Doing Dishes

Restaurants are nice. 

Enter, order and enjoy. Conversations flow when drinks are refilled. Dishes, cleanup and trash are someone else's problem. As long as there's money to pay the bill, dessert anyone? 

When money is tight, restaurants are still nice. Credit cards bridge the money gap. Enter, order and enjoy feel nicer when money is a problem: a little break; a little treat. 

Too many restaurants are nice at first. Credit card statements come long after someone else cleaned up.  Nice at first, but by the thirty-first of the month the bill is due.  When there's no money, credit cards stop working.  When credit cards have balances, restaurants can be an embarrassment.  Nicely, they ask, "Is another form of payment available?"  Conversations are harder when they're about what to do when the bill comes. 

When the bill comes, it's time to go home.  

Homes are nice.

Enter, relax and enjoy.  Home is a nice place for dinner when restaurants were nicer.  Debt makes home the only option for dinner.  Dishes, cleanup and trash are more overt at home.  Menu planning, grocery shopping, meal preparation and scheduling make dinner a big deal.  When it's over, busy family members have choices.

Dishes, trash and cleanup can be ignored: kind of like a restaurant.  Opting to repeatedly ignore chores creates a different kind of balance.  Odors attract vermin and unwashed dishes stack.  Use of paper plates or microwaveable dinners help but only so much.  

Another option is for one or two family members to hang back and take care of business.  Often the same person who planned, shopped and cooked dinner is the person cleaning up.  Resentment over the family's habit of full-bellied abdication can build.  

A third option might be for the family to to clean up together.  Many hands make light work and shared chores builds unity.  Busy schedules, homework and anything other than dishes, cleanup and trash can undermine option three.  A household's creativity can spawn alternative options.

Learning how to satisfy hunger together inoculates families from the sirens' song of fast food.  Poor planning and marketing have an inverse relationship.  Leaving home, without consideration of how meals on the go will work, leaves families vulnerable to advertisements.  A cooler full of snacks, finger food or microwave readiness decreases the likelihood of unplanned spending.  Each day a family resists on-the-go temptations is a savings victory.

No matter a family's size, there's often one person most concerned about the bills. Bill-payers see debt mounting before anyone else and may begin looking for solutions.   "Money fights are the number one cause of divorce," says Dave Ramsey, founder of Ramsey Solutions. When dinner rolls around again, zero planning means more restaurants. Travel sports, long days and short weekends leave little time for meal planning. Failing to plan is planning to fail. 

Friends shared the importance of weekends for meal planning.  A few tips that served the authors family might serve yours too:

1. Cook and Freeze: Pick a weekend to cook large quantities of meat, vegetable and starch.  For example, if spaghetti, meatballs and boiled veggies are the menu items, make a cauldron of each.  Use Tupperwear create individual meals and freeze.  Repeat with different menu items and alternately reheat in place of fast food during the week. 
2. Tit for Tat: Pack veggies in zip lock baggies and bring a favorite sugary / salty treat.  For each bag of veggies eaten, the child gets one of the sugary snacks.  Hunger is reduced and nutrition strengthened.
3. Water Bottles: Assign each family member a water bottle.  For meals on the go, make water the only option until tastier options can be enjoyed at home.  Increasing anticipation for a return home is the hope.
4. Picnic Basket: Social pressure to eat in the same drive-thru friends are enjoying is real.  Find a used picnic basket and plan a yummy alternative to fast food.

Ramsey Solutions prescribes Baby Steps for getting out of debt. Discovering the difference between restaurants and groceries is a game changer for some families. Eating every meal out of the household's kitchen takes planning.  Covenanting to visit a favorite restaurant to celebrate a milestone builds momentum.  Ramsey's Baby Steps set simple goals:

• Step 1: Save $1,000 for your starter emergency fund.
• Step 2: Pay off all debt (except the house) using the debt snowball.
• Step 3: Save 3–6 months of expenses in a fully funded emergency fund.
• Step 4: Invest 15% of your household income in retirement.
• Step 5: Save for your children’s college fund.
• Step 6: Pay off your home early.
• Step 7: Build wealth and give.

Releasing the pressure of eating only out of the kitchen can be therapeutic.  When the entire family looks forward to returning to restaurants, momentum builds.  Parents brainstorm; children contribute; budgeting and grocery shopping become team sports.  Dave Ramsey's radio show ends with a helpful reminder, "Ultimately there is only one way to financial peace and that's with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus."

May the Maker of the family strengthen your debt retirement and guilt-free enjoyment of restaurants.