IT'S BEEN A WHILE
With all the changes like new management and new projects at the Florence Branch I've neglected to write anything in my blog since January. And what a bitter cold January is was! Just feel the heat now and you know that summer is here.

My Women & Finance Book Club is going great, here are the books we've read so far:

• Women & Money: owning the power to control your destiny by Suze Orman
• Money, a Memoir: women, emotions, and cash by Liz Perle
• Rule #1: the simple strategy for successful investing in only 15 minutes a week by Phil Town
• Pay It Down?: from debt to wealth on $10 a day by Jean Chatzky
• Live Well on Less Than You Think: guide to achieving your funancial success by Fred Brock
• 7 Money Mantras for a Richer Life: how to live well with the money you have by Michelle Singletary
• Pilgrimage to Warren Buffett's Omaha by Jeff Matthews
• Make Money, Not Excuses: wake up, take charge, and overcome your financial fears forever by Jean Chatzky
• Half the Sky: turning oppression into opportunity for women worldwide by Nicholas Kristof

Maybe you like basking in the sun with a hot new read, or perhaps you'd rather chill with a cool one. Granted, our atypical book club doesn't read steamy romances or bonechilling thrillers but we're learning a whole lot about money and finances and investments.

For example, Phil Town's Rule #1 taught us how to use free online resources like Yahoo Finance and MSN Money to research businesses to determine the best business to invest our money. He advocates in the style of Warren Buffett -- buy a good company that you know well, and buy it for less than it's value.

Town also showed us how to use simple formulas to figure out a company's future probabilities based on its 10-year history. I applied some of his principals and selected Sprint. I like Sprint Nextel. I'm a long time customer and they've provided me with and excellent product and superb service. That was a good start for me on selecting a company. The next thing I did was find the annual report and read the CEO's letter to his investors. I liked his style of writing and sensed that he was down to earth and honest about disclosing information that wasn't misleading.

I also found, on Yahoo Finance, the executives who are investing in Sprint; its history; its P/E (price per earnings ratio); and a lot of information that helped me determine that this was an good company whose stock was less than the value of the company. Hence, I made my first investment on my own through a local brokerage firm. Very exciting for me, especially since the stock has risen in value more than 10 percent in less than two months! I feel I made a good investment.

The book we're reading now for our June 15 discussion is a little different from what we've been reading. Half the Sky is a story about the harrows of women's sufferings around the world and how women are learning to break away and become self sufficient with the help of organizations that provide micro-loans to set up micro-businesses. With the cards stacked against them, these women are being empowered and learning to take control of money matters. It is said that if you educate a man you educate the man, but if you educate a woman you educate a village. Women are powerful creatures and we can all learn something from each other.

This well-written book is enlightening and inspiring. I hope you'll read it and join us for our next discussion on Tuesday, June 15, 2010 at 6:30 p.m. at the Florence Branch Library.

Best,

Cynthia

Rule #1 Investors
This month (January 2010), we’ll be discussing Phil Town’s “Rule #1: the simple strategy for successful investing in only 15 minutes a week.”

The author breaks ground by discussing the “myths” of investing, such as “you have to be an expert to manage money.” Then he helps shatter these myths by explaining that Rule #1 investors should live by four straightforward steps:

1. Find a wonderful business.
2. Know what it’s worth as a business
3. Buy it at 50 percent off
4. Repeat until very rich

The point of Town’s book is to teach us how to find a wonderful business that we can “buy” for half of what it’s worth. Sound simple? Well, the way he spells it out, yes, it’s simpler that any regular Jane might think, but it does start to get a little tricky when he introduces formulas to determine what he refers to as “The Big Five” numbers – ROIC (return on investment capital); Sales Growth; EPS (earnings per share); Equity; and Cash. He assures us that with a little practice we can become a whiz at doing the math either with pencil and paper or by using the nifty calculators on his website, ruleoneinvestor.com, or at other online resources.

This book is packed with valuable information which I’m excited to discuss with my Women & Finance book club members. Hope to see you at our meeting next week – 6:30 p.m., Tuesday, Jan. 19, at Florence Branch Library.

Seasoned and Beginner Investors
Last night, at our Women & Finance Book Club meeting, six of us met to discuss two books, "Pay it Down" and "Live Well on Less Than You Think." There are some pretty saavy ladies in our group and one member in particular offered a wealth of information that went beyond the credit and debt issues and shared with us information about buying stock, U.S. Treasury bonds and different types of insurance. For example, she told us that the most sage piece of advice she's gleaned was that buying insurance should be easy to understand. If an insurance agent is trying to sell you whole or universal life insurance (or any kind of insurance) and you're not sure what he or she is talking about, DON'T BUY IT! Term insurance seems to be the most reasonable investment for most people. A book I recommend is "The Insurance Maze: how you can save money on insurance and still get the coverage you need" by Kimberly Lankford.

Our next meeting is Tuesday, Jan. 19 at the Florence Branch Library. We will read the book "Rule #1: the simple strategy for successful investing in only 15 minutes a week!" by Phil Town. Reserve a copy online or at any Omaha Public Library and join us.

Breakfast With Santa
Several hundred children and parents attended Breakfast With Santa, a holiday family event at Florence Branch on December 5. The kids made christmas wreaths, and clever little birdfeeders made from pine cones, crisco, and bird seed. Donuts and beverages were another highlight and Santa was the biggest hit of all! The Florence Branch and the Recreation Center collaborated and co-hosted the event.

Dashing Thru The Snow
Well, maybe not dashing but trudging rather. Blizzard-like conditions over the past two days meant trudging through the snow to get anywhere -- if you were brave enough to go out. If you headed to the library you found the doors locked because all locations were closed for two days. My Publisher computer class on Tuesday evening was therefore cancelled. Watch for the class to be rescheduled.

The Holidays are Here
On a tight budget? Learn to make charming holiday cards on Publisher that will delight your friends and family. Register for a Microsoft Publisher Basics class scheduled for Dec. 3 at Omaha Public Library's Florence Branch. The cards are so easy to make. And Publisher is loaded with greeting card templates that you can customize with your own designs.  You can make cards for Hanukkah, Christmas, Ramadan, Kwanzaa, New Year's, or any celebration you can imagine. Print them at your local print shop, on your home printer, or, if you're printing a small quantity on white paper, you can even print them at the library. Click HERE to register for the class.

Women and Money, Money, Money

THANK YOU to all who were able to attend last night’s discussion, our second meeting, which went even better than I had anticipated. With nine of you in attendance, we discussed Suze Orman’s Women & Money: owning the power to control your destiny and a couple of other books from our reading list, including Jean Chatzky’s Pay it Down: from debt to wealth on $10 a day. Some of you are interested in becoming better at budgeting. Others of you are interested in learning more about how to set up trusts and the proper way to create a will and other important legal documents. Still others are interested in learning more about saving money, managing stocks, and investing wisely for the future. I am thrilled with the participation and the enthusiasm I witnessed last night. And thank you to Lora Mae Frecks for bringing the fabulous poppy seed cake, it was delicious!

READ ABOUT MONEY: One thing Suze Orman suggests women do to develop their money “acumen” is read money and finance related literature. Just once a month, she suggests, pick up a magazine (eg: Money, Newsweek, Kiplinger’s) or a newspaper (eg: The Wall Street Journal) and read any article that piques your interest. These periodicals and others are available at any Omaha Public Library, and you can actually check out the magazines and take them home for two weeks at a time.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS! Next month’s meeting is DECEMBER 15, 6:30 P.M. at Omaha Public Library's Florence Branch, 2920 Bondesson St. (Call 402-444-5299) Our meetings will last no longer than an hour, though you’re free to hang around until we close at 8 p.m. We’ll discuss one or both of these books, the choice is yours: Pay it Down: from debt to wealth on $10 a day by Jean Chatzky, and Live Well on Less Than You Think: guide to achieving your financial success by Fred Brock. Both books are available at OPL, reserve a copy now by calling 444-5299 or visit the online catalog at omahapubliclibrary.org.

Here's an updated BOOKLIST.