Gather Little by Little

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Mrs. Stew, the brood and I are on the road this week. In fact, by this time next week, I personally will have driven 3,500 miles in the previous ten days. I have doing a lot of thinking about frugal travel.

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On Wednesday, I posted a rant about how our culture sometimes makes the mistake of defining marriage in financial terms. We commit our lives emotionally, physically and spiritually, but we keep the finances separate – just in case things do not work out. I think that this undercuts the purpose and plan of marriage.

Let me discuss the topic further by using the example of Katrina who was so kind as to leave a comment on the article. She suggested that a prenuptial agreement:

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I read a lot these days about signing a pre-nuptial agreement with one’s future spouse or checking the credit report of a possible marriage partner. The character of your future spouse is a perfectly good thing to research, but a money can be a distraction from the purpose and heart of marriage.

I still have the possibly old-fashioned, but still biblical view that marriage is for life. The basic premise behind a pre-nuptial agreement is faulty, regardless of your net worth. I might even go so far as to advise a single person  reconsider the decision to marry a future spouse who even mentions the idea of a pre-nuptial agreement.

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I did not own my own car until my parents bought me a 1989 Nissan Sentra just before my junior year of college. The car needed some work, but once the engine was overhauled, it reliably hauled me all over. The car had over 100,000 miles when I became the owner and I don’t think that I put more than $1,000 into it in the five years that I had it.

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I recently purchased an item of furniture via Craigslist from a woman in a nearby town. In the course of our interaction, she stated that she was trying to get rid of furniture because she was moving to a smaller apartment. She stated that she was trying to “downsize”.

Last week, we gave some tips for shopping on Craigslist. Today, I would like to talk about the other side of the bargain – selling.

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Times are tight for many people these days. Many Americans have had to use and even exhaust their emergency funds without warning. There is a whole other group of people who never had an emergency fund in the first place. However you get there, being in a cash crunch without an emergency fund is a tough place to be.

Here are some options for dealing with a dire family cash flow problem:

Borrow from relatives

Money can be a sticky topic in family relationships. Something like this might take a whole lot of humility, furthermore there can be long-term consequences from family financial arrangements. However, if your need is genuine, you might have family who can help.

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Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure–pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return. Luke 6:38

Sometimes those of us who watch our pennies closely forget to practice this verse. Recently, I had a friend do a favor for me for which I was quite thankful. Afterward, when I was reflecting on his generosity, I was struck by a thought: Would I have done the same thing if the situation were reversed? I had to admit to myself that the honest answer was “no”! I am often the person who avoids getting involved with others, either by making excuses for why I cannot help someone in need or by immediately wondering, so, what’s in it for me?

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Mrs. Stew and I have used Craigslist a great deal over the past few years and I keep finding more and more reasons to return to the site. The Craiglist concept was invented almost before Al Gore invented the internet. The service was first an email distribution list between friends and then the idea became a website in 1999. I used to view Craigslist just as a free version of the online auction site, Ebay, however while it is true that the best thing about Craigslist is the fact that item listings are free, the site is much more than a place to buy and sell.

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The 2010 FIFA World Cup starts this Friday at 10 am MST. I plan to watch both of the first two matches . . . after that, we’ll see . . . I happened to be in Germany during the first weekend of games during the 2006 World Cup and although I was unable to attend any of the matches live, just being in the host country during the event was a great experience. I am a big soccer fan and I cannot wait for the tournament to start. Every single game fascinates me. My job has enough flexibility for me to watch most of the matches during the first two weeks. After that, I will be traveling quite a bit and will probably have to miss a few games.

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