Back on the blogging train!

June 9th.  JUNE 9th.  JUNE NINTH!!!!
That was the last time I blogged on here.  I'm pretty sure that I will never become a professional blogger with that kind of lapse in blogging.

Where did the summer go?  We didn't really do much in the way of vacationing or BBQing, so where in the world did it go??

We are about ready to start school around here.  I have spent months researching curriculum and changing my mind and then changing my mind again.  It reminds me of when I was pregnant and would spend months researching baby names only to have Hotsauce look at me like I was crazy or agree quickly to a name because he knew I was going to change my mind soon!  I had my mind made up a few months ago that we would be doing my "perfect" curriculum, only to realize that $1,500 curriculum doesn't fall under "gazelle intensity" when it comes to paying off that snowball!

Last year I changed curriculum to go to a much cheaper one.  I was all for buying it as cheap as possible.  Besides, how different could it really be?

Ugh.  While last year's curriculum was academically great... perhaps even way above par... it was boring.  I mean, stick a fork in my eye this is soooo boring!!

So while I can't justify paying $1,500 for curriculum this year, I also can't put the turkeys through another year of boredom.  We decided that after 5 years of doing this homeschool thing that I can pick and choose from several different publishers and find what I need (aka want) at a price that will not jeopardize our debt snowball momentum. 

I was also given a first time amount for curriculum... In that I got a set amount to buy what I needed to get started for the year.  We also made a budget plan for items that I would buy later on in the year to supplement with other books, manipulatives, and this and thats!  After getting some great deals on Ebay and other sources I came in under my start up budget!  :)  Woo-hoo!  Who loves me now Dave Ramsey??

In other news...

The other day a neighbor of ours who attended FPU with us came over and asked us if she could do her happy dance!!!  Who are we to say no?  If the lady wants to happy dance it up in our kitchen then so be it!!!  After dancing she shared with us that her and the hubby had paid off $10,000 in debt in 6 months!! 
We joined in the happy dance with her!  This stuff works!!  And it's worth celebrating!! 

We've also been approved by the elders to lead a FPU class this fall.  We're just waiting for the money portion to be approved and then we'll be on our way!  I can't wait to encourage others on their Total Money Makeover journey ... to give them the tools that they need to succeed financially... so that they too can come over and happy dance it up in our kitchen!!

I once blogged...now I'm lost?

The worse part about blogging about our journey is that all of the "good" blogging things happen when I'm at my busiest.  By the time that I'm ready to blog I forget all everything that I was going to write about.

So I guess we're all going to have to deal.

Since moving Turkey Bottom Haven into our garage... it's now set up as our shop... we have definitely seen an increase in business.  Perhaps it's because people now have an opportunity to come out and "touch" the items they'd like to buy or because we've finally determined that if this is what we'd like to do then we need to get on it!

And that we have.

Traffic on Turkey Bottom Haven increases when we add new pictures of new product.  It holds true that foot traffic also increases when we are consistently adding new products in the shop.  The thing about adding new items in Turkey Bottom Haven is that we have to have money to buy items... makes sense doesn't it?  Fortunately our in house budget nerd has a great business plan and budget that is helping us put money into the business and into our debt snowball all at the same time. 

We recently met a man, Jim, at an auction.  We ended up buying 6 sets of lockers at the auction and he asked if we would be interested in more.  That night he gave us some.  Isn't God faithful?  We weren't planning on going to the auction and here we not only walked out with lockers, but we also began a friendship with Jim. 

One of my favorite things that Jim has said to Hotsauce went something like this:
Hotsauce: So why are you getting rid of so much of your stuff?
Jim: My kids want me to get rid of it before they have to deal with it themselves.  Besides, you and your wife are believers.  I can trust you.  I've never trusted anyone else to go through it.

It has always been our desire that we would conduct our business in such a way that we would glorify God.  The super exciting thing is that we never told him that we were believers.  Ben just listened to his story and offered to pray for him when he shared some of his hurts and concerns.  So while this new friendship has been a great benefit to us all financially, it is our hope that it will benefit the kingdom of God even more.

In other news, do you remember me talking about S.O.S... aka Sister Of Sorts?  She moved in with us last fall-ish?  Well, she's decided to take a summer position at a Bible camp that she's been serving at for many years.  In addition she's decided that when the summer is over she will be ready to move back into an apartment. 

While we all agree that the decision really is best for us all (it's hard living with friends) it has caused a little bit of a panic for me.  The loss of income "hurts" the budget.  Hotsauce, the eternal optimist, is not worried about it.  On the other hand, I am the eternal pessimist, and believe that the budget sky will fall on me.  The good news is that I'm already matching, if not exceeding, what we were making in S.O.S rent money at Turkey Bottom Haven.  The bad news was that we were getting used to having both extra incomes. 

God has not yet failed to meet our needs. 
How quickly I am to forget the goodness and faithfulness of God.

Speaking of the faithfulness of God.  Towards the end of May I started praying that God would increase the number of likes on our Turkey Bottom Haven page.  I specifically asked that by the end of June that we would have 600 likes on our page and that by the end of the summer we would have 1,000 likes.  Well, here it is June 9th and we have 643 likes!  How exciting is that??

Like I said earlier the more traffic we have on the page the more sales we do... and sales help us pay off a little more debt every month.  And every month we come a little closer to the day that we can finally adopt.

Oh, how I long for that day. 
How far away it seems... how very, very, very far away it seems. 

Hmmm, maybe this is another time when the faithfulness of God comes into play!?!?

Blow fund: yes. Diabetes: no.

We have been budgeting every penny for 9 months now.  And it is paying off big time for us!
By the end of this month we will have paid down $30,000 in debt... plus paid all of our bills (on time), fed our family of seven, saved for Christmas, saved for an emergency, and had a little fun along the way.

By the way, we live in an essentially one-income home, with two people who are willing to get any side job possible to help get to our goal a little sooner.  There are some weeks that we look at each other and say, "Hey there, who are you and what are you doing in my home?"  ;) Hotsauce is especially busy and seems to take his work uniform off just to put on his work boots and grubby clothes to go work on a remodel job.

And though we don't get quite as much time together as either of wish, we realize that this is the situation that we got ourselves into and it's our responsibility to get ourselves out.  Personal responsibility is incredibly important to us and we have found great joy in the process of paying off that which we owe others.

With that being said, one thing that I believe both Hotsauce and I would say, is that having a "blow fund" or "pocket money" is so incredibly important to both of us.  With every penny budgeted and no real "wiggle" room in the budget we need a little bit of money that is our very own to spend (or not spend) as we wish. 

We get paid our blow fund every two weeks.  It is a glorious day!  Hotsauce will spend his blow money quickly.  Typically on these gigantic cups of fountain pop from the gas station.  Or to bring his favorite wife a candy bar when she's had a rough day raising "his" kids! ;)  On the other hand I tend to save my blow money.  I use it to buy "bigger" items that the regular budget doesn't allow for ... typically for me this would be clothing (above the budgeted amount) or something old, rusty or with chipped paint!

The rules with our blow funds are pretty simple.  I get mine. He gets his. He doesn't get to tell me what to do (or not do) with mine. And, more importantly, he doesn't have to listen to me when I tell him what to do (or not do) with his... even if he's on the fast track to diabetes.  :P

I actually feel "richer" than I ever have before.  I have my own guilt-free money.  I know a lot of moms who would love to have this.  I must admit that in the beginning I had a really hard time using it on me, or at least only on me.  I would buy pizza for the whole family or a snack for the kids and I when we were out running around.  I have since changed my ways a little bit.  Those were old habits. Going out to eat because I was too tired (aka lazy) to cook or buying a bunch of junk food at a gas station because I wanted a candy bar (I love candy) and had to appease the turkeys by getting them something too.  Now I am seeing the benefits of saving my money for something that I really, really, really want.  That's not to say that I've stopped buying candy all together...

If you've started budgeting and haven't allowed yourself a little pocket money you may be doing yourself more harm than good.  Having a little space to treat yourself to something that you want will actually keep you on track and help you avoid discouragement.  So go ahead, give yourself a little treat.  Make sure that you're being reasonable in that amount too! 

So how much should you give yourself?  That's really up to you and your spouse (if you're married).  We each get $25 for a two week period.  In addition to that we give ourselves 10% each of any extra income that comes in... though we are considering dropping that to 5%.  It does make it a little easier for me when Hotsauce is working a second job, knowing that our time away will net us a little fun later on.  Though I'd much rather have the time with him!  Also anything that I make at Turkey Bottom Haven will give us each a little boost in our pocket money as well as helping to pay off debt.  It's a great motivation for those days when I'd rather just take a nap... or eat candy. ;) 

All this talk of candy.  Maybe Hotsauce isn't the only one on the fast track to diabetes.

Loving life.

The last few months have been a bit of a roller coaster for our online business, Turkey Bottom Haven, and on a few occasions I honestly wondered if this was the end of the line!

Turkey Bottom Haven is what we're calling our hobby business.  We are slowly trying to build it up into a business that we can run full-time.  But, we are not willing to go into debt to try to hurry the process along.  After all, the sole purpose of having an online business is to help us get out of debt!!

 As I've mentioned many times before my friend, Emily, was letting us sell items in her shop The Pickin' Shed... which was fabulous!  The advantage of a brick and mortar store was huge for us!  Lots of people love to touch an item before they purchase it and obviously an online shop cannot provide that benefit.  Early in the month we made a difficult decision and removed our remaining items out of The Pickin' Shed.  We made this decision based on a lot of different factors, but the biggest was that we wanted to go out on our own. 

It was time to establish our own identity. 

I was beginning to get lazy and thinking that as long as The Pickin' Shed was doing well that Turkey Bottom Haven would do just fine.   That's a great way to kill your business (and possibly your friendship). 

We are very grateful to Emily for her friendship and her desire to help us grow.  Very few people in this world desire to see others succeed, especially if they're in the same line of work.  Emily Smock is a quality gal and we kinda like her! :)

I've wanted my own shop for quite some time now... but I knew that we are in no place to pay rent and utilities and in general be strapped down with overhead costs.  But, I am also not comfortable having people come into our house to shop.  I love Turkey Bottom Haven, but my first job is protecting my babies and having strangers roam our house is potentially dangerous.

So Hotsauce came up with a plan.  He started clearing out one side of our garage and we turned it into a "shop" of sorts.  My business will remain an online shop while the garage stores our inventory.  But instead of having everything shoved into the space like a storage unit we decided, "Why not make it look like a small shop?"

And so we started filling the garage up and I kept thinking "I'm so glad this stuff is out of my house!" 

But, as soon as I thought that, I would think, "You know, I really like that shelf/cabinet/rug/quilt etc., maybe it should go back into the house!"

There are also a few items out there that will eventually need to be pulled out so that we can do some work on them.  For instance in the picture below here a bit there's a wonderful pie safe that needs a drawer repaired (and we are fortunate enough to have all the original pieces!)

So we find ourselves in a bit of a transitional time, but we are also finding ourselves in a season of God's blessings. 

This past Saturday we went to a building supplies auction and found 8 sets of lockers that we wanted... of course we had to wait several hours before bidding began on them.  While we were there a man recognized Hotsauce and started up a conversation with him.  When he found out that we were there for the lockers he told us that he had three lockers that we might be interested in.  They're pictured above.

He also told us that he had two semi-trailers full of items that we might be interested in and that we could go out the next day and take a look at them.

Holy.Moly.  He has a LOT of stuff!  Apparently his children don't want to have to deal with it when he's gone and that it would be a help to us both if we went through and got want we could use.  All he asked was for a fair price and we could take just about anything we wanted (with the exception of a few family heirlooms).

We only had an hour to go through his semi-trailers, but we made good use of that time and were able to find enough items to fill up one trailer load and the back of our Suburban.

We will be back though as there are many treasures that we had to leave behind on that first trip!  And once we're really able to start digging who knows what we will find!

I love this "job".  I love that it's helping us become debt free, but even more than that I love that Hotsauce and I are doing it together and both truly enjoy it!

God is so good to us!

By the way, if you ever make it up to our neck of the woods, please stop in and see all our goodies! :)

Locker Wars

There are some growing pains going on at Turkey Bottom Haven.

And some times I just want to throw my hands up in the air and just quit.

Returning home from our vacation means that we are forced to get back to business.  Something that we haven't spent a lot of time on recently.  Hotsauce has been very busy with remodel jobs and just doesn't have the time or the energy to head into the basement to work on the millions five projects that I have in mind for him.  Because he can't get to the projects that I want him to do, I'm kind of stuck. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting.

I also haven't showed a lot of motivation to work on something else that doesn't require his help.  But, if I mentioned that it would be self-incriminating right? ;)

We recently purchased a set of lockers that has had a lot of interest from potential buyers.  This is normally a really great thing.  In my experience there are always people who express interest in something, but in the end something comes up and they never show up.  It is very frustrating from my point of view because I'm counting on that income.  It is also very likely that once interest is expressed from a potential buyer that I'm telling other people that it is "sold pending pickup." This squelches their excitement for an item and since they don't think they have a chance to buy it they move onto to another item.  When the original person doesn't show I have now lost two potential buyers and am left "holding the bag"...

The lockers in question! :)

Since the interest was so high in the lockers I began telling everyone who contacted me about them the same thing.  I made it known that they would be sold on a "first come, first served basis" and that they would not be put on hold for anyone.  In my opinion it's the only fair where to operate a business.  I even had close friends ask about the lockers and decided that "favoritism" is also a bad business practice that I would not get involved in.

They sold this morning.  Which I should rejoice in, right?  Well, after announcing that they were sold I had one lady that was obviously upset.  I had one set of lockers remaining and offered those to her at a discount.  Her response was that I was unprofessional and that she wouldn't be doing business with me again. :(

Ugh.

I had a feeling this was going to happen. 

My response was that I was sorry she felt that way.  I offered to look for additional lockers for her or that we would even be willing make a wooden storage unit for her at a discounted price.  I'm not sure what else I could do. 

So I will worry the rest of the day if there was a better way of handling it... because if there was I would love to do it better.  If this is just a part of the business I will worry the rest of the day if I'm cut out for it.  Because I honestly don't like hurting other people's feelings or having others think poorly of me.

I would also love it if the rest of you would weigh-in on this... how would you handle things?  Is it best to let people call dibs?  Is a first come, first served basis only a work in a "brick and mortar" store.  What should my response be to those who's feelings get hurt in the process?  I would seriously love to hear your opinions. 

Freeloaders

We just got back from an all-expense paid trip to Denver, Colorado.
Did you hear that Dave Ramsey?... an all-expense paid trip. 

Boo-yah.

Well, actually I like to think of it as a work trip... as in, we were paid to do several construction jobs for Hotsauce's sister and her roommate, Katie.
Did you hear that Bob?... I said her roommate, Katie.

And it's only fair that from this point on when I say "we did several construction jobs" you should interpret that as "Hotsauce made some counter tops and did a few odd jobs while I played Candy Crush on my new phone."

Hotsauce beginning to take out the old counter tops.

The sink came out...

I know what you're thinking... that's the largest pan of brownies I have ever seen.  Not, to disappoint you, but those are actually the counter tops drying.

The house slave was called in to assist in a lot of cleaning projects along the way.  Look how happy she is!! :)

It took some doing, but they finally went in!!  Our work here is done... excited to see what it looks like once they get the new back splash in!!

And now you know why I call him, "Hotsauce!"

 So all work and no play makes for a very dull vacation.  So between those pictures there was a little bit of fun... and a whole ton of eating out!!

I.love.eating.out.
No, wait... I.totally.lurvesauce.eating.out.

And more than that, I love eating out when Jes and Katie pay. ;)

The highlight of the week was going to our very first roller derby bout.  Jes "BobLoblaw" is a blocker for the Rocky Mountain Rollergirls.  And she's amazing.  I'm pretty much an expert at derby now, so if you have any questions you can ask me. Errrr, not so much.

It only makes sense that Bob has a better mustache than Hotsauce.  I'm also pretty sure that her legs are hairy too.

No jammer has a chance against the brick wall that is BobLoblaw.

 Of course the Rollergirls not just won the bout, they destroyed their opponent.  I would tell you who it was that they played... but other than that they were from Minnesota, I don't know what the name of their team is.

Did I mention that the RMRG won by more than a hundred points?  Well, they did.

I must say that all in all, this was by far the best all-expense paid trip that I have ever been on!  Even if it wasn't an all-expense paid trip it would have been an incredible trip.  I love Jes and Katie.  I love how much the four of us laugh when we're together and that we can have passionate disagreements discussions about potentially explosive topics and still think the others are pretty fabulous people.  

Plus, now I know what a Domo is and can start writing my book...

There's a new game in town.

Bean and Lou, our daughters, have made up a new card game.  It's a game with rules all their own ... you know, the kind where you can change the rules at any time so long as the other player agrees.

And if you're the oldest player, it's possible to change the rules at any time, whether the younger sister objects or not.  ;)

Though they've tried to explain the game in detail to me, the point of it still escapes me.   I'm not even sure if it's a game that you can win or lose.  But, they love this game and have even taught a neighbor girl how to play.

So, why blog about it here?

Because one object of the game is to not go into debt.  They make piles on top of a row of cards and these piles are your "debt".  How one goes into debt or gets out of debt makes no sense to me... but I love that the object is to not go into debt!

So what did they name their game?

You probably already guessed it, but they call it, "Dave Ramsey"!

Oh, how I love them!

Livin' like no one else is hard to do...

"Live like no one else so that one day you can live like no one else"... Dave Ramsey's voice echos in my head.  Some days that's all I need to strengthen my resolve, it literally allows me to put my head up high, throw my shoulders back and smile at what's to come.  Then other days it becomes a whiny little mantra in my head that I stumble over and become resentful of and I trip over my desire of the here and now.

Press on!

I'm finding the longer that this journey of financial freedom goes on the less excited our support people are ... as if to say, "That was okay for a time, but this is getting a little old."  And if they think it's getting old for them, I just want to shake them and says, "Hey, this ain't no picnic for me lady!!"

We are in a battle.  While we battle our own wills to do what we want, when we want (aka right now) we are also battling other issues of time.  And so it seems like time has become the one resource we need more than money to pay off our debt.

With five turkeys, an active church life, Turkey Bottom Haven, homeschooling, helping two other families with their finances, and numerous odd jobs for Hotsauce we are stretched thin.  Not to mention his full-time job (that has weird hours for two weeks out of five) and my regular household duties and just regular old life we have little time for much else. 

It seems to me that nothing really ever gets accomplished.

Nothing ever gets done.

For instance, we signed our oldest son up for Tiger Cubs.  Talk about a bad year to make that decision.  His meetings never fall at a "good" time, but instead always seem to conflict with a ministry opportunity or an opportunity to make a financial gain.  For instance, last night was his awards night and it got missed because Hotsauce is remodeling a bathroom for a really great price (more per day then he makes at his day job) and in the shuffle of getting that job Hotsauce didn't see an email from the Pack Leader about awards night. 

But, even if he had I'm not sure that things would have changed much.  We are determined to pay off our debt.  It is our conviction that debt is sinful.   We believe that God has forgiven us for the sin that brought us to this place.  Yet, there is always consequences for sin and we must take responsibility for those consequences.  Right now, that means that we have to give up some things that we'd really like to do.

I'm also looking for the sunshine in the consequences.  Hotsauce is really great at seeing sunshine, rainbows and puppy dogs while I just see a glimmer of hope.  He inspires me to keep fighting the good fight! 

It would be appropriate for me to highlight some of the things I'm thankful for in the midst of this battle!  Did you notice in this blog that I mentioned that we are helping two other families with their finances?  Who in a million years would have ever thought that we would be giving good solid advice to people about handing their money??  No one in their right mind would have asked us how to budget a mere seven and a half months ago!  Isn't God so good to use imperfect vessels? 

I'm also thankful for this side job that Hotsauce has gotten.  He did some work for a neighbor, who recommended him for this job putting in a tub surround.  Last night was his first night and while there the gentleman that he's doing the remodel for decided to hire him to do some tile work in the bathroom as well! And before the night was over it was determined that Hotsauce would also put in a wood floor for them!  How faithful is  God to us?? 

How have you been doing in your journey to get out of debt, build wealth, and help others?

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's off to court we go!

On Wednesday we were back in court trying to recoup the money owed to us for our rental house.  If you're unsure of what I'm talking about you can go here to read about our wonderful renters of old.

This time we made sure that we had done everything right.  Hotsauce poured over the Iowa Code Sections to make sure that everything was done by the book.

You bet your bottom that we sent our former renters a copy of the damages and the estimated amounts that were owed to us... both by regular mail and certified mail.  That list was itemized and exact.  And it was long!

When all was said and done they owed us for back rent for the month of February and 8 days of March, they owed past due amounts, they owed for damages to the house and for the labor to fix it all.  In all we determined that owed us $2,970.07.  Of course they had paid a deposit of $400 upon moving in so that dropped the total to a mere $2,570.07.

That's a lot of money kids.

We arrived at court with our girls in attendance.  Joy, the former renter, also arrived just in the nick of time. And let me tell you it was disgusting.

It's very hard to sit and listen to someone out and out lie.  And then in the midst of their lying to accuse you of destroying the house yourself (you know, because we're trying to sell it and want her to pay for all of remodeling we're trying to get done).

After all was said and done the judge said that he would review everything and take it under advisement and that we would hear back on his ruling in 2-3 weeks.

As we left the courtroom with our girls we were able to hold our heads high knowing that we told the truth.  And as we climbed into our truck and left town Hotsauce began praying.  He prayed that we would get what we deserved and that Joy would get what she deserved.  He acknowledged that God is in control of all things and that He could do whatever He wanted.

His prayer also proved to me what a great man I married.  Because I was really hoping that the girls would be preoccupied and we could start blasting that woman and her lying tongue!  Ah, but he continually points me heavenward, reminding me to set my mind on things above and not on earthly things!

Today as I went to get the mail I noticed that we received a letter from the courthouse.  Not knowing what to expect I cautiously tore open the envelope to find that the judge had made his ruling much sooner than expected.

While we were not awarded the full amount the judge did grant in our favor!  I believe that God granted Ben's prayer and we were awarded what He saw fit.  We are very excited to get past this and now are praying that they will pay what they owe and that we will never have to see them in court again!

Thanks to all of you who have prayed and supported us along the way!  Please keep praying that all of this will be paid and resolved quickly!

As if.

Ugh.  You've all seen the pictures of our house in West Union. Disaster doesn't begin to describe it and I just want to be done.  I don't want to spend time on Hotsauce's day off to clean that house... AGAIN!!

It's really, really, really discouraging!  This will be the third floor that we've put into the kitchen.  That's a lot of money... not to mention that the hall and the bathroom need new floors too.

The whole house needs paint.  Not to mention the walls need to be mudded and sanded.

When need to replace two interior doors, a light fixture, lots of trim and we're rebuilding the cabinet under the kitchen sink, because mold isn't a great feature in a home you're trying to sell.

But, you know all this.

I must say that the last time when we went to the house and started busting out the tile floor with hammers and pry bars that I actually enjoyed myself.  It helped relieve some of the stress!  I also felt like I was contributing to the project.

Today there wasn't much for me to do.

So I cried.

Or maybe I didn't do much today because I was crying?

I know fussing, pouting, crying etc. doesn't go over well for my children, but I gave it a shot today.  Turns out that it doesn't fix anything... and neither do I!

It's so frustrating to pour so much money into a house to try to sell it and not have it sell.  So we find renters for the time being and only charge them enough to pay the rent, insurance and taxes and they destroy it.

It's so very frustrating to be in the midst of taking care of our own debt and striving to honor God in that decision only to have this major set back.

I felt like laying on the living room floor and kicking my feet and screaming, "I DON'T WANT TO PUT MY MONEY INTO THIS HOUSE WHEN I COULD PUT IT INTO FIXING MY OWN!!!!!!"

In the midst of throwing my little HUGE fit a very wise and loving man told me that God cares for us, He cares for our situation and He has always provided mightily for us.  He stopped work on the house and had us all join in a circle to pray, asking God for what seems like a miracle... that our work wouldn't be in vain and that the house would finally sell.

Wouldn't it be great if I always had faith?  Even just a smidgen?  I've seen God at work so many times before... I've seen the miracles that he has performed in my own life and yet a little work and a little bit of money and I'm seeing mountains.

As if God can't make a man out of the dirt.
As if God can't part seas.
As if God can't make bread fall from the skies.
As if God can't make a donkey speak.
As if God can't tear down walls with trumpet blasts and a shout.
As if God can't make the sun and the moon stand still.
As if God can't cause Armies to win by throwing hailstones.
As if God can't heal a woman by having her touch the cloak of Jesus.
As if God can't make wine out of water.
As if God can't roll the stone away.

As if.

As if a few hundred dollars, some broken doors and a new floor will ruin us.
As if all is lost.

Oh, me of little faith.

That's my girl!!

We received a less than normal tax return this year.  Hotsauce wisely made some changes at the beginning of 2012 so that we would receive more of our money during the year instead of lending it to the government.

That being said, it was still a very nice return. :)

We decided to budget our return before we wasted it... in years past Hotsauce and I would both make separate plans and then get mad at the other one for not knowing what the other was thinking!!  Another thing that I would do would be to drop hints of things that I "needed" ... aka new shoes, a dishwasher, always leather furniture, and who knows what else.  Hotsauce would agree that these would be great things to do if we paid off this bill or that bill first.  Once the money was deposited all bets were off and since there was no real plan our tax return was nickeled and dimed away.

Maybe you've been there?

Well, not this year.  Every dollar is budgeted.  Not all of it for something fun... but not all of it for the debt snowball either.

One plan that Hotsauce had was to bless each child with $50.  This budgeting stuff is hard and they have had to miss out on some fun things.  So shouldn't they get the chance to have some money of their own to decide how they'd like to spend it?

Hotsauce walked in from the bank carrying the cash in his hand.  Emma spied it immediately and asked (jokingly) if she could have some.  You should have seen her face when her daddy handed her a fifty dollar bill. 

That was fun.

Word spread fast.  And soon others were asking if they too could have some.  As this played out, Hannah, the oldest, wasn't asking if she could have some.  On the contrary she looked rather disturbed, as though she might start crying.

I asked her if she was going to ask Daddy for some money and she shrugged her shoulders and turned her face away from me.

Something was wrong with this kid.

When we pressed a little harder she started crying... she gets that from her mom... and finally she said that she didn't want the money.

We tried guessing why she didn't want it, worried that she might be concerned that we needed it more than she did... but no that wasn't it either.  So why wouldn't she take the money?

She finally told us...

"I don't want it because I didn't earn it."

Yep.  That's my girl.  Nine years old and far more responsible than most adults in America.

Smart, pretty, responsible, funny and most importantly loves Jesus.
Boom goes the dynamite.

About the rental property...

 We have finally made it back into the rental house in W.U.

It was destroyed.  As was to be expected. They still haven't paid their rent for February or March. As was to be expected.  Sometimes I just don't have words.  So take a look for yourself.

Under kitchen sink.  We assume they didn't call about the plumbing problem because of the condition of the kitchen floor.  You do not want to know how bad the water in that pan smelled.

Broken tiles in the kitchen.

More broken tiles.  There were almost 40 broken tile in all.  We had to rip out the tile and the sub floor and will have to replace the whole thing.

The wood floors were completely redone prior to the tenants moving in.  They're destroyed.

Hole in the wall.

Someone kicked a hole in the wall in the master bedroom.

Stole a light fixture in a bedroom.  Who steals a light fixture? 

Ripped out the motion light outside of the house.  It was there 2 days before we got possession of the house.  They had the "decency" to leave the light on the kitchen counter.

Laundry Room. Sick. Sick. Sick.

Door torn off the hinges.  Two days prior to them moving out these were properly in place.

Hole punched in door.  This was one of two doors that had holes.
I haven't mentioned all of the holes in the walls... but there's only so many pictures of holes I could post before things get repetitive.

So I will leave you with this final picture of loveliness.  That's the basement floor with a bunch of garbage and a few piles of dog crap.  Yes. They let their dog crap in the basement and lived with the smell of it permeating the entire house.  Have I mentioned sick.sick.sick???!!!

So this is what we're dealing with...

This is officially declared a no drama area...

Around mid-morning we received a call from our Realtors office.  They received insider information from the gas company that our renters (who we're trying to evict) are having their heat shut off today.

After a little investigating we also found out that said renters are also shutting off their electricity.

The good news is that they are voluntarily having these things disconnected.  Which means that they're likely on their way out the door.

As those of you in Iowa are aware of there's a nasty Alberta Clipper moving in and the weathermen are saying that we can expect 12 inches of snow tonight.  Most people do not voluntarily have their heat and electric turned off in the midst of a blizzard so we made the assumption that they're moving out today.

This leaves us in a bit of a quandary.  We have not been notified from our renters that they're moving out.  And from what the Sheriff's Office has told us is that they tried serving the eviction notice to the tenants 4 times before successfully serving it to them on the 5th try.

We were also afraid that these tenants would shut off the heat in an attempt to have the pipes burst before we took possession of the house.  Yet, if they shut the heat off and we transfer it back into our names will we end up footing the bill for the heat as well as the unpaid rent???

This defines quandary. 

Hotsauce immediately starts pouring over code sections of Iowa law to see what our options are... Turns out our options are:

1. We get screwed
2. We get screwed
3. We get angry, lash out, yell, scream, holler, throw things, curse the law that protects criminals and not law abiding citizens, write a letter to our Senators and then we get screwed.
4. We pray, trust God, and rejoice in the day that the Lord has made.

Or something a little more like us...
5. Get angry, yell at lawmakers who can't hear us ... and then remember to pray and trust God.

I know.  We stink at the whole pray first option.  Maybe someday we will figure it out.

Maybe we should pray that we remember to pray first, but of course we'd forget to pray to pray first!

Bean and I prayed together that what Satan means for evil that God would use for good.  That He would take care of the pipes and the overdue rent and our bad attitudes.  And then I gave my girls a short lecture on how they need to pay their bills when they're adults.

A few hours after praying Hotsauce received a phone call.  I knew immediately from his body language that this woman (ironically named Joy, though she has brought us none) on the other line was our tenant.  It took her about 3 sentences to get Hotsauce worked up... though by the grace of God, he found it in himself to be kind.

Sidebar: I really admire that man.

By the end of the call she told him that they would be out tomorrow, the house would be clean, they would leave a forwarding address and drop a check off with the amount owed by the end of this week.

Glory to God in the highest.

By the way, we went ahead and transferred the heat and electricity into our names.  God is faithful and will continue to see us through this!

Please pray that things go accordingly and that we would be able to get the realtor in soon and get this house sold.  We could use a little less drama around here.

Can I get a witness?

Hotsauce and I were going over our debt snowball to make sure that we are still plugging away and getting the job done.

Just to recap we started our Total Money Makeover journey in September of 2012 and in October of 2012 we went to our first Financial Peace University class.  If you have not read the entire book or done the class I would completely recommend it.  Check either out at www.daveramsey.com and let Davey know that The Fiscal Misfit sent you! ;)

This journey has completely and utterly changed our lives.  It has changed the way that Hotsauce and I respond to each other and given us common dreams.  We started an online shop called "Turkey Bottom Haven" and work side by side as the snowball melts a little bit each week.

So what did we find when we looked at our debt snowball?  It's been 6 months and we've made some headway. 

In September we had $21,610.45 more debt than we carry today.  Um, whicka, whicka what?? So before you go crazy thinking that we're the most amazing people that you know (though we probably are) I will give you glimpse on how that happened.

First of all we've paid off $10,679.37 out of our earned income.  This would be either from Hotsauce's job, from Turkey Bottom Haven or odd jobs.  That means that we've paid off $1,779.90 of our debt on average each month.  BOOM!

Now that still leaves $10,931.08 of debt that's unanswered for so what about that debt?  We call that the God Factor.  We had a credit card from a home improvement store that my Hot Hotsauce Husband did some wheeling and dealing on and they forgave $900 of what we owed.  Eat that credit card company! ;)

But, that $10,000ish leftover was not a deal that we struck.  Instead it was presented to us out of the blue.  I have 2 student loans that have been tossed from one lender to the next and has been in forbearance more times than I can count.  In the beginning of February we received a letter from our lender that they would forgive $10,000ish if we paid x-amount. 

Now you probably remember the $1,300 dash that we did a few months ago?  Well after we paid that off we did not celebrate as we wanted because we "stole" from other envelopes to get the money we needed.  We did not want to repeat that episode.  So we started by praying.  We asked God to provide the money we needed if He would have us to pay off this debt.  If He didn't provide we would know that He had other plans for us. 

He provided.

*Insert happy dance here!*

It seems to me that so far God has essentially matched our debt payoff dollar for dollar.  Can I get a witness?

Not our best day...

My bossy older sister  told me that I cannot post a blog about how my weekend has the potential of being awesome or catastrophic and not have some sort of follow up blog!

Let's start with the good news first. 

1. Sell the black cabinet. Check!
2. Sell the antiques. Um 1/3 of a check?!  Aka- we sold one of the three antiques!
3. Be awesome. Check!

Now onto the not so great news.

It is the 27th of February and our tenants are in breech of contract in multiple ways.  First of all rent is due on the first of the month.  That puts them 27 days late.  Secondly we are required to give them 24 hours notice when we plan on being inside the property and we gave them over 48 hours notice to let them know that we were going to have the realtor show the property.  They refused to let us in on the grounds that it was the tenants birthday.  There is no birthday clause in the lease agreement.

When Hotsauce posted the eviction notice he knocked on the door and both he and the police officer that accompanied him heard the tenants tell the dog to "Shut up."  But, they refused to open the door.  So Hotsauce taped the notice to both the front and back doors.  We waited four days to go to the Clerk of Court to file paperwork for their forcible removal.  There was other paperwork filed so that we can receive payment owed to us. 

Our tenant hired a lawyer and discovered that if we post an eviction notice we must also mail an eviction notice to them via regular mail and certified mail!  We honestly had no idea.   The case was dismissed. Since it was dismissed it also means that we pay the court costs.  =(

Ugh.

So we will start the process over.  And we started by going to the Sheriff's office to have them serve the eviction notice.  I think we might also have to send them the notices via regular and certified mail and post it to their door.  Just to make sure that we have all of our bases covered this time!!

We were told at the Sheriff's office that this isn't our tenants first rodeo and they know all the loop holes. 

It was a frustrating day to say the least.  Keep us in your prayers please!

Anything you want.

Just a short little post today. 
I hope this inspires you just a wee bit!

Photo Credit

"You know what you can do when you don't have any payments? Anything you want."

I love this!  No, I lurve this.  Actually I completely totally lurvesauce this.

I know some people believe that Christian's shouldn't be wealthy, something I utterly disagree with, but I think we can all agree that the borrower is slave to the lender.  And I don't know about you, but I'd much rather not be a slave to bill collectors, the bank and other financers.

Last night while picking up our Turkey Bottoms from Awana I overheard one of our elders talking to a high school student about his new (to him) truck.  I also heard the student (we will call him Bocaj) tell the elder (we will call him Tnilc) that he had to keep working so he could pay his $70 a month payment.  Bocaj said he had three more years before it was paid off.  Because I'm not one to keep to myself I told Bocaj that we should sit down sometime and talk about his finances. 

He's already enslaved at such a young age.  It breaks my heart.  How much better would it have been for him to save the $70 a month until he could buy a reliable vehicle that wouldn't require paying interest.  I wonder what would happen if this truck needs new tires, a new transmission, or needs a full tank of gas at $4 a gallon???  In short what happens if he can't make his payments and the lovely Repo man comes to his door?  There are heavy consequences for someone who's not even 18 years old yet!

Guess what he could do, what you could do, what I could do if we didn't have any payments? 
ANY.THING.WE.WANT!!

Thank God Friday - The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.

Thank.God.Friday!

This weekend could be absolutely stellar in the world of finances for us.  It could also be absolutely catastrophic in terms of finances for us.

Talk about a roller coaster of emotions! 

Here's the skinny.

First of all my friend, Emily, from the Pickin' Shed let us know that we might have sold a cabinet that we Hotsauce made!  Here's a couple of pictures of him...

 Isn't he wonderful?  It's the first cabinet that he's ever made and so selling it would be a big deal for us! 

I would also like to say that I think Hotsauce did an amazing job.  I love the bead board.  I love the entire look of it!  I really wouldn't mind if it didn't get sold and had to come home to me! ;)

As much as I would really like it to come home I know that my gazelle intensity says that we must sell it.  I'm sure that he will make another one for me someday ... (I can't wait for someday!).

Also we have a few 1920s antiques that have filled up our piano room and need a new home.  So we listed them on Craigslist and the end result was a.lot.of.spam.  Holy Spam Batman!  Thinking that we may be stuck with these antiques for awhile I started to get pretty anxious. 

Everything that we purchase for Turkey Bottom Haven comes out of our blow fund.  It doesn't come out of the regular budget and so we don't have a lot of "extra" money on hand.  And I would really love to have a little extra money in my pocket!

Also in order for Turkey Bottom Haven to make more money, we have to sell the items that we have on hand in order to buy more inventory.  If we're not selling, we're not buying more items, if we're not buying more items, we're out of business.

Today a lady called who is interested in a couple of our antiques.  If we sell these three items this weekend we will have made a profit of around $1,000.  One.thousand.bones.baby!

I would be OK with that.

So how could this weekend be catastrophic for us you might ask?

Last night Hotsauce called our renter who is occupying our house that we have on the market to let her know that the realtor would be bringing a potential buyer to look at the house.

Said renter, who has never been known for her cooperation, told him no.  She will not let the realtor in.  She also hasn't let the realtor in to take pictures of the house, other than the kitchen, because her husband sleeps 12 hours a day (her words, not mine) and cannot be bothered.

This could turn into a really long story.  Let's just say this renter is also 15 days late with her rent (and has never paid on time), started swearing at Hotsauce on the phone and has absolutely refused to cooperate.   Let's also just say that she woke her sleeping beauty of a husband to tell him that Hotsauce "was out of his [dang] mind" and was rude to her.  So the hubby called back and took a turn at swearing at him also. 

Now, for those of you who don't know my husband, he HATES confrontation and if it's up to him he would never fight with anyone.  But, he's also not one to run from trouble.  And these folks are trouble. 

Needless to say the Sheriffs Department will be at their doorstep with an eviction notice today.  And in the great state of Iowa you get three days to pay your rent before the Sheriff comes back to help move your stuff out on the curb.

Three days is a lot of time to do a lot of damage to the property.  And this will also delay the time when the realtor can show the house. 

This weekend truly is in God's hands.  The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.  Blessed be the name of the Lord.  It's good to have a God that can take care of these things for us!!

Sick and tired.

I saw this today and had to share it because it's so true for Hotsauce and I.  Well, actually since I had always been more of an ostrich when it came to our finances, I rarely got sick and tired.

Unless I wanted new shoes or jeans and we didn't have the money.

But, Hotsauce spent a lot of time being sick and tired of juggling bills, fees and overdue notices.  And not only was he sick and tired of it, he was sick and tired of feeling like it was never going to get better.

If you've ever been in a bad crisis situation and had the feeling that it was never going to get better you have an idea of how he felt.  And not only did it feel like it was never going to get better ... it was, in reality, getting worse.  The earth was crumbling beneath him and though he would take a step up here and there, for the most part he was sliding further and further into a trap of our own making.

And while he was sliding and unable to get a firm hold, I had my head stuck in the ground and couldn't see how fearful he was nor was I in any position to help him get out of the mess we'd made.

Perhaps the greatest benefit of our Total Money Makeover journey is that we are finally united in mind and heart.  We're walking the same path hand in hand.  He's not dragging me along kicking and screaming and I am finally able to be a helpmeet in our finances.  We truly are a wonderful team.

And though right now it seems as though we are slowly trudging through the muck and the mire of our debt, we are doing it together able to mutually encourage one another.  We have full confidence that though it may take more time than we would like, it will happen.  It is getting better.  We are fully committed to this and there is no going back to our old ways.

Because we're both sick and tired of being sick and tired!  I will not go back to that place. I.Will.Not.Go.Back.To.That.Place.

Anyone else sick and tired of being sick and tired???

Thank God Friday! - Press On!

It's Thank God Friday and it's actually Friday and I'm actually blogging!

I'm thankful for that.

Whew. Done for the week!

:0)

I seem to be writing about Turkey Bottom Haven and the Great Shelf Explosion in every post.  I'm sure that the rest of you are getting pretty sick of it.  But, I tell you what... too bad! ;)

This week we were on a mission to complete 6 shelves (4 small and 2 VERY large ones).  The most we had completed before in a week was 4 ... 2 large and 2 small.  Last week we only did 2 large ones.  It was not an easy task and to be quite honest it wasn't always easy.  We have 2 more to complete when Ben gets home tonight, but for the most part they're done.

I spent a lot, and by a lot, I mean no less than 6-8 hours a day, in the dungeon that is our workshop.  My fingernails are chewed up and dyed with stain and paint.  I haven't brushed my hair since sometime last week.  We still managed to have 4 days of school this week... though we did spend our read aloud time in the dungeon.

By Wednesday I was positive that we were getting no where and that I would die in the dungeon.  I had a huge meltdown. IT.WAS.NOT.PRETTY.  But, if you live in a dungeon, no one expects you to be pretty. ;)

I wanted to quit.

I kept hearing my friend, Dave Ramsey, saying, “If you will live like no one else, later you can live like no one else.”

I think I might make myself a sign that says that.  A nice sign made out of scratch paper and marker.  Nothing that would require paint.  I'm sick of paint.  :)  You know what, that's a great idea.  I'm going to do that right now.

But the thing about dungeons is that if you keep working eventually you make your way up into the castle.  In my reality the castle isn't an drafty ancient sign of wealth ... but instead it's a picture of my freedom. 

Now, don't get me wrong.  I love our shelves.  Hotsauce and I make an awesome team!  We have a good time working together.  We compliment each other in ways that only God could design.  I just get overwhelmed from time to time.  I'm reminded though that handcrafted items take time.  They are special because they didn't come off an assembly line in China.

And just in case you missed this guy you have to see my new favorite shelf...

He's still done in the dungeon... but he'll be breaking out soon!  Seriously that keyhole and lock are so amazing.

I keep calling him the gorgeous black guy that lives in my basement.  I think Hotsauce is getting a little jealous! ;)

We will keep plugging away in the dungeon working towards our financial freedom all the while making wonderful items!

Press on friends!

Dear Winter, I hate you. Sincerely, Me.

It is a balmy 0 degrees out today with a wind chill of -20ish.  Holy frozen snot Batman! Welcome to the Tundra formerly known as Iowa!  The good news is that we should have some cloud cover tonight which will warm things up to around 29 degrees on the positive side in the next few days.

Heat wave!! ;)

I despise winter.  It makes me sad.  Seriously, I think I smile less in the winter.  We have neighbors who call the cops to come and check on us to see if we're still alive because they only see Hotsauce leaving the house to go to work. 

OK, that's not entirely true. 

But, our neighbors to the east did ask our neighbors to the west if we had moved because they never see the kids outside playing anymore.  My neighbor replied, "It's winter, they never come out in the winter!"

Here's the thing.  Every year winter comes to Iowa.  Some years are worse than others.  Winter 2011/2012 was wonderful.  Do.not.tell.the.farmers.I.said.that.  There was very little snow and really quite warm.  I loved it.  But, history tells us that every year winter comes and every year I will whine and complain. 

I have lived in Iowa my entire life.  I have moved more times than I would have liked, but always in Eastern Iowa and never more than an hour and a half from where I grew up.  I expect to live in the town that I'm in (or a short distant from town) the rest of my life... and every winter I will complain for the rest of my life. 

So what does this have to do with our financial journey?  Before we read Dave Ramsey's "The Total Money Makeover" every year we would go further into debt.  Every year we would complain and think that perhaps in a few years when Hotsauce was making more money, or when the kids grew up, or even when we win the lottery, things will change. 

Things never changed.  Except that we slipped further and further into debt.  Some times weren't as bad as other times, but things were never really good.  We grew frustrated with ourselves, with each other and at times with God.  We prayed for blessings. Would God ever answer our prayers??

We all know the saying that if you feed a man a fish he will eat for a day, but if you teach a man to fish he will eat for a lifetime.  So God took us fishing.  He made us bait our own hook.  He taught us to be patient instead of impulsive.  He taught us about ourselves and each other.  He used Dave Ramsey's teachings to change our lives.

He brought our financial winter into the hope for a financial spring... and someday perhaps a financial summer!!!! 

Oh, how I long for summer!

What a crock... pot!?

I received a text from my friend, Danielle, today asking: "I haven't checked the blog for awhile, but was wondering how your snowball is coming?"

Photo by Kamshots

I laughed to myself a bit and thought, "You could check the blog, but it wouldn't do you much good! I've almost completely fallen off the blogging wagon!"

What I actually replied was, "It's melting every week!"

I just wish that it was a smaller snowball or melting faster... maybe there should be a January thaw for my debt snowball?  The good news is that it's melting and not growing, so that's good news!


I am reminded that Dave Ramsey likens this journey to cooking a meal in a Crock-Pot vs. cooking a meal in a microwave.  It takes time and isn't a get rich quick kind of journey!  Shootfire!  I'd really like it to be the other way around!

It seems as though building a business is also more of a Crock-Pot journey!  Turkey Bottom Haven is growing in "likes" weekly.  January has the potential to be one of our best months.  We are crazy busy, but we are constantly pouring our "blow fund" into it.  We have a lot of money wrapped up into 2 projects ... one that isn't quite finished yet and another that doesn't seem to be going any where fast!

It's hard not to grow frustrated in the process.  Especially since there are some definite highlights!  For instance, we only had time to make 2 shelves last week.  We dropped them off at The Pickin' Shed on Saturday.  Before we made it back home one of them had already sold! That truly was an answer to prayer!

How are your snowballs coming?  Is your debt growing or melting?  Anyone have a story to share with us?  Any frustrations?

I am a Mama first...

Let me tell you what...
I.am.tired.

My gazelle intensity is fading a bit.  I have not been making wise decisions with my "bedtime" and I am feeling it today.

We are in the process of making 2 more shelves.  They are made out of antique doors.  I love them.  But, they can be a pain in the rear end sometimes.  All of the doors that we use have been removed from old homes.  All of them also have layer upon layer of paint.

Old houses typically have lead paint.  Lead paint can poison people. Poisoning people is probably bad for business.  Not to mention against everything that I personally believe in.

So I've spent hours ... lots of them ... scraping paint off doors and prepping them to be safely used for shelves.  Hotsauce and S.O.S. have also logged some scraping time as well.

After they are prepped I prime them. Then I paint them with a base color.  Then I paint them again with a different color.  Then I paint them with a top coat.  When that's done I sand them.  Then I apply a glaze.  More sanding.  More glaze. 

When this is done Hotsauce puts them all together.  When he's done I do touch ups ... you know, sanding, painting, sanding, glaze, the usual.  And finally I apply a clear coat.

This may sound pretty systematic and it usually is... but in the midst of these going ons I also have been doing spelling tests, listening to memory verses, answering questions about missing undies, breaking up fights and reminding myself that no matter how tired and overwhelmed that I am ... I am a Mama first, Master Shelf Painter second.

Some days I don't want to be a Mama first.  I would rather paint and lose myself in the thing that I enjoy most - making something beautiful and praying that it will bring great joy to its owner.

And then it hits me... the time that I invest in my Turkeys it will make them beautiful and they will bring joy to the One to whom they belong.  And when my priorities are right, I too become more beautiful and bring joy to the One to whom I belong.

No matter what journey you find yourself on, whether you're trying to honor God with your finances, or just trying to make it through the day, or whatever your lot, I would encourage you to balance your priorities.

Make first things first.  The rest will fall into place!