Step 1: Get Organized

Since currently my filing system for our financial state has been a big ol' cardboard box where I have just been dumping things the first thing I need to do is get honest about our finances.  I grabbed the box and drug it over to the paper shredder and went to town shredding anything old, out dated or that I knew had been paid off.

I was left with a small pile. Okay I can breathe now.  Not so bad!  I know each paper has a digit on it that adds up to a much much bigger number, but having less paper clutter has helped calm my nerves.  I feel a little more like this is manageable.

Next I took a notebook to designate as our family financial notebook.  I got the idea from another blog writer that follows Dave Ramsey, Dittle Dattle.  Now I am a nerd and a perfectionist and I could get all hog wild and spend hours creating a major work of art with this financial notebook, but the point is simplicity.  I want to create a notebook that works, that is easy and that I won't spend hours on developing only to abandon the thing once I'm done because it doesn't work in real life.  Frustrated Perfectionists are all nodding their heads in total sympathy for me right now.  Getting out of this hole means changing behaviors!

So here I am a stack of bills and a notebook....now what?  I'm going to step away for bit while I work up the courage to add up the total....

Mind On My Money

I knew this day was coming and I was dreading it.  At some point I was going to have to prepare myself to face the fact that we have been running on empty for a while financially and have finally run out of gas.  We're sitting on the side of the highway of life with an empty gas tank and a dead battery to boot.

Job loss, failed business, unemployment, lay off have really put us behind and I seriously feel like we're in a deep dark hole.  We ran through every bit of savings and retirement that we had.  If fact we haven't been climbing out of our hole, we have been just sitting in it slowly sinking and ignoring the fact that muck had now risen to our eyeballs.  So today I took the first step and reactivated an old account that I had at Total Money Makeover.  I had started the Dave Ramsey program almost a year ago exactly and just as we had finished reading the books and understanding the program all heck broke.  While we adopted some general ideas of the program it never really took hold for us.  We couldn't focus on getting ahead we were just trying to put one foot in front of the other and hang on for dear life.

So, here we are and to be honest I don't know where here is exactly.  I've been so afraid to look at how far and how bad things have gotten that I have no idea how deep is deep.  Today, spurred on by some encouragement of some friendly sympathetic fellow hole dwellers as well as some reformed ones I took the very first step in getting myself out of this quagmire.

I decided today that as much as I can help it I never will be in the place ever again!  Things change today.

The Nerd

I'm the Saver in our marriage.  I'm also the nerd  (see Dave Ramsey for a full explanation).  Sometimes I feel like my Hubby and I are polar opposites when it comes to finances and our communication about said topic is terrible (working on that).  That being said, I am a budget maven.  Nothing gets me more excited than a well planned excel sheet complete with bar graphs.  I could spend hours "tweaking" the budget just to see the possible outcomes. My Hubby is a Fly by the Seat of Your Pants kind of guy.  He spends impulsively, rarely looks at the actual number in the account and figures as long as there is money in there then he can buy freely.

This is the cause of many arguments.  Many.  


I see living on a budget two ways.  One, I love the thrill of the game of beating the budget.  Secondly, it's a comfort for me to spend money knowing that I'm not going to be in trouble a few weeks from now when the light bill comes in.  If I have money for the light bill I can just pay it and that gives me freedom to feel good about buying a new pair of shoes.  Being on a budget teaches patience.  I really want a certain bedspread from Target, I have been waiting for it to go on sale, I keep checking circulars and checking the price whenever I do go into the store.  I could buy it full price, but I KNOW it's going to go on sale which will allow me to put the extra money towards some other area in the budget, there is nothing wrong with my bedding now so I will continue to wait.  Living on a budget also helps develop creativity.  You really start thinking outside of the box when you want something you can't afford.  It fosters a whole other lifestyle.  The idea of sustainability, growing your own food, living off of less, re-purposing items all are developed from having to learn to live within your means.  I haven't thrown away a jelly or pickle jar in over 6 months.  They get washed the label peeled and filled with dried beans, cleaning supplies, pasta, art supplies, pens you name it!  Thrift stores become your friend!  A bucket of paint, staple gun and a super glue can do wonders.


Are you the Saver or the Spender in your family?


Love,
Brandi