You know, when I started the Money Makeover, I was just trying to focus on getting our finances in order.  We've come a long way, but we still have things we could do better. 

One of the things that sticks out at me is our bad budget habits.  We've always had a budget.  But it's always been made in reaction to how we spent our money, not a forward thinking process of directing our money towards accomplishing our dreams and goals.  That's one area I hope Dave Ramsey can help us with this fall.  Paul agreed today we should try to live off $30,000 (our projected retirement income) for one year and see if we can do it. 

The Money Makeover has taught us to work together better than before.   We do have issues still, but I'm thinking this fall we may be able to sort through some more of them.  I've prepared the groundwork by introducing Paul to Dave Ramsey's material.  While Paul finds DR's manner off-putting, he has agreed with most of his suggestions so far.  So I think it's only a matter of time before we get things sorted out here.

Aside from that, I can't help but marvel at how the Money Makeover has brought forth issues in our relationship as well as with money.  We've had a lot of emotional ups and downs this year.  I continue to be surprised at how Paul reacts to the MM and how I feel directed to pray for him as a result.   My prayer partner has been instrumental in helping me over some hurdles with Paul (as have people on-line and IRL).   We've moved from not being able to talk about money at all without someone becoming upset, to being able to discuss it intelligently and with purpose at least every payday...if not every week.  Paul is slowly beginning to see the importance of entering things in Quicken every week. 

I realize that I have to take the initiative when it comes to planning our finances.  I always resented that in the past, thinking Paul should do it.  But it does challenge me to be mentally alert.  I am saddened to think what might happen if I ever reach a point I can't handle all this, but then that's tomorrow.  Today has enough worries of its own!  The fact is, Paul is a detail person, and I'm the systems thinker.  I need to employ my talents as a systems thinker in the financial arena, and let Paul do the bean counting.

Meghan leaving home has had a huge impact on us emotionally, spiritually and financially.  Paul has been extra concerned about me and made a conscious effort to take me out and discuss our new phase in life.  My parents divorced during this stage.  His parents almost divorced during it.  Neither of us want to see that happen to us.  I suggested we make time for a date night once a week.  Last week was his treat out to supper.  This week I had an unexpected chance to treat.  I took us to a Chinese buffet for lunch while waiting for my lenses to be put in my old eyeglass frames today.  We can't go out to eat every week, but we can take time to just be with each other and not talk finances or work.  And that's what we aim to do.  One thing having the house fixed has done is to take our focus off finances and work.  We have something else to talk about.  Something exciting.

I also marvel at the spiritual development I see happening.  The other day I was amazed at the fact Paul seems closer to God than ever.  I commented to him, after he said a spectacular grace of his own creation, that one would never know he questioned the existence of God (a discussion we had this past winter).  He responded with "Did I say that?"  I smiled and said yes, he had, and let it drop.  Once again, I credit the work I've been doing with my prayer partner, and Lee and Leslie Strobel's book "Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch in Marriage" with helping in this regard.  Mentioning some of Lee's feelings when his wife, Leslie, became a Christian, seemed to really strike a cord with Paul.  He seems a lot more relaxed these days. 

Course that could be because he sees the house being fixed up too!  He seems much happier with all the work being done on the house.  Very happy he isn't doing it, but happy to have someone else doing a good job on it.  He told me today that he didn't realize what a weight worrying about that large freezer in the basement had been.  Apparently he has been worrying about how to get it out of there for years!  The funny things people worry about...

I can't believe the twists and turns life takes when you have more money.  Seems you have more of Murphy too!  We were able to handle the fallout from the storm this summer because of our new way of handling money.  We've been able to afford new eyeglasses...which were not cheap due to my situation.  We were able to help Meghan make it to university...though that will be an ongoing expense and commitment. 

The amazing thing to me is that we were able to do everything we did this year.   By the end of this year we'll have spent $12,000 on renovations.  Our renovation estimates have gone up, but so has the amount of work we plan to have done.  We will see what we can do a bit at a time.

We now have a fully funded emergency fund.   We're still planning on going to Costa Rica, but we'll see how the finances handle this fall to determine that.  I suppose if push came to shove, helping Meghan is more important than going to Costa Rica.  So much is in a state of change right now we've decided after the roof is done to put a moratorium on any more large projects until our finances settle down a bit and we see where we're at.

So I see a lot of growth has happened this year in a lot of areas I hadn't expected, and in ways I hadn't expected. 

Thank-you Gail Vaz-Oxlade!  Check out her past episodes of "Till Debt Do Us Part" on SliceTV.