Month 2 a la Dave Ramsey:

It's much more difficult to live without a credit card than I thought. I am slowly realizing how easily I justified spending; a little here, a little there, and it's gone, or charged more than we can pay each month. Blech.

Dave says we are now telling our money where to go each month, but it feels like my money is telling me where it cannot go: save up for homeschool supplies and books, save up for that small decor item or storage item, or organizer (I am so not organized, and we have bare walls, really, I'll post some pics of bare walls sometime. It's really bo-ring.)

We haven't been using an envelope system, because Dave doesn't explain it in The Total Money Makeover. I can't spend the $10 to buy the other book he has out that probably explains it. We'll just have to figure it out. Because now that we have a debit card, it's almost as dangerous as a credit card, because we haven't weeded ourselves of that bad habit with a plastic card in tow. Last month, we overdrew. Even with the overdraft protection, it still cost us $15 so the bank's computer could automatically transfer funds from our savings to checking account. Someone's coming out ahead here, and it's not us.

We'll stick to it, because we still believe it'll get us where we need to go: free from debt.

It's just hard to teach an old dog new tricks.