I'm a moron newbie -- that's why I'm attempting to move it on a Sunday.
In this one-time experience of rolling over to Vanguard it happened quickly. It's in a rollover IRA brokerage account. Is that a cash account? Sorry for sounding like such an idiot. My husband is a retired electrician. His union did all the investing for him. I have a couple of 401 Ks. I recently received a substantial legal settlement that I deposited in Vanguard. I put that in CDs temporarily until I learn more. I'm 63YO and cutting back working as a nurse to 2 days a week soon. I want to be conservative. I just bought a $10,000 iBond with cash in our savings and will probably buy another one in my husband's name once one of the CDs matures. With this 401K money, I was thinking of putting at least 75% in Vanguard Inflation Protected bonds, VIPSX, 20% in Vanguard S&P 500 etf (VOO) and 5% in Vanguard S&P total international. Once my work hours are cut back more, I will work on our budget and reallocate if need be. I want all essential needs in something very conservative. Does this sound like a good idea?
All of this is my own opinion.
The I-bond purchase is great, Yes your husband can buy one. And you can each gift $10K to each other -leaving it in the gift box and it earns the fantastic interest while sitting there. That would be a total of $40K. The gifts do take up next year's $10K allotment or whatever year you actually "give" them.
Back to the Rollover IRA, You will have the ability to buy funds or ETF's , funds are actually purchased at the end of the day after you have ordered them sometime during the day.
ETF's are like stock and they trade immediately.
This is why I said not to put orders in on the weekend as you have no idea what price an ETF will be on Monday and could drastically overpay.
If you do buy an ETF/Stock, be sure it's a LIMIT order and only trade during the day.
Funds certainly will be safer to buy at first.
Your plan sounds very conservative (too conservative unless you have millions). Remember, this is a long term thing 30-35 years. Historically stocks have been much more rewarding than interest bearing CD's and bonds, especially as interest rates have nowhere to go but up as this will lower the value of the bonds.
Instead of the etf VOO, Vanguard has the admiral fund VFIAX , the difference in the rate of .03 vs 0.04 is basically nothing it's so small. The advantage is the fund is easier and safer to buy. In an IRA, the advantages of an ETF for taxes doesn't matter.
Also consider VTSAX which is like the etf VTI, it's similar to VOO but has 8x more companies in it, (maybe more diversified)