Your Spending Habits Need To Change... Immediately

Basically you need to stop spending.  Full stop.  This is difficult.  If we thought we needed something, and it was in the realm of affordability, we bought it.   I been a notorious sale shopper, able to justify any item's purchase with, "But it was on sale!"  This had to cease.  Temporarily, I sated the urge to spend with stocking up in gifts for others.  I overdid it on that too.  Our mindset needed to make the shift to "Do I really need this?"  

Case in point: my husband and I both still have flip phones.  Before I became pregnant, I had planned to buy myself a smartphone, but it came down to the fact that I didn't need a smart phone.  I was fortunate enough to receive an iPad as a combination Christmas/40th birthday gift.  I use wifi where it is available.  My husband works on a computer all day.  We contact each other by email.  We use our phones when we need to.

Our Past Spending History

Before our daughter was born, my husband and I were both working full-time at good jobs and rarely monitored our spending.  We had never budgeted.  When we made the decision for me to stay home with our daughter and (shortly afterward) when the Employment Insurance Maternity Benefits stopped when our daughter was a year old, it was a bit of a rude awakening.  Going from a full-time paycheque to maternity benefits when my daughter was born had been an adjustment, but all of a sudden we had just one income.  How were we going to do it?  Stay tuned to my blog to find out.  I'll be posting a daily tip.

Welcome to Learning to Live on Less Income

My husband said that he knew the day that our daughter was born that I wasn't returning to my full-time job after maternity leave.  Before she was born I had completed paperwork indicating would return to work after an extended maternity leave of 15 months.  My worry about leaving my daughter with a caregiver and returning to work began for me, an educator, on the eve of the first day of school when my daughter was only 3 months old.  It continued until my husband  and I made the decision that I would (gulp) give up my full-time position and stay home.  Though it was difficult to say goodbye to my job of the previous eight years, It was the only possible logical decision for our family.  Our daughter was an early 11th anniversary gift and she was born after we both thought we would never be parents.  We had both worked full-time for many years and were somewhat... established.  So began my journey as a stay-at-home Mom and all of the financial considerations that it entails. 

Family members tell me that my paternal grandmother, who lived during the Great Depression, knew how to stretch a dollar further than anyone.  This blog is dedicated to my Grandma, stay-at-home moms and seasonal/intermittent workers (of which I also have familiarity) who are learning to live on less income.