DH and I are both engineers, so it wouldn’t be shocking if one or both kids end up on that path. 😂🤣

MPL, I think my penmanship expectations for his age are maybe skewed by how neat the handwriting is of our 7yo next door neighbor and 7yo niece (both girls, and both are about 11 months younger than C). I guess I should consider they’re (1) girls and (2) perfectionists (for sure in the case of the neighbor - her mom and I were just talking about that).

Hmmmm....I think it’s maybe a little bit of not knowing how to get started and also maybe the complete sentences. He loves to read, both fiction and nonfiction, so likes stories. He definitely has no interest in writing anything long.

On today’s writing assignment, he tried to tell me he was mostly done with these 3 sentences written down: “No writing. More reading. Extra recess.” I had him erase that and start over. I tried prompts (the instructions had some as well) like would kids change places, would you do something extra that everyone likes, would something funny happen, etc. He just tends to shut down and yell he can’t. I’ve offered to have him type it out first, but that gets rejected. We’ve tried talking out the story before he picks up a pencil, but if I can get him to half heartedly do it, he’ll usually then say that’s too much to write.

I haven’t noticed him struggling with the act of writing, though his handwriting definitely isn’t particularly neat. I’ll try to pay more attention to that when he’s writing with a pencil and paper.

Hugs, Bonny. Thinking about you.

I am so very sorry for your loss, molly. Thinking about you.

I might have passed you! We were in SD last week!

There was definitely not a lot of mask-wearing by locals in SD, which doesn’t help anything. We wore our masks, and a few corporate type places mandate them (ie all hotels in the Marriott family), but lots of independently owned restaurants (chain or not) did not have a mandate for their employees to wear masks.

Ditto the others - if you're going to consistently contribute more than $4k per year, I'd open a second account.  If not, and this is a 1-year anomaly, I wouldn't open another account.

If you are going to contribute $8k each, go you for front loading! That'll give you flexibility to back off contributions later, especially if private school for K-12 enters the picture.

I googled it and read a few different articles about it I found there - I can't remember which ones or I would link them for you.  I ended up setting ours up with Vanguard as I could do the entire process online and didn't have to mess with contributing and then calling anyone to have them roll it over.  But the short story is that we contribute to a traditional IRA, and then once the deposit clears, I roll it over to a Roth IRA. It usually takes a couple of days, and if I'm busy, the money might sit there for a day or two past that, but it's never been long enough to trigger any tax implications - the money is basically in a money market savings account within the traditional IRA, so it doesn't earn anything (if it did, I'd owe taxes on the gains when I rolled it over).  Then once the money is in the Roth IRA, I just invest it in the mutual funds I want that Vanguard offers.  

There is a weird thing that if you already have an existing IRA account (like from an old 401k that you rolled over, or whatever reason), there are some tax implications if you roll money from the traditional to the Roth.  We didn't have that, so it wasn't an issue for us and I don't remember all of the specifics around it.

Since I know several of us are Midwest-ish located, I wanted to throw out a road trip recommendation. Due to Covid, we ended up doing a road trip we otherwise would not have done (or at least done for at least a few more years). We drove from KC up through Omaha and South Dakota to Fargo, ND (made a stop in Omaha to see the Big Boy train engine - cool to see and easy to social distance). We spent the night in Fargo, then headed west across ND. We stopped for a couple of hours in Bismarck for the zoo/stretch legs, and the continued on to Theodore Roosevelt National Park. It was beautiful - I wish we had planned more than an afternoon there! We did a few small hikes and drove the loop - saw bison and deer and prairie dog towns. The landscape is like nothing else I’ve ever seen - seriously amazing. We spent the night in Dickinson, ND and drove south to SD the next day.

In SD we drove through and did some hiking in Spearfish Canyon (beautiful), Dinosaur Park in Rapid City, Custer State Park (tons of animals), Needles Highway (cool tunnel in Custer State Park), Mt Rushmore (mixed feelings about this since it is a sacred Lakota Sioux mountain that was stolen from them, but it was a sight to see - we got there shortly after sunrise so it was mostly empty), and the Mammoth Site. Wind Cave and Jewel Cave were both closed, or those also would have been on the list. For all of that, we stayed in Rapid City and everything was easy to get to.

We left Rapid City to head back east to Sioux Falls. We stopped at Wall Drug (I thought it was a lame tourist trap but so many people said we needed to stop so we did), then the Badlands National Park (gorgeous - wish we had more time there - so many animals - mountain sheep, bison, deer, prairie dogs), and then Corn Palace (touristy, but my kids thought it was cool and my mom used to live in Mitchell, SD eons ago and wanted to stop since she was with us), and then spent the night in Sioux Falls. Before leaving that area to drive home, we went to Falls Park to see the falls, and the Devil’s Gulch - this was a cool and unexpected stop (to me, at least - DH suggested it and while the hiking terrain was too difficult for my mom, the kids loved it).

So - all this to say, if you ever get a chance to visit Theodore Roosevelt National Park in ND - go! It’s one of the least visited parks and it was amazing.

Similarly, go to Spearfish Canyon, Custer State Park, and Badlands National Park in SD.

I generally hate road trips, and ended up loving (most of) this trip. And the things I struggled with were more due to Covid than the road trip (ie we’re not comfortable eating inside a restaurant so finding places to eat or getting food and bringing it back to the hotel was sometimes a struggle).

And pictures because this was so wordy.

M and me at Devil’s Gulch, and C at Theodore Roosevelt National Park

No danger of telling the family - that’s why I posted here, where it’s mostly anonymous. 😉

Never say never, but I don’t think either of us will end up unemployed soon. We work for the same company, and they did some layoffs in April, and neither of us were in danger. Part of the reason for the cash reserves are to cover a down payment if I’m offered an equity stake in our employer this year. We thought it might happen last year but the company put all promotions to the equity level on hold while they were in the midst of strategic planning. They are doing promotions to that level this year and I know my name is being submitted, so we’ll see.

The other part is DH and I are either too conservative with our money or too lazy to figure how/where we want to invest outside of 401ks and backdoor Roth IRAs. Probably a combo of both. I have a small amount in mutual funds from 15 years ago, but haven’t done anything since then. Now that we finally opened Roth IRAs a couple of years ago through Vanguard, I’ll probably look at some mutual fund taxable account investing after I learn if I need a down payment or not, and go from there.

I was checking our various account values and statments for my monthly net worth update, and realized we crossed the $2M threshold, which has been a stretch goal the last year+, so yay!


Here's my August snapshot:




Checking/Savings: $149k

House: $428k

Retirement: $1.417M

Brokerage: $4.5k

529s: $44k





Total NW: $2,042,447





The list above excludes our cars, which are worth around $30k combined, but I leave them out because we're unlikely to sell, and need them to get to/from work, kids schools, etc. in the land of suburbia.


For reference, DH is 43, I am 38, DS is 8, and DD is 4.  We live in the midwest, so no crazy living expenses, and DH and I are both engineers.

We got married in July 2010, but the oldest NW data I have is from August 2011. Our NW in August 2011 was $406,556 (retirement then was $224k so clearly growth and contributions there have been a major factor).

August Update:





Checking/Savings: $149k

House: $428k

Retirement: $1.417M

Brokerage: $4.5k

529s: $44k





Total NW: $2,042,447




As usual, the list above excludes our cars, which are worth around $30k combined, but I leave them out because we're unlikely to sell, and need them to get to/from work, kids schools, etc. in the land of suburbia.





We're up about 4% over July- our combined retirement accounts went up over $79k since last month.

We also hit $2M this month, which has been a stretch goal for the last couple of years, so yay!

Funny C story. We just started our road trip vacation today, and stopped briefly in Omaha to see the Big Boy train engine. After eating lunch in the car from the zoo parking lot, we somehow end up driving through downtown to get back on the highway. C is reading off building and business names and sees one called Eat the Worm. He asks what it is, and proceeds to learn about a dead work being at the bottom of a tequila bottle. Eeeeeeeewww, why would anyone want to eat a dead worm?!? A live work is bad enough but a dead one??

This kid HATES worms. I’m not sure why he’s so grossed out by them, but he is - DH touched him with one once (in the last 6 months) and he shrieked for probably 10 minutes. No need to worry about this kid liking tequila someday. 😂🤣. Of course that just means he’ll probably like bourbon or scotch.

I took my kids to the dentist last week, and DH and I each had our own dental appointments in the couple of weeks before that. C is easy - he’s fine, no issues, relaxed about it all. M, not so much. She did much better this time than last time, and actually let them take the X-rays, so that was a win. But then started crying when they went to put the vitamins on her teeth at the end - it’s literally like a kids watercolor paintbrush they use to put a clear liquid vitamin on her teeth, and that’s what cued the freak out (before they even started it). She’s also got a couple of cavities, so we have to go back next month. Due to the placement of one of them, they’re going to try a silver-fluoride treatment instead of drill/fill, so hopefully she’ll do okay (especially since she has to go back for a second treatment a few weeks after the first).