205 | What Money Allowed Us to Do

Spending is tricky.

Some is fun, some is obligatory, and some makes you want to throw up.

Some we hope to repeat, and plenty we hope never happens again.

Without a teacher to grade it or a boss to give it a performance review, it’s hard to know if we’re being responsible or doing it well.

So, we judge, compare, rationalize, or grasp for arbitrary “budgets” to try and make sense of things.

And then spending becomes a number to control or regret or bemoan instead of a dynamic story about real life.

Everyone feels these feelings – including myself.

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

So, to try and move from controlling to storytelling, here are some things that our money allowed us to do in 2024…

$1,500 to seal a cut on our 3-year-old’s forehead
Expensive for a dollop of Dermabond, but less so (as Jessica continues to remind me!) when viewed as peace of mind for 6 more days at the beach and freedom from regretting a scar

$1,900 to a handful of phenomenal babysitters
We were able to go on date nights and commit to church small groups while our kids played with a role model – said that way, it sounds like an investment more than an expense

$9,200 on two LASIK surgeries
A contact-free house and the chance to make up the cost in 6 to 8 years hasn’t disappointed yet – fortunately, this is a once-in-a-lifetime expense instead of an annual one

$5,500 to remove a couple generations of squirrels and birds from our attic
A bitter financial pill to swallow, but gone are concerns of gnawed electric wires and the scratching sounds in our ceiling 30 minutes before our alarm clock

$100 for insurance on an engagement ring and a pair of earrings
The peace of mind and lack of marital tension when one went down the drain was impossible to measure (it was eventually found!)

$1,200 for two tickets to the UNC-Duke game at the Dean Dome
“Richard’s Taylor Swift Concert” that was easier to rationalize (on the front end) with the help of a $500 Christmas gift from family and (on the back end) an electric performance by the Tar Heels

$4,500 at restaurants
The biggest month was $520, and the smallest $200 – but every month afforded connection with friends, connection as a couple, connection as a family, a little convenience, and the joy of feasting on good food we didn’t have to prepare

$500 for a summer pool membership
The cost per hour was low for an activity that anchors a summer day, teaches kids to swim, and deepens relationships for the entire family

$4,300 maintaining a 2018 Sienna and a 2022 RAV4
Over $2,000 came in November to cap off the Shore family year of deferred maintenance – not fun and easy to overlook the privilege of maintaining a car to prevent a breakdown

$6,500 for a week in Ireland
Without a doubt, the most “treat yourself”-style dollars we spent in 2024 and the agenda-less, email-less, kid-less exploration of a place we had never been made me hope we can do it again

And of course…

Some was fun, some was obligatory, and some made us want to throw up.

Some we hope repeats, and some we hope never happens again.

But more than anything - just listing them out - provides more peace of mind and perspective than judging, comparing, rationalizing, or grasping for arbitrary “budgets” could ever do.