Meet Mickey: My New Ride! :)

I mentioned in my last post that we bought a 2002 Volkswagen Beetle to be my daily driver.  Now that we have four drivers in the house, all with school and jobs to get to, we were having a hard time sharing three cars.  We scratched up a bit of money and bought my "dream" car. :)  I've wanted a Beetle since I was a teenager and the older New Beetles were finally in my price range (aka CHEAP). It's definitely a fixer-upper but I've had a blast working on it. It is a 2002, 1.0 liter diesel with 152K miles.  I'm getting about 31 MPG in town and about 34 MPG on the highway! The car was really dirty so Aaron and I have been cleaning it a bit at a time. I've also been giving it some Disney-inspired touches. It's still a work in progress but here's a look at how he's doing:

The front bumper was all scratched up and had a really bad touch up paint job on the passenger side. We found a replacement bumper cover at the Pick & Pull for cheap and it looks so much better now!

The dash bezel was all scratched up and the previous owner spilled glue or something on it - I'm really not sure what it was. Aaron took it off and I sanded it down and painted it red. Under the bow, Aaron drilled two holes and threaded a zip tie through so I have a permanent loop to hold bows. I can change them out as often as I'd like! How cool is that?!

Beetles are known for broken glove box doors. Mine was not just broken, it was completely missing! I made a curtain and used spring-loaded curtain rods to cover where the door would go.

...and of course I made a matching bow! :)

My sister Mamie, made me this awesome Mickey head table runner for Christmas. It fits the back of my trunk cover perfectly! smile emoticon

So many stories, so little time!

Once again, it's been a while since I wrote. A lot has happened since my last post and we've been really, really busy.  For starters, at the end of January I found a new part time job as a help desk technician for a large medical firm here in town.  For a few months I was working there three full days a week, going to college the other two days a week, and working at my church on Saturdays!  Now that school is out (bagged another 4.0 this past semester - yay!) things have settled down. I've also since quit my church job so right now, I am working five days a week, still part time, at my help desk job.  I really like the job and the pay is pretty good, so for now, it's working.

Jake, our first born son, also got a job this spring. He's working at a hamburger joint in town and enjoying the work but not enjoying tax and standard deductions from his paychecks. ;)  Since Jake is working now, we gave him $1,000 to buy a car. We found him a Jeep Grand Cherokee off of Craig's List. It's nothing fancy but it hasn't left him stranded yet!

With four drivers, each of us having jobs, we were hard pressed to share three vehicles so I recently bought my dream car: a Volkswagen Beetle!  I will be posting more about it soon. It's a cosmetic fixer-upper and Aaron and I have been working on it as we have time.  It already looks so much better than it did when I bought it.

Probably the biggest and bestest (yes, I know it's not a real word) news I can share is that we got a new Shih Tzu puppy! Her name is Maizey and she is just the sweetest thing!  She was born on January 31, 2015 and she is four and a half months old.  I'll share a few pictures of her here and I'm sure there will be more to come!  :)

Quick update on our debt snowball:  We are currently at 65% paid off and we are down to three credit cards.  Although progress has slowed a bit with purchasing a puppy and two vehicles, we are not charging and still paying down as we can.  Getting into debt is so easy.  Getting out is so hard!!

Happy New Year!

Hey everyone!  I totally fell off the radar there for awhile as we wrapped up 2014.  Sorry about that! :)  I'm back with an update to our debt journey!  Aaron and I recently sat down and figured out the progress we made this past year and we were amazed!  The Lord has really blessed us and helped us to be diligent towards our debt snowball.  We are happy to report that we are over 60% out of consumer debt!  Woohoo!  I can't tell you how good it feels to be headed in the right direction after living off of our credit cards for so many years.  I always blamed having five kids as my reason to charge basic things like food or gas, thinking one day we would have a windfall, a big promotion, an inheritance, or something  to get us out of the mess.  Now, I'm so grateful that I finally understand how to create a budget and, more importantly, stick to it!  We hope that by this time next year we will be working on baby step three: a fully funded emergency fund.  For now, we will keep plugging along with baby step two - less than 40% to go!!

We decided that we would have what we call a "no spend January" in order to jump start our debt snowball for 2015.  The rules are NO spending for anything other than essentials unless it's money on a gift card.  Well, for Christmas, my extended family just happened to give me gift cards to Hallmark, Hobby Lobby, JoAnn's, Michaels, and Dunkin' Donuts!  I finally put them to good use today when I purchased a Lilly Pulitzer planner and supplies to decorate it.  I am already in LOVE with this planner!  I went with the jumbo size and it has so much room to write in!  I will show photos of the inside and how I'm decorating it, and more importantly, using it to organize my life once I get it put together.  I bought birthday stickers to mark friend's and family member's birthdays, as well as snowflakes to mark debt snowball payments, and extra fun stickers for....well....fun!  Here's a peek at what my gift cards bought:

Free Lunch

"There is no such thing as a free lunch" is a very common quote in  our society today.  Believe it or not, I am sitting in a school cafeteria right this minute....typing away......while my children enjoy a free lunch. Even though we are homeschoolers, our local school district offers a free summer lunch program for kids of all ages.  The food isn't fantastic, but they have their favorites (spaghetti and chili dogs).  I think they enjoy it more for the experience than the flavors.  Once or twice a week they are given apples and most of the time, we take them home and make an apple pie or crisp, so that's fun.

So is their lunch really free?  They show up between 11:00 and 12:15 and are given a tray of food by a very friendly cafeteria staff member.  (I'm not kidding..the ladies that work here are awesome.)  But is it really free?  Not for me, it's not.  We've had to bump up our gas budget to allow for the extra miles on Tina (the Suburban).  It also takes a lot of time out of my day; right in the middle of the day at that.

So why do I do it?  Becuase they like it.  We've never been able to spoil our kids with expensive dance lessons, music lessons, or costly sports programs.  School lunch is something you don't get when you homeschool so they enjoy the little cartons of milk and prepackaged cheese sticks, carrots, and entrees.  

All of that being said, today is the last day for free lunch and I am glad.  ;)

Beans & Rice

If you're familiar with Dave Ramsey and his program, then you are familiar with beans and rice. Sometimes, so eliquently put by Dave as, "Beans and rice, BAaaby!!" :)  The whole idea is to have a "beans and rice" lifestyle while you're in your debt snowball in order to be as gazelle intense towards your debt as you can be.  Everyone knows that beans and rice are the cheapest way to feed your family; and dinners with meat cost significantly more.

A lot of people don't like beans and rice.  My family actually does, except my husband.  So, when he is on night shift, I try to make some sort of bean meal at least once a week.  Beans - other than the carb load that makes them hard to swallow for diabetics like myself - are pretty healthy compared to pastas, mashed potatoes, etc. and I don't mind serving them to my kids at all.  Their favorite beans are pintos and they love some good old fashioned cornbread to go with them --- another cheap componant to dinner.  Pintos and cornbread costs about $3-$4 for the whole meal and there are usually leftovers!!

So why am I blogging about beans??  Glad you asked.  ;)  I got to thinking this morning that the hardest thing about feeding my family beans is remembering to put them in the crock pot.  I know, I know...that sounds silly.  For those of you who cook, you know that when you have dry beans they need hours......HOURS.....to cook.  Some dry beans need to be set out in water the night before so you can cook them the next day.  So what's the problem?  Glad you asked.  ;)  I seem to always forget to set them out.  It really got me thinking that you have to be intentional, even with your beans!!  The key to getting out of debt is to plan...do things "on purpose, on paper" as Dave says....even with your beans!  So my personal challenge for myself this week is to be intentional not just about money and my cash envelope system, but also with my beans.  Cheers!!

Introducing Mopsters, Inc.!

So for those of you who've been following me for a while, you know I'm just a little bit too crazy/high energy for my own good.  In the spring, knowing my piano teaching income would come to a halt, I began looking for a part time job to keep the debt snowball going.  Not having much luck, and finding a $10 per hour cleaning job as my only viable option, I decided that if I were going to clean, I'd really like to make a bit more per hour than that.  That's when it hit me:  I'm good at cleaning.... I enjoy cleaning....  Why not start a cleaning company?  So, I did.  Yep, I'm crazy.  Crazy cleaning lady!!

I found a real estate broker on Carolina Beach willing to give us a chance with three condos she manages as weekly beach rentals.  They're absolutely beautiful and we've been cleaning them for about six weeks now.  The broker we're working with is awesome and has been throwing extra jobs our way, too.  (Thanks, Cindi!!)  So far, Mopsters has replaced all of my piano income, plus some!  I've even hired all of my kids to help me so as they're earning, I can teach them to give, save, and spend.  Not having the extra money to buy them things during the debt snowball, I find it an absolute treasure to be able to give them work so they can buy things for themselves.  It's a win/WIN!!

So here's to dusting and mopping our way to debt freedom!  As the summer winds down and the beach condos are no longer rented every week, I'll need to find some new cleaning gigs, but for now, we are thrilled to be working every weekend.  Debt freedom....here we come!!

Check out the awesome Mopster Monsters my sister created for me. I ordered business cards (below) and car magnets (above). She's creating her own business doing logos so if you even need any, let me know. :)

Introducing Cash, Aaron's New Ride!

After selling Duke and sharing one car, we were on the hunt for a second vehicle. We searched for about a week and found this: 

It's a 1997 Chrysler Sebring Convertible with 135,000 miles and we paid $2,200 for it.....in cash!  I've never paid cash for a car before and let me tell ya, it's fun!  Aaron named the car Cash. :)

We live very close to the beach so having a convertible is especially fun. I must admit, it's really fun to go cruisin' in. We're going to have to keep a eye on our gas envelope. ;)

My husband rocks!

If you listen to Dave Ramsey, you know he HATES car payments.  Once we heard his debt lesson, we totally understood why.  Although both of our cars meet the value ratio he sets (values on combined motors should be no more than 50% of your annual income), we did not think we met the other requirement, which is to have the vehicles paid off within 24 months.

We have (actually had) two cars:  I drive a 2003 Suburban named Tina; Aaron had a 2008 Dodge Charger named Duke.  Ever since I've known him, he's wanted a Dodge Charger.  And not just any Dodge Charger, a black one with a spoiler!  Sixteen months ago, he bought one - a black one, with a spoiler!  Actually, to be specific, he financed one.  {enter scary music here}

In FPU we were taught that the average car payment in America is something like $457.  I thought to myself who in the world would have such a big car payment?  That's crazy!  Then, I realized that we pay $130 every two weeks on Tina and $97 every two weeks on Duke.  Yeah, do some quick math on that and guess what?  I'm around the national average.  Sure, it's on two cars, but who cares?  That's a lot of money going down the drain on vehicles that are plummeting in value.  Not smart.

Because of grasping that lesson, we realized that we needed to sell Duke.  Today we did just that.  I felt so bad for Aaron although he seemed to take it really well.  I told him how awesome I thought it was for him to put his family first and sell his dream car.  Then, I sent my mom a text to tell her he had sold it and we had paid if off.  She responed with, "AWESOME!! I'M SO PROUD OF HIM!!" I showed him the text and he just grinned ear-to-ear.  I hope he knows just how awesome he is.  I think I'll bake him his favorite pound cake as a thank you.

Now the search is on to find him something different to drive.  I promised him that if we found an old lady car, he could drive Tina to work from now on.  :)  For now, we are sharing one car until we can find something dependable for him.  Yet another adventure in our journey to financial freedom...

Here's Duke. We will miss him!

We no longer OWE Lowes!

Thanks to the yard sale on Saturday, plus a side job at Mawmaw's house (raking, raking, and more raking) we were able to knock off the barn debt on Sunday.  We were so excited about paying it off.  Our favorite cashier, Jackie, has taken our last few payments.  She is also doing the Dave Ramsey plan so she didn't mind our jars of change one bit.  :)  After I told her we were making our final payment, she said we had to come back to see her and update her on our progress.  I assured her I would be back in but never using my Lowes credit card again! :)

Progress on the Barn!

I'm so excited about Aaron's new barn!  I've talked about it before, but I wanted to share a new photo of our progress.  We were able to install the front doors and it is starting to look finished.  We still need to work on a few things, but I just love the progress!

The barn debt (to Lowes Home Improvement's Consumer Credit) is our target debt right now.  We've also made a lot of progress on it!  When we started our debt snowball that account balance was $3,735.83.  Today we made yet another payment and the balance fell to $934.26!  We've made six payments in the last two weeks!  It's fun going over there with Aaron, hand & hand, and making payments on the barn.  :-)

When we first moved here to Wilmington, I worked at Lowes as a part time cashier.  I especially loved working in the Lawn & Garden Department.  Last week when Aaron and I went in to make a payment, my old supervisor checked us out.  He told me they were hiring and he encouraged me to re-apply.  I guess they're really busy and he doesn't have enough help.  I told him I'd think about it.  I did and decided to apply.  I haven't heard anything about my application but today when we went in to make our payment, he was there again.  He immediately said, "I've got a register out in Lawn & Garden waiting for you!"  I told him I applied but hadn't heard anything.  He said he was going to talk to the hiring manager and I guess he did.  By the time I got home, I had a message from her.

I'm not sure it'll work out or not because I am only available three days a week, however I've decided if they offer a position to me, I will take it.  :)  I'll keep ya posted!

Refinancing!

Yet another step in the Dave Ramsey process is looking at your current mortgage.  Fortunately, we are well within the 25% limit of what he recommends so we aren't even considering selling our home.  (Your house payment shouldn't be more than 25% of your monthly take home pay.) 

Currently, we are almost 7 years into our 30 year mortgage at a 6.125% interest rate.  That was a very good rate 7 years ago, but now is quite high.  We are refinancing at 3.75% and taking a 15 year fixed which will increase our payment by only about $40 a month.  It's amazing to think that we will shave 8 years off of our mortgage by just refinancing to a lower rate!

Refinancing is not for the faint of heart though!  It's been a long process and even though we're looking at closing in one week, there is still work to be done. 

Our house did not quite appraise for what we had hoped (it was about $10K lower) however, we were happy to find out that we're not "underwater" on it.  ("Underwater" meaning we owe more than it's worth.) 

It costs about $2,500 to close a new mortgage and we are trying to decide just how much of that we want to pay out-of-pocket so we're not borrowing as much over the 15 year period.  It's hard to decide whether to plop down cash or keep it to put toward the debt snowball.  I think the hardest thing is finding time where Aaron and I are available to have an indepth conversation about what we want to do!  It just seems that we are both working non-stop these days.  I guess that's the power of gazelle intensity.  :)

It's Raining, It's Pouring, the Old Man is Snoring!

When Aaron and I began working on our budget back in November, my mom told me that once I had my emergency fund it place to get ready - it was going to rain.  I thought to myself, surely not...the baby emergency fund is supposed to be my murphy-proofing!  Boy oh boy was I wrong!  As always, my mom was right. :)

Since getting that fund together, we have had to tap into it three or four times.  The next time, I'm afraid, is going to be a DOOSEY!  Back in September we got a letter from our county saying that the ditch that runs across our side yard needed to be cleaned out.  We had sixty days to clean it. 

The kids and I worked tirelessly to get the ditch emptied out.  We raked out all of the leaves and picked up any trash we could find.  I called the man in charge and left a message telling him the work was done.  He in turn told me he'd be in my neighborhood soon and would let me know if we did enough.  I never heard from him.

Two days ago (on my anniversary, no less) we got a letter from the county attorney saying we did not complete the work and if it wasn't completed in twenty days, they would hire a contractor to do the work and slap a lien on our house.  I contacted the guy and he said he'd come out today to meet with me about it.

It turns out, we have about two dozen trees that we have to cut down along with a ton of smaller bushes and other vegetation.  The county engineer said it'll cost a couple thousand dollars to hire the work done.  Instant stress.  :(

I'm hoping Aaron will get on board and do the work before they hire a contractor.  I hate to bug him, but it's just work that I can't do. 

I tend to stress out about these kinds of things so I'm trying not to.  Wish me luck...  ;)

Update!  Update!  Update!
I realized I never finished and published this post, so I thought I'd go ahead, but I'm happy that I can give a positive update to it!

Aaron plugged in BIG TIME and cut all of the trees down in less than a week.  Our awesome friend from church, Teresa, helped us with the whole project.  We have a ton of firewood stacked up for the upcoming bonfire seasons....okay we probably have three or four year's worth....and a cleaned out ditch.

I handed the dealings over to Aaron and he has dealt with the county engineer since I met with him and was upset by what all we had to do.  Aaron has been awesome, not just with the work, but with following up with the man.

It turns out the house on the other side of the ditch is bank owned and the bank has completely ignored the county's request to clean the ditch out.  The engineer came and looked at our work and he told Aaron he was signing off on our part of the work!  This means that when the contractor comes out next week, the lien will be put on the other house, not ours.  Yay!!

"The quickest way to building wealth is having no payments." -Dave Ramsey

It's Saturday morning and Aaron is working all weekend so I stayed in bed a little longer listening to Dave Ramsey's podcast.  I especially liked this quote from the show:  "The quickest way to building wealth is having no payments."  This is ringing especially true for me lately as I've had a couple older people "poo poo" me for having consumer debt.  Of course, they think the mortgage is fine, but "they never use credit cards and if they did, they'd pay them off the very next month."  Yeah, yeah.  You're cooler than me. 

I've learned that the very next question to ask when someone talks down to me because I have credit card debt is to ask about their savings.  Guess what?  I've yet to find anyone with a "pile of money" as Dave likes to call it. 

I'm realizing that even though I thought this program was about getting out of debt, it's not.  That's just one step along the way.  You have to clean up your mess so the money you earn has your name on it, not Bank of America's, Chase, Discover, etc.  Once the debt is clear, all of that money you were paying to them, you can now pay to yourself.  (After giving, of course.) 

Right now, my minimum payments on my credit cards and cars is almost a thousand dollars a month.  $1,000!  If I didn't have those payment going out, I could invest that money, and within very little time, have a BIG pile of money.

To those who don't have credit card debt, car payments, and even student loans (fortunately I don't have this one, but a lot of folks do)....kudos to you!  I mean, really!  I'm impressed.  I wish I could say the same thing.  But I've learned that's not the whole battle...by ANY means.  The whole idea of paying off the debt is to get it out of the way so you can build wealth, live and give like no one else.

I'm no longer going to feel bad about my consumer debt.  And I'm not going to let people poo poo me.  When you know better, you do better.  Now I know better and we are doing better. 

I totalled up some nerdy figures and since November, we have paid off 5% of our TOTAL debt...mortgage included!  We've also paid off over 15% of our credit card debt!

Our target debt right now is Lowe's Consumer Credit Card and we used this card last fall to buy materials to build a barn for Aaron.  We started with a balance of $3,735.83 and we now owe a flat $2,300 - that's over 38% paid!  I was hoping to have it paid off by Aaron's birthday (April 15th) but we've had some emergencies we've had to cash flow, so I'm not sure we'll be able to.  I've been thinking of some things to sell to get the balance down quicker but the next round of cuts will hurt.  ;) 

Bye Bye Bank of America Visa!

Thanks to a sore shoulder from our accident in December, I received a settlement from the other guy's insurance company. We were able to pay off our Bank of America Visa with it - two months ahead of schedule!  Aaron and I are SO excited!  The first few debts we paid off were rather small. I think QVC was around $40, Old Navy was around $80 and our dentist bill was just over $200. We were able to knock those out fairly quickly but we had to really work at the BoA bill. It was over $3,100 when we began our debt snowball!  Having that first big one gone feels good!  We had it paid down about 1/3 to $2034 when I got the settlement, which wasn't much more than that amount. 

There was no question on what to do with the money. Jake (my oldest son) asked me what I would have done with that money had I not been following Dave Ramsey's plan. I told him I'd probably buy the materials needed to reroof our house and finish fencing in our backyard. The rest, I'd spend at Hobby Lobby, of course. ;)

We don't really need a new roof - I just don't like the roof we have. (I know....vanity, vanity!) Half of my little ranch-style house is shingled. The front half has a red rolled fiberglass roofing product that is downright ugly. Yes, you understood correctly....only half of the roof is covered in the red. It's terrible. Seriously. I asked Aaron if we could just take off the red stuff so the whole thing was shingled. He explained that we can't do that because it is screwed down and if we take it off, those holes will leak. Since the roof doesn't currently leak, it is not high on Aaron's priority list to re-do. I will have to wait . . . unless it starts leaking.

Seriously, it's kind of funny to think how differently I feel about money and how my thought process has changed. Whenever I come into money, my first thought is to put it on debt. Whenever I get an unexpected bill, my first thought is Oh no!  This will slow down my debt snowball! 

Who am I and where did the old me go? :)

Blow Money aka Pocket Money

If you follow Dave Ramsey, you know there is a budget line called blow money.  Some folks call it pocket money, others call it his & hers money.  The idea is that you can spend your blow money on whatever you'd like without busting your budget.  Dave advises that you take your blow money out in cash rather than use a debit card.

When we first created our budget, I wanted blow money.  Aaron did not want us to take any; he wanted it all to go to the debt.  I wanted to take out $20 per pay period to split, which would have given us each $10 every two weeks.  After realizing that if I had blow money, I would definitely spend it, and after crunching the numbers ($20 x 26 pay periods) I realized that was a lot of money that could go to paying down debt and I changed my mind.

Last night at our third FPU class the topic of blow money came up.  Our coordinator (who is my dad) asked if anyone was not allowing for blow money in their budget.  Aaron and I were the only ones!  It started quite a big discussion and everyone seemed to be of the mindset that we should take blow money.  No one really said anything to convince me to take it, but I am open to the idea if Aaron is.  For now, I think we will continue to leave that budget line at zero and have every dollar go to the debt snowball.  I will be so glad when the last credit card is paid! :)

Tax Trouble...Double Trouble!

So I've been working on our taxes and I am a bit disappointed this year.  Typically, we don't usually owe taxes so anything we've paid in over the prior year, we get back in a return.  Furthermore, because of the Earned Income Credit and the Child Tax Credit, we get more back than what we paid in.  It appears that is the case with the Federal taxes, however the NC state taxes has become a thorn in my side.  :/

Last year on my 2012 state return, I took a credit called the Credit for Children with Disabilities.  It is a credit designed to offset education costs for children with special needs.  I researched it and found that Brady was a great candidate for the credit.  He has cerebral palsy (diagoned at 10 months old) and, as a result, he also has severe dyslexia.  He has always been homeschooled but was tested by a school psychologist a couple of years ago so I had all of the paperwork to prove his disability.  I listed all of our homeschool expenses as well as his private reading tutor's charges and took the credit. 

This past December, I was audited on that specific credit.  I received a letter asking for additional information on Brady's disability and proof of expenses.  I promptly responded with all the required information and heard back just last week that we were not eligible to take the credit.  After talking with the auditor, I was told that the credit is only designed for children who have been in public school for at least two semesters and then pulled out because the public school was not able to service the child.  (The way the credit is written is not very clear and it was an oversight error on my part.)  As a result:  I owe the state $599.12 in taxes from the 2012 tax year.  Agh!!

Because I thought we would take the credit again in our 2013 taxes, I didn't ask Aaron to adjust our W4, which is the paycheck withholding form.  Not enough taxes were withheld, so, for the 2013 tax year, I owe the state of North Carolina over $1,000.  Combined, I have to pay in more than $1,600!  Double agh!!

Our plan is to try to cash flow the $599 within the next month.  Next, we will e-file our Federal return and holdout the amount we owe the state, then plop the remainder of the Federal refund on our debt.  We are hopeful that by the time we receive it, we will be able to completely wipe out the Bank of America Visa, which is our target debt right now.  We are sending anything and everything we can to that Visa and it's balance is just over $2,000.  I'm hoping next paycheck we can get it down to where the return will wipe it out.  If not, it'll be close!

I can't help but think that if I had gotten a surprise $600 bill this time last year, I would have cried.  I literally couldn't handle the extra stress in our finances.  This year, as much as it annoyed me, I took it with ease.  There is something about having a handle on your finances, and having an ememgency fund, that just makes dealing with surprises easier.  I'm so thankful for FPU, Dave Ramsey and his ministry.  I'm also thankful the Lord directed me to him and his program!

Shouldering the Debt

Well, I received some good news yesterday afternoon about the car accident we were in.  The other guy's insurance company is going to reimburse me for the copays I paid out to my doctor for my shoulder injury but - here's the good part - they also insist on paying me something for my "pain and suffering"!  From what I understand, the whole idea is to pay me something so that I won't come back and sue them for major damages later.  I'm not really the type to sue (I've been sued before - and cleared - however, it was no fun to go through.) so I wasn't even thinking about the possibility.  They are offering me $2,500 plus my $60 copays and a $500 'bonus' in case I need any other treatments for a total of $3,060.

If the Federal tax return pays off our target debt (currently Bank of America Visa), the next one on the chopping block is $3,600 to Lowes Home Improvement which is Aaron's barn materials.  That card is on an 18 month special 0% financing plan, however it is our next smallest debt and must die. 

I think it's kind of ironic that my shoulder pain will almost completely pay off Aaron's barn, which is coming along nicely I might add.  :) 

Once the barn is finished, I get the shed (which is attached to The Chick Inn) all to myself, so I am profiting from the barn as well.  I can't wait to clean the shed out and set up a cute space for me and the chickens!  My favorite part of the shed is that there is a window to the coop from inside the shed so I can just open the window and have feathered friends join me inside.  :)  I'm going to paint it up cute and add a fabric skirt to the workbench so I can hide uglies behind it.  I've got big plans for that little shed!  (I've even dreamed of making it a sewing studio.  LOL!  It's 8 feet by 8 feet! That would be one tiny sewing space.....but I'd take it!)  :)

Here's a picture of the barn in progress. Kip has been a great helper with the construction process. He is about fearless on the roof which makes this mama hen a nervous Nelly!  :)

Two decades of (mostly) wedded bliss! :)

Today is my 20th wedding anniversary!  Yep, I think I finally hit the "old married lady" status...at least to my kids I did.  :)

Aaron and I have been somewhat struggling on just how to celebrate our 20th.  We've always said that we would celebrate it together in Disney World...our special spot.  We spent our honeymoon in Disney and we were also there on our 10th anniversary.  Of course we've taken the kids other times, but we like to spend time together there by ourselves too. 

Since learning about Dave Ramsey, we quickly decided that a Disney trip was out of the question for now.  We strongly feel the urge to get out of debt as quickly as possible.  So much so, we were torn over whether to even go to dinner or not.  We had set aside $20 for a meal out and we were planning on using a theater gift card to go see a movie together.  We were both feeling like the $20 should go to the debt snowball so the plan was to pack a picnic and go see a movie for zero dollars out of pocket.

I teach piano on Wednesdays plus we have Financial Peace University on Wednesdays nights, so we had set aside tomorrow for our anniversary celebration day.  Well.....Aaron picked up overtime for tomorrow.  (Side note:  they weren't going to give any OT this month at all because of some schedule changes, so when he saw the opportunity, he jumped on it.)  He is scheduled to work from 5:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and has to work early the next day, so really there isn't enough time to work in a movie date.

So then we decided to celebrate this morning.  We were going to have breakfast together and then go make a payment on our debt snowball.  We also thought about going to the beach and doing some budgeting forms together that are on our to-do list.  Well, he came home last night with good/bad news......

The good news:  he was asked to attend a staff meeting which is quite an honor from what he was told.  The bad news:  the staff meeting is this morning.  Doh!

So, once again, our plans were thwarted.  I got up early this morning and made him French toast for breakfast.  We were able to hang out for a little while before he left at 8:30.  He may be home in time to sneak in a picnic lunch but I'm not holding my breath.  ;) 

I could be upset and have thoughts like after twenty years of marriage, this is what I get....nothing  -or- I can't believe he took overtime on our special day -or some other nonsense.  But the fact of the matter is that I love that he is digging in and working as hard as he can to lift us out of debt.  I'm sure he doesn't want to spend extra days in the jail, but he is willing so that we can be debt free.  I've got a great partner in life and I am so thankful for him!

We exchanged gifts this morning.  I had made Aaron two pound cakes yesterday while he was at work.  I gave them to him and told him that he didn't have to share - a rare thing in this house of kids & teens!  He gave me a very sweet handwritten card with a Disney IOU.  :) 

This whole situation reminds me of how marriages, as much as we like to think they are, are not the fairy tales we read about in books.  Don't get me wrong, I love a good Disney princess story, but true love - the kind that takes patience, understanding, forgiveness, patience, work, dedication and did I mention patience? - is the true fairy tale.  Marriages that last have fun times, but also not-so-fun times, and they all have one thing in common:  commitment.  Marriages that work aren't always glamorous, in fact they rarely are!  But they are formed by two people who love each other, and beyond that love, are committed to staying together in good times and in bad, for richer or poorer, til death.  I love that Aaron and I have twenty years of commitment and love together....that's my favorite fairy tale of all!  <3 p="">

Coming Clean

Since we've started Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace program, I have not shared with anyone how much debt we actually have.  I think the main reason is that I'm embarrassed about it.  I've been trying to decide if it would be beneficial for me to share the numbers, or if it really doesn't matter.  I see a lot of blogs online of folks who vow to get out of debt and list all of their debt amounts, just to see them go up over time, or the blogging falls apart because they're just not able to conquer the debt.  I wonder if that is becuase they've shared their numbers, or becuase of something else.

When I was losing all my weight, I was very open about my weight.  I had a lot of folks cheering me on and I felt by being honest about my numbers, I was in a way cheering them on, too.  I have NO problem telling people what I weigh (166) or even what I did way (212) when I started.  But ask me how much debt I have and I cringe at the thought of telling anyone.

I really don't know if I have much of a blog following at this point, so a lot of times, I feel like I'm talking to myself....almost writing a diary.  If you follow my blog, I'd love to hear from you.  Do you think I should share my numbers?  Would it make my story easier to follow; harder to follow?  Any input would be great.  Thanks!

Free Baby Mermaid Seashell Bra Pattern

Since we're in the middle of a couple snow days, I decided to revisit my baby mermaid pattern. This time, I made the mermaid tail two colors. I also worked up a pattern for a seashell top. 

Here' said close up of the top:

Here's the pattern.  (I used Hobby Lobby's I Love This Cotton for this set as well.) Please let me know if you have any questions or notice any errors. I did find a couple on my mermaid tail pattern so those have been fixed. :)

Seashell Bra

With H hook, chain 5, turn

Change to G hook

Row 1: sc 4 across, ch 1, turn

Row 2: 2sc in first st, 1 sc in next 2 sts, 2 sc in last st, chain 1, turn (6)

Row 3: 2sc in first st, 1 sc in next 4 sts, 2 sc in next, ch 1, turn (8)

Row 4: 2 sc in first st, 1 sc in next 6 sts, 2 sc in last, ch 1, turn (10)

Row 5: 1 sc in each st across, ch 1, turn (10)

Row 6: 2 sc in first st, 1 sc in next 8 sts, 2 sc in last st, ch 1, turn (12)

Row 7: 2 sc in first st, 1 sc in next 10 sts, 2 sc in last st, ch 1, turn (14)

Last row, scallop: sk first st, *5 DC in next stitch, skip next st, sc in next* repeat twice across, chain 1, fasten off leaving several inches to sew with. 

For connector piece, using H hook, ch 7, turn

Change to G hook

Row 1: sc in 2nd ch from hook, and in each st across, ch 1, turn (6)

Row 2: sc in each st across, ch 1, turn (6)

Row 3: sc in each st across, ch 1, fasten off leaving several inches to sew with. 

With F hook, make a chain of 50 for each side tie. Leave long tails for sewing.

Sew shells together with connector piece; sew side ties on either side. Weave in ends.