It's Almost Time... But Not Yet!

I'm hoping to make this post a battle cry of sorts. A lot of little and big things happened this past month that seem to have just drained all my energy away. 

• I've been sick for over 3 weeks now, going from a little annoying cold to really stupidly annoying cold and back, and I just about had enough of it.
• Winter is here, at least that's how it feels like from recent temperatures. Generally this wouldn't bother me one bit, because I like winter, but Japanese houses have close to no insulation, making being inside almost as cold as outside. And when the only respite one has is a hot shower, it can wear on you.
• Finally, there's been a lot of talk about our future plans, mostly in my head. This matters because I'm slipping into my version of senioritis; I'm so involved with the future that I just want to start with those plans RIGHT NOW.

So my point is, I have to try and psyche myself up for the work I have to do now. I know this feeling is temporary, but right now, it's a bit too much. So I'm going to try to write some positive statements about right now.

• I enjoy my job. Most of my schools are super nice. The couple that I don't really match with just need a change in perspective.
• I enjoy my time with my coworkers and my students. Most of my students like having me teach their class.
• I'm making a difference at work.
• I volunteered for things because they're fun to do. It's OK to do only as much volunteering as I want to.
• Problems in my personal life will sort themselves out sooner or later. Focusing on work is a way to let those problems rest, so that I can find new perspectives and solutions when I come back to them.
• Enjoy now, because now only lasts a moment, then it's gone forever.
• Focusing on the future will not solve today's problems and worries.
• Focusing on the distant future will not make the near future come any later.
• Just because I'm not being super productive doesn't mean I have to be a complete lazy bum. Work on finding a middle ground.
• But it's OK to be a lazy bum occasionally.
• It's OK to say no, and be selfish once in a while.
• Being able to work through selfish thoughts without acting on them is a good thing.
• There will be time for _____ later.
• Focus on priorities. Priorities are a good way to be more productive in less time, leaving more time to enjoy other things. 
• It's OK to feel negative emotions sometimes. The key is to work through them, then focus on the positive things.
• I will take a few minutes every day to appreciate just how lucky I am.

I know there are more things I could add to this list, but I can't think of any more at the moment. Now excuse me while I punch a few pillows in my head, and get out all the things that bring me down currently.

Tomorrow is a new day, but I'll enjoy today in the mean time.




Random last minute question:
Why do I always run to the future when I don't want to deal with the present?

Financial Steps

It's been 7 weeks since my previous post about finance, and I'm making good progress on reading the books from my list. So far I have finished The Millionaire Next Door, read "Part I" of The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing, and am in the process of reading Your Money or Your Life. Though I have yet to finish these last two books, I wanted to write a little bit about what I've learned so far about money and finance.

The Millionaire Next Door 

by Thomas J. Stanley, Ph.D. and William D. Danko, Ph.D.

This is the first book that I read after finishing up I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi. I chose to read this book for two reasons. The first reason was simply because it was available on Audible. The second reason was because I figured I should know where we (as a family) want to go, before trying to figure out more specific steps on how to get there. Does this make sense? It's the same as when someone goes on vacation... we generally pick our destination first, then we buy the ticket to get there. 

While it's not our goal to become millionaires in the way most people think about being millionaires, I wanted to find out the secrets of the people who are millionaires, to see if I could learn something from them. This book came highly recommended on many personal finance blogs, and I could see why.

The authors of this book interviewed millionaires of the U.S., that is U.S. households with net-worths exceeding one million dollars, to see what their habits were when it came to money. This was the first time I heard about the importance of net-worth, as opposed to the amount of money one has. Basically what this means is that it's not just how much someone makes, but how much they have to show for that income over time. The authors divided the millionaires of the U.S. into three categories: Under Accumulators of Wealth (UAW), Average Accumulators of Wealth (AAW), and Prodigious Accumulators of Wealth (PAW). While all the households in the three groups are technically considered to be millionaires, the main difference is that the UAWs tend to live like millionaires in the traditional sense (fancy cars, a big house, private education for the children, etc), but don't have enough money to keep up their lifestyle without their income for more than a few months or so. PAWs on the other hand look more like average Joes, but they have enough wealth to sustain their lifestyles for a decade or two or longer, even if they don't make another cent for the rest of their lives. The best way to become a PAW is to have not just a high income (good financial offense), but to be mindful of where one's money goes and being frugal (good financial defense).

I always knew it was important to save money, but this book really brought it home, just how much it costs to look wealthy. Most UAWs are UAWs mainly because they try to live up to the traditional idea of what it means to be rich. Before reading this book, I thought being rich meant being able to send our kids to a private school, and living in a big house in a nice neighborhood. Now I know that just because we have the money to do so, doing things that "wealthy" people do, is not necessarily the wisest of ideas. Having a low level of consumerism, being frugal, and not trying to look rich are all things that PAWs do. PAWs in general spend much less on any given item, than UAWs, be it a car or a watch or a nice suit. They also know exactly how much they spend for major categories, like food or clothing, in a year, while UAWs generally have no idea. Most PAWs are financially literate, while UAWs hire financial consultants. And the list goes on.

What I've learned from this book:

Being rich means having enough money to support ourselves and our lifestyle for years, even if we have no jobs. The longer we can do this, the richer we are.

The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing

by Taylor Larimore, Mel Lindauer, Michael LeBoeuf, and John C. Bogle 

Now that I've learned about what it meant to be financially independent, I wanted to learn about how to get there. We've been fortunate to have pretty good financial offense with my job as an ALT, and we've been saving up ever since we moved to Japan, but I didn't want to squander away our savings, or let it lose value by letting our money take a vacation in a saving account. I also became a bit nervous about my own retirement fund, which is currently nonexistent. I wanted to put our savings to a good and productive use, to get us closer to being financially independent.

I bought The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing for my Nook, because currently there isn't an audio version for it, but it was labeled as THE book to read for anyone who wanted to be financially independent. I don't have a lot of actual reading time, so I didn't expect to read it as fast as I did, but it's been a good book so far. True, I've only read PART I (which is about 2/3 of the book), but that's because PART II deals with keeping up with the strategies that were suggested back in PART I, which I have not yet implemented. This is also the book where I learned about the steps needed before we start investing our money. These steps are:

• Having no debts (check)
• Having at least 6 months worth of living expenses saved in the bank (in progress, but more or less check)
• Maxed out contributions to 401K/Roth IRA (as we're living abroad, we can't really contribute)
• Still have money left over.

Bogleheads follow the advice of Jack Bogle, founder of Vanguard, and believe in slow and steady investing, while steering clear of get-rich-quick schemes. This book is great because it explains all the different ways someone could invest their money with short and precise explanations, including pros and cons. The advice in this book is concrete and no-nonsense. One of the most interesting things that I've read about were the different ways we can save for our child(ren)'s college education. So far the only college fund I've heard of was the 529 Qualified Tuition Plan (QTP) that most people know about. But have you heard of the Coverdell Education Savings Account (ESA)? It's pretty amazing, with the only drawback of having a low contribution limit per year, at $2000. However, who said we can't have both? Actually, that's one of the advices of the authors: invest in the ESA first to the max, then if we still have money left over for college education, then contribute to a 529.

What I've learned from this book:

Besides the meaning of bonds, mutual funds, and other investing terms, the biggest lesson I took away from this book was slow and steady wins the race. 

Your Money or Your Life

by Vicki Robin, Joe Dominguez, and Monique Tilford

By the time I finished PART I of The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing, it became clear to me that while it's good to know specific steps about investing, I needed to learn more about what money was, and what part it took in our lives, so that I can handle it better. I wanted to learn more about defense strategies when it came to our finance. So I bought Your Money or Your Life on my Nook, again because there isn't an audio version available currently.

This book is not a personal finance book in the traditional sense. It's much more than that. It's more like a philosophy. It gives a completely different meaning to money, a new definition, if you like. In some places the book feels a little new age-y, but it definitely makes you think. The book doesn't talk about how to invest money, instead it shows the importance of living simply, being frugal, and questions every purchase, as well as the meaning of work itself. It's a journey to find out what is "enough" and to figure out how to get there. Having less than "enough" is the place where a person's needs are not yet met, while going beyond "enough" is unnecessary consumption, leading to feeling always unsatisfied and perpetually poor, no matter what the person possesses or how much one earns.

I'm only up to Step 7 out of the 9, but already I asked my husband to give this book a read. I'm hoping that during the time between Christmas and New Years we can talk about the steps this book presents, and implement them in the coming year. Some of the steps are not new to me, some I've even tried in the past. But now, I'd like to give it a try from Step 1 all the way to 9, and make it the first big step toward financial intelligence being second nature.

What I've learned from this book:

Being financially intelligent and independent doesn't only mean investing in the right things. It starts in the home, by knowing exactly what we do for- and with our money, so that we are as close to "enough" as we can possibly be, by living simply and frugally with consciousness.

*****

Overall, I learned that there's is a lot more to being financially intelligent and independent than I originally thought. While in my first financial post the books I chose focused primarily on how to invest money, now I realize that investing is only a small part of the big picture. So I'm making a new list of books to read, in the order I'm hoping to read them. I also included in parenthesis where I'm going to get the book, and the category I sorted the book into. Enjoy!

1. America’s Cheapest Family by Steve and Annette Economides (from Audible; simple living)
   I definitely think my next book should be about simple living, and the reason this book is on the top of my list out the four simple living books, is because it's finally available on Audible.
2. Born to Buy by Juliet Schor (book from Amazon; consumerism)
   This book was pretty hard to buy in Japan. I can't wait to read it though! It's about how consumerism affects children. The book is based on tons of research, and came highly recommended.
3. The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Daczyzyn (book from Amazon; simple living)
   This book is the bible of simple living. Originally started as a newsletter, now it's a gigantic book full of tips and tricks on how to live frugally.
4. The Four Pillars of Investing: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio by William Bernstein (from Audible; investing)
   As I understand, if The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing is the beginner course in investing, this is the intermediate course.
5. Smart Couples Finish Rich by David Bach (book from Amazon; personal finance)
   One of the personal finance bloggers said that everyone should read one book, and only one, from David Bach. This book deals with the only thing that I haven't came across yet: dealing with finance as a couple.
6. Miserly Moms by Jonni McCoy (ebook on Nook; simple living)
   This is another book about simple living, which focuses on stay-at-home moms. Since I'm hoping to stay at home after my job in Japan is done, I thought it would be appropriate to read. My hope is that even if it doesn't contain any new information after reading the other simple living books on the list, it puts it a new perspective for me.
7. Enough by John C. Bogle (from Audible; personal finance)
   A book about the elusive "enough" from the founder of Vanguard. Need I say more?
8. The Only Investment Guide You’ll Ever Need by Andrew Tobias (ebook on Nook; investing)
   From what I understand, this book could be considered my advanced level course in personal finance.
9. The Little Book of Common Sense Investing by John C. Bogle (from Audible; investing)
   Just another perspective on the same topic, again highly recommended by people who are into personal finance.
10. The Joy of Simple Living by Jeff Davidson (book from Amazon; simple living)
    I'm not sure if I'll need to read this by the time I get to it, but it could be a good way to refresh the information I've read so far.
11. The Power of Passive Investing: More Wealth with Less Work by Richard A. Ferri (from Audible)
12. Lifecycle Investing: A New, Safe, and Audacious Way to Improve the Performance of Your Retirement Portfolio by Ian Ayres and Barry Nalebuff (from Audible)
    These last two books were books I found on Audible that seemed interesting, but have not been mentioned in other personal finance blogs. I'll decide whether or not I'll (need to) read them once I get to them.

Mommy Time and Daddy Time

Since Rini has turned one, both James and I have tried our best to connect with our daughter more, to have some special times with her, basically having "Mommy Time" and "Daddy Time." Because I leave for work before Rini wakes up, and don't get home until dinner time, these "Mommy Times" are extra special to me. 

Weekday Mommy Time:

Sometime in July, I decided to take Rini to a local sento, or public bath house, called Yurara. It's about 5 minutes from our house by bicycle, which makes it really convenient. Every week, generally on Wednesday nights after dinner, Rini and I bike over and spend a relaxing hour and a half to two hours in various hot baths. On an average day/night, it costs 400yen for an adult, and 70yen for a child Rini's age, but there are many specials. For example, it's possible to buy 11 tickets for the price of 10, or there are special days when the price is halved, or when Yurara gives 3 points to the member's point card, making it that much faster to get more discounts.
Once I pay and get our key, Rini and I go into the locker room to undress.  I usually leave our towels just outside the bathing area, and take our soaps and sponges in. As we step into the bathing area, right in front of the door, there's a huge "sink" (not pictured here) where people use some small hand buckets to kind of rinse themselves off a bit. So once we've done so, we head over to the shower area. The shower area is made up of rows of seats with shower heads coming from the wall and a mirror at each spot, in front of which people sit and bathe. There are two types of showers: the one that can be seen in this picture has one faucet for hot water and one for cold, and people generally put their little bathing bowl (stacked neatly on the sides in the picture) under it to mix the water temperature as they see fit; and the other ones which have a regular shower head and cord coming from the wall, as well as a main faucet to use for the buckets. I generally prefer this second option, because it makes it easier for me to shower Rini off faster.
Once we're done showering and washing our hair, we head for our favorite bath. Here Rini walks around the little seating ledge, where the water covers half her body, while I soak and follow her in the middle. The middle area is pretty deep; when I kneel down, the water is up to my armpits roughly, so it's really nice and relaxing to float in. The water temperature is not too hot either, around 40C/104F. Lately, I've been trying to get Rini to be more comfortable in the water by jumping into my hands, so I could "swim" her around to another ledge. She cannot quite jump yet, more just steps into my hands, but we have a ton of fun nonetheless.
After we spent a good half hour here, I try to steer us to the water massage seats to the left. This is the same temperature water, and even at the deepest point, the water is only up to Rini's armpit, if even.  She doesn't like being in such deep water on her "own" yet, so generally she just walks all over me and the seat ledge, while water jets massage my back and feet.
After about 5 minutes, we head over either to this little wooden edge pool to "cool" off, or head outside. The temperature at this pool changes according to the season; during the summer it's really cold, but during winter it's around 41-42C/106-108F. Rini just likes to walk along the edge, as I sit on the edge myself and soak my feet. We generally don't stay too long, because Rini likes to go to the open air bath. The water here is about 41C/106F, and shallow enough to reach only my armpits when I sit in the middle, and up to Rini's chest as she walks around. The walls and floor of this bath are made up of these big stones, so it's a nice challenge for Rini to practice her balance as she walks around. Also, sometimes she likes to play with the little stones around the edge of the pool, so we both have fun.
There are two more pools in Yurara, which we don't really use. One of them is a scented bath, where the scent is changed once a week, and the other is a really deep "cool" bath (about 39C/102F), with some more jet streams.
Once we're done, we get dressed, go home, brush our teeth, and sleeeeep. It's a really nice way to relax.

Weekday Daddy Time:
Something James started doing with Rini on Thursdays is going to a play group specifically for 1-year-olds. The play group is from 10A.M. to 11:30A.M., where the first hour or so is just the kids playing with each other. Then, in the last 20 minutes, the parents sing songs with their children. I was able to go one time back in August and the play group was really fun.
Every week, I hear stories of how much fun Rini had at this group, all the little things she enjoyed playing with, and how she is developing.
I can't really write anything more about this, as it's James's territory. Maybe one day, he will write a post on his own blog. Until then, here is a little video I took back in August:

Mommy and Daddy Time Alone:

While we both enjoy our  alone time with Rini, sometimes James and I need to spend some time being just the two of us. For this reason, I asked a friend to help us find a babysitter service here in Fukuyama. Through her we made a connection with a Family Help Center, who connected us with an older lady, who used to be a nursery or kindergarten teacher. The lady is really nice, and Rini spent a few hours with her 2-3 times already. Luckily, Rini really likes her, and they have a good time together. They sing songs, go to the park, and other fun things. The hourly rate is pretty good too, and I hope we'll be able to set something up, where she could watch Rini for 3-4 hours every other week in the future.

Time just flies by... 19 and 20 Months

Mommy!!! Stop giving me funny hair-dos! ...
OK... They are fun after all. You can continue.

This blog post has been in the works for almost two months at this point, due to lack of time to sit down and focus on this. Rini's height and weight are as of October 15th-ish, but will add November's stats (in parenthesis) this weekend. The further down the blog goes, the more recent the entries are, with updates in Italic to reflect recent development in earlier writing.

Height: 82 cm (82 cm)

Weight: 10.15 kg (10.5 kg)

Vaccinations: Rini received her booster Polio shot just today (Nov. 11th), and boy, was it an interesting experience! As soon as we stepped into the doctor's room and Rini saw all the nurses in their pink outfits, she turned around in my arms, started crying and clawing the air towards her dad behind me. We could not calm her down, but at least the shot was over quickly, and she didn't become a puddle of tantrums on the floor. I'm wondering if her strong reaction against doctors and nurses has anything to do with the fact that the only time she's really been to the doctor was when she needed her shots. I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case, but at least now she's done for quite some time. We also decided not to get her the flu shot after all, as she's been a really healthy child, almost exceptionally so, and instead we'll just be a bit more vigilant of fevers and coughs this winter season. So if all goes well, Rini will not need to get another shot while we're in Japan.

BAAALLS!!!... Yes, they're that much fun! (^_^)

Clothing size: Still 80 cm, but just barely. I think any clothes we buy for her from this point on will be 90cm.

Shoe size: 12.5 cm

Diaper size: L; we switched up shortly after my last post, because we ran out of mediums. Thinking about switching up to L on FuzzyBunz, too, since she's starting to show a bit of her bum in the medium ones.

Teeth: This past month she's been busy growing her canines. I can feel all four of them just under the gum line, and see one (TL3) pretty clearly, too. Any day now they will start braking through the surface. Note: TL3 popped out on October 25th, and BR3 on October 29th, with next one probably being BL3.

Food: Nothing really new to report, except her amazing love for tangerines. She eats at least two at every sitting, and if she sees it on top of our fridge, doesn't matter what time of day it is, she wants some, and wants them now. I'm glad, since tangerines are chock full of vitamin C, so hopefully it will help keep colds away this winter season. Update on November 11th: She still really likes them, but now we think it's more of a fascination with peeling them, than the irresistible urge to consume them, as she often keeps peeling more after she had enough, which we end up eating instead of her.

Getting ready for Halloween maybe?

Nursing: It seems to me, that she's been nursing more later than earlier, as in closer to 5AM than 2AM. Not every night, but it is happening slowly. I'm kind of hoping this means that she might wean herself off. (I know, I know... dream on...)

Sleeping: For a few weeks now, Rini has been waking up sometime between 6:30 to 7AM, unless she fell asleep late the night before. I don't know if this has to do with the fact that she's been more consistent in napping for an hour to hour and a half around mid-day, or that she wants to make sure she still finds me home in the morning before I go to work. Maybe it's a little bit of both. The main result of this early waking is that I have almost no time to blog. I generally try to blog on Saturdays (even if it doesn't get posted until later), while she is asleep. I used to have an hour or two for this every week, depending on how early I got up. Now, however, I'm lucky to have 30 minutes or so.

Milestones: She's getting faster every day. Though not quite running yet, she will be before Christmas for sure. A few days before Halloween, she learned how to peel a tangerine, and since then, she doesn't allow us to do it anymore. She is also much better at handling her utensils and food, so much so, that she rarely makes a mess on the floor.

On a side note, I finally (around Halloween) got her to "jump" into my hands when we're at Yurara, the public bath house near us. That is, from the shallow water, she "jumps" into deep water where I catch her before she goes under. This is a pretty big step, because the past 6 months or so, she was quite fearful of being in the water. She also lets me "swim" her around a little... very little, but still much more than before. 

Further Update (Nov. 11th): She's been practicing jumping up from the floor. Her feet don't quite leave the floor yet, though, but what matters is that she is trying!

Laughing with Daddy!

Potty training: This is a new section, which I'm starting because we began discussing potty training at home. We have not started yet, as she is too young, but we've been keeping an eye out for signs of readiness. Some things, like saying the words for pooping when we catch her in the act, or saying "stinky" if it's a particularly odor-full diaper we're changing her out of, have been going on for some time now. She even says the word stinky and uses the hand gesture when it's appropriate, usually during diaper change. But lately, I started showing her what's going on while I'm on the toilet, and she finds it rather fascinating. She's been following me to the bathroom for months now, so doing this little extra step was not a big deal. I think she might have learned the word for pee in Hungarian (pisi) in the past few days (from Nov. 11th), but I'm still testing this theory. Overall, we're thinking of getting her one of those child seats that go over the regular toilet soon, just so she can try it out once in a while, if she's interested, but we won't start anything "serious" until Christmas break.

Words: During the last week of October, she has learned the words "no" and "nem," both meaning the same thing, just one is English and the other is Hungarian. Though she prefers using "no" over "nem" in general, when it's just me and her, she does say the Hungarian word a little bit more. She also mimics a lot of new words, but they're so rare and fleeting, that I'm not sure if they're quite set and can be considered learned, yet. Anyways, I'm sure they will come soon, as she is quite the chatterbox.

Wearing great-grandma's
dress for the first time.

Favorite toys: Same as last time, but add cards to it. She looooves playing with cards. We have a set of plastic playing cards that have pictures of common words on them, and the words in Japanese and English, which I bought in the 100yen shop. I use these to try and teach her words as we play with them. Not sure how much good it does, but hey, I'd rather try than not.

Likes: She really likes cereal in the morning, and oatmeal, too. Also, she loves copying whatever we do or say. It's funny watching her wipe her nose with a tissue, just because one of us just did it a moment before. She also wants to eat and drink what we're eating and drinking, using the same style utensils and cups. So, sometimes when we're drinking soda during dinner, we trick her by using the same cup, and giving her water in it. Of course, the cups we use for soda are not see-through, so generally she's none the wiser.

Dislikes: I don't know if she has any new set dislikes, but she's definitely more capable of telling us when she doesn't want something right at the moment. I did notice lately that she hasn't been quite as eager to wash herself when we shower together, like she used to.

Mommy/Rini update: I've been noticing this the past couple months, but last week have confirmed it, that I've been gaining weight again. I'm up to 64kg, which is not bad, but I rather not go beyond. For this reason, I've been thinking of what I could do to keep my weight at this level. One thing that came to mind was, I need to eat a more balanced breakfast. I mainly eat cereal with milk, and bread for breakfast every day, and that's probably not the best. I need more fruits and vegetables in my diet, smoothies and salads. Also, maybe I should bring some fruit/veggie snacks to school, so that I won't want to eat so fast and so much during lunch time. School lunch is generally pretty healthy and balanced, but I get served a lot of rice, that I probably don't need. Also, a little veggie snack shortly before I leave school would maybe help me not get nauseous during my bus ride home, which in turn makes me want to eat a buffalo, when I get home finally. So, in general, less bread and more fruits and veggies from now on is what I'm going to do. I don't really eat sweets and fatty things, so that should be alright. I've considered working out again at home, but with Rini waking up so early, it's almost impossible to keep it up on a regular basis, and I need the routine.
On a different note, as the weeks pass by, I have a stronger and stronger yearning to stay home with Rini. I still like my job, but I'm anxious to spend more time with her, while she is my only little girl. I probably mentioned somewhere before that depending on things, we would not be opposed to having another little one as early as sometime the end of next year. This also means, that there's a high possibility of me being pregnant before I say goodbye to this job. Learning to be a stay-at-home-mom, while being pregnant is a little scary to me, though not enough to make me wait. I know I'll be able to do it, I just want to make sure I give as much attention to Rini as I possibly can, before I have to focus on our new baby.

Enjoying one of the last warm November days.