Grow up already!

I cried on my 27th birthday. My oldest sister, Lu, had her first child when she was 27 and somehow that seemed a "grown up age". I thought when I turned 27, I would be an adult. Never mind I had MY first child at 25, I thought 27 was the magical, mystical age when I would be a (deep voice here) grown up. So when I checked the mail on my 27th birthday and found an insufficient funds notice from my bank, I cried. I was not a grown up, I may have been a professional, married, home owning, mother, but I was not a grown up. Grown ups didn't bounce checks, grown ups didn't hold their breath when giving a credit card to a sales person. And grown ups keep their house reasonable clean for heavens sake!

Ten years have passed. Many things have changed, two more kiddos, loss of several family members, and thanks to check plus, I haven't actually bounced a check in years. But I am still struggling with many of the same issues. I'm still not a good steward of my money or my home and I'm sick of it! There have been improvements, haven't used a credit card in over 2 years. OM has, but not much, unfortunately not using credit cards, doesn't erase the old debt, darn it. And I've read, and read, and read on the subjects of organization and money management. I bought my first Suze Orman book in college and my first Organize from the Inside Out soon after graduating. I'm like one of those overweight people who can tell you how many calories in every food and exactly how much exercises is needed to burn off every bite. I know a ton of the advice and tricks, but can't seem to consistently implement them into my budget and my house. My budget, ha! I have a beautiful googledocs spreadsheet put together with all the monthly bills imputed and my Mint.com account is up to date, well, kinda. The last couple months transactions are broken into categories and there is a pretty little pie chart. But before that about half the chart is "Uncategorized".

I subscribed to www.flylady.net soon after my second son was born. Flylady has inspired some changes, I make my bed every morning, wear lace up shoes at home, and can crisis clean like nobody's business. And most importantly, I hear from other (mostly) women who have the same struggles I have. I'm sure more women I know in RL deal with some of these issues, but we don't talk about it much. Several women I know and love have messy homes, and they've decided they are okay with it, for now. I'm not, I never feel like I can relax completely when my home is a mess and Flylady's group showed me there are others like me. But, and this is a huge but, my house and finances are still a mess and I'm sick of it! And I really hate that I spend way too much of my time dealing with messes and not playing with my kiddos. And I spend a ton of time nagging them to clean. I want them to be able to keep a house together and still have a life they love. I want them to be able to budget and afford what they need and some of what they want.

So, I'm committing follow Flylady's 31 days all the way through and set up a budget and actually follow it. I'm going to track my progress, good and bad on this blog. I'm even, gulp, going to share my little hiding place on the web with some friends in hopes they can keep me honest.

Day One - My sink is shining and I bought only diapers and milk at Target. I did fine tune my spreadsheet. I also unpacked a couple boxes and did about four loads of wash and folded a couple others that had been sitting around. They have not been put away. But I'm heading to bed as Go to bed early is another Flylady commandment.
I snuggled with all three kiddo at different times, OM too. And I read "Guess How Much I Love You" to Hope.