{ The Harvest Begins }

Here is the bounty of summer potatoes my little 24 foot bed has yielded so far this season. Our late potatoes will be coming in a few weeks. I can taste the mashed potatoes and gravy with homemade meatloaf now!

{ Are They KIDDING Me? }

May I just point out that the muckity mucks in Washington are still sorting out how much our bill will be for this bail out. (How dire can it be when our president spends less than five minutes addressing the nation? He talks longer about the dog cam at Christmas for crying out loud.) But guess what? Without a big fat check being written yet from our pocket books, the market didn't completely tank today and my own WAMU got bought out by a bigger, better smarter bank...hmmm...I wonder if they continue to yell long enough in DC maybe they won't need my money after all. Sigh...another afternoon cup of tea for me!

{ Bail Outs and Some Things to Consider }

I am trying to refrain from truly perching myself on a soapbox to the point where I have lost all perspective. As I watch Congress grapple with the mess that Wall Street has gotten itself into I MUST wonder...why can micro businesses and small business be left to sometimes drown under the rules of Capitalism and laize faire economics and the big fish are expecting (and getting) safety nets from Capital Hill?

Let me get this straight? They made a ton of money in the boom time on the backs of consumers who probably shouldn't have been lent money in the first place, they failed to SAVE any of that money for a rainy day, THEN they paid CEO's millions to leave their companies and I am supposed to foot the bill for their mistakes? I have that right, don't I? When you break it down, take away all the talking points and the politics, isn't that what's happening? How come I can't run my business with a federally funded safety net that will save me when I overspend, underbudget and run things into the ground? Oh, that's right, I'm a tiny business in a big pond...silly me.
I need a cuppa tea!

{ Women and Money }

Yesterday I was in a Board Retreat for Women Take Wing http://www.womentakewing.com and during one of our many (many many) conversations around women in business we talked some about women and their responses to money. It's so interesting to me that during these conversations it always comes back to an emotional tie..how we feel about money, how it makes us feel, etc. As we took a lunch break, I began to wonder if men ever talk like this or if they even PROCESS like this about money. But the long and short of it is, as a society we have given money a value and that value is both tangible (a dollar is worth 100 pennies, which ties to how much gold or maybe the GNP ...blah blah blah or something like that, seriously I keep telling you this isn't what I paid attention to in school) and intangible. Do you think Paris Hilton would be at all interesting if she made $45,000 a year. Who would care what she thought was so hot?

No, somehow as a society we have decided that if you have money, you have a special value and with each passing generation that number goes up. For example, as a kid, the "one day if we win the lottery" dream was to own a million dollar house. Guess what? My childhood home in California would sell today for just under that number. Trust me, it's a nice suburban track home but if I won the lottery tomorrow, I wouldn't be looking at that house. (Actually, I'd buy five acres just outside city limits a mile away from where I live now and get me a chicken coop and grow way more food...but I digress.) But several years back I remember hearing a story out of the South of a woman who died in her 90's who left something like $500,000 to a small college for a scholarship fund and that was after putting several local kids through school already. This woman made well below the median income at the time...something like $28,000 a year. How did she do that? Simple. If she made $28,000 a year she likely only spent $16,000 or $20,000.
Live within the boundaries of what you make, commit to saving some of it for later and you too can be rich. That is what I'm striving for today. To pay off the debt we just accumulated (by choice) as quickly as possible and then to live on 65% of what we currently make. Would I love a vacation on a beach next year? Yes. Is it worth working after the age of 70 if I don't WANT to work after the age of 70? Heck,no. The more I am committed to "need it" vs. "want it" today, the more choices I will have tomorrow.

{ Bu...bu...budget. If You Can Say, You Can Do It }

I've been nudging for more than a week...do you have it all together? Your budget, I mean? Most people look at budgets like diets, it's all about deprivation. I see them as clear boundaries...once you've stepped over the boundary you aren't safe...kinda like financial baby gates, if you will. As you grow and learn, move the gate. Just because you figure out a budget in January, doesn't mean that same budget still meets your needs in May. Look at it constantly.

Owning two businesses has helped me with my personal financial perspective. I opened each business with a set amount of money and they either make money or I adjust the business plan. Home financing isn't that different. You either make a profit or you don't. When you don't, change the plan.

As we watch as some of the world's largest companies fail on Wall Street right now, learn the lessons of that failure...don't over reach, don't play Russian Roulette with your financial future. Live within your means AND try to live below them so that you have something saved for tomorrow. It takes a change in cultural philosophy from "I want it, I need it, I deserve it" to "I want it, I'll work for it so I'll save for it." For the same reason that food prices have spiraled out of control (Do you REALLY think tomatoes are meant to grow in February or be flown or trucked around the globe? The ones I grew and picked last week are already over ripened and ready for sauce), we live in a cultural with more credit card debt and less retirement savings then ever before. CHANGE your mind about spending and change your life to be in control of your money. While the steps to that change are not always smooth or easy, the concept really is that straight forward.

{ The Last Days of Summer }

This picture perfectly describes the mood here on the island these last couple of weeks. The tourists have pretty much all left, our snowbirds and summer time people are closing up their seasonal houses and the long nights of winter will follow our brief but glorious Autumn. Ahhh....life on an island.

How are your budgets coming along?

{ Practicing What I Preach }

Confession: We have already broken the eating out once a month rule by meeting friends who came in from out of town over in the Big City last night for dinner. We did pay cash (well, debit, another broken rule, but not credit at least!) and of course, nothing was local about the food. On the long drive and ferry ride home to the island, we discussed this break with commitment. Here's what we came to: life happens and this exercise in local food and financial stability is meant to enhance our lives and keep us more connected with our community. If we are so structured and rigid that we can't go meet friends who we have not seen in years for a meal than what's the point?
Observations: This week alone, I did not stop at my local coffee hut for my down fall 16 oz. vanilla steamed milk each time I was in that part of town (a savings of $7), I resisted the urge to go to our local Bistro for take out dinner on a night when nothing was defrosted and we ate 45 minutes before bedtime (a savings of $25), for the commuting half of the household, I made home made black bean, veggie and cheese burritos for this week's lunches (a savings of around $8-$10) and today I will be processing our own shredded chicken into enchilada's for both dinner tonight and lunches next week (a savings of another $8-$10)

Happy Friday!

{ Going Against The Grain }

I hope my sister doesn't mind but I'm going to use a recent email exchange as a launching off point today. A few days ago, this was in my Inbox:

"Sis, your blog is killing me." (Literally, that was the whole email)
My reply: "Why?" (Literally, that was the whole email)
Her reply: "Because that is so NOT how we were raised."

The picture of my sister, laughing as she read about my white envelopes and me picking up 20 chickens (with bones, no less...a long family joke), ran through my mind and made me giggle. But she was SO right. My sister and I were raised by parents who worked their butts off to make a better life for us but our Mom was a shop now, pay later kinda girl. That's not to say she was irresponsible, far from it, but we were not raised with a "wait till you can afford it" mantra. Nope, it was more like, if you want it, buy it and work longer hours to pay it off.My views on money, money management and debt...they are not easy, or second nature or even instinctual.

I've said it before, I'm not formally trained in anything money or business. I've learned it the hard way. We have paid off not one, but two student loans and a mountain of personal debt in the last 16 years. My business experience began quite quickly when I opened an itty bitty shop, in an itty bitty town, with friends two weeks after 9/11 (clearly, the planning happened before). I had never worked a bookkeeping software before that first month in my life and my entire buy in was on my credit card, not my recommendation at all! (That little shop has now grown into a big shop http://www.thepaintescape.com/ owned by our former employee and dear friend, Tina. Check it out!)

My soap box lectures come from a place of been there, done that, don't need to go back. The life I strive for today is different. It's a life of not of running to stand still, but of just standing still. When I post about Operation Feed Ourselves, it's a project to see if we can raise more of our food in our little garden to save money and support of local economy, but it's also time to be still in my yard, with my family, with myself. I fight every day against the easier road of "just don't think about it, make it easy" but I know that if I listen to that voice, I won't be OK in 10 or 20 years. I watched my Mom work her whole life and we buried her at 56. She always thought she could stop and relax later but later didn't come. As long as money drives you, you are not driving yourself and that, at its core, is why I am taking this not so easy path. Sharing it with you just keeps me honest.

{ Garden Update }

This week in the garden we'll be harvesting the potatoes and onions and I'll be letting the squash limp along for a couple more weeks. We've got a warm sunny stretch coming but I'm not holding out a lot of hope for a bumper crop. We're retiring the two small beds with cover crops but will plant some more fall/winter veggies this week. Admittedly, without our CSA memberships this project would be a bust but we've learned a lot for next year.

In the kitchen we've just frozen 10 pounds of blueberries (and we're happily eating another 2 or 3). Two pounds of basil will be in my CSA order this weekend for pesto and peaches will be picked up next weekend. Apples and pears will be coming in late September. I have made the decision NOT to put up my own tomatoes, as we are fortunate enough to have a local organic company that I can buy a few cases from to get us through the winter. There is only so much processing we can do with two full time jobs. The next ten chickens will be ready for pick up next weekend and I'm putting in my final beef order for the season in October. For those keeping track, we'll have 35 chickens when all is said and done, one tom turkey for Thanksgiving, and a quarter of a side of beef. Remember, we split our last quarter in early spring and that eighth will see us through about six months. We aren't big pork eaters but I do like the ham hocks for soups and the occasional bacon on Sundays. We're trying to decide if it's worth splitting a side of pork. If anyone has experience, we'd love to hear about it.

Fall is fast approaching here in the Pacific Northwest. Summer was a short season. There may be a greenhouse in my future!

{ When Is Debt OK? }

Lisa commented to my "Cheering Squad" post a fabulous question about debt that has inspired me to rattle on more on the topic. (I hope Lisa doesn't regret asking!)

When is debt OK? Is debt ALWAYS bad? Well there are some people in the world with far more knowledge than little 'ol me who have very definite opinions about these questions but since this is my blog, I'm going to offer my thinking on the matter. One small opinion which you are free to completely ignore.

In a perfect world, one would only enter into a debt with forethought and a plan to pay it off. In THIS world, most of us slam up against a crisis situation (the car finally really died or the water heater really was rusting from the inside out, who knew?) and whip out our credit cards. Life happens and often it isn't cheap. But in those moments where you are making a choice to go into debt...a house, a NEW car off the lot when the old one probably has two more years left on it, a vacation or new clothes...it's those moments that you have to really be honest with yourself. Other people would say, "don't do it, you don't need it, walk away, cash only." (Full disclosure here: I am currently trying to toe that line of mild deprivation but I wouldn't necessarily impose that on others, it's not a easy road.) I'm not going to say that because for 99.9% of us, that's completely unrealistic. What I DO want to say is that if you choose debt don't kid yourself about it. You are spending money you don't have. You are borrowing from your future and you are living beyond your means. Period. Just don't stick your head in the sand.

Now, back to the original question, when is debt OK? Debt is OK when you plan for it and never let it drive the bus. An example: when we went to ask for a mortgage 9 years ago we were shocked to learn what we qualified for on paper. When I asked the kind man how much that particular mortgage would cost each month (30 year fixed) he casually rattled off a number that was more than twice any rent we had ever paid before and I couldn't imagine where we'd ever get that kind of money every month for the next 30 years. When I asked him instead to work the numbers the other way (I want a monthly payment that is no larger than....) he gave us a mortgage figure that was half the original amount. And so that is the house we bought (and still have today). With the mortgage we have, we can literally lose half of our current income and still be able to pay our note or we can rent the house for more than what we owe each month. We didn't get our dream home and yes, we've been remodeling it since we bought it (cash only remodels) but it feels good to know that we have financial options and we're not tied to the house payment.

Debt is OK when it won't overwhelm you or force you into places or decisions you don't really want to be. What you don't ever want is to dig yourself so deeply into a hole that you will never get out.