Hello again.

Thanks to everyone for emailing, tweeting, and getting in touch with me while my site was in maintenance mode. Now that I’m done with the back-end work, I’ll be writing new posts. And I’ll definitely explain why the hell I was gone so long.

Ahh.. it feels good to be back.

The post I’m Back. appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

You can read the entire round-up at Not Made of Money. There are a lot of new great personal finance bloggers listed that I’m really excited to check out. Thanks to NMOM for including me.

The post Included in Yakezie Personal Finance Round-Up appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

Ready to start a new challenge!

And now for a quick announcement: I’m joining the Yakezie Challenge! It’s a “behind the scenes” commitment that will keep me focused and help me to grow my blog, not unlike a training plan for a half-marathon. And heck, if I can do one of those I can surely hit my blogging goals, right? Wish me luck and welcome to all the new Yakezie visitors that I hope will visit the site!

The post Announcement – Yakezie Challenge appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

Welcome to The Budgeting Babe, written by me (the waver), designed by the guy in the beard and sometimes commented upon by the other guy.

To those of you visiting from this week’s Carnival of Personal Finance, hello and welcome! Please feel free to browse around the site while enjoying your morning coffee or tea. Despite the site’s lovely shade of pink, I think you’ll find plenty to keep you entertained and informed. Site archives start in 2004 and are searchable by keyword. Enjoy.

To my awesome regular readers, thanks, as always, for being part of this site. A new post is coming tomorrow. Today, I recommend checking out this week’s Carnival to browse the best of Personal Finance and find some new folks to follow on your reader.

And, just for fun, I’m throwing in a pic of my two youngest brothers (the third brother is pictured with my nephew in the knitting post). The one with the beard designed and coded the version of the site that launched in 2010. (And the awesome doodle of me found at the top of the page). I call him whenever I break something on the site (which is often). He’s usually sleeping when I’m awake though, so the other brother (with the wristband), takes a message and sometimes one of them calls me back. The wristband guy has a degree in filmmaking, and one day, I swear he will actually make a video for this site. Or an award-winning movie that has nothing to do with the site, I’m not sure which will come first (but I better be in that movie).

Until then, I thought I’d introduce my awesome design and tech team to the community here and say a giant THANK YOU to all three of my brothers for their constant (well, when they’re awake anyway) support.

Happy Monday everyone. Let’s get through this work week.

The post Welcome Back, Carnival Readers appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

I, in the meantime, will get crankin’ on some new articles for the blog. I have so much to write about; I just wish there were more hours in the day! Can’t we get a daylight savings time that gives us 25 hours in one day, every day? That would really help a gal out over here. Somebody work on that, k?

The post New Carnival of Personal Finance appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

And to those hosting upcoming Carnivals, I know it’s a lot of work, but I love the idea of opening up with a video so we can all ‘meet’  the personalities behind the PF blogs.  I will have to figure out how to get some video up should I ever host again.

Have a great week peeps!

The post Back in the Carnival of Personal Finance! appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

1. Letting the Grass Grow. I got a lot of positive feedback on this one from friends and colleagues. The truth is, climbing the corporate ladder isn’t for everyone all of the time. As I’m learning, personal growth can happen outside the office, and when it does, it can be just as rewarding as big career progress. Make time to set your own goals, rather than conform to expectations, and be sure to assess those goals every once in a while. You might be surprised at what you find.
2. My Biggest Monthly Expense. Who knew writing about my grocery bill would prove so popular?  Actually, this was more about priorities than groceries — as in, since living healthy is one of my biggest priorities right now, maybe it’s OK that it’s also my biggest expense. Budgeting gives us the freedom to make those choices.
3. My Budgeting Weakness. This was about how my once cheap hobby — running — has become a more expensive lifestyle choice. The cool thing is that a lot of other fitness enthusiasts saw this, and some even reposted. I like that blogging can bridge two very different worlds in a way that traditional magazines typically don’t (can you imagine Kiplinger’s doing a column about running or triathlons?).

I’m really proud to look at this little selection and see that my most popular items really cover the core focus areas of the site, and of myself: career, money, and living healthy. The fact that these were popular means I’m connecting with community of readers with similar interests who can help encourage me to reach my goals and appreciate the journey along the way. Let’s hope 2011 continues along this happy little path!

The post Your Favorite Budgeting Babe Posts of 2010 appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

So if 2010 was the year of restarting, 2011 will be the year of reconnecting.  There are many fun, new, exciting faces out there just starting their financial journeys. It seems like every time I look, more 20- and 30-somethings are hitting the web to chronicle their saving, spending and investing with great stories to tell and a flair for design. And it’s awesome. So awesome, in fact, that I just updated my blogroll to include a number of new young bloggers recommended by the wonderful Krystal at Give Me My Five Bucks Back. Be sure to check them all out! And I’ll be sure to check them all out too. I am particularly excited to read more of Punch Debt in the Face, which looks hilarious.

After you’ve browsed around a bit, let me know who else belongs on my blogroll and whether there are any sweet Midwestern PF blogger meet-ups I should be attending. See you soon!

The post New Finance Bloggers, New Fun, New Friends appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

For me, today is the day I start blogging again. Today is my new beginning…. Welcome to my new site!

I stopped posting last year amidst a sea of changes in my life and work habits. I had started a job that required renewed focus, was attempting to heal an injury and lose some weight in the process (both which require a ton of effort and discipline), and generally needed to regain a sense of balance that had gone missing for a while. I was feeling overwhelmed by the challenges of making my site easier to navigate and adapting The Budgeting Babe to changes in social media. Plus, I was starting to question the blog’s purpose faced with the explosion of major news outlets covering financial basics in response to the recession. In short, I needed a break.

In my year away from blogging, I’ve mostly been observing the personal finance landscape (my how it’s changed!), while focusing on growth and education. (OK, I may have also been watching Glee.) I bought a car (Subaru Outback), learned my FICO score, paid off my student loans, and traveled a ton. I learned that I’m not done telling my story, or with helping young women in all corners of the country learn financial basics. And so, with the help of my peeps at TeamYellow Media, I’ve redesigned my web site in a way that I hope is more user-friendly for you, dear readers (we now have tags, categories AND a better search bar), and I’m refreshed and ready to pick up where we left off roughly one year ago.

Here’s what you can expect to see from me on the new Budgeting Babe. Of course, it’s not an exhaustive list, these are just some topics I hold close to my heart. The blog will mainly continue to serve as a chronicle of my personal finance journey, and I’ll pass along tips, tricks and lessons I learn while trying to save, invest and plan for my future. Topics on which I’ll focus follow:

• Navigating your career in your 20′s … and experiencing the next steps as you dive into your 30′s!
• Spending and saving on a working gal’s budget
• Living within your means – and having a ball doing it (even in a recession)
• Finding a healthy work-life-friends-family balance
• Overcoming and understanding the terribly boring world of personal finance literature
• Living your priorities with gusto!
• Exploring how the economy is affecting the average person
• Taking a baby steps approach (in heels or flats)  to personal finance

I plan to post two to three times per week, and will be responding to comments on the page.  I really hope you guys find the new site as exciting as I do, and look forward to hearing your thoughts, questions and success stories!

Yours in personal finance,

Nic

The post A New Beginning for The Budgeting Babe! appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.

Among my tasks: clean up the links, organize posts, update graphics and widgets, figure out my e-mail situation for the site and potentially even switch to another site host, provided I can learn HTML. And of course, there’s the issue of posting. During the last year, my writing has become uninspired. I need to find my voice again as a writer, rather than just posting thoughtless one-offs becasue I haven’t written anything recently. That’s a disservice to you guys, and a waste of all our time.

So, allow me this winter to grow and change and learn some new things. I’ll leave the old site up so it’s still searchable (I’ve heard about a few people finding the site through search engines), but I won’t be posting anything new for a while. Good luck to you all on your financial journeys, and see you soon.

The post Budgeting Babe on Hiatus appeared first on The Budgeting Babe.