We're in the BLACK... for a couple of days

Wow! It has been a challenging month! Finally "manning" up and looking at our budget and where we are financially has been difficult. 

We have spent a lot of money this month on bank fees. Our bank charges $5/day for overdraft - and unfortunately, we have been in it a lot this month. It has taught us, though, how important it is to try and stay where we are.

How have we climbed out? As I said using our overdraft a bit, paying minimums on credit cards, buying minimal groceries, keeping up on our bills, and eating what food is already in the house. If you are struggling, I challenge you: look in your freezer and cupboards. What is already there? Do you have leftovers that you have stored away for a "rainy" day? This is the time to use them. If you are not making a list when you buy groceries... DO IT!  That will save you from buying more than you need. Those are a couple of things that we did and it has definitely helped a lot.

We won't be completely out of the red for a few days but it is definitely looking brighter!

Impossible... Or Not!

I was reading today on my friend Stephanie Warnock's blog - www.faithhasnolimit.blogspot.com- and she has a post about contentment.

I started to journal  about that and I ended up thinking about how it feels impossible for us to be out of debt. That lead me to the story of Mary and Gabriel in Luke 1:37. That verse reminds me that nothing is impossible with God - even our finances.

You see, I want everything NOW. I hate the word process! I don't want this to be a process, I want it to be instant. I want instant gratification - just like when I spent the money. That is not how this works though. It is a process. It is learning discipline - another word I do not like. 

We will go through this though. We will get through it. We will be debt free... Someday.

Here's to the process... Sigh!

Slacking Off

It has been a very long time since I have written anything on our blog. I have thought of it many times but it has not happened. So what's going on, you might ask...

Budgeting is hard work and it SUCKS at times. We were just hanging out thinking this budgeting thing was easy. Well it's not. I was thinking "I know this" and my husband admittedly was burying his head in the sand. 

Then I got into two fender benders - both my fault - and we had to rent a car AND pay for the deductibles on our insurance. For all of that, we did not budget and pulled out our MasterCard again. I was also buying a few things online with my Visa. In other words, racking up the credit card debt again. Then we went on vacation - which we did not budget for and put it all on plastic again. 

It seems like we have fallen back into our old patterns. We are now in our overdraft for a few months, temporarily, and we have credit card debt to pay too.

That is very difficult, and a bit depressing, to admit. We were both bound and determined this year was going to be different - and it was for a few months. Then "unexpected" things caught us off guard. I don't know if we should have used our emergency fund for the repairs and then built it back up. We also had an $8000 payroll debt that we had to get a loan out for and pay back - which we have.

It just seems like we are behind the 8-ball again. We have committed to each other that we are going to "meet" once a week to discuss our budget. We have not done that - and that was wrong. If you are in a relationship, discussing your money issues together is vitally important, in my opinion. If you can't discuss your finances with that person then who can you?

So, our new plan is to meet once a week, get back into the "You Need A Budget" and "Dave Ramsey" podcasts and bogs. As they say in the YNAB world, it's time for a Fresh Start.