After six months of travel and being in one inhospitable environment after another how do you get back into the daily ‘normal’ of just being home? You have a budget and a goal, but you also have the itch for that local Chinese food place. Once it is out that you are home you also have friends and family wanting pieces of your time.

Finally home

You just worked for the past six months, why can’t you afford it?

The hardest thing for us when we got home was getting back into a normal routine. It took days for us to get our things unpacked where they belong, and we still have much more to unpack. Just this morning I unpacked my face wash (five days after getting home) so I can add that back into my morning routine.

Turtle, her mom and I went up to Goldstone Ghost Town yesterday. It was a wonderful little Gold Miners Ghost Town that was bought and turned into a tourist attraction way out by Apache Junction. I absolutely loved it, the Old West architecture and history are my favorite.

We spent a good several hours there under the Arizona sun and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. However, Turtles mom paid lunch, then when we went to do the train tour I had to tell her we didn’t have the money for it. First, it is $9 a person and cash only. We don’t carry cash and $18 for a train ride was sadly not in our budget.

“You worked for the past six months, why can’t you afford it?” Turtles mom asked incredulously. In her mind any money that is made that isn’t going to bills is money that can be spent if you’re saving some. Turtle and I have been working hard to maximize our savings and eliminate spending as much as we could.

Over the last few months we ran into issues with my truck and have had to sink several thousand dollars into it to keep it road worthy as well as to get us home. Our budget and savings took quite the hit and we weren’t ready to resume unnecessary spending any time soon.

Turtles mom paid for the train ride and we had fun. I got a bunch of cool pictures and the tour conductor was a humorous older gentleman who goes by Cousin Jack. Overall a great day out with our family.

Setting Proper Expectations

The biggest struggle with being home over the past five days has been other people’s expectations of us. Whether it is that they expect us to suddenly be wealthy and bankroll all the group excursions or just wanting to go out and spend frivolously when otherwise they wouldn’t. It isn’t a happy or healthy situation to be in.

We have big plans for Turtles mom that she knows about however, she seems to forget about them at every bend in the road. She is nearing retirement age at a breakneck speed and due to several prior situations, she is highly unlikely to have any real amount of money to sit on in retirement.

So as Turtle and I move into our future endeavors and are making more money we plan on giving Turtles mom an allowance and letting her retire. When we told her that a year ago she was so excited! Likewise, we are so excited to do that for her because she has been a great mother to Turtle and to myself as well.

These are conversations we have with her regularly however, we haven’t really had the nerve to sit down with her and explain our current situation. We are one year further along and yet monetarily we are still at step two when we should be at step four.

As I write this I find myself leaning back in my chair and sighing. We have some grand goals and solid plans to make those goals a reality. However, there are always situations that pop up and you must react. Those reactions are decisions that you must stick with and ride out whether good or bad.

Today we are going to sit down with Turtles mom and discuss with her where we are financially and what the next step is that we must take to make our goals a reality. It takes communication and determination to thrive and lately we have let it slip.

We need a code name for Turtles mom! Give us some suggestions in the comments!

The Next Step

With expectations being set with everyone who matters we can start to move forward. We have seven months until we leave again and there is a lot of prep that needs to happen during that time to ensure I maximize my income when I go back to full time work.

However, between hiring the right people to work with me next year and training them we need to get back on budget and rebuild routines. Work dominates a large portion of my time as it does for most people but there must be a happy balance where we work on ourselves. Our happiness and fitness and mental health are just as important as dollar signs filling our coffers and it is what we have tended to ignore the most while working crazy hours and just trying to “make it.”

Our next step is to take the next few days and rework our budget into something that is sustainable because as it stands it is no longer applicable to our situation and therefore we don’t use it. A budget that isn’t used is worthless and should be thrown away. So that is what we are going to do.

Meanwhile we will be going to the gym regularly again after more than a month of slacking off. Sweat equity not only helps clear your mind from what is bogging you down but also makes you feel so much better. I have found that the best work that I have done came to me right after I got out of the gym and started writing with the sweat still rolling.

Lastly let’s face it. With travelling and then getting home and just wanting to wind down we haven’t been eating well and our bodies are showing their displeasure. At the start of the summer we had gotten into a very clean meal plan that worked with our gym plan. We felt so good about the food and for a change we weren’t bogged down.

However, like most plans ours had a giant hole in it. We were going to be eating the same exact meals every single day except Sunday for the entire summer. While it was monetarily feasible, and I loved the concept of having steak every night for dinner; Turtle got bored and quickly. The plan fell apart on the third week and we found ourselves sitting in front of the TV eating Panda Express rather than going to the gym and just like that it was over.

I am pulling out our cookbooks today and we are going to find ourselves a variety of healthy meals that we can do and add to as necessary. This is one of the largest bullet points in the new budget we will be working on. Eating out is such a money sink that eating at home is so very important.

Thank you for reading, I will see you next week!