No TV: Hmm - yeah, I'm completely hooked on One Tree Hill and the OC. Every weekday. Naptime starts at 1:00 sharp now. I've never been one to watch 'traditional' soaps, but I guess that's what these are. Maybe I'll be able to break the habit when we can leave the house again, on a regular basis (like when it gets above freezing). But for now, I'm just LOVING these shows.
Ok - so that one is bad but the rest are pretty good.
No Pop: It's officially been over a month since my last Dr. Pepper. That's the good part. The bad part is that the scale still does not reflect this fact, so each day I am inching closer to cracking open a can. (There's still 2 in the basement) I won't feel bad about it either.
Getting organized: Well, high five us on this one! We have FINALLY redone our budget for this first time in FOREVER.
Chad and I have been listening to the CD series from Financial Peace University in the evenings as well as reading the book Financial Peace Revisited [both by Dave Ramsey]. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT!! Seriously - I want to communicate how important these lessons in managing money are. I think they should be teaching FPU in Highschools. I want to encourage, implore and BEG everyone I know to read this stuff. A few points I want to make:
- I started adult life thinking that debt was a NECESSARY evil. "You'll always have a car payment" was something I thought was true. I feel like this is how a LOT of people I know are living. I was WRONG!
- As foolish as it makes me feel to say it, I never considered SAVING and PAYING CASH for anything, once I was 16. Having a car loan and a debit card sealed the deal. The debt began.
- We've never been wildly out of control with debt. We have never had student loans, and we live in a modest house. But we still haven't been preparing for the future like we should. And we have had our share of fights about money. I think we are where MANY people our age are at.
- This Book and the studies that accompany it are a Crash course in how to WISELY handle your money, to build financial stability for the future. It's so important, and yet I avoided it for so long (mainly because it was uncomfortable and I didn't have a good understanding of it.)
- I will be giving this book/series to EVERYONE in my family starting with my 18 year old, high school senior sister, who has her first job (like outside of working in the family business). I vow to start that girl out RIGHT when it comes to handling money! If she implemented the principals in the book about investing (not risky stuff, safe stuff) NOW she could have millions when she retires. All because she's starting EARLY.
So if you are at all curious about this book or what we've learned feel free to ask - I would be happy to share. Mind you, we're only on lesson 4 of 13!! Imagine how I'll be at the end! I tell you what- having the money organized feels the BEST.
Come back tomorrow for Not me! Monday. (I'll be writing it tonight while the rest of the US watches the Steelers beat the Cards.)
3 comments:
We teach FPU at our church. It has changed many families including our own. I did not want to go to the envelope system and fought Paul on it, however, we ahve been doing it for about 7 months now and WOW the freedom of knowing you have money to eat out or knowing you can truly afford new shoes is so amazing. Preach it sistah = )
wow i really need to look into this. you are not the first person to tell me about FPU.
Time to get serious
todd is a HUGE fan of dave ramsey, and it has been such a blessing in my life. i also always thought that debt was pretty much inevitable, but todd has taught me so much about living within our means, and i LOVE the feeling of being totally debt-free AND completely confident with what we've saved. seriously, it's so strange to not feel anxious AT ALL about our finances - strange, but nice!
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