Being Financially Responcible

August 2011


So for anyone out there who hasn't heard of Dave Ramsey and struggles with debt, budgeting problems or just wants to become financially responsible, you should pick up Dave's Total Money Makeover next time you are at Wal-Mart or the book store. Reading this book has been quite eye opening for me and has made me take control of our finances in a way I never thought possible.

Along with the rest of the world, my husband and I have made some poor choices when it comes to money and credit cards. Mostly before we were married, but once we got married the bills piled up, we lived a money with no pay checks in a brand new city, the car needed tires, a new battery, a new battery mount and new CAR, medical bills and list goes on and on...unfortunately the childish decisions from pre-marriage made these situations astronomically more devastating on our bank account and somehow found ourselves $8000+ in debt. It seemed like every pay check I was making large payments, and I figured we would see a dent made in the card, but we never did and kept living our lives.

Finally one day, I had enough and I googled Dave Ramsey (after getting suggestions from my mom that we read his book) I read his website and his Baby Steps of his Total Money Makeover and realized that we already had Baby Step 1 ($1000 in an emergency fund) After reading the rest I had to have the book. It all spiraled from there and suddenly we have a budget and envelopes we put cash into each week for our spending money instead of our debit card.  I say this happened suddenly but in reality it was a hard process to create the budget and implement the cash envelopes into our daily life.

Although living this way has had its hard moments, it is completely worth it. We haven't TOUCHED our credit cards since April and we have been sticking to our budget rather strictly. We have $350 left on one of our cards and we are thrilled that we will have it paid off by August 19!!! Now we just have to tackle our real demon, the visa with $7000 on it. Then we can move onto builiding a fully funded emergency fund, in case something happens to one of our jobs!

So like I said, Dave Ramsey is a miracle worker. Although he has no original advice or ideas (they are just simple logical ways to control your money) he delivers it in a way that makes it stick and gives you the motivation to move forward and be successful on your journey.


I am currently working on goals and rewards when those goals are met, i'll let you know what they are once i decide.

-Milly