Thank you both for such thoughtful gifts!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Breathe Weekend
8 months ago
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
More Easter Surprises
The doorbell is getting quite a workout during the Easter season from the postman! Here are our new outfits from Aunt Ann and our new froggy towels from Mimi!
Thank you both for such thoughtful gifts!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Thank you both for such thoughtful gifts!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Easter at the Pavillion
Cooper and Caleb wanted to wish everyone a Happy Easter and share how they are spending the holiday!
Our church has our Easter service at the woodlands pavilion.
We are expecting over 5,000 people to attend.
Kids church featured a puppet show that had the boys full attention!
Happy Easter!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Our church has our Easter service at the woodlands pavilion.
We are expecting over 5,000 people to attend.
Kids church featured a puppet show that had the boys full attention!
Happy Easter!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Friday, April 22, 2011
Easter at Memas
We headed to Lufkin for a quick trip. Of course mema had an eater egg hunt and all sorts of games and prizes!
Daddy's new Easter present is a mobile blogging app so maybe the blog count will go up!
Easter slip and slide!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Daddy's new Easter present is a mobile blogging app so maybe the blog count will go up!
Easter slip and slide!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Softly Call the Muster . . .
Granddaddy, you will be in our thoughts and prayers tonight when your name is called at Muster!
We gather here to mark the day Aggies proudly stand.
To honor those who've gone before to the promised land.
Each name is called upon the roll, comrades answer "Here."
Trumpets sound their sad good-bye to those we held so dear.
All heads are bowed in silent pledge never to forget.
While rifles fire their last salute echoes answer yet.
To their mem'ry we'll be true; we will take their place.
One for all and all for one ever in Thy grace.
We'll meet again another day, reunion while we pray
To ask Thy blessing on each one on this Muster day,
Aggie Muster Day.
Mrs. Earl (Margaret) Rudder
Friday, April 15, 2011
The Dentist
The Seely Boys recently completed yet another milestone with a trip to the Dentist! Apparently I need to get into the Dentistry business cause this place was nice (and expensive). Special thanks to my employer for providing great Dental insurance that paid 100%.
As expected, my big boys did great and absolutely loved going to the Dentist. They still babble about how much they want to brush their teeth so they can go back to the Dentist.
If they are anything like their parents, the novelty of the Dentist will soon where off as they will get plenty of visits between now and time to go with dentures.
Jennifer took them by herself which is no small feat! But seeing that she is SuperWoman when it comes to these 2, I didn't expect anything less than a great report.
Until next time . . .
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Dave Ramsey - Our Story
As many of our friends are well aware, the Seely household practices the financial teachings of Mr. Dave Ramsey. You would be amazed at the disdain you can meet when you admit to someone that your ultimate goal is to live a debt free life, have an emergency savings that can last you 6 months and plan for the future. I didn't start this blog entry as a way to make excuses for how we manage our money. I did start this blog to chronicle our story and re-motivate myself to finish the plan we have started.
In March 2006, Jennifer and I got married. At the time we were lucky enough that our parents had kept us out of debt from credit cards and student loans. I cannot tell you how much that means to me right now. We both had credit cards, with outstanding balances, we were just lucky enough that our parents had the desire and means to decide those balances would be their last act as our sole source of funding.
Our first major financial decision as a young, married couple was that we would live off of my paycheck and save Jennifer's. Our goal was to use this money for a down payment on a future home. In our first year of marriage we were able to save almost $30,000. This money was used to put 10% down on our home and also pay our closing costs. Looking back on it, saving this money was EA$Y. It was just the 2 of us and we honestly would have turned it into bar tabs and eating out if it didn't go to savings.
Six months into our marriage is where it got interesting. Not only did we find out that natural planning is a crock of you know what, but we also found out it was not one, but two AMAZING, WONDERFUL GIFTS FROM GOD! Once C&C arrived, the house was bought, closing costs paid and savings not nearly as big as we had grown accustomed too. Our next issue was our vehicles. My 2-door truck and Jennifer's Corolla weren't gonna cut it for our new family of four. The truck was paid off, but gas prices meant it would be the casualty. Now we have 2 car notes and Jennifer was not working because daycare costs and a teacher's salary don't mesh terribly well. We went from dual income/no kids to single income, 2 kids, mortgage and 2 car notes in a matter of 6 months.
We now reach the point of the story where the evil that is credit card debt joined our family. We received some pretty bad advice about using credit cards for all purchases and paying off the balance at the end of the month. The benefit of doing it this way was $0.01 of every dollar spent could be turned into gift cards from Babies R US. I commend those of you out there who can manage this process, but we simply couldn't. Looking back on it I tell myself that I wasn't going to let a little thing like money get in the way of happiness while we were adjusting to our new family and lifestyles. We eventually got to the point where we were a full paycheck behind our monthly credit card statement. That meant we were putting money on credit cards under the assumption that my paycheck would never stop. When we finally realized how silly we were being, it took not only my current paycheck, but also 1.5 paychecks worth of savings to get us back even. I will admit that we still have a credit card and to this day any time we relapse and use it, we end up spending at least 150% of what we had originally budgeted to put on the card. They just aren't worth it and I despise the damn things (even though I still have one). My current excuse is that my job has called for business travel in the past and I refuse to pay cash for plane tickets and hotel rooms I will eventually be reimbursed for. Dave may not agree and you may call me a hypocrit, but NO ONE is perfect.
Don't forget about Mr. Murphy! You know who I am talking about! That little saying of what can go wrong, will. Well, we met Mr. Murphy multiple times in the 2007 to 2009 timeframe. The first of which was 3 (yes 3) orthotic devices for my kids abnormally shaped heads. If you really wanna know, look up positiional and synostotic plagiocephally. Long story short, the cure for this condition are custom made, plastic helmets that run $3,750 each. You may be wondering how we ended up with 3? Cooper needed 2! In addition to the helmets, I managed to total Jennifer's car which was 6 months from being paid off. My company eliminated our bonuses during the great recession. And we finally realized that a 4-door sedan just wasn't big enough for our family. If you are doing the math, my perfect little post marriage financial situation has now turned into over $50,000 of debt on a single income with 2 more mouths to feed!
Enter Dave Ramsey - Jennifer started working for what is now our church. Everyone knows how much Dave likes Jesus and how much people who like Jesus, like Dave. The initial introduction was somewhat limited. Jennifer started telling me about this lifestyle and me being the educated, finance major from Texas A&M didn't really want to listen. I am now of the opinion that anyone who understands Time Value of Money is more dangerous to their personal financial situation than you can imagine. I was smarter than these guys because I was able to finance things with 0% interest and that is FREE MONEY. Guess what, There is NO SUCH THING AS FREE MONEY! Jennifer convinced me to pay off the helmets, even though I had them on a Care Credit card and had a monthly withdrawl scheduled with the intent of having it paid off the month before I would accrue the additional interst. Yes, I might have lost the 1.5% in interest over those 12 months, but buy paying it off I removed the temptation to spend the money elsewhere.
Some time in 2009, I bit the bullet and read Total Money Makeover. In front of God and everyone, I need to admit that I didn't do it because I thought we were in financial peril. I did it because money had become something in our house that caused some pretty good fights. In short, we would spend money and spend money and then spend more money. We didn't talk about how much money we had or how much we were spending. We just spent money. Jennifer would periodically inquire about our "financial freedom" and if I was honest with her, we would get in a fight. If you are connecting the dots in our timeline, this is the period when we were incurring all our credit card debt. My main issue was that at the end of the month, I always had to go into savings to get us back to even. We needed a solution and for the sake of my finances and the sake of my marriage, I read the DAMN book.
I am not going to explain the Dave Ramsey principles. If you want to read the book, then read it. If you don't, don't bitch at me in 20 years when I ask if you want to spend a week in Barbados with us and you can't. That said, I do want to mention one concept that was key to my motivation for adhering to the program.
Zero Based Budgeting - In short, you should spend EVERY single penny of your paycheck on the first day of the pay period. You have to be careful though because you have to make sure you are spending it in the right places. This was perfect for us because now any time Jennifer asked what we spent our money on, I could pull up my budget spreadsheet and show her every dime before it was even spent. You put your money in savings, you pay off your debt and you figure out if there is anything left. SIMPLE AS THAT! This was perfect for us! Jennifer still doesn't like talking about the budget, but now I am prepared for her questions and I know immediately how much went to car note and how much went into savings. Whereas before, I was making excuses. Now I am explaining progress.
You will be happy to know that in April of 2011 we are debt free and are almost 50% of the way to our emergency fund! If my current plan is realized, we will have a full funded emergency fund by December 2011. Then I can move on to more important financial goals like retirement, funding my kids college and paying off my house!
You will be amazed at how much you can defy yourself if you really try. I hate bringing my lunch to work, but I do it. I need new work clothes, but the one I have are beyond fine. Jennifer is not current on the latest designer jeans, but she still lives and breathes. We don't go on elaborate vacations, but we still love each other. We don't have new cars, but we are safe and arrive where we need to be on time. Our kids have eaten dry cereal and fruit for dinner on multiple occassions, but they survived without a happy meal. My point here is that once you make the commitment, financial freedom is not that far away.
In March 2006, Jennifer and I got married. At the time we were lucky enough that our parents had kept us out of debt from credit cards and student loans. I cannot tell you how much that means to me right now. We both had credit cards, with outstanding balances, we were just lucky enough that our parents had the desire and means to decide those balances would be their last act as our sole source of funding.
Our first major financial decision as a young, married couple was that we would live off of my paycheck and save Jennifer's. Our goal was to use this money for a down payment on a future home. In our first year of marriage we were able to save almost $30,000. This money was used to put 10% down on our home and also pay our closing costs. Looking back on it, saving this money was EA$Y. It was just the 2 of us and we honestly would have turned it into bar tabs and eating out if it didn't go to savings.
Six months into our marriage is where it got interesting. Not only did we find out that natural planning is a crock of you know what, but we also found out it was not one, but two AMAZING, WONDERFUL GIFTS FROM GOD! Once C&C arrived, the house was bought, closing costs paid and savings not nearly as big as we had grown accustomed too. Our next issue was our vehicles. My 2-door truck and Jennifer's Corolla weren't gonna cut it for our new family of four. The truck was paid off, but gas prices meant it would be the casualty. Now we have 2 car notes and Jennifer was not working because daycare costs and a teacher's salary don't mesh terribly well. We went from dual income/no kids to single income, 2 kids, mortgage and 2 car notes in a matter of 6 months.
We now reach the point of the story where the evil that is credit card debt joined our family. We received some pretty bad advice about using credit cards for all purchases and paying off the balance at the end of the month. The benefit of doing it this way was $0.01 of every dollar spent could be turned into gift cards from Babies R US. I commend those of you out there who can manage this process, but we simply couldn't. Looking back on it I tell myself that I wasn't going to let a little thing like money get in the way of happiness while we were adjusting to our new family and lifestyles. We eventually got to the point where we were a full paycheck behind our monthly credit card statement. That meant we were putting money on credit cards under the assumption that my paycheck would never stop. When we finally realized how silly we were being, it took not only my current paycheck, but also 1.5 paychecks worth of savings to get us back even. I will admit that we still have a credit card and to this day any time we relapse and use it, we end up spending at least 150% of what we had originally budgeted to put on the card. They just aren't worth it and I despise the damn things (even though I still have one). My current excuse is that my job has called for business travel in the past and I refuse to pay cash for plane tickets and hotel rooms I will eventually be reimbursed for. Dave may not agree and you may call me a hypocrit, but NO ONE is perfect.
Don't forget about Mr. Murphy! You know who I am talking about! That little saying of what can go wrong, will. Well, we met Mr. Murphy multiple times in the 2007 to 2009 timeframe. The first of which was 3 (yes 3) orthotic devices for my kids abnormally shaped heads. If you really wanna know, look up positiional and synostotic plagiocephally. Long story short, the cure for this condition are custom made, plastic helmets that run $3,750 each. You may be wondering how we ended up with 3? Cooper needed 2! In addition to the helmets, I managed to total Jennifer's car which was 6 months from being paid off. My company eliminated our bonuses during the great recession. And we finally realized that a 4-door sedan just wasn't big enough for our family. If you are doing the math, my perfect little post marriage financial situation has now turned into over $50,000 of debt on a single income with 2 more mouths to feed!
Enter Dave Ramsey - Jennifer started working for what is now our church. Everyone knows how much Dave likes Jesus and how much people who like Jesus, like Dave. The initial introduction was somewhat limited. Jennifer started telling me about this lifestyle and me being the educated, finance major from Texas A&M didn't really want to listen. I am now of the opinion that anyone who understands Time Value of Money is more dangerous to their personal financial situation than you can imagine. I was smarter than these guys because I was able to finance things with 0% interest and that is FREE MONEY. Guess what, There is NO SUCH THING AS FREE MONEY! Jennifer convinced me to pay off the helmets, even though I had them on a Care Credit card and had a monthly withdrawl scheduled with the intent of having it paid off the month before I would accrue the additional interst. Yes, I might have lost the 1.5% in interest over those 12 months, but buy paying it off I removed the temptation to spend the money elsewhere.
Some time in 2009, I bit the bullet and read Total Money Makeover. In front of God and everyone, I need to admit that I didn't do it because I thought we were in financial peril. I did it because money had become something in our house that caused some pretty good fights. In short, we would spend money and spend money and then spend more money. We didn't talk about how much money we had or how much we were spending. We just spent money. Jennifer would periodically inquire about our "financial freedom" and if I was honest with her, we would get in a fight. If you are connecting the dots in our timeline, this is the period when we were incurring all our credit card debt. My main issue was that at the end of the month, I always had to go into savings to get us back to even. We needed a solution and for the sake of my finances and the sake of my marriage, I read the DAMN book.
I am not going to explain the Dave Ramsey principles. If you want to read the book, then read it. If you don't, don't bitch at me in 20 years when I ask if you want to spend a week in Barbados with us and you can't. That said, I do want to mention one concept that was key to my motivation for adhering to the program.
Zero Based Budgeting - In short, you should spend EVERY single penny of your paycheck on the first day of the pay period. You have to be careful though because you have to make sure you are spending it in the right places. This was perfect for us because now any time Jennifer asked what we spent our money on, I could pull up my budget spreadsheet and show her every dime before it was even spent. You put your money in savings, you pay off your debt and you figure out if there is anything left. SIMPLE AS THAT! This was perfect for us! Jennifer still doesn't like talking about the budget, but now I am prepared for her questions and I know immediately how much went to car note and how much went into savings. Whereas before, I was making excuses. Now I am explaining progress.
You will be happy to know that in April of 2011 we are debt free and are almost 50% of the way to our emergency fund! If my current plan is realized, we will have a full funded emergency fund by December 2011. Then I can move on to more important financial goals like retirement, funding my kids college and paying off my house!
You will be amazed at how much you can defy yourself if you really try. I hate bringing my lunch to work, but I do it. I need new work clothes, but the one I have are beyond fine. Jennifer is not current on the latest designer jeans, but she still lives and breathes. We don't go on elaborate vacations, but we still love each other. We don't have new cars, but we are safe and arrive where we need to be on time. Our kids have eaten dry cereal and fruit for dinner on multiple occassions, but they survived without a happy meal. My point here is that once you make the commitment, financial freedom is not that far away.
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