DH and I are trying to follow Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover, but having some trouble figuring out how much of his advice we are truly comfortable with. First, we will be done with Baby Step 1 (EF=$1000) on Thursday. We have already begun Baby Step 2, the debt snowball, and have some great projections. However, we are combining it with the YNAB buffer method of having 1 months income in the bank at all times to help with our cash flow woes, so funding that is happening concurrently with the snowball. Our buffer should be fully funded by the end of June and then we can attack the snowball even harder from there. Both DH and I are comfortable with this.

The part that is giving us trouble is the part about using all of our savings to blast the snowball. Right now we have about $15,000 in an annuity that we have been funding for the last 12 years. If we cleaned out this fund (or left just enough to keep it open), we would be able to pay off 1/3 of our overall debt, but when we even THINK about doing that it feels like a punch in the gut. This account is the only thing we have been doing RIGHT with our money since we got married and we both hate to un-do it. What do you think? Is this a necessary thing to really get us "on the program" or can we just look at it as already having Baby Step 3 done before we are done with BS2? Are we drinking enough of the Kool-aid to make it work?

I am one of those people who can't remember what needs to be done unless it is written down. Therefore, I have about 4 to-do lists floating around at any one time. One for home, one for work, a grocery list, a Target list, an event planning list, etc. Unfortunately, the lists never seem to get shorter and they tend to get lost before they can do any good.

Well, I found a great site on-line called

BackPack that has been helping me with my list problems. Basically, you can sign up for a free account that let's you create as many as 5 separate to-do lists at any one time. They can be accessed from any Internet terminal and has little check boxes for you to check stuff off as you get it done. You can even email stuff directly to a specific list from a blackberry or PDA if you are technically inclined (which I am not)!

In other news, we got the new rates for Caleb's daycare that go into affect next week. Was really hoping for a significant change so that we could put more towards debt payments. I should have known better. We went from paying $218/week to paying $213/week. Know we can almost afford to go out to eat once a month. Also, we found out that the cost for an infant for the next year will be $288/week which is more than we had planned on for sure.

All we can do is try even harder to get out of debt as quick as possible to free up a little more money for daycare payments. I am going to have to propose some pretty tough restrictions on spending if that is going to happen, though. Once again I have to be the bad guy...

Well, we were able to avoid having 3 separate repair people come to our house last night. I managed to fix the DirecTV ($0), Scott fixed the garbage disposal ($0), and then we both worked at fixing the weed whacker ($13 for parts). I figure we saved ourselves about $600 by repairing what we had instead of throwing it out and buying new.

Logged on this morning when I couldn't sleep and am LOVING the new look. And I love that we can do so much customization, although I will probably be too scared to try different colors for a while.

The former title of this blog "Debt Free Living, Here We Come" just wasn't working for me. Hope you like the new title! Seemed a little catchier and a lot shorter. Not that I am known for being brief...

So recently my DH and I have been talking about having another child. We already have Caleb who is 2.5 and he is wonderful. But daycare costs in this area are insane. Having another child in daycare would mean another $1000 a month in daycare charges alone (we are already paying $950/month for Caleb). Even figuring that we won't be buying anymore diapers than we are now because Caleb will be potty trained by the time Baby 2 were to come along and all other expenses could be easily absorbed, it seems almost impossible to carve $1000 out of our already tight budget.

Yes, we are working hard at getting out of debt. In all likelihood, we will be out of revolving debt in the next year, but that would only free up about $500 per month. In order to come up with the rest we would have to stop putting money away in savings, which I am hesitant to do.

Everyone we have ever talked to has said, if you wait until you can afford kids you will never have them. And I can understand that you do what you have to and make sacrifices where needed, but I can't seem to wrap my head around the economic implications.

I know what some of you will be thinking...Could I stay home with the kids? While it is true that 2 kids in daycare is expensive, I currently make the same amount of money as my DH. So one of us staying home would mean cutting our income in half! Plus, I have worked VERY hard to get where I am and I ENJOY working. Many of my "friends" don't get that but I am done apologizing to them for making the decision that is right for me.

OK, whine fest over. I know I should stop being so selfish and just get over my hang-ups. *sigh*