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Chewed Cud Spews Forth from the Pie Hole of the CowFinancial PeaceThis is the blog post that is probably going to be the hardest to post. It's easy to talk about money, just not your own. For some reason, though,
I feel this calling to do this post. It's been calling me for a few months now. I've resisted, given it some thought, and finally decided to take that leap.
BAD IDEA because announcing to the world how you have enough net disposable income to actually "budget" each month, EXTRA money for family and couple dining, "nights on the town", allowances for your kids, karate lessons, Chick Fil-A and Starbucks treats, gifts, vacations, "goals" of things you want to buy going into your savings accounts, baby sitters, daycare for Gabriel, paying off debt faster, flat screen tv's, IRA-retirement accounts, charitable donations, cell phones with internet access, and "blow money" , when you are on WIC, Medicaid, and take donations from people! The only "call" she should be getting is from Medicaid, WIC, and the IRS Fraud Division!!
MY GOD, did I leave any of your FRIVOLOUS spending habits out? You have the NERVE to say I am heartless with my "at the tax payer's expense" comment in reference to Lily, yet you BRAZENLY post your careless and self indulgent spending habits! Do you live in such a bubble you don't know that in this economy, MANY PEOPLE don't have the extra money to stash into retirement and savings accounts, GIVE TO CHARITY, spend $25 on GIFTS every month, go out to eat, give their kids allowances, let ALONE have any "blow money", as you called it, to throw away! HOW DARE YOU rape the government till with getting WIC and Medicaid and take donations from well meaning people and then QUIT YOUR JOB!
THEN you pretend to be a hard working stay at home moo of a disabled child, all the while you are dumping the one kid off on a daycare center and pay a baby sitter to watch Lily, until she finally got sick of your horse shit and quit.:YOU are a real piece of work and have a LOT of nerve. NEVER have I witnessed such a BLATANT act of greed or entitlement, ever. As if all of that wasn't enough, THEN you expect sympathy and pats on the back for allowing your poor child to suffer. UNBELIEVABLE. :headbrick
It's not for me. Perhaps there is a family of a T-18 baby out there who's wondering how they can cut there financial lives back to a single-income household. Maybe not. Still, I feel led to write this post.
No, YOU don't need any advice on how to make it financially because you have WIC, Medicaid, and donations to line your pockets, and God only KNOWS what all else you fraudulently obtain!Donations for Lily spent on, "much needed night on the town" and other things they weren't meant forWhat I am not trying to do is put myself up on a pedestal and give a financial holier-than-though attitude. This is our lifestyle. Plain and simple. I am also not using this as a way to secretly ask for money. I would rather use my talents to make money than to ask for it to be given. But we're not at that place, so please note that I am not asking for money.
I'd like to add that we have had a few anonymous people send us monetary gifts. There have been times when I don't know what we would have done had these gifts not come. Other times, they have lightened our financial load. Some of these gifts have allowed me and Dave to spend a much-needed night on the town. We have tried to use the monetary gifts for purchases mainly for Lily, but sometimes we've used them for Gabriel and Soleil and things they need. Occasionally, they have been for personal items, but we try not to use them frivolously. There have also been times when our parents have helped us, but it's been more like helping with gifts or vacations. We certainly appreciate all they've done, and never intend to "mooch" off of them.
It's not enough to steal from strangers,but she mooches from family too.:BS
Long string of excuses leading to her PERMANENT unemploymentWhere to begin? When we found out about Lily having T-18, both Dave and I were working. I was contributing about 52% of the income. The rush to go to a single-income household wasn't really there because we didn't know what was going to happen to Lily. I didn't want to quit my job and then something happen to her and be left at home to dwell in that sadness. On the other hand, we also didn't know how we would be able to afford it. After she was born and it was time for me to go back to work, we decided to have someone to come into our house and watch her and Gabriel. This was not an easy decision because of the scary nature of that and because it was going to cost us a lot more than what we would have paid for both Lily and Gabriel to be in daycare. But daycare was not an option.
Is it necessary to point out you were contributing "52%" before you up and quit work for good? That doesn't impress anyone you USED to be the majority bread winner, at all, and it sure doesn't make up for the fact you "retired" at age 40 and won't ever bring in another dime, except what you collect from donations and WIC.I don't know how we've done it. There have been many contributing factors that I can say, yes, those helped,
but there have also been some very mysterious happenings that perhaps God himself had initiated to help us through all of this. Income tax checks and extra work, a little government intervention and employment payouts have helped, but still, there are some things that are unexplainable.
Unless GOD pays into WIC and Medicaid and sends you donations in the mail, that's NOT how you were helped financially. Stop trying to make your mooching sound like divine intervention.In the time that we've been in Charleston, basically a year,
we have paid off our car, our only credit card, and my student loan. Getting rid of those debts lifted a large weight off of our financial load. We have used Dave Ramsey's model for paying off our debts, but I must admit we don't have that "gazelle intensity" that he talks about. There are times when
we probably buy things that we shouldn't and contribute to a debt instead,
but we are human, and we know that we cannot deprive ourselves of everything. That leads to disaster. I also am a big fan of the tv show "Til Debt Do Us Part," and try to follow some of Gail Vaz-Oxlade's suggestions.
WHY NOT? Why should you get to go out and eat and go "out on the town" while on WELFARE, when many working people can't afford it? WHAT makes you special? I can not BELIEVE she "budgets" for charity when she IS charity case!The first item is Charitable Gifts. I must admit that we do not give monetarily as much as I would like, but we do try to give a little of our money and a lot more of our time. I'd like to see both of those types of charitable gifts increase, for I believe in the "Pay It Forward" philosophy. Since the new school year brings a small increase in income, Dave and I have been able to increase this category a little.
MY how you must feel so warm inside to donate to poor people from your welfare check. larious
Savings comes next. Right now, our savings is mainly in the form of putting money away for short-term items like taxes, car/house repairs, clothing, office supplies, gifts, and goals that we have, but those aren't really in our "savings" column. I'll talk about them later. When he started this new job, Dave decided to take a break from contributing to retirement. If we don't contribute this year, we will definitely make it a priority next year.
It's not something we like holding back from, but it has helped us pay off a few bills and afford to live in a slightly better area. SAVINGS? Does Medicaid know you have savings and retirement accounts and "blow money"?Housing:
We were unable to sell our house before we moved. Luckily, my brother rents it from us, but we don't make any pocket money off of it. What we make goes right back into it. Plus some. We are actually putting a little more into an equity payment attached to that house as part of our bill paydown plan.
We recently bought a house, and luckily, Dave's school switching to a year-round schedule gave us a small "chunk" of money with an end-of-the-year payout. We were allowed to use that towards closing costs.
Plus, we borrowed a small amount from my mom, and we'll use our tax refund to pay her back. Actually, our closing costs were a lot less than we expected, and we could have depleted our short-term savings and taken that leftover amount and paid her back, but she told us to keep in just in case we needed it and pay her back later.
You own TWO houses and STILL get WIC, Medicaid, and donations? I forgot about your hefty tax refund you no doubt get too. Utilities: We budget $150 for electricity and $50 for water. Since we've moved, we may have to adjust that. What that means is a 79 degree thermostat (in the summer) and 67 (in the winter), which we find keeps us comfortable with our
ceiling fans on, not using the
dishwasher every night, turning off lights and tv's when they aren't in use, taking shorter showers, and bathing the kids together. In the winter time,
I give myself permission to take one long, hot soaking bath per month. Like I said before, I can't deprive myself of everything.
We have cable, which we mainly got for football season because going out to watch football is not possible with three children and it can get expensive.
But we also don't go to the movies very often, and we know where to get free movies and cheap movies. We both have
cell phones that have internet access, but we don't have a home phone. When we bought them, it was cheaper because we didn't have internet. Now, it's become a luxury. But it does come in handy in many ways. And we pay for internet, but that's pretty cheap for us right now.
Food: This is the one I'm proud of. I was watching The Today Show or something like it the other day, and they said the average household spent somewhere around $800 on food. Blah! We could never afford that!
Our grocery budget is $290--one hundred of which goes toward our CSA for fruits and vegetables. So we budget $190 to spend at the grocery store. This includes toiletries. It's actually quite easy. . .and healthy. What we don't buy are sodas (unless we have company over), a lot of processed foods, and a lot of junk. (Read Michael Pollan's books, and you'll understand.) Our snacks usually consist of a GORP mix or popcorn and sometimes ice cream, but we've been making that ourselves lately.
Occasionally, I'll buy crackers and sometimes canned fruits and vegetables, but we try to make it as fresh as possible. Meats are bought when they're on sale and we try to have leftovers. It's humiliating, but I'm being as safely transparent as possible,
but we do receive WIC. We usually get a lot of meals out of the eggs, tuna, and beans, too. So, yes, it helps our grocery budget, but we usually have a little money left over, so we could probably be safe without it. It's just nice to have that "safety net." Plus, with school starting back, Gabriel doesn't
eat breakfast and lunch here. Oh, and I don't use coupons. STOP BRAGGING about how little of YOUR money you spend on groceries when WIC is subsidizing your fucking budget and Gabriel gets free lunch and breakfast at school! You don't need much grocery money because you're always going out to eat!:BS
Restaurants: We budget $50 for going out to eat. Dave's a good enough cook that eating in isn't too bad, but it's nice to have a change eating out and not have to clean up afterwards.
INCREDIBLE. So few people can afford to go out anymore and THEY have jobs! Transportation: We budget about $250 for gas and $70 for taxes and repairs. Dave has begun to carpool with a fellow teacher, so hopefully we'll be able to cut our gas bill.
Medical:
We budget $200 for medical bills and $40 for medicine.
Lily is on Medicaid. That has saved our financial lives. Personally, I'm not proud of it, but she deserves it, and that's all that matters. If our bills are over $200 each month, I call and make payment arrangements. Luckily, everyone has been very accommodating.
But it sure is nice when all medical bills are paid up and we don't fully spend the $200! fuck
While everyone ELSE has to PAY their medical bills after insurance pays, but MEDICAID is free, for you the cows who get it!:BS
Personal: We have things like life insurance that I'm not accounting for in this post, but we do have those bills. We put aside $5 for office supplies (also mentioned in savings),
$25 for gifts, and $16 for karate for Dave (a man's lifesaver!). :headbrick
Allowance: Gabriel gets $12 for allowance, but that will go up to $16 when he turns four. He puts 5o cents in each labeled jar: savings, spending, gifts, and donations. The other dollar, he puts in the jar of his discretion. Sometimes he breaks it up; here lately, he's been giving it to himself in spending. We RARELY buy him things, including the cereal that he wants
(we get cereal with WIC). When we do buy him something, it's because we would like to give it to him, not because he's screamed for it. The last toy we bought him was a housewarming gift we let him pick out when we moved. I really can't remember if we bought him a toy in between then and last Christmas, but he has bought himself a few things. The way Dave and I see it, we'd rather enrich Gabriel's life by spending time with him and taking him places than to buy him things that will never truly make him happy.
Plus, he has plenty of toys that he's very happy to play with. Extra: We allot $30 to "blow" money. This is money that we can just spend on whatever. $30 goes to entertainment that could be a restaurant but doesn't have to. $50 goes towards vacations, but we don't always put that much aside because this comes out of our bank program that puts a dollar in savings every time you make a purchase. Most of the time, we're always under budget with this one.
PLUS the $200 they "budget" for medical and RARELY have to spend thanks to the tax payers.Student Loans: We have Dave's student loan to pay off. It's a pretty hefty sum, but we hope to have it paid off in the next four or so years.
Goals: I've already mentioned that a small part of our savings consists of goals. This money does not come from Dave's teaching income. Dave also writes grants and does part-time work on high and low ropes courses.
I make pies that I sell around Thanksgiving and Christmas time and do a little cake decorating. The extra money that we make goes toward our goals.
There are times when people might think that we spend this frivolously, but we don't. We've made a list of things we'd either like to buy or do, put them in order of importance, and marked them in our goals column.
And if it's something to buy, we wait until we find a good deal. We bought a flat-screen tv. While that may seem frivolous, Dave had been wanting one for years, but he didn't want to pay more than $10 per inch for it. About six months ago, he found one at Sam's on their clearance rack for about $10.40 per inch, so we bought it. We bought iphones. Yes, we knew we'd have a more expensive data plan, but we got the iphones refurbished. Dave paid $20 for his; I paid $9.53 for mine. They listed for $200. Some of our goals are pretty expensive.
One of mine is to go back to South Africa. I'd like to take all the kids with us, and that's going to be pretty expensive. But I want to go and meet my newly found T-18 friend Taryn and let her daughter, Mikayla, and Lily play with each other. Plus, I'd like to go back to Kruger National Park. Once we get our bills paid off and if I go back to work or start doing something from home, who knows, maybe this dream will materialize. I don't mind being patient.
At this rate, she'll be able to fly first class to South Africa by this ChristmasOur budget, our goals--yes, they require sacrifice. Sometimes, I hate those sacrifices. But I know that they are molding me and making me more appreciative of what I have and more aware of what others don't have. That awareness spurs me to want to take action, and I take action when I can. I remember when I lived in Augusta how Chick-fil-A was about a twenty minute ride from my house, so I would only go maybe four times a year. Oh, how I love Chick-fil-A!
Then they built one down the road from us, and it became a five minute drive. Rani, Autumn, and I would go every Thursday, and they would get a free kid's meal and I would get my regular value meal. After a while, I didn't appreciate Chick-fil-A so much. It kinda got boring, and I got to the point where I really didn't want it anymore. Now, we don't go to Chick-fil-A very often, so I've grown to appreciate it again. :BS
If you've made it this far, CONGRATULATIONS! I know this was a long post. I know I disclosed a lot of. . .um, personal. . .information.
And I know I'm not perfect. Our budget is only a budget, and we could stand to perfect it. I hope it has given inspiration to someone out there who may be thinking about staying home with the children or even to someone who may be looking for happiness in. . .things. It's not there. I know. While living our budget is hard, and I complain about it sometimes, I am not unhappy. I am fulfilled, and in the little that we think we have (because God knows, there are a whole lot more out there who have less than we do!), I find myself. . .blessed. And I know you will too.
THAT'S the understatement of the year! She has more "extras" in her budget than the Screen Actor's Guild!------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------
If YOU are the "exception" to what I am saying, then why does my commentary bother you so much?
I don't hate your kids, I HATE YOU!