I am still alive

Hello all my faithful blog readers.

I just wanted to let you know that I am still alive.
Ben and I are doing better.
We have started the Dave Ramsey way to financial Freedom.

We are working like crazy and still not able to save much but I must say it is nice to even be staying afloat with a little less worry especially around the holidays.

I am however starting to worry about my parents finances since we depend on them for so much. I know they are not making all their bills and yet they continue to pay for things for us all the time. I try to stop them and it just doesn't work. The insist. I don't know how to boss them around when I am living under their roof. What should I do? I know moving out would be the best answer but I just don't think that is feasable right now.

gotta go.

try to get back sooner next time.

A long downward crash with no way to pull up

I am reading a great book call The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. It is not great because it makes you feel good that is for sure. In fact I cant seem to read it without breaking down and crying. I keep hearing (also watching a video series at church) and reading about the Hope people felt with a plan in place but yet the more I read and the more I try and try to get gazelle intense about getting out of our student loan debt the worse I feel. I know the only possible way we can do it is to work like crazy people (as we don't have much to sell) and I am already mourning the lost time with my son. I tried to increase my income without paying the sitter the extra time by taking him with me thinking I would also feel better about not completely being separated from him but I just got frustrated and angry with him. I was sick and tired of being around him by the time I actually had the time (after work).

I am a nerd and I can't help but crunch the numbers and they don't give me any hope. It will still take years to drag ourselves out. I will stick with it and keep trying as my experience with loosing weight tells me that eventually you start to believe in what you practice and it gets easier.

By the way the crash implied by the title is an emotional one. I actually know we will not fail at getting out of debt I just also know it will be a very long time and a hard life that I emotionally struggle to endure. The thought of 3 to 9 more years of the status Que is frightening.

Here we go with.
Step 1: Emergency Fund $1000.00

Well we tried selling our most valuable (money wise) posesion, excluding the car needed to get Ben to work, our Big Screen LCD TV and stereo system. We found a buyer but they can only buy it in payments so getting our Emergency Fund done will be delayed if we use this to fund it.

I am requesting more hours at my original part time (used to be full time) job to help out but only time will tell here. If this doesnt work I am thinking about looking for a 3rd part time job. I allready work a 2nd part time job on my days off and this is the one that I tried to take Tyler along on.

Ben is looking for a part time job also (in addition to his law office) to get this paid and get the debt snowball rolling.

And of course we are praying for increased success at his law office which will also help.

Anyone know how I might have a winter garage sale or another way I might "find" some money?

Last night we went to the ZooBoo at Binder park Zoo. Jessie dressed as Dorthy and Tyler was the cowardly lion from the Wizzard of Oz. On the left they pose with a pumpkin guy on our way in. On the right Tyler is showing how he now has his Courage. Roarrrrr!!

We all had a good time and got lots of goodies.

Life at the speed of Wow!

So I am writing today to update everyone on things. I have spent the last month working 6-7 days a week between my part time job as a researcher and helping my parents with their business as they geared up for a move after being in the same location for over 17 years. It has been incredibly busy and I dont even know where the month has gone. I am not prepared for Halloween tomorrow but I am now forced to adress the topic as we are planning to attend the Zoo Boo tonight. I had a costume for my son Tyler but now I have no idea where it is since I was on a cleaning frenzie a couple months ago and now it is lost.

I am trying to stay sane in all of this but it has been hard. I tell myself that I need the money and any extra work I can get is worth it for our family but man is it stressful.

I have put my weight loss on hold as the stress and effort to move the bussiness has made the thought of exercising excruciating.

I hope to get on a normal routine within the next week or two. Lets hope so.

Positioning Yourself for a Miracle

I listened to a podcast today about how in order to position yourself for something extraordinary like a miracle you cannot expect and accept normal results. You must have Faith. The sermon came from the story in Mark Chapter 5 where a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years and could find no cure knew she would be healed if she just touched Jesus cloak. She expected a miracle and she found one. Others touched him as he was surrounded on all sides but the did not expect a miracle and thus did not receive one. The woman was healed by Faith.

I made a conscious decision today. I asked for and decided to trust God to work miracles in my own life.

You see Ben and I have enormous student loan debt to the point that the minimum monthly payments exceed my monthly income and Ben's income is unreliable at this point. We survive by the generosity of our family and we scrape just enough money together to pay our debts. In the past God has opened normal doors for us to just get by and continue to struggle because they are our solutions and not his. I work extra hours here and there, we borrow from family, I work a 2nd job occasionally.

I am now trusting that God will help Ben to skyrocket into a success with his Law office. I know that he will soon make enough to not only pay our debts but support us. We will pay off our debts early, we will purchase a home, we will find the finances to adopt and we will discover a financial peace that will allow us to give freely without worrying about the consequences of that giving on our own livelihood. We will be able to do great things for God and his kingdom through the generosity he will show us.

For those of you who know me this is a very big breakthrough as I have always relied on myself to find solutions to my problems and tend to be a pessimist. Please Pray for me so that I can remain in Faith and Trust God to work his wonderful plan in my life which I believe includes financial peace.

I would encourage you to Trust God in whatever struggle you are encountering as well. Imagine your life if God worked a miracle in that situation, write it down and then Trust that it will happen.

God bless and work Miracles in your life and mine.

8 things you did or did not know about me

1. I used to be in a bow league. (bow and arrow, and I even won prizes)

2. I love to swim. (but am way out of practice)

3. I hate tan lines (once tan the white just looks sickly)

4. I like to roller skate (not roller blade)

5. I love to dance

6. I hate to be alone ( a 2 year old is not company either)

7. I suck at pop culture stuff (who cares who sings I just dig the song)

8. I am not a Harry Potter fan. (read 1 book and watched all the movies but its so ho humm to me)

So I know that was very superficial but I tried to give a more intimate look and it just became an 8 things I dont like about myself so this is what you get instead.

Is Education the best financial choice?

I know most of us have felt at some point or another that we do not have enough money. Some of us have even seriously wondered how to put food on the table, but are we really that poor?

Of course not, we feel that we do not have enough money because everyone owns more than one TV and more and more people own a HDTV big screen. We have to have nice furniture, nice clothes, everything. In fact food is one of the last things we think about when it comes to our expenses. We will buy a dollar menu item to eat and spend 100s on clothes out shopping.

Other countries standard of living is down to the basics they feel proud to simply have some nice food and newer clothes. Being able to afford seed to grow their own crops or a few head of cattle are the things they judge themselves by.

But how do we escape the cultural standards we face everyday? I do not pretend to know the answer. You hear the term poor college student (who has plenty of money to party and go to lots of events) and even the poor newlywed starting out. You see on TV a 20 something year old buying over 200,000 dollar homes and expecting granite and this and that. When I know that most of us cannot afford it.

It is also a cultural no-no to be living with family or working for low income, but why?

I have to say that I often envy those living comfortably on very little. They are blue collar workers who earn what they have.

I am disgusted by the fact that these people are portrayed so poorly by media and not respected by our culture. It is these depictions that made us (my husband and I) think we needed more.

We are both college graduates, he even has a JD (law degree). We thought this would mean a life of easy living with plenty of money for the simple expenses like housing, food etc. Boy were we wrong. Instead it has put us behind by years and we find ourselves struggling to dig our selves out of a student loan avalanche. Now we do not even have the money to afford even the simplest of things due to large loan payments and wonder if it wouldn't have been better to save that money and find low but sustainable paying jobs.

Everyone tells us that its only short term but how do you cope even in the short term.

Are we expected to just keep accumulating debt to stay afloat while we wait for those degrees to pay off.

Prayer seems our only option these days. Praise to God for the people around us who support us emotionally and financially these days. He provides through love and kindness of family and friends. We also Pray that we can somehow find a way out of this financial dilemma and guidance to cope in the meantime.

Personal Space, Whats That?

So Ben and I have been considering purchasing our own home and escaping the chaos that is "Gale" living. I call it Gale living because we currently live with my parents and bless there heart they have an open door policy to just about anyone out there especially family (the rest of the Gale's). Living with the constant bombardment of friends, family, and neighbors has really been getting to me lately and I grew up with it this way. What is Peace? You mean there isn't someone coming to your house every single day? Lucky!! My family is so comfortable dropping in on us that they show up unannounced and we usually end up feeding them. My cousins even planned a family reunion at our house and gave us about a week and a half notice.

I am so amazed that we have lasted the past 3 years here. By now I bet you are too. Anyway, so we have been desperate to be our own family but have not been able to do it financially and unfortunately after crunching the numbers we are still stuck.

I will continue to cook and clean for not only the 6 members of this household but for all the visitors I can't kick out because it is not my house.

We are hoping that Ben's business will pick up and that we will be able to find our own space in the next year. I often wonder if praying for my own space is greedy. God is already providing us with all we Need through the generosity of my parents but oh the stress on every aspect of our life.

I pray instead that God help me to be happy in any situation I find myself in. I pray that God uses me where I am since I know that my family and our many visitors could use His guidance. This has proven difficult as I get very angry with them and find it hard to be an example of Gods love, but I will keep trying.

Yesterday my cousins came over to "hang out" while they flea bombed their home and while I was not real thrilled with their presence I remembered that I needed to act out of Love and so I offered to feed them (cousin, wife and three girls) dinner. I know it was a small gesture but it was a large step for me and I am hoping that God can use it to weigh on their hearts.

With Gods help I can get through anything even the chaos of "Gale" living.

To sleep like a 2 year old

I wish that I was able to sleep like my son.

Yesterday, Cori brought him to lunch at the Blackhawk for the kids eat free day. Well he fell asleep on the way. I barley got him to wake up so I could get him out of the car seat and then he laid his head on my shoulder and was out again. Then I sat him in his chair. I got a "mommy I sleep" out of him before he put his head on the table and was out like a light. Cori and I tried to wake him on several occasions to no avail. Anyway he slept all the way up until I sat his to go container of food next to him. He suddenly woke up and scarfed down 2 chicken strips, a pickle a bunch of chips and of course his Oreo cookies as if he had never slept at all.

Don't you wish that you could power nap like that, I know I do.

My Life the condensed version

I grew up as a tom boy and softball was my greatest love even after I started liking boys. It wasn't untill I fell in love with my husband that softball seemed less important. I played softball all year long from the age of 6 when I started t-ball untill I graduated from college at age 21. I struggled with depression through school with dilusions of the world being against me and that the only people who loved me were my parents. I struggled making friends outside of sports and didn't make time for boyfriends (2 week relationship was my record untill I met my husband).

I married my high school sweetheart and best guy friend, Ben. We were only friends for the first 3 years of high school (I had moved to the area my freshman year) and then decided to date our senior year. After a year of being separated during the week at colleges 3 hours apart we got enganged and he transfered schools to be within an hour. The next summer we were married and lived near my college (he made the 1 hr commute). We graduated from undergrad 2 years later (I had a BS in biology and he had a BA in economics). I started looking for work and he prepared for law school. I was lucky enough to land a job at the same university he was attending law school and we moved to the big city. That first year of law school was awful. He was so busy studying and I was so not busy with no friends and nothing to do. We decided to move home with my parents after that first year so that I could have people to talk to when he was unavailable and we could save some money. We now had over an hour commute every day. Soon after that I found out I was pregnant and then Tyler came along after a very difficult delivery. He is now 2 and a half and very bright and big. Due to the complications at his birth I will not be able to risk another pregnancy and so hopefully this blog will someday discuss our adoption of a few more children. My husband Ben has now since graduated from lawschool, passed the bar and opened a practice. Things have deffinatly not been easy to this point nor do they appear to be getting easier any time soon.

I have transfered my job closer to home and it has been a great blessing. I now get to see Tyler most lunches and am home much earlier. Soon I will be reducing my work schedule to spend even more time with him. However, as the primary breadwinner for the majority of our marriage I am apprehensive. This change requires Ben's practice to provide at least half of our necessary income. Pray for us.

I have been fortunate enough to have a very kind and patient best friend over the last 12 years. She has been there for me when Ben was not able so many times and has been a godsend in a babysitter for Tyler. Her name is Cori and she has a 7 year old daughter named Jessie whom she has raised all on her own while holding down various jobs and more recnetly going back to college full time. It is her ability to do all these things that has kept me going during the difficult times of Bens schooling and my recovery after having Tyler. I thank God for her role in my life everyday and I look with both joy and sorrow at her moving next year to get her master's and PH D. I regret all the times that I wasn't around for her when she was struggling with being a single mom (while I was away at college). It is her turn to go away to college and I will miss her greatly but I am so excited for her.

Well, thats about it for now.