Ryan - Saturday was a fun-filled day. I woke up an took our car in to get fixed (oil, rotars, and gaskets). I had Mike work on our car and he's always been so generous of his time when it comes to working on our car. He gave a price when he was done and it was a ridiculously low price, so I gave him double what he told me. I know this seems to go against what we are trying to do, but this really supports our mission. I went to Mike to get an honest evaluation and help save money, but not at the expense of him working for or at a loss of his time. We needed this work done as a preventative measure to spending more money down the road, but I don't want to short change friends who do work for us.
Sunday - President Eyring spoke about debt and getting completely out of it. Once my schooling is paid off, I'd like to start putting extra money towards our mortgage. I think of the baby-boomer generation and how they dealt with post WWII and the economic depression they experienced as children and how it has affected them and their mindset. Credit cards weren't available to them.They had to pay cash for everything, which meant saving first. Many like my parents, mine focused on paying their homes off first and at a below average age (my father when he was 50). My dad said, if your pay your home off, you'll always have a roof over your head. Very wise advice and simple. I feel this "experiment" that our family is doing will get us back to these true and sound financial principles. My father was always telling and showing me how to save. It was by not spending. Pretty simple when you think about it. He has a what I feel is a comfortable retirement and he still worries that he's one disaster way from being broke. There's a lot to learn from that mentality. Some positive and negatives but I respect that he erred on the safe side and made sure his family was provided for.
I remember the exact point in my life when I got away from these principles. It was a year after my mission and I was attending the U of U and I saw a pamphlet from Citibank offer a $500 line of credit for students. I applied with the intent to pay it off each month (sound familiar?). Well six months later, I had a card that was maxed out and I needed to get a second job to pay it off. And that was for only $500. By today standards, that's nothing. But by sound financial principle standards it's a valuable amount. Unfortunately, my mindset didn't change (i.e. I didn't learn my lesson). I didn't value my money and my time earning it and I spent a lot of time earning it. Last night Melissa and spoke about our goal and some of the things we are learning. I told her we can't go back to the way we were. I want our money to work for us. We realize we are saving a lot of money, but we agreed that we cannot go back to how we were living (paycheck-to-paycheck). Yes we won't be as extreme as now, but when it comes to spending, we need to keep our same mindset that we spend our money to worthwhile things and place more value on our money and our time earning it. We need to make sure we prioritize the order in which we save and spend.
Lizzy - Because it was conference weekend our plans were already made for us. We spent time with our family and friends and as Ryan stated also got the car fixed and the house cleaned. Because Karl is from Ireland and has no access to Root Beer my mom gathered 15 different kinds of root beer from specialty stores around town and we had a big taste testing experiment. It was fun and interesting. I never knew how much of a preference I had. When it all came down to it Mug out did all the specialty ones (in my opinion of course.) No money spent nor any desire today.
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