Summary
Crystal and Lanea discuss their approaches to budgeting, financial goals, and the challenges of managing finances as new parents. They explore the effectiveness of different budgeting systems, the importance of setting realistic goals, and the dynamics of financial planning within a partnership. They talk about the significance of emergency funds, planning for future expenses, and the balance between enjoying life and maintaining financial stability.
Takeaways
- Writing down goals can help clarify financial objectives.
- Switching budgeting systems can lead to better cash flow tracking.
- SMART goals may not be effective for everyone.
- Regular financial reviews can help keep goals on track.
- Emergency funds provide security during uncertain times.
- Teamwork in finances requires open communication and shared goals.
- Quarterly planning helps adjust strategies based on life changes.
- Balancing expenses with celebrations is crucial for financial health.
- Long-term financial goals should be revisited regularly.
- Finding a remote job can enhance work-life balance.
Transcript
Crystal (00:00)
Hi, I’m Crystal, the founder of the Piggy Bank Patrol, a podcast that gets parents talking about money. Myself, along with my co -founder, Lanea are financial analysts and new parents. We want to empower parents to learn healthy money behaviors while breaking cycles and teach children about money.
As always, the piggy bank patrols content is intended for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only, and is not to be taken as legal, financial investment, or tax advice of any kind.
Crystal (00:30)
today we’re doing something a little different.
Going forward, we hope we can inspire you to do the same and that is visiting, revising, and creating quarterly money goals October is quickly approaching it all of the autumn and spooky fun, including both of our birthdays, that
Lanea (00:47)
Yay!
I think that’s the perfect end to the year. Fall is one of my favorite times of the year, so I cannot wait for fourth quarter to start. But before we get there, I thought it would be a good idea to kind of discuss what we do to set goals. Just this year, I actually started writing down my financial goals. Before then, Adam and I kind of talked about them, but we didn’t have any concrete plans.
And to be completely honest, it really only happened in the second quarter of this year with our baby. I did always budget, but I didn’t specifically outline and set goals. I did want to kind of give a shout out to a newish YouTuber. His name is Logan Samuel in the personal finance space. He recently released a video titled Why You Need to Set Financial Goals.
which is just an excellent primer on today’s topic. He also mentioned, which I kind of found interesting, a study that he found that people that write down their goals have a 42 % higher probability of achieving them. So that really motivated me to continue to write down my goals going forward.
Crystal (01:57)
That’s a big increase, wow.
Lanea (01:59)
I know. Well, and I was thinking about that compared to rates, if you could imagine a 42 % return, it’s such a simple thing to do, but it has such a large impact.
Crystal (02:05)
Yeah.
I find it interesting that you started recently writing down your goals, but before you, still kind of did budgeting and things, because I do the opposite, where the last couple years I write down my goals, but I’m like, fuck writing down my budget.
Lanea (02:25)
it makes sense if you can achieve your goals without doing a I just never did. And I was so focused on sinking funds. So I had smaller goals, but I did not have a macro picture. And I did not in earnest track even my cash flow, which is kind of crazy when I think about it.
I really only started that in December of 23 and that was because I switched budgeting systems. So I switched from YNAB to Monarch and that’s really when I started tracking my cash flow more carefully.
Crystal (03:02)
Do you think that that system focuses more heavily on the actual cash flow aspects?
Lanea (03:08)
absolutely. And I think YNAB was is only about sinking funds. So it’s very much your true expenses, which is great because I guess they don’t have the stats on it, but I just don’t know very many people that actually set money aside for car repairs or, annual car registrations or household, expenses. So.
Crystal (03:27)
Mm -hmm.
Lanea (03:31)
YNAB is great at smoothing the cash flow with sinking funds, but it doesn’t actually show you how much is coming in and out of your accounts and your budgets very good. And it also has a very poor net worth tracker as well. So it wasn’t something that I focused on previously.
Crystal (03:50)
Yeah, I signed up for a YNAB a while ago, like back before everyone was starting to switch over. I just couldn’t use it because I’m all about that net worth tracker and it was pretty much a dud for me.
Lanea (04:03)
I actually, YNAB was probably the best financial thing I’ve ever done in my life. I will give it that, it’s really good when you are pinching pennies, you’re having to assign everything down to the dollar, your margins are very small or you’re in debt. I think it’s perfect because it’s only allows you to budget the actual money that you have in your account, not some hypothetical.
money that you will get, but what you actually have at the time that you have it. And I think that’s the genius behind it. But once you get past that,
Crystal (04:35)
Mm -hmm.
Lanea (04:38)
it doesn’t function as well as other trackers do.
Crystal (04:42)
think you.
Lanea (04:41)
What do you guys do for goals?
Crystal (04:44)
I personally don’t believe in SMART goals because SMART goals are procrastinated goals, especially with the postpartum lizard brain that’s compounded by ADHD and PPA.
Lanea (04:57)
think for me the only part of a goal that I tried to do is I do try to quantify it. just because if I can quantify it, it’s a little bit easier to, did I meet this or did I not meet it? But that’s about the only part of smart that I try to get to.
Crystal (05:13)
look at my overall picture for money goals overarching. So I review my five -year goal. I review the steps that are required to hit that goal. And then I determine where I’m at and what the next steps are. So a lot of that fire, financial independence often right now is just
grind grind grind grind keep saving keep saving so the goals are pretty easy it’s just keep doing what you’re doing
Lanea (05:38)
Yeah.
so I have a question for you, how you and Raph manage it, because for Adam and I, Adam is very supportive, but he doesn’t have a desire or motivation that I do when it comes to finances. So it’s pretty much just me talking him agree or saying that sounds good. he doesn’t work against us at all.
he’s good with money, but there’s not the motivation part there. And it’s hard when it feels at times you’re the only one that is doing it.
Crystal (06:20)
the one who handles all of our personal finances. Back before when Raph was managing it, we were constantly in the hole and having fees on our bank accounts. So I’ve been managing it since and sometimes we’ll have money dates, not so much the last two years, because again, it’s just grind, grind, grind like
What’s it going to check in on the fact that we are still saving the same percentage? but I think that it helps to have a common goal too, because a part of financial independence and why we were going so hard at it the last three, four years was because we both agreed we hate working. But we also wanted to start an orchard.
since my illness, I’m not sure that’ll happen because I’m having a hell of a time taking care of a under one year old baby.
Lanea (07:09)
To be fair, it’s hard. It’s hard. You’re still, you’re still healing yourself too. So give yourself some grace.
Crystal (07:11)
Bye!
That’s fair, I just can’t see myself planting 500 trees anytime soon.
Lanea (07:23)
That’s also fair. It’s good to know yourself.
Crystal (07:27)
Yeah. So by the time we get to that point, we’ll have the ability to be like, do we still want to do the orchard or do we just want to fuck around and travel? So because you could do either or either way, the money will be there. it helps to have the shared common goal of that. that’s pretty important. But otherwise, it’s
pretty much just me directing it.
Lanea (07:50)
I think Adam and I have the same shared vision of how we would like our life, but on the day -to -day, month -to -month part, it’s definitely me that’s managing it.
what goals did you set Do you set your goals annually, monthly, quarterly? What’s kind of your cadence?
Crystal (08:09)
Well, I used to do it monthly. And then I had a baby and then I had no goals.
going back to review this last year, just like generic overall goals that I had like default set in the back of my head file deep, deep, deep down into the archives. I’d go digging for these ones actually. It was pretty dusty back there. But for quarter one, my goal was to
save as much as I could for January and February because February was like the last W2 paycheck for me.
Lanea (08:39)
and you also, you know did something pretty big that month, too
Crystal (08:43)
yeah, yeah, I had a baby. But I feel like it doesn’t count for like February because he was on almost the very last day.
Lanea (08:51)
it counts, it counts.
Crystal (08:53)
All of the money stuff hit in March. Up until that point, it was
for quarter two, was survive. And we also bought a house and replaced the roof. that was like 30, 40. Yeah. 30, 40 ,000. We blew through there, but the house appreciated an equal amount. So that’s okay. I just don’t include the house or the mortgage in my net worth statements anymore because what’s the point? I’m not going to sell it. Yeah.
Lanea (09:07)
pretty big.
Sell it, yeah, yeah.
Crystal (09:26)
quarter three was to stabilize spending accounts. And as days ago, I did our net worth, before we bought the house, our net worth was a 126,000 – And it is.
92 ,000.
Lanea (09:47)
Okay, all right, that’s not bad considering you don’t count the house, yeah.
Crystal (09:48)
And that’s a small increase. Yeah, that’s a small increase from the previous month too, by like, I think 300 bucks.
Lanea (09:58)
you’re on the positive side. So that’s the main thing.
Crystal (10:01)
Yeah, June realized nearly $17 ,000, a loss.
Lanea (10:07)
ouch. Ouch.
Crystal (10:08)
That was the roof.
Lanea (10:10)
months it be like that as a homeowner.
Crystal (10:13)
but otherwise, going forward for a quarter for I want to do a no spend October, although I am keeping a small fund for my birthday. And then in November, my goal is to just get discounted glasses and I need to replace my retainers because if you don’t replace them, then your teeth get out of alignment and then you just wasted 3000 bucks for nothing.
Lanea (10:37)
Yep.
Yup, yup, that happened to me.
Crystal (10:41)
no, my dentist didn’t tell me I had to replace them. So I was using them for like two years and then I found another set that I had and I switched over to that and they were painful, but I got them back into place. So I want to keep them where they’re at because the whole reason I paid the 3000. was because of overcrowding and I was in pain for every day constantly for 15 plus years. I don’t want that again.
Lanea (10:59)
yeah.
see mine was vanity purposes.
Crystal (11:11)
That’s fair enough though, because you smile impacts your income.
Lanea (11:15)
Exactly. See? You get it.
Crystal (11:18)
Yes.
Lanea (11:18)
So for quarter one for me, I was literally just have a baby. I wrote right down three things per quarter and it was have a baby, take a long road trip and don’t worry about savings. And we did all of those. We went on a 12 state road trip the day after he turned a month old is when we, wait, no, was it six
Crystal (11:32)
Nice.
Lanea (11:41)
It was, I think it was the day after he turned a month old. Yeah.
Crystal (11:44)
Which is just absolutely insane. I don’t think I could even pick up a phone and make a phone call at one month.
Lanea (11:47)
We
I don’t know how we did it, but it was perfect and it was exactly what we needed. And it was such an amazing experience. we went to his one month appointment and then we left the day after. And And we did it and we were gone for one day shy of three weeks.
Crystal (12:04)
Yeah.
Wow.
Lanea (12:10)
And it was just the best thing.
Crystal (12:12)
What did you do with your pets while you were gone?
Lanea (12:15)
Larry went to stay with Adam’s parents and then Adam’s dad checked on our kitty two days.
Crystal (12:25)
Nice.
Lanea (12:26)
The only thing that we planned is we planned the Waste Management Open in Phoenix, the golf tournament. That was the only thing that we planned. We hoped that we would make it a week, but we were being realistic, having a baby. And it just, it went well. So we just kept going.
Crystal (12:35)
Yeah.
you kept messaging from different states and I’m like, are you going home? Because that’s the wrong direction.
Lanea (12:52)
Yeah, it was perfect. was our only goal for quarter one was having a baby. And then quarter two was recover from reduced maternity leave income because I didn’t get paid, obviously. And I always use last month’s income to budget. really June was the first month that I wasn’t affected by maternity leave.
Crystal (12:59)
Nice.
Mm
Lanea (13:17)
Because I went back on April 1st and obviously there’s a delay between when you work and when you get paid too. Luckily, in our situation, my income doesn’t factor in that heavily. But still, anytime you have reduced income, it kind of sucks. And then we wanted to purchase a rental property and obviously that didn’t happen.
Crystal (13:24)
Yeah.
Lanea (13:41)
I’m not sure why we put that in there or why I put that in there. We had high hopes, but we weren’t gonna make something happen if it wasn’t right. We had lofty expectations. And then the other one was save slash invest 35 % of our income. And we were able to achieve this, but it’s only because Adam got
a back payment of several thousand dollars in June. So if we look at our monthly savings rate, April was 17%. We also had to spend almost $800 in insurance premiums because I had to pay out of pocket for maternity leave. May was 25 % and we spent quite a bit of travel that we booked for our July trip. But that was that. And then June was 55%.
Crystal (14:19)
Yeah Jesus
Lanea (14:33)
made up for that. this last quarter, July through September, it’s kind of a TBD at this moment. The first one is I switched it from percentage to a figure. So we wanted to save forty five hundred per month. So on a regular month, not like a magic three paycheck month, that’s about 40 percent of our income.
We’re doing with that. We met it in July. We did not meet it in August. And we’ll meet it again for September again, just because it was a magic month and there was three paychecks. So I don’t know if I like doing it with the solid figure.
or the percentage. I feel like I’m more motivated by the percentage, but I don’t know. It’s just hard has been kind of weird lately Adam finally closed out his account, which had like 10 K in it sitting there for years, earning 0%.
Crystal (15:38)
that account! Nooo, my god!
Lanea (15:40)
Yes, he finally, he finally, I think that there’s a thousand dollars in it, but I’ll, I’ll take it, you know, but he finally closed that out. yeah.
Crystal (15:47)
Yeah
I cried a little bit inside when you told me about that account.
Lanea (15:54)
my gosh. And he has five grand uninvested too, which gets like nothing. So I don’t know what he’s doing, but it is what it is. So we’re, we’re on the right track there. So I think we’ll hit that. and then the most exciting one for me was we finished our emergency fund. So,
Crystal (16:09)
Yeah.
Lanea (16:20)
We had money set aside, but it an emergency fund. And it was from the sale of our houses. So I didn’t feel like it counted because it wasn’t like art. We didn’t grind for it. So there was no grinding involved.
Crystal (16:26)
Mm -hmm.
You didn’t work!
I need to earn it.
Lanea (16:47)
But we finished our emergency fund. So from December till August, it took us that long, but we saved 30 grand. So I was pretty excited about that. Thanks. was nice actually putting it in there. was like, we’re going to finish this. And then finally, we were going to set up financing for a rental property, but…
Crystal (16:58)
Nice. I’m proud of you.
Yeah.
Lanea (17:15)
We still have not done I don’t think that we will because we have enough liquidity depending on the property if we want to buy something outright and then finance it later. But we’re just not actively searching on a daily basis just because the market is crap and we’re not going to force something to happen. And I also don’t want a hard pull on my credit if I can help it. So we’re just kind of pausing it for the right now.
Crystal (17:27)
Mm -hmm.
You can get better deals buying straight cash and also you can always cash out if you need to.
Lanea (17:51)
Yeah, that’s kind of what we were thinking.
How have you felt about your goals for each quarter for the year so far?
Crystal (17:58)
overall for the last three quarters, we’re doing a lot better than I expected. Mainly because I did move 5000 out of our emergency savings to cover the fact that we’re on one income and we haven’t even touched it.
Lanea (18:12)
Yeah. nice. That’s impressive. You’ve been budgeting, not budgeting the hell out of your guys’s situation.
Crystal (18:16)
Yeah
Yeah, I’m like $1 ,300 in the green right now before I would have to use that 5 ,000. And then I still have the rest of my emergency savings, but it’s in a high interest earning account because you best bet but I’m getting that five plus
Lanea (18:38)
sometimes it’s nice just to have it available to, it gives me security just knowing that it’s there.
Crystal (18:44)
bank account was negative for so long that even when I earned $12 ,000 a year, I had to have a thousand in my bank account. since our incomes increasing, I need like 5 ,000 in my account to be okay mentally.
Lanea (18:57)
Yeah, I get that. how about going into fourth quarter? What big plans do you have?
Crystal (19:03)
I want to do the no spend October. And then I know the groceries are a sore spot for us. So I want to keep that under 300 by using slow cooker recipes and just shopping at Aldi more. We shopped at Walmart more recently because we had WIC benefits, but those end for me because I’m not exclusively breastfeeding anymore.
would like to grow our net worth by like $1 ,000, in the market should be doable just by – existing. But I don’t know, usually December is a down month, so we’ll see.
Lanea (19:40)
Great goals.
Crystal (19:42)
then like kind of money oriented is I want to find like a remote job either part time or full time. So like I applied to that one Milliman gig that’s full time and it’s out of Seattle, but it says it’s remote. So we’ll see how much they honor that because I’m on the opposite side of the country.
So we’ll see. The other thing is to find child care that works with our budget and hours in preparation for returning to full -time, ideally next year, but if I get a job sooner, as long as it’s remote, I’m okay. I just can’t mentally bring myself to go into an office. I can’t do that no more.
Lanea (20:13)
Mm
Yeah, yeah. Well, I think it makes it more difficult too because you don’t have an office nearby or the chances of you finding a job within less than a half hour commute time just are not probable. And you guys have one vehicle too. So that just makes a huge difference.
I don’t have really anything. I just know this quarter is gonna be extremely expensive. So I’m not even sure how to balance it out because we have our anniversary and my birthday in October. I usually buy all of our Christmas gifts in October and November and I’m sure I’m just gonna overspend with it being Leo’s first Christmas.
Crystal (20:59)
Mm
Aww.
Lanea (21:08)
I’ve heard it all, I’ve heard it, I’ve heard it. Like Adam has told me, everybody has told me, the damn baby won’t remember anything.
but I just know myself and I know that it’s gonna happen.
Crystal (21:21)
anything for like Christmas or holiday wise, but I am gonna buy a Christmas tree and I’m gonna put it in the Florida room because that’s the first time I’ll ever be able to have a Christmas tree with cats because the cats aren’t allowed in the Florida room.
Lanea (21:37)
I love it.
That’s awesome.
we have two different vacations that we need to pay for. One of them is paid for, but and that we’re going on in December, but it’s a cruise. So we’ll have, gratuity and drinks and excursions and all of that stuff. And then in
Crystal (21:52)
Mm -hmm.
Lanea (21:56)
January, we’re going to Mexico. And I think that one’s two to three K. I want to go, but I don’t want to go because our vacations are literally three weeks apart. and we’re going with friends and we’re leaving Leo. So I’m nervous about that.
Crystal (22:06)
-hmm.
Lanea (22:14)
but I’m excited to go with friends and have adult time, but I’m just like, my gosh, the expense of this. And I would not have gone to that particular location and resort if I chose it, but it’s just such a last minute thing with his friends. So I’m excited about that, but my God, the money, the money, the money.
Crystal (22:18)
Yeah.
Mm -hmm.
Yeah, keep a little bit of extra cushion just in case.
Lanea (22:42)
I just know this quarter is going to be so expensive. And I want to be realistic, but I also don’t want to lose track of our goals either. Adam and I have different philosophies when it comes to vacations.
Vacations for him are like a necessary part of life and I love traveling. Don’t get me wrong, but I’m also like the money.
Crystal (23:03)
traveling was my identity until I found the Lord and Savior financial independence.
Lanea (23:09)
You’re like, I’ll travel when I’m retired.
Crystal (23:11)
Hahaha, yeah?
Lanea (23:13)
Are you guys gonna do annual goals? Do you do goals that year at all?
Crystal (23:18)
I think it’s a good idea to reestablish annual goals. Everything kind of fell by the wayside with the baby, so – trying to get back into it.
Lanea (23:29)
my gosh because i do go into the office i think it’s a little bit different and leo goes to daycare so i get a break
So I get to think about other things, which is super nice sometimes.
Crystal (23:43)
I try to think about other things and then he reminds me he exists and he gives me dirty looks. So he’s like, how dare you? You’re not looking at me.
Lanea (23:53)
I also think that your baby is more of a high to normal needs baby and Leo is more of a I can play by myself baby. I yesterday I sat him down for his nap and he wanted to be down. He’s like, OK, please leave me alone now. Like leave, shut the door, leave my room.
Crystal (24:01)
Mm -hmm.
my god.
Lanea (24:20)
and let me like, lay down in peace.
Crystal (24:22)
No, that just blows my mind. No, my baby is like, it’s nap time. I’m gonna cry until you bring me to bed. he’s this, he’s like extra constipated this week. So he’s been in like a little tummy pain and he’s also teething. And he is basically like, I will not sleep in this fucking bed unless you hold me and rock me and sing Binky Baby.
So my life is singing Binky Baby about six hours a day for the last three days.
Lanea (25:00)
my god, you poor thing.
Crystal (25:01)
I have not edited the last episode because I’ve been singing Binky Baby to him
Lanea (25:07)
my gosh, you poor, thing. Yeah, Leo just wants to be down. he does not want to be rocked. He likes being held, but not when he’s tired and ready to go to bed. He just wants to sprawl out in his crib, be left alone. Like, yeah, literally… He’s literally like, just please leave me alone. I just really want to lay down.
Crystal (25:22)
He’s like, goodbye. a good day!
when he’s older, when he’s tired. he’s five years old. He’s like, just leave me alone. I need to sleep.
Lanea (25:31)
I have no
I have no idea if it will stay the same or change or what.
Crystal (25:40)
It’ll be interesting, we’ll see.
Lanea (25:42)
So what were you think you didn’t make goals this year? I made two. One of them was the emergency fund, which we did complete in August. And the other one is we’re trying to set aside 40 ,000 for a new vehicle or new vehicles. That one, I don’t know. It just seemed like a nice goal to have, like the ultimate, I don’t know, flex of not having a car payment.
Crystal (25:49)
Mm -hmm.
Lanea (26:09)
But it’s a lot of money, so I don’t know. We have 14 set aside for it, but Adam wants to rebuild his engine on his Corvair. And I think that’s either seven or eight. I can’t remember how much he said that it was. And I know that that will come out of this fund. So we’ll see how far we get or if we’ll continue that onto the next year. But at least it’s there in four or five years when we want to.
Crystal (26:27)
Mm -hmm.
Lanea (26:37)
get a new vehicle.
Crystal (26:39)
it’s a good idea to have a car fund anyway. My emergency fund access every single cover thing. But my car is like I took it in and got the oil change and had the dealer look at it. And the only thing that they needed to do is change a gasket. I’m at one hundred eighty thousand miles right now. So.
Lanea (26:59)
You also have a Prius and those things don’t die.
Crystal (27:02)
No, they don’t. It’s going. It’s going. I was like, anything wrong with it? He’s like, nope, you’ll just need to get your back breaks changed in a couple months. I’m like, cool, see you then. Because at two millimeters now, so I got to change them out next oil change.
Lanea (27:19)
Gotcha.
So what is your five year goal?
Crystal (27:23)
well, have to remake it, but it was slash is the orchard. I don’t know how realistic that’s going to be. If I can get a job remote, man, we’re just going to fly through the grind. And, and in five years, like three years, I’ll be retired if I can get a remote job. So five years, I’ll do whatever the fuck I want.
which is either owning an orchard or just going to visit orchards. Because there’s a giant orchard in Germany and I’m so there for it.
Lanea (27:53)
You’ve mentioned it before,
Crystal (27:55)
Yeah, see? That’s why I’m like, I wanna go.
Lanea (27:59)
goals. I probably should but we don’t have any
Crystal (28:02)
Yeah.
We do kind of a very rough ten year where we would want to be and then we do a five year goal. So the ten year is a super stretch because you can’t predict ten years into the future. Yeah, but it’s fun to do and it’s good to have. And then like the five year one is important. And I think a three year one and a one year one too, just to keep you on track for the five year would be good.
Lanea (28:16)
It’s 10 years, yeah.
We don’t, the only goal that we have is that we want to move out of this house, but we want to live in here as long as possible because our mortgage is so freaking But we need to be settled before Leo starts kindergarten. So I guess that’s our five year goal.
Crystal (28:37)
Mm -hmm.
Yeah.
mean another workaround for the interest rate is to make up for it in the price of the house.
Lanea (28:54)
Yeah, I don’t know. I go back and forth. Sometimes I’m like, yeah, I really want like a fixer -upper. And other times I’m like, if I have to grind it out in this house for five years, then I just want my nice, more permanent house that doesn’t need new drywall.
Crystal (29:17)
Have you guys thought about using the money that you were gonna use for rentals and just buying yourself a house and having no mortgage?
Lanea (29:25)
Adam does not want to do that because he can get a zero dollar down VA loan. I don’t know. In some ways, I think that would be great to not have a mortgage or have a super nice house with a medium sized mortgage,
I think he just has a really hard time parting with money. I think that we have very different concepts of what a nice house is and how much that will cost.
Crystal (29:51)
It’s hard.
Lanea (29:58)
I don’t want to be house poor.
Crystal (30:00)
why we got the one that we have because this was a stretch for us. But at the same time, if we had a two income household, we could pay it off in three years. So I think it’s important to value of the house under three years of income.
Lanea (30:11)
Yeah.
that. But even then that’s, that’s still like a
Crystal (30:18)
Which allots you guys a pretty decent house.
Yeah, it’s a good chunk for you.
Lanea (30:24)
We’ll see what it looks like when it comes down to that.
I hope that he’ll be understanding that we’ve lived here for a long time and it’s time for a new one.
Crystal (30:36)
I mean he’ll start to feel it once the baby starts running all over the house and getting into his things.
Lanea (30:41)
I think he already feels it. It’s just a matter of it’s worth the sacrifice at this point. it’s both of us feel like it’s not a forever thing. It’s just a for now thing.
Crystal (30:52)
and that’s okay.
Lanea (30:53)
I think my project leaving this is to do a three year goal, a five year goal, and then a 10 year stretch goal. I think that we really need to like sit down, discuss that and come up with something.
Crystal (30:55)
Okay.
We can revisit in December
Lanea (31:08)
We could do a yearly wrap up of how our finances were over the last year.
Crystal (31:13)
I don’t want to look at mine.
Lanea (31:15)
to know than not to know.
Crystal (31:17)
my bank account’s not zero. it’ll be interesting. I love this quarter, because our birthdays are both in October and I really love that about us.
Lanea (31:25)
I love October birthdays.
Lanea (31:27)
Thanks for listening to today’s episode. Please remember that finances and parenting is a complex balancing act. But remember, By learning and growing together, we can build a brighter future for ourselves and our families. If you have any questions or want to share your experience, reach out to us at YouTube, Instagram, or Spotify at Piggy Bank Patrol. We would love to hear from you.
Sound Bites
“I find it interesting that you started recently writing down your goals.”
“I personally don’t believe in SMART goals.”
“We haven’t even touched our emergency fund.”