Financial Peace University, Bigfoot

Monday was our very first meeting for Financial Peace University (FPU). We went around the room telling the others why we were there. There were several other couples there and a few people from our church. The class was at our church. When it came to us, Guy told everyone who we were and that we had gone through FPU 8 years ago and have been on Baby Step #2 since that time (Baby Step #2 is to pay off all your debt). And that we were very close to paying off debt and it's been so long we're not sure what to do after we're done.

That was a good way to put it! We weren't sure what Baby Step #3 entails and we could also use a good group of motivated like-minded people to keep us moving in the right direction. We are literally six days away from paying off our debt. And to the week it has been 2 years since we moved in here!

Baby Step #3 is to save up for a "fully funded" emergency fund. In Baby Step #1 we just saved up for $1000 emergency fund, to get us through until our debt was paid off. So a fully funded emergency fund will hold 3-6 months of our expenses, so that if something were to happen to our income we would be able to exist for 3-6 months before needing new income. We plan to do this but we have other things on our plate first, one of which is to find a new place to live (we're about 6 months out from this). This new place will hold us for a while as we get through Baby Step #3, because this baby step has another part to it, #3b, which is to save up for a down payment on a house.

We understand that things can change, but this is our vision of the future for now!

And so, wait, you came here to hear about Nico? Oh right. He came with us to the meeting on Monday.

:)

and he was so well behaved. We plugged him into the iPad and he played games the whole 2 hours.

On Sunday we got to see the Grandparents Salisbury, plus Lexie! The Grandparents Salisbury recently returned from a trip to St Louis. They brought us back a license plate from Russell, KS that says "RUSSELL" on it! Nico and Lexie both got a Bigfoot toy that pops foam balls out of its mouth. Apparently Lexie and Nico are both very big Bigfoot fans. At Grandma Camp they would watch Finding Bigfoot together. I had no idea Nico was so interested in it! He said to Grandma "want to see what I got from the library?" and he pulled out a graphic novel about the history of Bigfoot! I had no idea he had checked that out. Lexie was so excited about it and looked through it.

Grandma asked Nico if he liked Grandma Camp and he said "Yes, no, kind of" and put his thumb in the middle instead of up or down. Grandma asked him why and he said he didn't like sleeping alone because he got scared (he was usually the first one in bed, and his bed was made up in Grandma's room). Grandma asked him what could make it better next year and he said "Maybe I could sleep in your bed and then when you go to bed you can snuggle me or something?" That was pretty sweet. But then we came up with a different plan - that he sleeps where the big kids sleep. He was happy with that. Grandma asked Lexie what she didn't like about Grandma Camp and Lexie laughed and said she didn't like getting sprayed with water from the kitchen sprayer. Apparently there were a lot of water fights with that thing! And apparently she got Grandma really good in the back one time when Grandma wasn't looking! Nico told us that story.

More bike rides with the boys.

Sorry for the lack of pictures!

We've been doing lots of dot-to-dots, color by numbers, and then this morning he pulled out the mazes. Picture day was on Wednesday. He's been wearing his suspenders to school a lot. He has been asking to go to school early, so, we do! He can't show up before 8:15 but we arrive at about 8:25, the bell rings at 8:40. I suspect he gets there early so he can have first pick of the basketballs. There are a few that are flat.