On the "ability" of being a SAHM

Last night, DH had his company Christmas party, where employees from all the branches come to town to have a nice meal, free alcohol, door prizes and free hotel rooms. It's a huge deal, and they go all-out. Anyway, before the party, DH told me that some of his co-workers are jealous that I am able to be a SAHM. And indeed, a handful of them mentioned to me and DH that they wished they could stay home.

The thing is, they CAN.

Now, I've thought this way long before Dave Ramsey entered my life. So I won't turn this into a "take a Dave Ramsey course" plug, although I'll admit that his program has made it a little easier to be a SAHM. But soooo many people don't realize that if they really really wanted to, and both the husband and wife agreed, one of them can stay home and raise children for a living. They just have to realize that they'd have to sacrifice on some of the more creature comforts Americans have grown to "need". And yes, it is hard. But again, if they really wanted to, they'd find a way.

Here's a list of things we've sacrificed a bit on which makes it possible for me to stay home.

1. Our mortgage is modest enough that I don't need to bring in any money to help keep the roof over our heads. And a modest mortgage means that we have a modest house. No McMansions here.

2. Both our vehicles were bought used, were paid for in cash, and are creeping up on 10 years old. We have no plans on getting a new "used" vehicle anytime soon, as we haven't saved up enough to pay in full, and a car payment would take a big chunk of our budget.

3. DH's cell phone is mostly paid for by his employer, and mine is just a simple TracFone. I can make a call and text. That's it. No camera, no WiFi, no games. It's maybe $100 a year. (No, I don't talk on the phone a lot). If DH's employer decided to stop paying for his cell phone, he'd get a TracFone, too. And like the vehicles, we don't get the newest phones that hit the market.

4. We eat out once a week. Sometimes twice, depending on what's going on. But eating out is expensive, and it's sad when you spend more on eating out than what you spend on groceries. We used to eat out a ton, but when we added up everything we spent, it gave us a wake up call that we were wasting money.

5. We no longer have cable. If DH had his way, we wouldn't have internet, either, but a girl's gotta put her foot down sometime. :) Out of everything I've listed so far, this one is by far the hardest. I liked the background noise it offered, and the trashy MTV shows I got addicted to. But when it comes down to it, we really don't need to spend $60 a month on trashy MTV shows that I could watch for free online.

6. We don't do a lot of shopping. And this might be a product of where we live, where Walmart is the best place to get stuff, but really, we take one or two big shopping trips to Fargo a year. But otherwise, there is very minimal amounts spent on clothing, shoes and whatever else other people like to buy.

7. We don't take many vacations. And by vacations, I mean "go somewhere that's more than 1 state away". We'll take an occasional weekend trip to see friends in Minnesota or go see my family in Montana. But besides gas, those are pretty cheap as we don't pay hotel costs. Maybe some day we'll take a big vacation... and of course we'd save up for it.

Anyway, those are the big things that most people don't want to give up. Not saying that everyone does all those things, but just one or two of them alone can make it impossible for someone to stay home with the kids. But if they really worked at it, I bet they'd find that they COULD stay home.

Home Girl

I'll admit it, I'm a home girl. It's where I'm happiest. Going out to bars just isn't my thing, and many weekend nights I'll just chill at home while my husband goes to a friend's house to play games. It comes with a price though... oftentimes I'll feel like I missed something. But at the same time, if I go, while I have a good time, I don't get the time I need to re-energize and then I tend to get crabby. So I try to even it out and not be so anti-social.

But sometimes I just like to get out. So today, my husband and some friends went to the local lake just to swim and lay out. It was nice, although it was pretty cloudy and not as warm as it was supposed to be. I love swimming, so that's what I did the majority of the time we were there. I think there's a tentative plan to go again next Saturday, but this IS North Dakota... you never know what the weather will be like.

An Introduction

Hello. I thought I'd give this blogging thing a try, and share interests, challenges and just the randomness that is my life.

A little about me... I'm a 29 year old female living in a small city in North Dakota. I've been married for over 2 years to the wonderful guy I met in college, though we've been together for for 9 years total. I am a new homemaker, and still trying to learn the ropes of that... it's more work than it sounds like. And for the past 2 years, we have been actively trying to conceive... and not getting very far. I hope to share some of the challenges as we try to figure things out. I can't promise there won't be any rants or poor-me posts... because most likely, there will be, because it goes with the territory of infertility.

My blog won't be solely about infertility.... it'll just be about my life and whatever is going on at any given point in time.

Enjoy!