Yikes!
We’re approaching mid-August which means some of you start school on Monday.
It’s a bag of mixed emotions for moms as it means a return to schedules and routines. Order feels good. Anticipating managing it can feel stressful.
Next week we’ll round out our Grace in Family series on the topic of The Family Meeting. Do you do this or is this a new concept for you? It can be extremely helpful for setting expectations, stimulating motivation, improving communication, and holding each other accountable.
It also plays right into our next series…
In September, we’ll move into Grace in Productivity with an 8-week series on navigating those aforementioned schedules and routines.
This week, though, we’re looking at the benefits and how-tos of a family budget.
Do you have a family budget?
While there’s no one-size-fits-all system when it comes to managing money, in general, having some semblance of a plan typically yields less financial stress on a family.
I, for one, wish I’d learned more about budgeting in my youth… before I got all of those “free” t-shirts in college… You know the ones. They came with the “free” credit cards that led me to a mountain of debt in my twenties.
With that hard lesson ever coursing through my mind, we thought we’d add to today’s content some helpful resources on kids and money.
We’re taking a look at the pros and cons of allowances. What’s your stance? And how about chore-based debit cards for kids? We’re seriously considering it for our kids 😬. Have you tried it or given it any thought?
Finally is this idea of coordinating your family budget with the school year. It makes a lot of sense when you think about all of the expenses families incur in the fourth quarter between back-to-school and the winter holidays. Get ahead of it with a school-year-based family budget!
👇🏽 Access all of these resources, expert tips, insights and more in The List.👇🏽
The List: 15 Expert Resources for Moms (updated weekly!)
6 skimmable articles to offer perspective on this week’s topic, 8 informative and/or entertaining podcast episodes to make the chores fly by, and 1 insightful video to inspire you to move forward with grace.
📖 6 Skimmable Articles
🎗 Awareness 🏡 Home 🗂 Productivity 🥗 Wellness 🧗 Growth 👨👩👧👧 Family
The Family Budget
🏡 Are you ready to give your kids the green light for their own debit card?
“Between the math homework, pop quizzes and history lessons that just don’t stick, it’s easy to forget about some of the lifelong money lessons your kids have right in front of them at home.”
Read 5 important money lessons for kids of all ages from Greenlight
👨👩👧👦 Do you involve your kids in your family budget?
“The time and effort we invest in our kids now will pay off in their having a better understanding of how to manage money, avoid debt and save for their future.”
Read How To Involve Your Kids In Your Family Budget by Kevin Payne, Daphne Foreman
🗂 What’s your stance on allowances for kids?
“Earning an allowance is a good way for kids to learn about money and develop financial habits that can benefit them in adulthood.”
Read The Average Allowance for Kids by Rebecca Lake, Reviewed by Erika Rasure PhD
🎗 Is your money working for you?
“Many people simply spend their income without being intentional about it, she says, but you get to decide how to allocate that money so that it works for you.”
Read How to Create a Family Budget by Laura McMullen
🥗 How to help your kids avoid the money mistakes you made
“The bright side to these money mistakes is that I learned a lot. Given that I don’t like losing money or being financially strapped in general, I vowed to myself and my family to avoid these situations at all costs.”
Read 5 Ways to Promote Financial Wellness for Your Family by Andy Hill
🧗🏽♀️ Make learning about money fun!
“There are a lot of good reasons to teach your kids about money. For one, you don’t want your children repeating your own financial mistakes. Also, if you raise financially shrewd adults, chances are they won’t someday be asking you for money.”
Read Fun Ways to Teach Kids About Money by Geoff Williams
🎧 8 Podcast Episodes
KEY:
📰 Newsletter Topic
👸🏻 Society & Culture
💡 Ideas: Big and Small
🤰🏻 Motherhood
😎 Relax & Escape
🧗 Growth
👨👩👧👧 For the Family
⏭ Series
💣 explicit language
🌭 frank content
⚠️ sensitive topic
📰 “The Best Place to Start is With a Budget”
“Whether you’re paying down credit cards or saving for daily necessities during COVID-19, some simple budgeting tools can help.”
Listen to Life Kit | Budgeting Basics To Get You More Money (22 min)
👸🏻 “Do we have alcohol to thank for civilization?”
“The answer, according to “Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization,” is a resounding yes. Edward Slingerland, who’s a professor at the University of British Columbia and self-proclaimed “philosophical hedonist,” says that far from being an evolutionary fluke, our taste for alcohol is an evolutionary advantage — one that we’ve relied on for millennia to help us lead more social, creative, and pleasurable lives.”
Listen to The Next Big Idea | Drunk: Can Alcohol Make You More Creative, Sociable, and Attractive? (75 min)
💡 Dr. Jade helps us understand hormonal complexities… easily!
” Join Dr. Jade on this installment of the Next Level Human podcast as he elaborates on the physiology and roles played by female hormones, the prime fat loss hormones, and understanding hormonal complexities. “
Listen to Next Level Human with Dr. Jade Teta | The Science of Estrogen and Progesterone (40 min)
🤰🏻 “Tweens…what to do, and what definitely NOT to do”
“For today, we will be focusing on talks with tweens, and how to use the BRIEF B-R-I-E-F model to Begin peacefully, Relate to your child, Interview to collect information, Echo what you’re hearing and give Feedback to help middle schoolers thrive.”
Listen to How to Talk to Teens About Anything | How to Talk to Teens about Topics that Matter with Michelle Icard (52 min)
😎 Presenting… Stories Full of Pleasant Surprises
”From unexpected friends, to the Civil Rights Movement, and a love story over 60 years in the making.”
Listen to The Moth | Pleasant Surprises (51 min) 💣
🧗 “What does it actually mean to know your worth at work?”
“This week, we asked the queen of confidence (and of morning TV), Gayle King, how she found hers. She told us her self worth came from years of salary negotiations, building strong support systems, navigating setbacks, and dealing with tough bosses.”
Listen to 9 to 5ish with theSkimm | Gayle King On Knowing Your Worth (30 min)
👨👩👧👦 “Saving money can be tough — and even tougher to talk about!”
“So this week on the show we’re gonna get the conversation started and learn a few ways to think about spending and saving our money.”
Listen with your kids to Million Bazillion | Saving money is really hard to do (22 min)
⏭ “It’s a race against the clock for the remaining climbers”
“Unforeseen conditions have put the world’s strongest climbers to the test as they battle their way down the mountain. Before it’s over, the savage mountain will bring on more avalanches and below-zero temperatures. “
Listen with us to Against The Odds | K2: The Savage Mountain | The Final Descent | 3 (54 min)
🎬 Insightful Video
Are you smarter than a 5th grader?
“Carson Byblow is a 5th grade student who goes to the Anglo American School of Sofia in Bulgaria. He was born in Belgrade, Serbia but is from Canada. Funny thing is he has never lived in Canada but have visited many times. Carson loves to play football, basketball and hangout with his friends and family. He speaks a little of Bulgarian and is fluent in English. He wrote his talk about growth and fixed mindsets because he has struggled with it for his long life of ten years.”
Watch The Mindset of a Champion | Carson Byblow | TEDxYouth@AASSofia (6:48) from our series of TED talks by kids for kids.
That’s The List for this week!
Do you have go-to tips to for the family budget … or a take away from The List this week? Drop us a note in the comments.
As always, we hope our newsletter inspires you to get your ship together and get through your week with grace.
Have a good one and please reach out if we can be helpful to you in any way!
Love & Grace,
Rachel & Amanda
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🎧 Podcast Playlist 8/11/21