Bucket List v.2013

I've been really bad about blogging, pretty much since I started, yet every once in awhile I dust it off and just read through a few posts and think, "I should really do this more often." The one post I do enjoy doing each year is my bucket list because it gives me a chance to look back over the past year and see what fun things I've managed to do, and what fun things I have to look forward to.

1. Sing in a choir
2. Read the entire Bible
3. Go on a missions trip
4. Open a B&B
5. Visit Ireland
6. Go on a cruise
7. Give my Christian testimony
8. Finish a master's degree
9. Go in a hot air balloon
10. Take my kids to Disney
11. Be completely debt free
12. Learn to ski
13. Be in a movie
14. Visit South America
15. Visit Europe
16. Visit Asia
17. Visit Australia
18. Visit a National Park
19. Visit Mt. Rushmore
20. Go to Vegas
21. Blog my life story for my kids
22. Feed the hungry
23. Go to an NFL football game
24. Stay at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island
25. Visit Niagra Falls
26. Attend a church service at Saddleback Church
27. Run a 10K
28. Run 365 miles in a year (or more!)
29. Run a 5K
30. Meet my dad
31. Be a mentor
32. Run a half marathon
33. Run a 25K
34. Go on a zip line

What a year 2012 was. We paid off the last bit of our debt and have been enjoying the debt free life. We went on a fun family camping trip for the Fourth of July and also visited Great Wolf Lodge a couple of times. I did a lot of running with some pretty big accomplishments like first place in my age group running a 5K on July 4! Right now I'm training for a half marathon and a 25K, so I definitely have my work cut out for me this year. Nathan and I sang in the church choir for Christmas Eve and that was such an awesome experience for us together. 

In just a few weeks we'll be headed over to Niagara Falls for my sister's wedding and that will cross another item off the list and be a fun family vacation too. A bit cold in February, but I know we'll have a blast!

Summer Loving, Having a Blast!

I started a calendar a month or so ago to start to get us organized for the summer, but it was mostly to get things scheduled and not OVER scheduled. I have a pretty good idea of what we are going to do, but I thought it would be more fun to turn it into a challenge, can we really do it all? And besides what I have down now, what else can we do to make our summer fun and not boring.

What have we done so far:
Charlton Park Day in Hastings
The Riverbank Run (adult and kids!)
Stay at the Holiday Inn with the Big Dip water slide
Swim (a lot) in Gun Lake
Went to Michigan's Adventure
Whitecaps night in the suite with WNJ

What is still on the agenda, subject to change of course
Go camping as a family, maybe at Son-Life
Nate will go to Camp Gerber
Nate and Nick are going to Camp Manitou-Lin for Harry Potter Week
Gun Lake Church VBS
Voice of Hope VBS
Whitecaps overnighter
The Chemical Bank 5K
Visit Millenium Park in Grand Rapids
Hawk Island Park in Lansing
Backyard camping
The kids will spend a week in Detroit with grandma
Visit the Wild Animal Park
Watch the Gun Lake fireworks

The one thing we tend to do the most is hang out at the Yankee Springs State Park. It's only a couple miles from our house, and the beach is just beautiful. We pay a whopping $10/yr per car to use all the state parks in MI, and we just happen to have one in our backyard.

Old Habits Die Hard

It's not like we've been debt free for very long, but I've found myself more than once thinking, "I shouldn't do that!" and I can't really come up with a good reason WHY I shouldn't. Why shouldn't I buy some groceries that aren't on sale and I don't have a coupon for? Why shouldn't I buy my daughter a new dress for Easter instead of going to a thrift store? I think I am by nature a pretty frugal person so I am wired to find a deal, but at the same time I need to learn to find some happy place where I am ok to spend money now and not freak out or feel like I am doing something wrong.

WE'RE DEBT FREEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

Yeah baby, it's all about FREEDOM!! Hard to believe it, but we are HERE!!!

September 2008:
$39,216.30

March 2012:
Zero, ZIP, NONE!!!

Yes, it took us 42 months, but we are finally debt free! The inner nerd in me just noticed that is almost $1000/month going straight to debt. We didn't actually pay it off that way, but if you spread it out on average, that's pretty amazing. Wowza!! And on a more exciting note, it's like we both just got a mid-year raise at work...YES!

As I was online making a payment to my student loan account, I decided to poke around the website a bit and see what kind of interesting data I could find, because let's face it, I'm kind of a nerd when it comes to these things.

I didn't even really pay much attention as I was signing the papers for my student loans, and as I look at my account statement, I am absolutely horrified that I signed on the dotted line for a $16,522.15 chunk of change to be paid back over 178 months (yes, 14yrs!). My last scheduled payment was June 24, 2022, over TEN YEARS from today. What the world was I thinking? Clearly, I wasn't thinking!

We could have probably done this sooner if we had been more aggressive, but we had a lot of "life" catch us up in the past 3.5yrs that we have been working towards this. The 2 big things that have slowed us down:

1. Vehicles
We had a vehicle totaled, the replacement vehicle required 2 transmissions to be replaced, and now we're driving our 3rd minivan. We've paid cash for all vehicles and all vehicle repairs associated with them. That number I dare not add up because it will just depress me.

2. Braces
Nate went in for a routine dental cleaning and we got the "wow, you need to see an orthodontist STAT" conversation. We were super creative in covering the $5500. Some of the money came from my pre-tax flex spending account and we also did a cash payment plan with our orthodontist (interest free for a year). I am so thankful for Dr. Hannapel's office that worked so well with us and made this possible without pushing any of the funky credit plans on us.

Phillipians 4:19 (NIV)
And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.

God has provided for ALL of our needs, in abundance, since we started on this journey in September 2008. We made the very intentional decision to go from being $20 in the plate to giving a full tithe to our church. We made the choice to reduce our income by 10% and put our faith in God that he would provide for everything we needed, which is significantly different than what we want. We have been able to not only support our church, but we've also been able to support other charities and organizations we've felt led to. We've been able to take a couple of small family vacations by being very frugal and planning ahead. Our kids all have plenty of clothes, we are all very well fed, we have a very stable housing situation, and we've both been blessed with full-time employment.

Now that we've met this amazing milestone, we are ready to do so much more! Time to beef up the emergency fund so that when we have that next car disaster, we're ready to buy a reliable vehicle, focusing on contributing to our retirement funds, maybe taking a vacation, maybe going on a missions trip....

I'm ready to start having some fun!

Thrift Store - SCORE!!

I know a lot of people are totally grossed out by the idea of going into a thrift store, and the idea of actually buying something makes them dizzy, but there is definitely a segment of the population that enjoys it. Growing up, I always thought of thrift stores for poor people and was horrified when I was on the receiving end of something from one. Now that I'm an adult, my perspective has definitely changed.

When I pull into the parking lot at a thrift store, I am always amazed when I look at the cars. You don't see many broken down, beat up, old junkers. Look next time you drive by (or the next time you shop), people who shop at thrift stores usually drive pretty nice cars! By extension, I would guess that most of the people driving those cars are doing pretty decent financially.

Yes, lots of times thrift stores are just full of junk. But by knowing your neighborhood and knowing the stores, you can come across some true gems in the midst! It takes a bit of time, and sometimes a bit of digging, but if you are a person who thrives on the thrill of a good find, it's so worth it!

Last year I started running and I thought to myself, "hey this is gonna be cheap, all I need is a pair of running shoes." Oy! I was wrong! Even worse, it turns out I like running so I wanted to slowly build up my running wardrobe and accessories so that I wasn't running in old t-shirts and cotton shorts. Those are great to get started in, but once I started running longer distances, the comfort level in those clothes drastically reduced.

In my thrift store travels I've managed to come up with a Pantagonia jacket and a Merrell pull-over hooded shirt. Both items would have easily been close to $100 each, and both of them were in excellent condition and have years of wear left in them. I've also come across some higher end things like Under Armour clothes, but unfortunately not in my size. I'll keep looking though! (Note: I would not encourage the purchase of used shoes, especially if you are using them for any sort of exercise. It's worth it for so many reasons to really buy a good pair of shoes)

One other thing that we tend to buy quite a bit from thrift stores is books. Nate is really reading like crazy and we could go broke just buying him new books. Plus, he has really taken to some older books that are much easier to find at a thrift store or yard sale. He's always excited to come across the older "Choose Your Own Adventure" books and even "Goosebumps".

Bucket List v.2012

I started keeping an actual bucket list instead of just randomly saying, "that's on my bucket list" this past year and it's been fun to look back over 2011 and see what I accomplished off the list and adding a few new things to it.

Things that are coming off the list, because I accomplished them:

1. I ran a 5K
2. I met my dad this summer, and we just spent Christmas together
3. I joined a lunchtime mentoring program through my work

The new and improved bucket list, v.2012:

1. Sing in a choir
2. Read the entire Bible
3. Go on a missions trip
4. Open a B&B
5. Visit Ireland
6. Go on a cruise
7. Give my Christian testimony
8. Finish a master's degree
9. Go in a hot air balloon
10. Take my kids to Disney
11. Be completely debt free
12. Learn to ski
13. Be in a movie
14. Visit South America
15. Visit Europe
16. Visit Asia
17. Visit Australia
18. Visit a National Park
19. Visit Mt. Rushmore
20. Go to Vegas
21. Blog my life story for my kids
22. Feed the hungry
23. Go to an NFL football game
24. Stay at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island
25. Visit Niagra Falls
26. Attend a church service at Saddleback Church
27. Run a 10K
28. Run 365 miles in a year (or more!)

November 25 - Cleanin House!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving yesterday! But what comes after Thanksgiving? Well this year, even sooner than usual, came the shopping! I can't say I was thrilled that the sales were starting at 10pm, but I made my list and headed out to tackle a few things and mission was accomplished.

Today I was working around the house and the yard a bit and decided when I went to put away some new purchases in Nate's dresser drawer that I was tired of all the chaos I was up against. I've mentioned before that I have been known to "UpCycle" things, so I thought a bit about what I could use around the house to bring some order.

Yes, I still had some old baby wipe containers stashed away that I just couldn't bring myself to part with and I used 2 of them to organize the every growing pile of Scout gear that lives in Nate's top drawer. One tub has neckkerchiefs in it, one has slides, and then I put his hat in the front. Nothing fancy, but it rounded up a lot of stray crap that was making me irritated everytime I had to put clothes away.

What else did we do post-Turkey Day? Nate had a friend come over and we took a break from organizing dressers and cleaning the basement to go to the park. The weather was amazing! I dragged the bikes up from the basement and we hit the road. We were not the only ones thinking of it because as we were there tons of families made their way up there too.

There are still plenty of leaves on the ground, and still lots of crap in the basement, but those can wait for a dreary day.