The school year hasn’t even begun yet but the teachers are starting to send out emails and reminders about upcoming events. The HS band is going on a trip to Chicago – naturally both skids want to go. Actually, both skids expect to go. There has never been any hint of doubt that they would. *cough*entitled*cough* Being the only financially responsible parent in this three-some, I started scanning the budget for future months looking for places to squeeze in the monthly payments for this trip.

Back in the day when DH and I first got married, he was paying BM in cash for everything. The bookkeeper in me put a stop to that and everything has been done with checks ever since for tracking purposes. Another thing I put a stop to? Handing over a wad of cash for school clothes every season. Instead of BM demanding a certain dollar amount, we started taking the kids shopping ourselves so that we could have more control over how our money was spent – plus it was nice to be able to help the kids pick stuff out and know what came from us.