12/06/2010 | Where we are today!
Things aren't quiet where we want them. We decided to go ahead and finish most of the home repairs we were in the middle of while Angela's parents came to visit and as we expected it used up most of our savings.
14 posts categorized "Stone Family"
10/01/2010 | Pretty Good Month
This month has been pretty good. I think we're really in the groove with savings though not in the way I had expected. See I was planning to sock things away towards our 3-6 months expenses but instead we've realized we need to improve food storage first.
09/03/2010 | Stone Family Update
In July our family went on our first real family vacation to a family reunion in Utah. We decided if we were going to drive 14 hours there we ought to make the trip "worth it" so we spent 11 days driving a total of about 2,600 miles and seeing lots of friends and family.It was the best trip I've ever taken and that was a surprise to me.
07/06/2010 | July Update...
When we were working to get out of debt so quickly, it was almost easy because it was a mission.
We were passionate!
It was incredible,
and EXCITING!
It was incredible,
and EXCITING!
06/23/2010 | "Use it up, wear it out, make it do and do without"
We just got back from our first of two family reunions this summer and I was disappointed my estimations for fuel costs were so off. I’d underestimated it by about $50. I guess I am grateful I figured that out now instead of after the second and there is still time to modify next month’s budget to better reflect our anticipated expenses. We also had family come stay after our reunion which caused increased grocery costs that I thought I’d planned for, though not very well. Thankfully I was able to adjust things and they’ll balance back out.
Continue reading ""Use it up, wear it out, make it do and do without"" »
05/24/2010 | May update...
The first weekend in May the check went out and the last of the debt was paid off. I have to say it has been awesome not thinking about them anymore. As we promised our kids, we celebrated the next week by going to Jason’s Deli on Kids Eat Free night (since we’d not been out to eat in nearly 6 months). It was a really special treat for all of us and I think we’ll make eating out a quarterly event, rare enough it is special but not expected.
04/30/2010 | Last day of challenge
It is the last day of the month and WE DID IT! Our goals were tight but we made them work. We are ready for our auto insurance renewal, and with next week’s paycheck we’ll have paid off the last part of our debt. When that check goes out we’ll have paid off more than $10,000 of debt in five months!
04/27/2010 | Giving on a budget
Charitable contributions were one part of our budget that did not change much in our effort to get out of debt. We give a tithe to our church as many people do and though money was tight, know that we are better off sacrificing other things to maintain this level of giving. We still made very small donations to other charities during this time but only in special situations. When those came up, the money was taken from the grocery budget.
04/23/2010 | Where we are...
I thought I’d give an update of where we are so far this month.
We’ve had quite a bit of extra money come in from delayed moving benefits, selling things, etc, so we’ve paid off much more debt than we’d planned to. After doing my last grocery shopping trip for the month we’re still within the $275 we’d planned for groceries.
04/19/2010 | Extra Income
When we decided to get out of debt I knew we would be most effective by “ignoring” extra income and using it to make extra debt payments. In the past extra income was an opportunity to splurge and we wanted to change the way we handled things. By putting that extra income towards the debt we are training ourselves to budget for the unexpected expenses or fun splurges. Another natural consequence is getting out of debt sooner!
