (one day until 3:15), which means I get to drop off and pick up the kid at school most days, which is less money to daycare - about $20 less a week! And I'm getting paid hourly at a teacher wage.

I don't have any benefits, but I didn't have benefits subbing either.

It also means that I can sub Mondays and Fridays if I want to - and sometimes I want to, and sometimes I'd like to set Mondays on fire, but it's nice to have the option to bring in a little more money every week.

The divorce drags on and on, and my lawyer is awesome but expensive. I just want to be DONE.

Voldemort and I are making most of our holiday gifts this year.

Voldemort made

these snowball soaps for their (pronoun switch again!) cousins, and it was super easy and fun. And cheap! We used old lego figures that V doesn't play with anymore to put inside the snowballs.

I'm making dry erase placemats for V and the cousins as well, which I hope they'll like.

The sisters are getting homemade clove lip balm - my SIL loved the Burt's Bees clove balm, but they aren't making that anymore, so I found a recipe and played with it a bit, and I think I got pretty close!

I also have vanilla brewing for the sister who bakes, and I took an extra vanilla bean and decided to make some vanilla sugar while I was at it.

My dad will get cookies, and my sister is getting my mom a crockpot, so I'm going to get her a crockpot cookbook to go with it.

And that's pretty much everybody - there are still some bought things that I'm getting for the kid - and I'm having no luck finding a decent pair of roller skates used, so I might have to go new for those - but mostly, gifts are taken care of!

This week, I've been drowning in paperwork from the lawyer - I've been busy filling out a sworn financial statement, which has included tracking down all statements for stocks, IRAs, bank accounts, blue book values of cars, zillow estimates of houses..

And while I've been doing that, I've been working on getting everything set up to start subbing on Monday, getting the kiddo's stuff together for his school, and meeting with his teacher and the dean of students to go over not only the divorce and how he might react, but also the yearly "my kid scoffs at your gender boxes and here's how to handle that without being a jerk."

He goes back to school tomorrow, and I have to admit I'll be glad for the break. I'll still be worrying about financial stuff, but at least he'll be busy!

With some of the stuff going on with the male, my lawyer recommended a protection order. Setting that up burned through WAY too much of the $5000 retainer, and now I have to call and put more money in. Yuck.

To my complete lack of surprise, the male lasted six whole days in rehab and then checked himself out, claiming that he had defeated alcoholism. *sigh* I havent spoken to him since he was served with the divorce paperwork and the protection order, and I have to go back to court this Thursday to review the protection order.

I just wonder if he's even looked at the paperwork and knows to come.

Regardless, I've been working to continue cutting costs. Here's a few frugal things I've done in the past week or so:

- set up our own netflix account for 7.99 instead of 8.99. Not a lot, but hey.

- snagged a copy of the school supply list from the website and have gone through last year's supplies to reuse what we can

- packed our lunch to take to the science museum instead of buying food there

- started to cancel my audible membership but was diverted with a $20 credit. As soon as I spend that, I'll cancel.

- used the food processor to chop up a giant zucchini to make muffins and froze the unused bits

- applied and interviewed for guest teaching in my district this year, as full time work still feels wildly overwhelming