This weekend we went camping. We decided not to do any outings this summer other than our trip to Silverwood. Hubby's parents are paying for the tickets and helping with the food. My only jobs are to pay for gas and help with food. I've wanted to go to Mar Don's resort which is just a camp ground where we love to fish in the middle of nowhere, but I couldn't wait to FINALLY take the kids! From past years though I know that camping is not cheap. Especially when it includes gas money to go half way across the state with 4 kids two adults and the dog. Oh, and because we're using the SUV, now the husband pointed out that we really *need* a car top carrier because there's just no room for all the camping supplies and cooking materials, food, and clothing, AND us! Ok, we managed to borrow one for our Silverwood trip. I finally gave up the Mar Don's resort trip. It's so hard to let that go, as I've been wanting to do that since I met my husband. But we have Silverwood and that will be enough. Then, my friend posted that they were going camping. It's only overnight - husband won't lose time from work. It's nearby, not so much gas money. We camped on the river - we didn't waste our money on paying for a site. I was pretty proud of ourselves and we had a blast! Husband had to work pretty hard. He was tired from work and we didn't get there until 9 at night! Our friends found a place on the river which was perfect, but it meant hauling all our stuff down a steep bank, over a stream, and then along the river for about 100 yards. Several trips, he hadn't eaten almost all day, was exhausted and it was pretty much dark. I had the baby and was therefore not a lot of help. I had gone to the store and bought hot dogs and buns, stuff for S'mores, chips, pop, beer and gas. I justified all of it. I was proud we had saved so much. We did better than we've ever done before with our money and had a really good time. We had stopped by at my aunt and uncle's and they gave us firewood. Our friends brought their 2 month old and 2 great Danes. We had our 3 month old baby and our lab. The river was cold and shallow, the moon was full and even though we set up late, we could see so clearly! We went to bed late and woke up early. At the end of the day yesterday all of us have bright red faces and even the dog is ready for bed!

This morning I looked at our bank account - actually excited. Yes, I know I bought some items at the store for the trip, but really it wasn't that much. No, we probably didn't need to buy beer. We could have found chocolate for smores at home. I could have saved money on gas if we didn't go. I was pretty shocked to see more than six new entries and over $200 gone. I'd spent money at the store for the trip and for gas. Husband made several small trips to the store and he bought gas too. All things that we'd agreed on, but everything altogether - how did it add up so fast again! I read a couple posts on "being gently led's" blog on their debt story and feel awful. I really, really loved our trip. And I love our gym membership. And I think I'm finally really getting a handle on our food budget. Hey - we've got 6 (well, 5, really, since one's only nursing) hungry mouths to feed. 1500 for gas and food isn't that much?!

Ok, to be fair, we don't spend all that in food. Our gas bill is enormous. It's debilitating. I bought my truck when I was single and decided I could finally splurge. I couldn't, but I felt I could. My husband uses the truck now for work and he needs that truck. It's starting to fall apart, but we tried everything to sell it and our credit wasn't good enough to buy anything financed and there is no way we can buy outright now. Yet we spend $50 in gas every other day to keep it running. In his job, he needs to drive everywhere to help his crew, and the truck just sucks up the gas. Not owning a truck is not an option. Owning this truck...well, we're stuck with it for now. But that's 750 in gas for the truck! That doesn't include my gas cost running our baby to daycare in another city. What if we really had to make some tough choices though? COULD we?

Reading "being gently led" hurt. They had to make some pretty tough sacrifices. Ok, maybe they're not that tough, but they feel really tough. I know I'm a wimp, but I don't want to let go of our gym membership - for Pete's sake, it's our ONLY entertainment! She went to the grocery store with 40 for the week and fed her family of five mac and cheese. Really? Wouldn't that kill me to feed my family (same size family) mac and cheese?

She is debt free now though. How much do I want this? How badly do I want to say "ok" to my children's dreams of lessons and my dream for travel and for the self worth I'd see in my husband's eyes if he was able to afford to finish his degree and work as an engineer like he dreams?

Did I mention that we have $110,000 in debt (a lot of it is student loans for both of us) NOT including the mortgage and his job hours change daily? My job is not secure either.

Did I mention that I haven't been completely honest. We have a terrible old car. It's terrible for real. We have both been pulled over in the car before because it's just so awful. Chevy celebrity, dinged up white, with a black trunk. It's embarrassing! It doesn't fit all 6 of us, only the SUV does. Husband COULD use the SUV and i COULD use the car and we'd just be out of luck for the trips as a family - ever, and we are together a lot. (Is that really reasonable?) We'd have to buy new tires. Oh geez, I just don't think I can do this!

It's curtains, for us!

Today was tough! My sister invited us to go to Willis-Tucker park. Lots of outdoor water play areas, kids had a blast! Husband was off today, sun was out, so fun! We get there and I looked around and...started comparing. All of the sudden - "I want to get my hair done, I wanted to buy clothes, I need to get back into shape...." "Do I REALLY want to forego all this for two years while we work on our debt?" Dumb or not - these were all the dumb ideas running through my head. It was hard to go to the sister's new house where there is so much SPACE! Cute, very trendy hair cut, kids are well dressed, so hard not to get the "I wants..." I want now, not in two years. I don't want to go home to my tiny house, overflowing with stuff. I want space. I want to be at peace with my job. (Dreaded staff member was conveniently present at the park. What a way to spend the day.) I want to be able to buy that cute blouse that trim blonde gal was wearing, or that adorable skirt. Wishing I could buy some really cute clothes for the kids. We really both need to lose weight and we love those protein shakes, but they cost a lot...." Husband and I even fighting this morning - in a hurry to get out of the house and no one took out the lunch meat to defrost. "Whose job is it, anyway?!" (not nice questions to broach - but we simply never fight. Virtually never; we just don't.) and then, when everyone is good and angry, of course the dog has to throw up. All over the curtains. We're supposed to leave for the park at 11:00 to be there in half an hour. We're now an hour late and no one knows how to clean up dog vomit off of the curtains. And no one took out the garbege this morning, since we both overslept.
Coming home, hubby and I were both tired and I was surprisingly grumpy. It was, despite everything, a fun day at the park. However, we both still have a lot to do, and want nothing more than to relax in front of a movie with either some take out or stop in to the local appleby's - or even Olive Garden. We ran the rest of our errands, then came home. Tonight I'm not in the mood to fix dinner, not even with my new e-mealz menu. I sat down and checked email and found that my very sweet friend directed me to her friend's blog - Gently led, who is also trying to work her way out of debt. Reading her story and knowing that my friend was encouraging me to keep going was really the push I needed to get refocused and stay on track. It may not have been on the planned menu, but our frozen pizza and salad (spinach with mandarin oranges, bacon, strawberries and cucumbers) was really very good. (Kids had three helpings!) We made it through another day! Our wallets are intact. Now I need to go kiss my sweet husband, who took out the lunch meat because I forgot. (and I should probably look up how to clean the curtains)

Last time we tried to organize our hosue, we decided we need to have a huge storage space. We have a tiny tiny house, so it's not like we hoard stuff. It's just having such a small house... Anyway, this is what we've been telling ourselves. If we could eliminate this "need," we'd save 1600 a year! So we brought home all the bags of toys for our kids to go through - they have small rooms but the relatives have generous hearts. Too many toys, so it's not fun for a kiddo when he/she can't even get in his/her room with all the stuff. So we stored some of it. I've saved all the baby clothes. We've both saved all of our college books. Extra furniture. Clothes that fit "back when..." We're paying to store our excess. Today was a busy day and now the house really is a wreck. Ug. I'm prepared for this though. I knew it would be a mess for a couple days as we all go through our stuff and decide what we need and what we want to ditch. Not exactly a fun chore. (Ok, it really stinks right now.) But to be able to reclaim our budget, our house, and maybe even take back the garage so the kids can have their playroom back -- that would be pretty worthwhile! (and it really is embarrassing to have to admit we have so much junk that we have a storage unit.)

Day three - not fun. Kids are grumping at each other and I am still trying to GET to my bags to sort through. All with a baby to feed, bathe, lunches to make, arguments to referee, laundry to fold, dinner to plan, bills to pay, job hunting and so much more.

To give them credit though, the girls are doing an excellent job of going through their things. (Will I be able to do half as good a job?) My house is a wreck. Their bags of toys they want to sell or donate or throw away are all over and it doesn't seem like we've accomplished anything. Their room is still a mess and I still have a full storage unit. And no new job. I received a "thanks but no thanks" email today. That hurt. I had hopes for that one. Checked the school email and found out the other one was also a no-go. Not a good day.

A couple weeks ago I talked to my mom about shopping and budgeting. She said "You don't just eat whatever you feel like, you start with a plan, you look at what's on sale and build a plan around that." To make her point, she got out the Sunday paper with we went over what the really good deals were. (I soon learned that just because it's on "sale" - it's not necessarily a "good deal." ...and we have six grocery stores to shop from, and it seems like they all advertise using different quantities and sizes. Husband and I made our list. We checked it twice, we rewrote it based on what we would buy at each store. We got all of the kids ready and off we went! Comparing the number of bottles of water, and the amount in each container, the different units at each location - I think I should have earned a math credit! We did this all day long. At the end of the day, we'd only made it to three stops. (But we learned a LOT!) We'd saved a ton of money, but we'd also overspent our tiny budget. It was now late and the kids were argumentative, and hubby and I were both very grumpy. It would take a lot to get everything home, the baby settled and taken care of, the groceries put away...and the kids and hubby were obviously exhausted and hungry. It would be so much easier to just grab a couple tacos at taco bell on the way home. We'll skip the drinks, nothing special, just tacos... something to quell that hunger. We didn't stop. We went home and my sweet tired husband grilled the pork chops and made the rice while I nursed the baby. The kids were just so relieved to be out of the car and FREE, they forgot to complain about being hungry! K helped set the table, and Z took a shower. Dinner was ready 20 minutes after we got home, and we spent no extra money. This was a major accomplishment for us! The next day I got up feeling like we really could make this work! We could definitely get our food budget under control and therefore make more headway on our debts.

A good friend directed me to the Dave Ramsey site and I looked it over and felt pretty smart that we were already working on the same list of steps in about the same order Dave Ramsey lays out. (We still need to put that grand in the bank though....) From there I found a lot of sites dedicated to getting meals planned and organized. I read more blogs on others who are trying to become financially free. After all this reading I've realized....I have a lot more work to do to get our food budget under control!!!

My mom is the cooking queen. Everyone loves her cooking and quite frankly, she spoils us rotten! We have dinner every Sunday night and she tries to continually outdo herself. It's not a rare event to go out for a restaurant dinner and be disappointed because mom's is simply so much more creative, outstanding, fresher, and of course, MORE of the good stuff! So of course I have some of the same tendencies as my mom. We like to have a stocked house. That's food in the kitchen, pantry, food in the 'fridge, food in the garage 'fridge, and more frozen food in the chest freezer. I buy high quality, healthy food. And lots of it. We don't need the cutest new clothes, we gave up cable years ago, we've skipped a few vacations, rarely ever indulge in things like mochas etc, but we need to eat, right? Ok, so we are trying to get this last obstacle to our budget under control.

I started by trying to just live on what we have in our pantries. I buy milk and eggs at Costco. we go through nearly a loaf of bread a day, and a gallon of milk every two days. At Costco we buy the two gallon containers - times 3 or 4. We buy 5 dozen eggs at a time, and make sure we always have fresh veggies and fruit on hand. Two weeks without going to the grocery store - it wasn't really even a challenge. (We were half way through week two before I told my husband what I was doing. He hadn't noticed!)

I was so proud of the money I'd saved. As of Saturday though we were needing some staples. So, instead of spending a ton of money on whatever looked like good deals - we made our list based on what was on sale in different stores when we were out shopping. (we checked, and cross checked to make sure these were actually good "deals." Not time consuming, not at all. ) But I didn't have a plan for any of this food. We just had food. And a lot of it. Again. I found e-mealz, a site that plans weekly meals based on what's on sale in each store, sends you the recipes and the shopping list. For 4-6 people, we can feed our family for $75 a week for dinners. Granted, the meals don't look that exciting, they're basic and have only a few ingredients, but they are nutritionally balanced, easy, and pretty cheap and someone else did the mental work. Wow! I've got a plan. Now I need to see if my family will eat these meals...

When I found myself alone, pregnant and without a job, it was a pretty scary time. I was working for an outdoor program with high risk youth. I camped outdoors for three weeks at a time, then subbed in between trips and visited friends I had made in college. I am a very goal-oriented person though, and so I sat down and wrote a list to accomplish in five years. I listed the things I wanted for myself. I let myself write down crazy ideas, ideas I knew were not realistic but I wrote them down anyway. With hardly even a place to live (I rented a room) I listed owning a home and a stable job (as a single mom with a brand new baby - uh huh, yeah right! Know that many single mom teachers? I couldn't name even one!) That was only two things. (not that they weren't major - but who writes lists that only have two items on it! Pathetic!) So I added more - getting my masters. Providing for my baby. Ok, what else? I've always wanted to foster parent, so I wrote that down too. (Like I said, it was a crazy list.) I found a full time job teaching, and I realized I couldn't make it without the income from a master's degree. So, in a year I completed my masters - thesis, research and all (it was a very tough year.) Then I bought my home. My child was blessed beyond my wildest dreams with clothes and more clothes from friends and family and the cutest hand-me-downs imaginable! It took a few false starts, but we found the best day care provider - she is second to none and I believe one of the reason my daughter is such a great person - her daycare provider was a wonderful, wonderful mom who taught me so much! I had accomplished everything on my list, except for fostering. I wasn't married though, so how could I do that? I decided that would just have to wait until I was married.... Or not. The more I thought about it -- why? Why do I need to be married to foster? I looked into it and found out that I could foster parent as a single mom. I had saved all the massive amounts of beautiful clothes from my daughter, I had my own home and a good job, so it really was do-able. So I did - for about 5 years, to three sweet babies during that time plus my daughter. My list was completed! After what seemed like forever, (I really didn't believe this would happen) I finally met my husband. We have his two children and my daughter full time. It's a busy household and I couldn't be happier. I wanted a baby and it's taken 2 years, but I have my precious little boy. His smile makes my heart melt everytime I see it. This truly is All I've ever wanted!!! Ok, well, now about that list... I need a new list. We're very happy - except. That darn "except..." We're constantly struggling to pay our bills. These darn bills now define our lives. What we buy, how we spend our time, what we do and our plans for the future. I can't believe how being behind on bills, can effect me and even our marriage. I've been feeling the need to write a list for a while. About six months ago, we made a comittment to a new goal. We want to be completely debt free. Of ALL debt - even mortgate. I decided this before my husband. I talked about it and he agreed. It was a nice idea. He really wasn't buying into it - how could WE be debt free. We have some bad credit, we have jobs that are unpredictable, we can barely make ends meet most months. I told him about the list though. I explained that I know this is possible, because I wrote a crazy list before and I did it. All of it. I know we can do this. I've been working on budgeting now since July of 2008. There have been so many set-backs, that it really has seemed impossible. Husband lost his job. We had to go to court over custody. Medical bills. We got married - big expense. Husband got his job back while we were trying to plan the wedding! Then lost it again - not needed during the slow season. He took on other jobs, at minimum wage, unstable hours... So, so frustrating and scary. We both have brought debt into our lives and into our marriage. At one point, we simply couldn't pay all our bills every month. I had to pick and choose whom to pay. (I thought I was being smart and as responsible as I could be - I paid what I could - a little bit to everyone, to show each creditor that I was making payments, even if it wasn't the full amount. That backfired - I just got late charges and slapped with bad credit for not making payments at all, since if we didn't pay the required minimum, it wasn't counting as making a payment.) I can't express the stomach churning stress, the tense-ness I felt in my arms not being able to take care of what we needed to be taken care of. We have made some progress paying off a lot of small debts and are getting our budget under control. Husband is working full time (SO THANKFUL for this blessing!!!) But that could change again, and now my job is unstable. It is no longer a desperate wish, but an absolute necessity for the safety of our family to be financially stable. Specifically, we need to minimize our debt so that if our jobs change again (very possible) we'll be able to handle it financially. We're making progress, but can we do better?