We're Debt Free!!!

Neal and I are so excited and proud of ourselves! We've been reading the book The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey and today I mailed the final payoff for our last bit of debt (except the house)! We have been working hard and really been disciplining ourselves in the area of our finances. This past Christmas we did not use credit cards (like we had every other Christmas), we haven't gone shopping with credit cards in a very long time. We never were people who used credit cards often, but I'd get an urge to shop for new stuff/clothes every few months and just pull out the Visa. Neal did the same for hunting clothes/supplies. And even though it happened only 3-4 times a year, it sure did add up fast! I have to say that the thing that is helping us the most is Dave's budget plan and "envelope system" that we use each month with each paycheck. We now have a clothing envelope, a hair/makeup envelope, a vacation envelope, a food envelope, a gas envelope and so on, and we save up to buy/use this money for those things. And if we don't have the money, we don't buy it. We cut up 2 credit cards and kept one but put it in a safe place where we can only get to it in emercency situations. In the past, if we have gotten tax refund money, we've used it to do a major home project. Not this year though. ALL of our refund money went to help payoff this debt. Although there's plenty we could have done to our house this year, it's a great feeling not owing anyone money! And since we probably won't call in to Dave's radio show and shout it, I'll shout it hear in blog land: WWWWEEEEE'RRRRRREEEEEEE DDDEEEEEEBBBBTTTTT FFFFFRRRRREEEEEE!!!!!!