Jen’s mother

June gloom. I have an admission. We had June gloom. The bills are current. The budget is not. I may have shared that Jen’s mother had been ill for several months. Backing up a bit, we moved in to care for her mother nine years ago when Jen’s father passed away. Her mother had hip replacement surgery a year or more before her husband died. She had been unable to walk up the stairs of her two story home for a couple of years. Jennifer and I were in a small 2-bedroom condo across town raising a toddler. Soon after Jen’s father passed away, we moved in with her mother. We cared for her. She cared for us. Earlier this month on her 78th birthday, Jen’s mother passed away after a long slow battle of several different ailments including dementia. Although she had been in managed care facilities since October 2007, we miss her.

Losing it

Gloom. Our minds were busy. Hearts were and still are heavy. We crept back to losing some steam of the debt end journey. Forgotten were the staples that kept us on course. An example would be as Dave Ramsey would say, “On baby-step #1, the only time that you should see the inside of a restaurant, is if you work in one.” We ate out a bit. Comfort food and all. Our church family really stepped up and were a great source of encouragement. We received MANY cards, telephone calls, and dinner delivered to the house. We had just lost it.

Summer savings

The gloom less news was that we met the goal of saving three months of salary for Jennifer to cover her salary this summer from teaching. Unlike most conventional public school teachers who spread their salary across the entire year, Jennifer is paid only 9 months of the 12. Our goal was to save at least $10,000.00. We met the goal only with the tax return and irregular savings of $1,100.00 a month. This would be less than her take home amount each month, so the double savings is on. We have to budget for less income from her salary, plus continuing on with the budget developed from our financial fitness class taken last March.

Getting ‘Chased” by Disney

We have skipped renewal of the family annual passes for Disneyland. Each year prior to March of 2008, the four of us had annual passes for as far back as I can remember. We would spend upwards of $600.00 a year on passes. One year we bought four unlimited passes which were over $300.00 each. Of course we could not really afford this, so we opened a Disney Chase Visa to pay for the passes. We fooled ourselves into thinking that we would use that Visa card only on Disney purchases. We racked up $4,500.00 on it and then CONsolidated it into a CONsolidation loan. So 18 months ago the card was not closed and I have since spent another $2,300.00 on non-Disney related purchases including the Wii.

The good news is that the Disney Visa is next in line to be roll into the debt snowball. The emphasis on CON is mine. I have since learned that consolidaing debt without addressing the spending issue sans budget, is asking for trouble. We have two such loans to which make up 2 of the 6 debts listed in our snowball debt list. They are numbers 3 and 5 on the list.

Memorial service

This coming Friday is the memorial service for Jen’s mother. Until then, I have been watching out for my wife through the grief process. She has not gone into crazy spending mode. She never really has. Ever. Unlike me who is the one that finds comfort in buying, she does not. Thank you soooo much God! We are doing ok aside from that. When a family member passes on, you hear the same heart felt question. It goes something like this. “So, how are you doing?”. I have been answering honestly with, “Better than we deserve.” God gives you peace that passes understanding. If you have peace and cannot understand why, perhaps that’s God’s gift for your soul.

Right now

We have guests over right now. The girls are in the ice cold Jacuzzi. The boys are playing video games. The women are at the kitchen table learning something called a Cricut Machine. I’m once again checking in with you about our debt end journey. So how ‘ya doing?