Birthday vs Budget

Ok so I am going a little out of order here, but it's my blog and I can do what I want.

Tomorrow is my baby's first birthday. Where has the year gone? Along with the first birthday comes the first birthday party. It's a big deal! The party, the gift, the pictures, the balloons. It all has to be perfect! The baby only turns once in their life and in this instance it is the last time one of my children will turn one. Its the last first birthday party. Its not only a big deal for B, but for me.

Its been five weeks since we started our journey to be debt free. (Only five weeks, holy moly, it definitely seems like longer.) You might remember in my last post I shared that I had a major breakdown including some super water works, resulting in the puffiest eyes I have ever seen. The anticipation of the birthday while trying to live on a budget and not use credit cards was more then I could bare at that moment.

I know you are thinking, this chick is crazy, what's the big deal. Well, the big deal is/was that up until now I have purchased whatever I wanted/needed for the kids with minimal thought about the money in our bank account or the balance on the Kohl's card- because that's where I do most of the kids shopping. I was a good shopper. I don't know the last time I bought anything full price. I never really went overboard when it came to the kids, but at the same time I just bought without over thinking. (clue number 147 to how we got into debt) In my brain I started to feel like a bad mom, that because I needed to stick to a budget I was not going to be able to provide the same type of first birthday experience to the baby as I did his sister. He's going to grow up thinking we played favorites. I already haven't had his picture professionally taken as often as his sister. I thought about throwing this whole debt free living out the window. We can't become debt free at the sacrifice of our children.

OK! OK! You can stop yelling at me now. Stop the pity party Jen! The pity party started and ended somewhat quickly, with some kind words from my husband. (Thank God there's at least one calm rational person in our household, he is doomed though, 3 against 1).

Luckily the next homework assignment was to create our cash flow plan and budget, and it was coming at the right time, pay day! So I took all that energy I had been wasting on crying and feeling bad about not providing the best to my son and put it into creating our budget for the last 2 weeks of the month. I hate to admit it but it was the first time in my 37 years that I had actually made a plan for my/our money. (I've been working since I was 16. That's 21 years of wasted money.) It was the most amazing thing, after I completed the budget and hubby and I reviewed it, it felt like this huge weight was lifted. The boulder that I had placed on my chest, worrying about money and the kids and having enough for them, it rolled off. It was like when you are pregnant and the baby is taking up all your lung capacity, then the baby drops or you deliver, and voila you can breath. I could breath!!!!

Not only did we have a plan for the 2 weeks, but we were paying all our remaining bills for the month, AND I budgeted for the baby's party, present and pictures. The budget helped me make sure I had the things I felt were important for the kids. It helped me keep things in perspective. It didn't cut off my hand like I thought it would, rather gave me a helping hand in doing all the things I wanted to. We were able to get B's pictures taken. We spent less then we have in the past and pictures were 100x better. We only bought B one present, and if I do say so myself, I think it was his favorite. He received plenty more. I made his cake- which I still can't decide if that was economically the best choice, but he will never forget it.

It was our first couple weeks using the "envelope system" as well. If you've never tried paying for most things with cash, you should try it. You would be amazed at how hard it is to spend cash. Not that people won't take your cash, you just won't want to let it go. I will say we weren't 100% successful. We did borrow money from one envelope to pay for items we wanted from other envelopes...mainly food. But we didn't take out anymore cash then we originally budgeted, so that's not too bad for our first try. I will explain more on the whole envelope thing next time. As of right now we are in need of reviewing the budget we created for August and putting some money in our envelopes so we can do things like grocery store shopping.

Oh for those of you who are still stuck on the fact that I was a big blubbering moron earlier and feeling like a bad mom, I don't anymore. I really do get the big picture. That the sacrifices we are making now, changing our bad habits, actually makes me a better mom. The mom that will provide an amazing future to her kids (I am writing this from my point of view, but I am certainly not doing this alone, my husband is a great father and is making all the same sacrifices, so please don't be offended when I say I did this, I really truly mean WE). Getting ahold of our finances is probably one of the hardest things we have done, and oddly enough it seems it comes with using the most common sense that your parents and grandparents gave you. If I had only listened...

In this episode of Birthday vs Budget, it was a draw! We had an excellent birthday and didn't break the budget!