by Matt Fildes
Hello everyone and Happy Tuesday!
With a weekend between last week and me, I’m feeling a lot better than I was last Tuesday. I spent the whole weekend doing nothing but relaxing, playing video games and watching football. It definitely wasn’t the most productive use of my time, but greatly needed.
As for this weekend coming up, GF and I will be celebrating our 3rd year together! It’s crazy how time flies. It’s been a very, very blissful 3 years together and I cannot be more excited to celebrate with her. Two years ago, on our 1st anniversary, we celebrated by going to a small town that has quite a large ski resort. The ski resort is open yet, obviously, but the resort does have a golf course (now closed for the season) that has some amazing views of the mountain side and the fall foliage on it’s cart paths. We spent a few hours walking these paths before, and I’m excited to do it again this year. Afterwards we’ll stop at our favorite bar in the town for some food and drinks. Once we get back home, we plan on going apple picking and making apple sauce. Nothing fancy, but we are both really excited to enjoy the weekend together. And it shouldn’t cost more than the gas to get there, $30 for dinner and beer (it’s really cheap there) and $5 for apples. Very much worth it.
So…I would like to know: How do you celebrate your anniversary? Do you change it up every year, or do you do the same thing year after year, as way to reminisce? I’ve love to hear your stories.
As far as gifts are concerned, I don’t want to spoil anything here since GF reads this blog, too. I want to do a handmade gesture (like I did for my mom and dad) that shows her how much I appreciate her. I have a few ideas on how to accomplish this. I will share what I did and what I spent on next week’s post.
Here are my debt totals as of this morning:
| Loan Name | Interest Rate | Original Balance- May '09 | Current Balance | Total Paid Off | Paid Since Last Week |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sallie Mae 01 | 5.25 | $27,837.24 | $23,662.64 | $4,174.60 | $57.28 |
| Sallie Mae 02 | 4.75 | $22,197.02 | $18,556.32 | $3,640.70 | $47.72 |
| Sallie Mae 03 | 7.75 | $20,692.10 | $0.00 | $20,692.10 | $0.00 |
| Sallie Mae 04 | 5.75 | $10,350.18 | $2,631.67 | $7,718.51 | $264.11 |
| Sallie Mae 05 | 5.25 | $6,096.03 | $0.00 | $6,096.03 | $0.00 |
| Sallie Mae 06 and 07 | 4.75 | $6,415.09 | $0.00 | $6,415.09 | $0.00 |
| Sallie Mae- DOE 01 | 5.25 | $5,000.00 | $0.00 | $5,000.00 | $0.00 |
| Sallie Mae- DOE 02 | 5.25 | $3,000.00 | $0.00 | $3,000.00 | $0.00 |
| AES | 6.8 | $9,000.00 | $0.00 | $9,000.00 | $0.00 |
| TOTALS | $110,587.66 | $44,850.63 | $65,737.03 | $369.11 |
I hope everyone has a great week!
Happy Anniversary!
We’re in a slightly different situation because we have kids, but we try to spend a night (or 2 if we can swing it) away. Even if it’s just here in town, it’s not at home with all the trappings of daily life. This year we didn’t get away, but did go out to dinner and the kids spent the night with our babysitter.
2016 probably won’t be any better, as we already know we have weekend activities the weekend following the day (our daughter does cheerleading), but I’m sure we’ll still fit in a nice night out and the kids will go stay with their grandparents or babysitter.
That sounds very nice Mary. Good for you guy- I’m glad you still make time for each other.
Happy anniversary! No need to respond to this (especially since your GF reads), but I so, so, so want you to get engaged while you’re blogging here!!!! I would LOVE reading about all the ins and outs of engagement stuff, wedding planning, etc. on a budget! ; )
Our 5th wedding anniversary is coming up in November (but been together for 13 years overall). Before blogging here I’d had it in my mind that our 5th anniversary would be a big trip to Hawaii. It’s definitely on my bucket list and something I’ve always wanted to do. Of course, Hawaii is crazy-expensive and now that we’re planning a big trip next year (Cruise 2016 in April for my Mom’s 60th birthday), we’ve nixed any idea of a big anniversary trip for ourselves. That being said, my MIL is planning to come out to visit in November so we’ve been kicking around the idea of doing a one-night staycation – leaving the kids with MIL and spending one night away. Sleeping in is truly a luxury these days and without having family around to help with childcare its not something our budget can ever withstand (because babysitter overnight = $$$). Haven’t looked into prices for hotels, etc. yet, but I think that’s a nice splurgy-type anniversary without the giant price tag associated with a Hawaiian vacation.
I don’t want to disappoint anyone here, but I’ll be out of debt (ideally) prior to us getting engaged. For one, even though GF isn’t materialistic AT ALL, I still won’t be able to afford a ring until I am out of debt. Not even a crappy one. And GF is currently in a super tough program in grad school. Prior to her getting accepted into the program, the dean told her that she shouldn’t plan on having kids or getting married during her time in school because she will not have time. One year into it and what the dean said is certainly true. GF won’t graduate until 2017, so until then she’ll most likely remain GF.
We’ve done one night stays in B&B’s before and they’re AMAZING. They’re pretty cheap up here in the winter so we try to take advantage when we can. Good luck in your search!
We’re not the best examples since both my husband and I forgot our anniversary this year. We have been married 6 years as of Sept 17. We did go out to dinner the night before. Honestly we don’t really do anything big. A dinner out is about it.
Me and GF both LOL’d at your comment. I’m sure it won’t be long until I’m forgetting about ours too.
Congratulations!! We have been together 8years and always spend our anniversaries camping. There is something wonderful about unplugging and reconnecting. For gifts we already have too many possessions so we spend money on experiences or activities we can do together: scuba diving lessons, cooking classes, horseback riding, etc. Also I agree with Ashley on wanting the proposal and wedding on a budget posts 😉 but I respect that this is not reality tv and you aren’t here to entertain us
Wow camping sounds AWESOME! GF has been talking about doing that. The activities also sounds great! Maybe when I have money again, that will be our anniversary gift to ourselves. I’d love to take a cooking class, or even ballroom dancing lessons would be fantastic.
It’s funny – maybe as the years go by you just don’t pay as much attention to it (or we don’t) – we have been married 32 years and honestly, we don’t do anything. We don’t need anything, we certainly don’t need more “stuff”, and we go out to eat when we want now…..the main thing we DO make sure we do, is to tell each other “I love you”, and how much we mean to each other – that is plenty for us…but we are total homebodies too 🙂
That’s how we are too.
Awe, that’s amazing Sue. We make sure to do the same thing. We never leave the house or go to sleep without an “I love you”.
We actually have our 15th wedding anniversary this week (together 20 years) and we have absolutely nothing planned. We stopped giving each other gifts (any occasion) ages ago. It’s just redundant after a while. We do sometimes watch our wedding video or use it as a time to get away from the kids for a weekend. We do usually at least meet up for lunch, but this year we had a busy week and we are leaving for Hawaii in a few weeks anyway.
P.S. Your plans sound lovely!!
Lucky! Have fun in Hawaii!
Sometimes we do this for our anniversary or new years…it depends. But, we dump extra change into a jar for a year, then cash it in and that is our budget for a “secret date” that one of us plans and the other gets to go along for the ride! It’s really fun and creative, and the budget dictates what we do. We sometimes augment it with our normal entertainment budget and sometimes not. It’s a fun way to spice things up!
Great idea! I love the thought about using the change and one of you plan the date. You gave us something to think about for next year…:)