Managing Our Finances: This is How We Do It (Happily!)

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I'm not very good with money.

I mean, I guess I'm good with it compared to much of the nation-- I've always paid off my credit card each month and never spent beyond my means.

But when I was single, I never managed to save very much either. Not when I lived just a couple of minutes away from the best mall in Nashville.

Fortunately, my husband is good with money, and so he handles our finances. This works out very nicely- He writes the checks, pays the bills, makes the interminable phone calls to dispute the bills, allocates the funds, and keeps everything recorded.

I do the housework, the cooking, and the bulk of the grunt work involved in caring for two small children.

We both enjoy our roles- perhaps that's why we're still married!

I think that the best way we can teach our children about finances is through our example. The reason, after all, that I've never had credit card debt is because my parents never had credit card debt. I was raised to believe that credit card debt was as shameful as having a naked woman tattooed on your arm.

I plan to raise our children the same way, and my husband has taken it a step farther. We don't buy a car unless we have enough money to buy it outright. This has led to some interesting scenarios-- At one point, my husband drove a 15-year-old Tercel with no air conditioning back and forth to work for a year while we saved for an SUV that could fit our family of six. We also drive two older, reliable cars that we could afford to buy at the time, rather than newer models that would have come with payments. Yes, I sometimes see snazzy Volvo SUVs and tricked-out Ford Winstars pass me by and feel a pang of envy.

But I really do think I sleep better at night with a mortgage as our only debt.

And I hope my children can say the same thing when they're my age.