November's Review

Well, it's time to look back before we press on forward. November was a pretty even keel month. We had a small grocery budget once again as we ate out of our own pantry, fridge, and freezer. We are really just trying to eat at home as much as we can so we have fewer food items to move to the new apartment. Slowly but surely Chris and I are starting to see the bottom of the freezer!

In those common categories, I mentioned things went pretty smoothly. I guess the real shock was how amazing a new system Chris and I have begun to try has really worked for us. So, you remember in a previous post I have written I mentioned that we have still kept our credit card. gasp I know, that's not allowed on the Dave Ramsey plan. Well, what we discovered was some online sites that we have needed to order one or two things from refuse to allow us to use any type of Visa Debit type of plastic card. As a result, I came up with a really good solution. We decided to set up a separate savings account (what we would call a sinking fund) for our credit card. Any money we decide to shop with online for a purchase gets moved to that account immediately after buying that purchased item. For example, I'll decide I want to buy something for $16.75, before making that purchase I check in with Chris to make sure he approves of the purchase as well. (We always check with each other with all purchases.) If it's a personal item for me, I take $16.75 out of my own personal pocket money, or if it's a household item, I take it out of the household money (or deposit it back into the checking out before making the purchase) then transfer it to the newly set up credit card sinking fund. That way, we feel the pain of losing that money for the purchase and we don't forget to budget for it. The money is already sitting there waiting for the credit card bill.

We verify all purchases and balance our account every day (just to make sure all purchases are legitimate) then before the bill is due, we pay from that specific sinking fund.

This method has really changed the struggle with not being able to use a Visa Debit card. It's such a small change, but it has drastically made a difference.

I must caution you though, to only use this method once you've established good budgeting habits. I can't imagine doing this a year ago. I wouldn't have done very well at it back then but now, I trust myself and I trust Chris. We've done the Dave Ramsey plan for almost a year now and life is a lot calmer.

We don't worry so much, about a bill coming in the mail. We know how much money we have in our accounts and we have more in savings/sinking funds then I ever thought possible.

Are we completely out of the hole that we dug for ourselves? Definitely not, but we can see the lip at the top now. The ground beneath us is a lot more solid and anytime a problem comes up our first response is to pray about it. Our second response is to stay calm and look at the numbers, don't blame each other and just ask questions, talk through it.

Amazing what a difference a year and a half of budgeting will do. Yes, we made some incredible progress from May to December 2016 on our own, but once Dave Ramsey came into the picture in January.... radical changes -- and for the better!

Sinking funds.... and a sinking fund for credit card purchases! Who would've thought of that a year ago? Life changing! Thanks be to God for the little changes, which can lead to making bigger lifelong changes!