Late nights or wake ups in the middle of the night are early morning killers for me. However, this morning I powered through my desire to keep sleeping....so much on my mind....
My kitchen is warmer today. "Little by little" is our new phrase and sure enough, little by little, the siding has gone up around the section of the house where cold air blasted against, creeping in through this one section of the wall making our kitchen feel like an ice box. Today, no blast of cold air. Yeah! That might actually mean no more frozen pipes!
We're starting to realize that nothing is going to happen magically all at once. Getting a small section of siding done like that is, oddly enough, going to make one of the biggest differences in our heating bill. I used to think, if you can't do the whole wall, don't bother. But the little changes we make are what add up slowly over time.
My son is even seeing this in his math curriculum. He started off with the goal of finishing two courses before Christmas. That seemed completely impossible, but then, suddenly, in two short months, one was done. There was no way in his mind he could do the other one in 6 weeks, but we encouraged him to push himself and think positively. As well, I reminded him, "little by little"....
Then, yesterday, he came down and told me, "I'm 50% through the course!" He's doing it on-line and it actually tracks where he is. He couldn't believe it. This is the boy who struggles with math! I was so happy for him and he was so happy for himself!
All the things we are doing in an attempt to make extra cash seem so insignificant, yet, that phrase now is at the forefront of our minds.....little by little. The lottery seems like a viable option sometimes, but we know that wouldn't be God's way of clearing our debt. I think He is going to honour the little things we do.
Last night, one of the things that kept us up late was the conversation my husband and I were having about next summer. We have so many ideas that we hope to accomplish by using the land God has given us as well as all the resources on the farm. We are in true salesmen mode - we are really hoping to hit the farmer's markets next summer with all the produce we want to grow as well as with all the new things we hope to build and sell.
Our children are starting to get on board with all their ideas and all sorts of mini-businesses are starting to come together in their minds.
I've been super inspired by the Maxwell's latest book, Buying a House Debt Free. All the oldest Maxwell boys have been able to buy homes debt free as well as a group of other young men that they write about. They were able to do this by acquiring all sorts of skills at a young age and then not simply doing one thing, but many things, that paid anywhere from small amounts of money to large amounts. The key? Saving their money and not spending.
They included a little table that showed that this was possible. If a young man or woman, making only $10/hour, saved his or her money and spent only $50/week by living at home as long as possible, a young person could save $100,000 in just 8.6 years or less if they made more than $10/hour, which is entirely viable. That is so inspiring!
We're trying to communicate this vision to our children and each evening this week, we've been sitting as a family, with little notebooks in hand for each child, and asking them to dream, to plan, to vision - what would they like to sell this summer? what business would they like to start they we could help them with? We asked each child, right down to the six year old girl. Her ideas were pretty sweet....she wants to start her own hairdressing salon, of course, as well as a "nail shop" where she can do your nails. She had quite the long list.
As we went through to the older kids, each idea was taken very seriously and they had a lot of them. We know that in order to get these summer business ideas off the ground it's going to take some prep now in the winter months. But we want to see as many of these ideas take off as possible.
One of the things we see taking more and more of our productive time is the TV. This device is something we really struggle with. We love it and hate it all at the same time. When things are absolutely screwy in the house and toddlers are screaming, it's so easy to say, "Just put on a show!" We don't have broadcast TV or cable, so it's always a dvd, but still, it starts to become a crutch, so quickly. We talked about this with the kids and suggested putting it away for a bit, so we could really focus on the many projects we talked about. If we gave up time in front of the TV and started working on the tasks we needed to work on to sell the things we wanted to sell next summer, we'd be way ahead of the game.
My oldest loves movies. I was shocked to hear her say a day or two ago that she thought giving up the TV for a bit was a really good idea. I think it was her way of admitting that she hasn't been using her time the best. She seemed excited to think about what she would do with that new slot of time. None of us automatically become self-disciplined...sometimes we need a push, a little help. I'd rather sit and veg on some nights than sit in front of a sewing machine. Putting it away instead of just unplugging it may just be what we all need, even if it's just to read instead for a change.
Each one of the young men the Maxwells interviewed for their book sacrificed in some way in order to buy their homes debt-free before they were 30. Giving up typical forms of entertainment was something all of them had in common. They walked a different path, the road less travelled for sure, but now none of them have the financial burden of a mortgage. I think the sacrifices they made were worth it and we are highly encouraging our children to think this way as well. Big picture, that's what we want them to have. We don't want them to be short-sighted and think, "Oh, I'm going to miss watching that new movie!" We want them to think, "I'm giving this up, so I can be financially free 10 years from now." That might be hard to imagine, but we truly think this is possible! We are having to re-train ourselves, too, as I never thought this way myself until recently.
We're excited. Our kids are excited. They are starting to catch the vision that we are trying to place in them. I've always been excited for summer to come, but now, summer coming means so much more. It's less and less about lazing around and more and more about being productive and accomplishing as much as we can in the short season of warm weather we get. Same with winter. Believe it or not, we're all pretty excited about winter! Now we're hoping to get as much done in the winter months as we can, in hopes to see all our summer ideas and mini-businesses take off!
It comes down to mindset. We are just changing the way we think about everything, even winter. Last year, one of my greatest battles was with the dark feeling of dread. I no longer dread the season of winter. I'm starting to see it as a gift of time, indoors, where much can be done, as a family. The new mindset has turned everything around for us. We all walk around our house now with a much greater purpose - we don't just exist. We know we have a purpose, a vision, a plan.
Now, the only problem is we only have 7 days in the week and 24 hours in the day! My husband said, "We're going to need a couple more days in the week to get all the things done we want to get done!" But God thinks we have enough time. One of our other favourite phrases ,which I think we'll be saying a lot more around here this winter, is "We've declared war on spare time." That's it - we've declared war. I think that is a battle I'm willing to fight.
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