Family Trepidation...I Mean Traditions

Aren't the holidays perfect. Family, friends, cousins, in-laws, his grandparents, my dad's house, his uncle's house, my mom's house, my cousin's at our house...you get the picture. Discussing where to go and what to do for the holidays is no easy task and can cause spontaneous combustion.

Each family has their own traditions. Each family may live in different places. Each parent may live in a different place for that matter. Deciding which family will get priority can be tricky and can be made worse by said family pressuring you to come and visit.

Here are some (relationship safety) tips for the holidays:

1. Plan ahead, plan ahead, plan ahead.
Talk with your spouse about things before you wind up on the phone with your mother asking about your plans. Enough said here.


2. Decide that your spouse is number one. 
This is not easy and if you are new to marriage it will likely be difficult to do. The first few holiday seasons of marriage are when couples' holiday expectations are built, re-created (as a pair), or destroyed.

If you are like me, you will have family traditions that have been kept for years. I am the oldest child and am the first great-grandchild. Given the stats, it was obvious that I was going to break some traditions. It was very difficult to tell my family that I would only be coming for half the day (since we live close to Karl's family as well). I dreaded this phone call with good reason. It didn't go over very well. I recall some silence on the other end. There was a clear message of disappointment. Looking back it's hard to imagine that they didn't see this coming, but it was also hard for them to not make some non-verbal signals over the phone upon hearing the news. It was hard on me and hard on them. However, a few years later (today) it is much more acceptable that I may not make it for the entire holiDAY or even come for one particular holiday at all. This year we are going to my husband's uncle's house hours away, and we will not see my family for Thanksgiving.

Another reason to put your spouse first regarding holiday traditions is that it sends a clear message to both of your families, that you and your spouse are a family now. You can and should signal to your family and in-laws that you will be making decisions as a couple. It's scary and difficult to do this, but it sets you on a solid path for future decision making. Family may fight this, but they will eventually get on board if you send a clear message. This will also bring you closer to your spouse over time.

3. Create new memories that may become traditions.
Since you and your spouse are now a family it's OK to start some new traditions. You can put up the tree and decorate whenever you want (if you don't live with your extended family). You can bake special items for a special night. You can set aside money to go see a movie, if you want to make that your new tradition. If you want to open presents at midnight on Christmas Eve do so! You are in charge of your own traditions as a newly married couple. Creating new traditions, together, will allow you to feel connected and to know what to expect for future holiday seasons.

4. Know how much money you are are going to spend on presents.
I could not emphasize this enough. Agreeing with your spouse about money and presents before Christmas will keep you sane and your relationship healthy. Presents were a huge deal with my extended family. For all of my life we all got and gave presents to our cousins, aunts, and extended family at Christmas time. This was more acceptable when I was young because our family was smaller. But at age 27 my family has multiplied. We have well over 30 people coming to Christmas dinner. My husband and I spent a few years in heated debate about the fact that we would "have to (not that we didn't want to but that I thought it wasn't a choice)" supply presents for all of my extended family (and that is only on my mom's side). Last year, after much debate, we finally brought it up with the matriarch of the family. She agreed our family had grown enormously and understood our quest to at least draw names for next year. We successfully (we have yet to see) implemented name drawing last year, for this year's presents. We will see how it goes, but at least we are headed in the right direction and we agree about bringing only 2 presents to Christmas to exchange with others who drew our names.

I'm thankful this week that these choices and traditions have made it easier  for us to enjoy each other over the holidays.

Feel free to join my other friends for Gratituesday at Heavenly Homemakers!

Post College Expectations

If you are anything like me, then you also had GREAT expectations for what it would look like when you finished college.

My expectations included some of the following descriptions. I planned to have a large house, maybe not immediately, but surely by 27 (the age I am now). I'd be able to decorate it with matching pieces of furniture. I planned to buy nice clothes (like Banana Republic, etc.). I thought that I would be wearing those nice clothes to a nice paying job that I would enjoy. I assumed I'd find a husband, but wasn't that positive about my hopes for marriage (which have changed greatly and will be addressed in another post.) I figured I'd be able to eat out regularly at fancy restaurants if I wanted to (I didn't know how to cook until age 25ish). I thought I could afford a nice car as well. I figured I'd be making slightly under 100K (before 30:) and be successful at work. I always planned to work outside the home and be able to pay a sitter. I figured I'd travel across the county often and take lots of "little" side trips to the neighboring states.

Ohh, foolish me. What I didn't anticipate was my debt or how my major in sociology would effect my ability to get paid 100K. Somewhere in my mind I thought I'd make enough money to outrun my excessive spending, simply because I'd be getting paid a lot. I figured I'd slowly pay off student loans/mortgage while I quickly made a lot of money.

How do things stack up now that I've been done with graduate courses for two years? I don't make 100K. I actually made better money delivering pizzas (tips included) in high school. I made about 10$/hr to deliver pizza and then made anywhere from 2-15$/hr in tips. Wow, maybe I should look into that again. Ok, really I love being a crisis counselor. I love to help people in need. But, people in need can't afford to pay for services. So most of my income comes from the government and grants. I make about 11$/hr at my morning job. My afternoon job pays a bit better at 13.75$/hr. OUCH. That is not what I expected to be making at 27.

I do have a house (that we can afford), but it's filled with my families second hand stuff. My house actually looks like my grandma's living room twenty years ago:) I can't afford to buy new pieces so nothing matches. Or, perhaps I should say it's "eclectic"?? My closets are filled with clothes from since I was 16. My new clothes are generally second hand from Plato's Closet. I don't have a new car, but I did purchase my Buick from my grandparents. I can't complain for a second about my car. Traveling has happened some for us. We got free plane tickets (thanks to getting booted off another flight) so we have visited our friends in Colorado. We also saw some friends in New York buy signing up for a credit card that gives you free tickets (I don't recommend this).

I learned how to cook. Actually my husband I both learned from the Food Network. We don't have cable anymore, but we did have cable for our first two years of marriage. I loved watching and ultimately my  hubby and I learned to cook. Which is a good thing because it is so much cheaper to make your own food at home. This also allows for leftovers. We can't afford to eat out very much.We have actually become very picky about our food and where it comes from.

I did find an amazing man and have changed many of my (previously bitter) views about marriage.

What happens when expectations don't meet reality? Well, I'm working on learning to be content with what I have. I have always had a creative mind. I have ideas flowing out of me. For example, I plan to write a book someday about relationships and am using this blog as a way to practice my writing. I can easily see how I could sell a million books and be successful financially. On the other hand, I have not sold a million books yet and need to live with my 20$ couch from Craigslist for the time being. I am trying to balance contentment with the possibilities of tomorrow. It's a slippery slope balancing dreams of tomorrow with the reality of today. It takes practice and some days that balancing act gets the best of me.

How do you balance contentment today with setting goals for tomorrow?

Billy's Bakery - my favorite one in New York City

Emotional Spending

I wanted to share my struggles with emotional spending. I only began to understand how it affected me when we started working our budget. Our budgeting plan has helped me to reduce emotional spending. I completely underestimated how much budgeting would change my inner thoughts and processes on matters of spending.

Before using our budget, I would shop because I was upset or overworked or underpaid or needed to feel better about something. I didn't realize how powerful this emotional spending component was until I was restricted in my spending (aka: not using the ever-flowing fountain of student loan money and only using what we budgeted). I didn't buy expensive things. I didn't think I was going overboard. I found good deals, which was another emotional high, and had enough money to pay the bills each month in college. I felt very sure that my new purchase was both something I deserved and something that I could afford.

After a big test in college, I would go shopping. I felt better about buying something because I worked hard to study for the test. I also felt better because I had something that looked great on me. Even if it was just a new 5$ scarf, I would feel prettier and happier.

I would shop with my friends and family. If I wanted to hang out with someone or have them hang out with me we would often shop at the mall. It felt like we were both getting "something" done and finding something to wear for the weekend. I would also shop with my family when they came to town. Many mother-grandmother-daughter relationships consist of shopping. Mine did as well. Together-time happens when mom takes child to a place of business and purchases something for them. The talking/bonding happens presumably while on the hunt for a good deal or something that looks great.

It's probably not necessary to say that I still go to places of business to buy things. I can't make my own clothes or shoes or toilet paper. I do still buy items I don't need...since I'm human and have flaws. The difference is that my buying is intentional. I don't just find myself driving to target. I don't just see something in the store and think that I must have it. A light triggers now when I look at something and want it. It's a light that didn't have time to turn on in the past. In the past I would look at something, want it, decide that I deserved it and then buy it. That flawed process is broken now with the help of my envelope system. Emotionally speaking, I try to disconnect my wants from my needs. I try to disconnect the fact that there are pretty things in the store that I want with the fact that I worked hard yesterday doing something difficult in another area of my life (like finding a job or cleaning my house or giving a friend great support). I try to separate my purchasing from any feelings of unhappiness or self worth. This is not something that can happen overnight. I myself have a long ways to go.

Budgeting has changed my thought process. I DO think about how much I'm going to have left in my envelope after I buy this item. This helps me to stop and think...do I really want this item? Is this item really something I'm willing to spend my money on? What if I find something I want more later in the month? There are other perks. If a salesmen of any kind is pressuring you...you can say things like "I don't have any money left in my envelope this month" or...."I check with my husband before spending money not in my budget."

At the beginning of the month I think ahead about what activities will be happening that month. For instance this month we are taking a weekend trip to Galena, IL, my friends and I will tailgate for the University of Iowa football game, and several members of my family have birthdays (this comes out of our gift envelope). A few months ago I had 60$ left in my fun envelope at the end of the month. I paper clipped and set aside this money. This month I used that extra money to spend on groceries for our Galena trip. I have been saving my fun money this month to spend on food/fun when my friends come to town.
This is not easy, but worthwhile. It also opens the door to let other positive emotions come into your life.

                                 Thought this sign, outside a lovely Galena shop, was appropriate:)

Our Budget

I talk often about how my husband and I are on a written budget and are trying to pay off debt. I wanted to address our budget more specifically for those interested. Most of our budgeting ideas came from the Dave Ramsey Show. Dave is a financial adviser. You can check out his website for yourself.

The first full year we were married, we attempted to do a watered-down version of Dave's budgeting system. We (my husband) wrote down our expenditures and our sources of income. We found out exactly how much debt we were in and compared that with what we made each month. We wrote down our "dreams" (purposely using that word here because they weren't actual goals..they were dreams at this point) of what we wanted to spend in each category of life.

*Side note here. It's important to know who in the marriage is the detail oriented person. Usually one of the two of you are more detailed than the other. Luckily, my husband is this person. He is the one that put together our budget. BUT, it's very important to see that we AGREED on this budget he wrote out. I argued for some changes and he argued for some changes and then we agreed on a final budget. One major argument was with clothing money. It took a number of months to get this worked out. I continually over-spent (which can be fixed with the envelope system that we initiated later...see below) in the clothing category. He finally realized that the budget was too low and we agreed to a much higher amount for clothing per month.You can read more about my emotional spending habits here.

Back to the budget. So the watered-down version left us going over our vision each month in multiple categories. If you don't actually add up the amount of money you are spending, each time you spend it...you easily wind up over-spending at the end of the month. So for each month in 2010 we overspent.

We started to realize this wasn't working at the end of 2010. This is when we turned to Dave Ramsey's envelope system. I'll tell you we saved 500$ in the first month we used the system. The envelope system is basically you putting actual dollars into real envelopes at the beginning of each month. For example, we put 100$ into our shared "fun" envelope at the beginning of each month. My husband and I actually have 3 "fun" envelopes. We put money into "Karl's Fun" envelope, "Lindsey's Fun" envelope, and into a shared "Fun" envelope. Yes, we have about 15 envelopes we put money into each month. It's a lot of envelopes. I am able to reach into my personal fun money whenever I want. If I wanted to eat out during the day, this would come out of my fun envelope. If Karl and I wanted to go on a date, that would come out of our shared envelope. The trick is, that when the envelope is out of money...you stop spending money.

There are some down sides to this plan. Someone does have to write out the budget, that can be time consuming. You and your spouse have to agree on the budget. That can be argument-inducing and difficult. But, I promise it's worth it. Having conversations about money that don't end with crying and leaving the room is healthy for couples to learn how to do. The funny thing is that the shared goal (of paying off debt) really unites you as a couple. It may not happen as quickly to all couples. Some couples are in a world of hurt related to money. That conversation is for a different post though. For now, suffice it to say that this plan works.We have had to make some difficult decisions about our fiances. We may run out of grocery money at the end of the month and have to live on leftovers for the last 3 days of the month. We did have a month where I thought we had about 80$ left in the grocery budget. When I opened the envelope I found only 20$ left. We wound up eating pasta and beans the rest of the week.

There are so many perks to this plan. One is that you and your spouse will be on the same page about money. When Karl and I first got married, he would confront me every time I came home from shopping. We got into an argument about me buying socks! Now that we have an agreed upon budget, it doesn't bother him to see me come home with shopping bags AND he doesn't interrogate me about what I bought. He is happy that I found something I wanted, because he knows I only spent what was in my envelope. Also, we save a lot of money. This money goes towards paying off our debt. We are excited as we look forward to getting out of debt and begin to build wealth. Third, this plan has changed our perspective about finances and financial decisions. When you know you only have 100$ to spend, you treat your money differently. You tell friends that you can't go out to eat. You hold off on something you think you WANT in case there is something you NEED at the end of the month. I'll write more in other posts about our money decisions, but this is a basic description of our budget system.