Some of our plans

As most people might know, Joe and I have been married almost 5 years. Some might think this is a long time to be married before starting a family, but I always knew I wanted to wait a few years before having kids; I wanted some time to just be us. I also thought we would know when the time was right to start having a family. Lots of people say that the time will never be right and that you should just do it, but I don't entirely agree with that. I think that planning is an integral part of starting a family. It's a big commitment because once you start there's no going back!

We starting thinking seriously about starting a family last year (2008). We decided that we wanted to try to get pregnant some time in 2009 and that meant we would need to make a plan and hopefully meet most of our goals before we become pregnant.

Here are few things on our goals list:

• Get out of debt (a good goal at any time in life)
• Have 3-6 months expenses in savings (or more!)
• Budget! Learn to live on one income.
• Buy as many baby items as we can while I'm still working.
• Get the house organized.

We hope to have as many of our goals completed by the summer time. If we are lucky enough to get them all completed, especially our financial goals, then we'll be able to focus on just baby stuff once I'm pregnant.

I think something that is really great is that Joe and I are on the same page. We came up with the plan together and we can discuss these things without fighting. It's also great that Joe is an active participant in planning for our family, although I get considerably more excited about cribs and car seats.