We got by, and we had everything we needed, but we had a bad case of lifestyle envy. It seemed everyone else had more. More toys, better clothes, a home of their own. Meanwhile, we drove old cars, lived in a tiny single wide, and were busy paying off student loan and credit card debt.

Five years and another child later, we moved to a bigger city, where my husband landed a sales position at our local newspaper. The economy was booming, and we saw our income increase quite a bit.

If I had been a Dave Ramsey fan back then, we would have continued our modest lifestyle and paid off our debt quickly. Unfortunately, after living on such a tight budget for so long, we did what most people do. We spent more.

We were finally able to buy brand new clothes for our kids, instead of shopping the thrift stores. We took some fun vacations. We went out to eat more often. And our debt lingered.

The funny thing is, even though we were buying more, we still weren’t satisfied. There were still people out there with better cars, bigger houses, and more toys. Probably more debt, too.

We finally got our heads together and decided to cut back on our lifestyle again so we could pay off our credit cards. Unfortunately, that’s when the economy turned, and my husband lost his good paying job. He landed on his feet with another job, though it paid considerably less.

Still, it was a good job, and we were able to tighten our budget enough to pay off our credit card debt. Had we been smart from the beginning, though, our debt would have been long gone before my husband’s job loss.

The moral of the story is that someone will always have more than you. It’s best to focus on your own financial goals and avoid the lifestyle inflation that will prevent you from meeting those goals. Learning to be content in all circumstances is the best path to financial freedom.

3 Tips to Help You Avoid Lifestyle Inflation

So what can you do to avoid lifestyle inflation?

Use a Budget

Our biggest downfall during my husband’s income boom was that we didn’t have a zero based budget. If we felt like eating out, we ate out, even if we’d already spent $100 that month on restaurant meals.

By making and using a budget, we would have been more aware of how much we were spending on frivolous things. Just seeing the numbers in black and white would have made us think twice about some of our spending decisions.

Ignore the Joneses

Like I said before, someone will always have more than you do. The thing is, you don’t know how much debt they’ve acquired in order to buy their possessions.

Be happy for your neighbor’s success, but realize that you have your own goals. By keeping your eyes on your own situation, you can work on your own problems. It’s when you start paying attention to what everyone else has that you fall prey to discontentment, and envy is a catalyst for bad spending decisions.

Stay Focused

If your goal is to pay off debt, stay focused on that goal. Listen to Dave Ramsey, read books on good financial practices, or display a chart of your progress toward paying off your debt. Do whatever it takes to motivate you to meet your goals.

Just one big splurge can cause you to veer way off your debt repayment path. Stay focused on your goal.

I’ve done the lifestyle inflation thing while still in debt. Learn from my mistakes. Living large while you’re in debt isn’t as much fun as it seems.

What did you do the last time you got a raise or a higher paying job? Did you find your lifestyle inflating, or did you manage to keep control of your budget? Do you have any tips for avoiding lifestyle inflation?

Photo by javajoba.

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• If I Were Debt Free….
• Review: Master Your Debt: Slash Your Monthly Payments and Become Debt-Free

But nothing is further from the truth. Toddlerhood is a foundational time in a child’s life. The lessons you teach your toddler will set the stage for childhood and adulthood. And believe it or not, what you teach your toddler can set the foundation for good financial sense!

I know you’re scratching your head right now. You might be asking, “How can I possibly teach my toddler about personal finance? I’m just trying to get through the day!”

Financial Lessons You Can Teach Your Toddler

Believe me, I understand. But stay with me. The following are a few lessons you can teach your toddler that will pay dividends later on. Literally.

Delayed Gratification

Back to my tantruming toddler…She wanted a snack. I was in the middle of doing something, and I told her to wait a minute. She threw herself on the ground and cried.

How many times do we see adults do the same thing? They want something, and they can’t have it right away. Instead of waiting patiently, they pull out a credit card to purchase what they want when they want it.

Delayed gratification is an important life lesson and one you can begin teaching very young children. By teaching toddlers to wait, even when they throw a huge tantrum, you are setting them up for success in an important area of life.

Hard Work

One of my favorite things to do with my toddler is clean the house. Yes, you read that correctly. My toddler cleans the house with me. We put away toys, books, and shoes, and she’s an enthusiastic helper. Sometimes her two year old efforts don’t measure up to my adult standards, but that’s OK. My toddler is learning to work hard and to enjoy the work she does.

So often it’s tempting to baby our children, to do everything for them. But what does that teach them? Entitlement! Instead, begin to teach them the importance of hard work at a young age, when they enjoy mimicking their parents.

If you teach a child to work as a toddler and praise their efforts, you will teach them to take pride in meaningful work. Again, that’s a lesson many adults don’t understand these days.

Saving Money

My toddler has a piggy bank. Actually, it’s a ladybug bank, but you get the picture. Sometimes I give her a coin or two to drop into her bank. Like most toddlers, she loves to drop coins into her little bank. She doesn’t understand the concept of saving money yet, but she understands that dropping money into her bank is a lot of fun.

By the time she understands what it means to save money, I’m hoping that she will associate fun with saving. Banks sometimes do the same things for kids. Our credit union ran a program where they’d let kids pick a small toy out of the prize box for every fifth deposit a child makes. And the bank had a good thing going. Saving money should be fun!

When you teach a toddler to regularly and joyfully save money, you’re shaping their attitude toward money later in life.

As difficult as parenting toddlers is, rest assured that the lessons you begin teaching them at 2 can be a huge asset for them at age 22. So when you’re having a bad day with your toddler, just remember that the effort you put into her life now will pay off later in life.

What are some of the things you teach or have taught your young children that pay big dividends later in life?

Photo by Paleontour.

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In a perfect world, parents teach their students what they need to know about finances over the course of eighteen years. However, if you’re just now realizing that your soon-to-be college student doesn’t have the financial know-ho to get by on his own, there’s hope.

Make the most of the summer to teach your child what she needs to know before heading off into the real world. That said, what does she need to know?

Spend Less Than You Earn

Maybe you don’t have time to teach your child the detailed ins and outs of budgeting. If you drill this one idea into your child’s head, though, he will be OK. That idea is spend less than you earn. This simple idea means your student needs to know two things.

1. How much money is coming in.
2. How much money is going out.

As a college student, your child may not have a regular income. Whether he has a job with a weekly paycheck, scholarships that are paid out quarterly, or a stipend from mom and dad that he receives monthly, your student needs to know his income.

Then he needs to track his expenses, making sure they do not exceed his income. Teach him to save a little bit for emergencies. Be prepared for a rough start and some mistakes, but if your college student learns this one lesson, he will be way ahead of many college graduates!

Write a Check

Let’s face is. Checks are quickly becoming outdated. With the advent of debit cards and electronic transactions, it’s rare that one needs to write a check anymore. However, there are still a few occasions when checks are the only way to go.

Make sure your college student has access to a checkbook through his bank account and knows how to write a check. Just as important, make sure he knows to record the check and balance the checkbook, so he’s not surprised when a forgotten check clears!

In addition, your student should know how to void a check, as he may need to present a voided check to his employer for direct deposit.

Manage a Bank Account

There are many fabulous programs on the market to help manage a budget and bank account. If you have time over the summer to teach your college student how to master one of these programs, great! But at the very minimum, your student should know how to reconcile his bank account, use online banking to check up on pending and cleared transactions, and what to do if there is a mistake on his bank statement.

Also educate your student on the different fees banks charge. You don’t want your college student to overdraft his account, because he didn’t calculate ATM fees correctly!

And most importantly, teach him that if he has a question about his bank account, it’s OK to call you or the bank for help. We all need a little guidance sometimes.

Use Credit Properly

If there’s one thing that gets college students in trouble, it’s the improper use of credit. Whether the student takes out too many student loans or racks up a credit card balance, graduating from college deep in debt can have a negative impact on a young adult for years to come.

Parents, if you teach your children one thing in the summer before college (or preferably sooner), teach your children to respect credit.

Just because your daughter’s favorite store offers 15% off that day’s purchase for opening a credit card doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. Explain that taking on debt and paying it back over the long term will eventually cost more than the 15% she saved in one day. One lesson I didn’t understand before college was that just because I could afford the monthly credit card payment didn’t mean I could afford the purchase. Make sure your student understands this.

Teach your child to use a credit card responsibly, if at all. Teach her to pay off the balance every month and that if she can’t pay off the balance one month, she needs to stop using the card. The momentary pain of being broke and passing up a purchase is a lot better than the long term pain of paying off a purchase you made five years ago at twice the price.

College is a time of learning to be an adult. As a parent, you can expect your young adults to make plenty of mistakes, even with good preparation. If you take time to prepare your student in these four areas, though, chances are that your child’s mistakes will be minor, with only short term repercussions.

Am I missing anything? At a minimum, what do you think young adults should know about finances before heading off to college?

Photo by Wikimedia Commons.

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One of the most difficult crimes to deal with today is identity theft. When someone steals your identity and racks up credit card debt, bounces checks, and otherwise trashes your credit rating, it can be hard to survive in a world that is so dependent on good credit.

You may not be able to get a loan. Your car insurance rates may go up. You may be turned down for a job.

The best way to deal with identity theft is to prevent it from happening in the first place. You’ve heard advertisements for companies like Lifelock, which claim to insure that you will never succumb to identity theft. But do you really need to pay to prevent your identity from being stolen?

The answer is yes…and no. No, you don’t need to pay a company to monitor your credit for you, though it certainly can’t hurt. But if you don’t want to shell out the big bucks for someone else to monitor your credit, there are simple steps you can take to make sure your identity is not stolen. Some will cost a little, but in the end, these purchases are well worth it.

Invest in a Shredder

A good shredder is an identity thief’s nightmare. If you merely toss bank statements, credit card applications, and other financial documents in the trash, it’s easy for a thief to raid your trash to find the information he needs to steal your identity.

If you shred all of your sensitive paperwork before tossing it, a thief will move on to an easier target. Shredding documents just takes a few seconds, but the result could save you from a big headache down the road.

Check Your Credit Report

By regularly checking your credit report, you will be able to quickly catch any strange activity. Checking your credit report is free at annualcreditreport.com. By law you can receive a free credit report from each of the three major reporting agencies once a year.

Rather than ordering all your credit reports at once, though, you should order from a different agency once every four months. This will allow you to monitor your credit report throughout the year, making it easy to catch an identity thief before he does major damage.

If you are married, stagger your credit report orders with those of your spouse. Since many transactions are joint transactions, suspicious activity on your spouse’s credit report may alert you to a problem with your own. Another way to keep watch is to check your credit scores regularly with one of the many free services available.

Secure Your Mailbox

Many identity thieves steal identities by stealing mail. If your mail isn’t secure, find a way to secure it. A small post office box doesn’t cost very much, and your mail will be kept safe in a locked PO box. Similarly, you can buy a locking mailbox for your house.

Leaving your mail unattended and unsecured isn’t worth it these days. Spend the money to make sure thieves can’t get easily get your mail. I use a UPS box for my blogging correspondence, and my plan is to use that address as my main mailing address from now on.

Identity theft is a crime of opportunity. If you make it hard for an identity thief to steal your identity, he will move on to an easier target.

Do you have any additional ideas to help prevent identity theft? If you’ve been a victim of identity theft, how did the thief get your information?

Photo by TheMuuj.

What Do You Know?

One of the first rules of investing is to avoid investments you don’t understand. What do you know about how the investment works? If you want to invest in stock funds, it helps first to understand how stocks work, and how mutual funds operate.

The good news is that many of the more “standard” investments that most people take advantage of — stocks and bonds — are fairly easy to understand. Understanding funds, including mutual funds and exchange traded funds, isn’t much of a stretch beyond that. These are good places to start, since you can learn about them quickly.

You can move on to more complicated investments as your knowledge increases. Don’t forget to learn about the specific investment you are looking at. Before choosing a bond, stock, or mutual fund, do some research. If you want to invest in energy futures, you not only need to learn about how futures are traded, but you should also look at the characteristics, market movements, and fundamentals associated with the types of energy investments (oil, coal, solar, etc.) you are interested in.

What’s Your Risk Tolerance?

Before you start investing, consider your risk tolerance. As you might guess, this is a measure of how much risk you can stand. There are two types of risk tolerance:

1. Financial: This represents how much money you can afford to lose. Don’t invest money that you can’t do without.
2. Emotional: In some cases, the high volatility of certain investments causes you disquiet. Not only do you need the financial risk tolerance, but you also need the emotional risk tolerance. While stepping a little outside your comfort zone might be warranted, don’t invest in something that you are really nervous about. Other aspects of your life will suffer as your anxiety takes over.

Where Should You Invest?

The next thing to think about is where you will invest. There are a number of brokers out there. Many people like to use online discount brokers. These can be helpful if your needs are fairly basic, and you are comfortable with the amount of research you do. A full service brokerage might be needed for someone with more complex needs. Also, consider the cost of investing. Take into account transaction fees and commissions, as well as the service you get.

Before you open an investment account, make sure the broker offers the services you want, and that the prices are reasonable. Remember that the fees and commissions you pay are eating into your returns. You want to keep these as low as possible. Investing can be a great way to build wealth, no matter what you are interested in. However, doing a little recon before you start will help you make better, more informed decisions.

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Notes from Robert

First I use ice cubes that are really small. You should be able to buy these at local stores like Fred Meyer, Target, etc. This is important because if you use large cubes, you will have a lot more chunks in your drink and you won’t be able to use as much ice as the blender won’t break it up enough. Prior to getting these trays I did it with just 5 regular size ice cubes, as any more really mucked up the blender.

Also, I use an Oster Fusion blender that I bought at Costco for less than $50. It has a setting for iced drinks. You need to have a blender that has a setting like this, as it will give you better results. It actually varies the blend speed at several different times during the blending. Several companies make them. If you have unlimited budget, BlendTec makes world class blenders that are used in Starbucks, etc worldwide. But a “consumer” version will set you back $400, so check out Costco for a much cheaper alternative!

Here are the best sources I have found for the ingredients:

• Caffe D’Amore Mocha Frappe Freeze Coffee Mix – This can be found at MOST Costco’s in a 2.3 lb package for under $9. It yields about 90 servings. It is not available at the Medford Costco, but it is at just about every other one in the state. I load up every time I go north.
• Nescafe Tasters Choice Gourmet Roast Coffee – Target has the best price I have ever seen. About $7 for a large container that 60-70 servings (at least). It is on sale right now for slightly more than $6.
• Torani Chocolate Sauce – While you can buy this at Winco and many other stores, the best price I have found is at United Grocer’s Cash & Carry. 64 oz is about $10. They also have sugar free. This is the same chocolate sauce that Dutch Bros uses. Torani also makes a sugar free version of the same sauce.

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1. Camp out in a tent in the back yard.
2. Read to your children under a tree.
3. Take a nature walk around the neighborhood. See how many different kinds of flowers, bugs, and animals you can find.
4. Play an old fashioned game of Hide ‘n’ Go Seek.
5. Go to the park.
6. Ride bikes, scooters, or roller skate.
7. If it’s hot enough, turn on the sprinklers and let the kids run through them.

And for the adults…

Sit out on the deck with a good cup of coffee or a glass of wine and just talk to your spouse. It’s like a mini-date after the kids are in bed. Just make sure you break out the citronella candles! I’m paying for my mini-date with mosquito bites up and down my legs.

What are your favorite things to do when the weather warms up?

Photo by Nicholas_T.

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Checklist for a Campout

• 1 Tent (improvise with sheets and a tree, if you have to)
• Sleeping Bags
• Pillows
• Air mattress (optional, but recommended, if you have bad knees)
• Flashlight
• Fire (use the barbecue, if you don’t have a fire pit)
• Ingredients for S’mores (graham crackers, chocolate bars, marshmallows)
• Wire or clean stick

How to Set Up Your Camp

Have the kids help you set up the tent. Make sure you scope out a nice flat spot in the yard. If you don’t have a tent, improvise! When I was a kid, my friends and I tied a couple of blankets together and draped them over a tree branch.

Inflate your air mattress, if you’re using one, and place the mattress, sleeping bags, and pillows in the tent, along with the flashlight.

If you want, roast hot dogs on the grill and have dinner outside, to make this an authentic camping experience. When the sun sets, roast marshmallows over the fire (or barbecue).

Before it’s time to turn in for the night, gather ‘round the fire (or around the flashlight in the tent) and sing songs, tell scary stories or try to find the Big Dipper in the sky. Make sure you spend some time talking. Time in the dark, away from the television and computer, is a great time to find out what’s on your child’s mind.

In the morning cook up some flapjacks, in the kitchen, of course. The benefit of backyard camping is the modern conveniences in the house a few feet away!

Photo by makelessnoise.

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Fast forward many years, and now I do 6-8 loads of wash per week (depending on what sports the kids are playing that season), and thankfully, I’m using my own machines. Laundry costs are still substantial. Here’s how most similar-sized households can save up to $1500 per year in laundry costs.

Laundry Detergent/Products

I’ve made my own detergents for years, using a similar recipe to Lyannae’s How to Make Your Own Homemade Laundry Detergent. I use castile soap instead of bath soap o Fels-Namptha because I want a detergent-free laundry. I pre-treat stains with Dawn, and also use white vinegar as a rise aid (when it is necessary). Laundry detergent savings $198 year.

Laundry Lines/Racks

To save energy on drying, I rack-dry when the weather is warm. Outside line-drying isn’t an option for me since I live in a townhouse. Savings about $28 over the dry months.

Need a quick free drying rack? If you’ve got one of those wooden drop-side cribs that has recently been recalled—grab a side and position it over your tub/shower (mine has a ledge, making it a perfect place to hold a rack like this).

Reduce Drying Time

Adding “laundry balls” to the dryer helps to prevent static, reduce wrinkles and speed drying time, which has eliminated the use of dryer sheets and bars. Laundry balls are just heavy felted soft-ball sized balls. They’re all natural, and their weight gets them bouncing around in the dryer a lot, without adding noise. All of this extra movement in the dryer dries garments much faster. I got my laundry balls (pictured here) from Shayna’s treats http://shaynastreats.com/. I can’t tell exactly what this is saving, but I did notice that when we started using the laundry balls, it seemed to offset the use of our portable air conditioner, so I’m guessing it is a savings of $84 per year.

Need to Replace a Machine?

If you’re using an inefficient machine, or have a machine that may be near failure, it may be time to replace—but don’t buy new! If you don’t have to have the top-of-the-line machine, you can definitely benefit from those who do. Recycled and second-hand building supply stores get lots of washers and dryers. Often, they are the brand-new base models from a new home or condo that was immediately replaced with a designer model by the new owner. Many areas have a used building materials store, we are fortunate to have three of them near us. One can easily find a working high-efficiency, front loading washing machine for $250 or less, compared to a new machine at $600-700. Total savings: At least $350.

Ditch the Dry Cleaning

Dry cleaning not only exposes you to potentially hazardous chemicals, but is expensive! Furthermore, it’s not always necessary. Dry clean typically just means that your garment shouldn’t go through a machine with an agitating system, or would be harmed by traditional detergent or extreme water temperatures.

You can scale back or eliminate your dry cleaning bills by hand-washing your garments with mild soaps (detergent free, such as a pure castile soap). Rodale provides some excellent instructions here.

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Sure, furniture isn’t what it used to be. My great-great-uncle built our kitchen table shortly after he married his wife who arrived by wagon train in Oregon (not exaggerating!). It looks nearly new, still. But my modern mid-range furniture and kids’ beds are starting to show their age already. I guess they don’t make things like they used to. But admittedly, much of my “mid-grade” furniture was packed flat and assembled with hex wrenches.

But there is good news. There are ways to fix cosmetic damages and wear to your “in-between” furniture. (All that furniture that came after pizza boxes, bricks and boards, and before the furniture you hope to will to your children or grandchildren).

A Few Tips for Repairing Minor Furniture Flaws

Scrapes in Faux Leather

My cat like to ride “co-pilot” on the back of my faux leather chair. But every now and then he surprises me, and I give him cause for alarm. And he gives me small holes in the back of my chair. But to my wonderment, the brown Sharpie pen matches the material perfectly, and obscures the little snags. For larger tears and snags you can buy a leather repair kit that creates a patch.

Real Leather

For small cat scratches and snags on real leather, you may be able to find a shoe polish that matches. If you can, take a needle, and very carefully push the snags back into place. Next, smooth a light coat of the matching shoe polish over the area, and heat it with a hair dryer. Repeat the process several times until the snags are concealed. (Be sure to test your shoe polish on a hidden section of leather to ensure it is a good match first!)

Upholstery

Red wine, dark chocolate, blood, cat vomit, melted crayon, and ice cream: All things I’ve successfully removed from my pale beige sofa!

The melted crayon—it was bright orange, and fully melted. A small child left it in the sunshine on my patio, and brought it in positively dripping with moist wax. He came to show it to me and dragged it across the back of my chaise at the same time! It left a .5” orange gash across the back of my sofa. After contacting Crayola, we discovered that WD-40 would remove molten crayon from the sofa. Sure enough, it did. WD-40, followed by a wash with dish soap to remove the residual oils, and there was no stain left at all. (We raced outside and cleaned the green crayon from the back seat of our car next!)

For other stains, we try to follow the old fashioned chemistry rule of “like dissolves like.” We usually pre-treat with dish soap, and then follow up with a soft scrub brush (even an old toothbrush) and some oxygen bleach. We’ve never had an issue of bleaching, and nothing has ever stained. It helps that we own a steamer. Sometimes, after scrubbing, we put an oxygen bleach or vinegar solution in the steamer and run that over the affected area.

For cat snags, if you’re handy, you may be able to use a needle around the affected areas, and pull individual threads to weave the spot back in. If that doesn’t work, get some clear nail polish, clip the snag and nail polish it in place (be careful to use only a tiny bit, or it will be obvious). The idea is just to provide enough texture that the thread can’t slip back and create a run.

Bashes/Scrapes on Wood

I have a lovely dark walnut colored desk. It sits in my little corner of my living room and serves as my “office.” The downside is that this really is a “discount” desk, and is made of rubberwood. While it’s heavy and stable structurally, if you even lean on it wrong, you leave a ding that goes through he finish and it looks like heck.

For low-frequency injuries, I cover it with a product called Old English Scratch Cover for Dark Woods. It is an oil base, and soaks right into the wood, and it looks beautiful. But for high-damage areas, like the front of the desk, where my chair rubs on the edges, I once again rely on my trusty Sharpie pen. There are also wood and floor markers designed for this sort of thing, but my sharpie is on my desk already, and it was cheap.

Deep Scratches, Nail Holes and Kid Carvings

Yes, kids are ever so cruel to furniture. Our church has recently had an epidemic of kids “carving” things into the walnut pews. You may think that this damage will require a full sand-down, but there’s a pretty good repair available. Minwax makes a wood-toned soft wax fill, that blends beautifully. You smash it into the scrape or gouge, smooth it off, and put a coat of furniture polish over it. Contractors use this to cover nails used to apply finishes like beadboard, and mop boards.If the surface is painted, it’s a good idea to keep a little bit of touch-up paint on hand in matching colors. Most hardware stores can mix small sizes from a sample (even part of the furniture!)

“Ruined” Pots and Pans

Unless you’ve melted a pot or pan to your range, it is likely salvageable. (Note: don’t use scratched, flaking non-stick products, it’s not believed to be safe!) For bad burns, broiled-on-food or the remnants of a stovetop popcorn fire, try some warm water and a product called “water softener.” You can usually find water softener at the hardware store, or a pool/spa store. A couple of tablespoons of it, plus some warm water and soaking time, and you will be able to scrub off almost any messy cookware.

Let me hear it — what was your best home fix?

The home fix I feel most victorious about is still the crayon on the sofa. The sofa was brand-new and the giant swath of molten crayon was so shocking to see, I was sure it could never be salvaged.