Debt free.... oh the joys!

No... we're not debt free but we're certainly keeping that our goal! Cam and I just refinanced our home for 15 years and are enrolled in Early Mortgage Payoff so it will be paid off in 12.5. We also have a rent house (a house I bought before we were married) that we will have paid off in 8 years. I am SO thankful for the convictions God has given us both about living frugally and simply. Cam and I are not going to have a $200,000 home paid off in 12.5 years but a $80,000 home paid off in 12.5 years and you know what... we LOVE our home. God blessed us with enough money to add on to our house this past year and make it 4 bedrooms/3 bath so it's plenty big enough. It's got a wonderful yard with a pool. A great built in storm room. There are definitely things about our late 80's home that we'd like to change and when we have the cash we will slowly but we are so thankful for God's gift of contentment! We're hoping to pay off our Highlander soon and then have no car payment. I'd like to save up enough money for a minivan before purchasing one but I'm not sure we'll wait that long but I know we'll have a lot of it paid for with cash when we buy it. I'm not saying any of these things to brag, I'm honestly just SO thankful that God has burdened us to live this way. In fact, I guess I am saying these things to brag on Him... He is definitely the one who has blessed us with these burdens and wisdom. I truly believe that God will meet your needs but so often we "Americans" live as though we expect God to meet our "needs" which really were our wants. We know everything we have is His... He's letting us be stewards of it and we are so thankful for that! He has been so good to us and I can't tell you how many nights we lay awake thanking Him for just that! Living below our means has brought us complete joy and no financial stress! Our dream goal is to pay off our rent house and then use the rent from it to put back for the kid's education. We've got a little put back now but when that mortgage is paid we'll be able to put back several thousand a year. Then when they move out to go to college, they'd have a home they could stay in (assuming they go to college in the area). Our mega dream goal... :) is to be able to buy a couple of acres in Marshall, Valley Springs, or somewhere close to there in the mountains and build a very small cabin. Wouldn't that just be wonderful to have a little cabin the woods to go and relax. Ahhhh... mega dream :).
Probably the thing I'm the MOST thankful for was my humble upbringing. I did not have a silver spoon in my mouth, more like a plastic one;). I remember vividly driving up to our rented shack with the floors caving in and my dad proclaiming ... "our mansion on a hill" :). One of my best memories and you know what... I didn't even realize we were poor. I don't think I ever realized that. One year there was a flood in a town near ours so my parents got our Christmas presents free I guess. They wrapped them in a big blanket and put them on our porch. Heaven, I tell ya. My parents made more money the older I got but I always knew how hard they worked for it and was so thankful for everything I was given and thankful for the lessons God taught me along the way!

Tighten our belts..

I've been reading my cousins wife's blog... and she's really got me thinking. I've been wanting to cut back a lot on our spending but have been lazy with it. I think because we don't really live paycheck to paycheck right now that it's easy to get lazy with our finances. Cameron and I do really well in the area of shopping, we rarely go and rarely, rarely spend money on clothes, etc. I'm as cheap as they get... ask my cousin. Anywho.. reading Niki's blog made me want to evaluate our spending and get a good look at how much we waste on eating out and such. I'm only admitting to all of this on the Internet because I think it's the best way for me to be accountable for the waste. I created a spreadsheet with the amount of money we spent last month eating out and it was astronomical. Sure, there was a week that Cam didn't have his regular paninis/lunch meat for lunch b/c we didn't make it to the grocery store so he had to (sarcasm added) eat out at Chik-fila way too many times. I'm not innocent either because I went to a baby shower at Mike's Place and racked up a $15.00 bill that we normally wouldn't have:(. The total for the month was right at $300.00. WHAT??? Eating out... $300.00. Our grocery bill for the month was $450.00 but it was probably less than that if you deduct other things we may have purchased on the trip to Wal-Mart. We're going to be very conscientious this month and cut back a lot!! We've decided it's okay if we go out for lunch once a week but we better be taking a can of Sprite and asking for a cup of ice:).