Wishing you a Joyful Christmas

 

I know, I know...Christmas is over and way to far in the future to think about...unless of course you are a craft store.  Some of us are just coming out of our holiday hangover....shoot, some of us still have Christmas lights on the house.  (Levi's job, as I don't do roofs or attics:))  But I have to tell you that for Levi and I, a joyful Christmas starts in January. 

No, I am not one of those people who has all their gifts bought by August, or who plans every detail down to the minute, although I envy them sometimes.  But Levi and I set the budget for Christmas in January and then every month we put money aside to pay for it. Then when Christmas rolls around we can focus on joyfully giving and not stressing out because we have to charge everything and know that we won't have the money in January to pay for it.

 

I know what some of you are thinking...Bea, I don't have the money you obviously do...there is NO way that we can afford to put money aside for Christmas...well, let me tell you a little story:

 

The year my second child was born, we lived paycheck to paycheck.  We were sadly already about $5,000 in the hole with credit cards due to some stupid mistakes that we made with our money.  We had no savings, owned one of our cars, but we had a car payment and house payment.  We could only pay the minimums and we were on one income.  My second child came along and we found ourselves in medical debt up to our eyeballs!  Emergency C-sections where one has to be completely knocked out on top of NICU charges caused just the hospital part of our bill to be $6,000 out of our pocket, and we had good insurance (80/20 after deductible).  I had a friend who had a baby that year that had HMO insurance and paid $200 for her delivery...seriously?  But that is a whole other post.  This bill did not include NICU doctors, regular pediatrician, my doctor, anesthesiologist, etc.  Keep in mind that we were living paycheck to paycheck.  Then not a month after my delivery our oldest had to have ENT surgery.  I cried...and then felt horribly guilty for being so upset that he was going to cost us so much money.  What kind of horrible mother feels angry that her child is going to cost her so much?  I know that I am not a horrible mother, but the stress of all of these bills was really getting to me and I knew we had to do something...but what?  Now I had another hospital bill, plus doctor and anesthesiologist bill for our oldest and we had to pay them all at least something.  Because we were already living paycheck to paycheck we had to start charging our life.  We didn't qualify for any help with our medical because we made "too much" and were only able to pay each doctor $10 per month.  The hospitals required a larger amount each month and we owed 10 different doctors.  You can see where I am going with this...by the time we paid the house, car, and doctors, we had to charge everything else: gas, groceries, etc.  We racked up thousands.  We were already living fairly frugally...no cable, I did not have a cell phone, etc.  Were we perfect all the time?...no.  I got a job at a preschool and started an at home business after we decided that if I went back to work teaching that I would only be paying for childcare.  That Christmas was charged and I hated it....I found absolutely no JOY in giving.  Our marriage was strained, I resented my own children at times, and was angry with myself and my husband.  My husband began listening to Dave Ramsey on the radio.  Say what you will about him, but he helped us immensely.

 

We decided that January that we were going to start to save for Christmas...we looked over our bills and had no idea where it was going to come from, but we were going to do it!  We began with $50 per month.  We would automatically put it in savings....ON PAYDAY.  We were adamant that we had to do this and sometimes it meant that we had to charge something which we did not want to do...but when you need new tires and you are driving your babies around, you do it. I continued part time work and we had a garage sale.

I am not telling you all of this to make you feel sorry for me.  I am telling you this so that when you say that you can't do this then I can call BS.  If we could do it, then so can you! 

It took us two years to pay off our medical bills.  TWO YEARS!  But that Christmas was Joyful...why?  We could give small presents that we knew we weren't going to spend the next year trying to pay for.  I remember getting my youngest a Little People set, opening it up and wrapping each individual piece so that he would have lots of toys to open.  He was in heaven.  They were so little that they did not notice.  Levi and I did not give each other anything and our siblings and parents got very small gifts...like ten dollar gifts. 

Two years later after several promotions, living frugally, tax returns, and savings...we had not a single thing on our credit cards.  That is for a different post as it took a lot of work, but Christmas remains a joyful time, because every year in January we adjust the budget and are able to give JOYFULLY.  We also now save for our Home Owners Association fees as they are due in December.  We save for our car insurance and pay that every six months instead of paying the monthly penalty and we save ahead of time for vacations instead of charging them and then not being able to relax and have fun.

Saving for Christmas has spread into every area of our spending and now when the car breaks down, or the fridge stops working the hit doesn't hurt as badly and we can be JOYFUL.  So since my goal this year is to CHOOSE JOY, then I wanted to share this JOYFUL habit with you so that you can have a JOYFUL CHRISTMAS this year.