Working To Pay It Forward

I've been going over my Christmas list again today, and I'm crossing my fingers I can meet my goal of buying everything before Dec 1. At the rate I'm going I don't see that happening though. I had a good chunk of cash saved up just for Christmas shopping, but it looks like I'm probably going to have to use that chunk of cash to keep us afloat over the next couple of weeks instead.

I had already budgeted in for a short week due to Thanksgiving. Hubby will be off Thursday and Friday, but I didn't budget in for all this rain/sleet/snow. It's only raining here, but up on the mountain where Hubby works it's started snowing. He's on his way home now, and if it continues to snow through the evening they won't get to work tomorrow. It doesn't matter if it snows on them during the day tomorrow. What matters is they won't be able to get to the job site at all in the morning to work because it's on top of a mountain in the middle of no where. The salt trucks don't hit those roads as they're not main roads in town.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Hopefully he'll be able to work, and I won't have to redo my budget to work around this. I know this is going to be a rough Christmas for everyone, but that's an even bigger reason I want to get my shopping done. I have friends and family members that will be scraping to get by with a measly Christmas thanks to the economy, and I'm going to do what I can to make sure they have at least a semi- decent Christmas.

Yeah, we still have debt that I'm paying off at an incredibly faster speed than I could ever imagine, but I'm not skimping on Christmas for anyone. I look at the fact that we're the couple who has finally gotten themselves on their feet. We don't have any kids, and we have the extra cash that a lot of people don't have. We're not rich by any means, but we get by nicely. We're no longer pinching pennies, and it's due in a big part to people who have helped us get by over the years when we were down.

It's time to pay it forward. Whether it's by buying a holiday dinner angel food box for a family that I know won't be able to afford dinner, or buying presents for a couple of kids who won't have much under their tree, I want to do something extra this year. I may just have to rearrange my plans instead of rushing to get it all done by December 1.