Well it seems as if my little lesson in lamps has helped to reignite my commitment to learning to live within or below my means. I've been thinking about how far my husband and I have come in paying off our consumer debt (I'll tell you more later but it hasn't been easy- he's a teacher, I work part time and we have a commitment to keep our three girls in private school). All this has got me thinking of how far we still have to go. I thought I'd share a peek into some of our goals:
1. Live within or below our means (As a lifestyle choice- not for short term savings)
2. Do not use credit/debt (requires living within budget constraints)
3. Build up an emergency fund (currently we have $0 in our emergency fund- at this point if an emergency should arise we'd have to use credit- not good.
4. Save for our daughters College Fund. To date we do not have anything saved for them. Our oldest is 16! YIKES! There is not much time left! This makes me sad and remorseful over not beginning this lifestyle sooner. (Although we've never been wasteful with our money we could have been a bit more conscious with our spending and more focused on saving for the future.)
5. Build savings for the future: Retirement, Vacations, Replacement Vehicles, Household Maintenance and Repair.
These sound like hefty goals, especially since there isn't a lot of wiggle room in our budget. But since I've learned some creative ways to cut back over the last year and a half that helped us pay down our consumer debt, I'm confident if we keep on track we can begin to save! Yeah.
Now what am I to do with all the creative ideas I have swirling around in my head?? Creativity can be expensive especially if I think I need to satisfy it by buying something new (like lamps) but what if I see what I can do to make something beautiful for free?? That's what I'm planning on doing this weekend. Stay tuned and I'll let you know what fabulous things God has planned.
Bye for now.
Elizabeth
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