As scheduled, DH and I sat down and had a budget meeting tonight. He's a bit prickly about it and has never been much interested in our finances. I think the poor thing is just emotionally exhausted and a bit disheartened by the whole thing.
We found that if we dramatically slash our retirement contributions, we could indeed live on my regular university salary. It won't be pretty, but it can be done. So that's the plan. We bank his unemployment, look for a new job with lots of energy and also bank my night class money to build our cash reserves further.
I have to say, it really hurt me to log in to the retirement accounts and curtail them to that extent. Although I know it's right, it just feels so wrong.
We're doing the opposite of freezer cooking; we're doing freezer eating. I found two of last summer's lingering bratwurst (Milwaukee life) and a frozen carton of chicken broth in the freezer. It turned into an amazingly good soup from a blog called "Eatin on the Cheap." I tweaked the recipe a bit, but who knew two brats, three potatoes, an onion, two carrots and some chicken broth could be as good as it was. I wish I had more!
Budget Meeting
November 18th, 2011 at 05:44 am
November 18th, 2011 at 12:50 pm 1321620650
Take care!
November 18th, 2011 at 01:49 pm 1321624157
Love the attitude to embrace the challenge! I am glad that your salary can cover the basic living expenses for the time-being. Hope your freezer contains more good surprise eats!
November 19th, 2011 at 04:49 am 1321678195
November 19th, 2011 at 02:08 pm 1321711691
I also checked out the website you mentioned - the soups look wonderful! Good thing it's soup eating weather!!