It’s Not in the Budget
Tuesday, August 19th, 2008It amazes me how money touches almost every single part of our lives. If your finances are in disarray, it can affect the way you feel, act and think in a negative way. On the opposite spectrum, if your finances are in order and you have control over your money, it can impact you in a positive way. You feel like you can accomplish anything and that everything is swinging your way. I have mentioned before that my four-year-old daughter has been catching on to the way we handle money now and this, too, has affected her positively. I love it!
The other day we were driving home from Grandma’s and she started saying that she was hungry and that she wanted to go to McDonald’s for dinner. We set aside money each month for eating out, so normally this would have been fine. This month, however, we had unfortunately already depleted that envelope. What happened next was completely unexpected! We started to tell her that we didn’t need to go to McDonald’s because we were just going to make dinner when we got home. She quickly returned an answer and began the debate with us as to why she wanted, needed and deserved dinner from McDonald’s. Pretty much out of desperation, I decided to throw into the conversation the real excuse of how it wasn’t in the budget, completely thinking this logic wouldn’t phase her at all. But to our surprise she took the “grownup” excuse very well and simply said, “Oh, okay.” That was it. End of conversation and argument. My wife and I looked at each other, completely surprised. I mouthed, “wow,” and she just shrugged her shoulders. The rest of the drive home was great, to say the least! And that dinner was one of the best we’ve had in a long time. Once again, we owe it all to our trusty envelope budget!
Kristopher Higley, Designer
