Y3W: Money is Tight

Money is Tight!

I will never understand why people don't talk about money, and if they do, they always feel the need to make it sound like they have more money than they really do. I might not even be talking about it either, except that I'm mostly writing this blog for Addie so she'll know what life was like for us when she was little and the truth is that money is tight right now.

When I first went on maternity leave, money was just fine. We had quite a bit in our savings account, we didn't really need much more for Addie and I ended up getting a lot more for maternity benefits than I expected. However, we suddenly became popular after we had Addison and all of a sudden our doing alright got stretched. Between showers, weddings, birthdays, stag and doe's and some other unexpected expenses, we quickly realized that we weren't keeping up with our original budget like we usually do (well we're usually pretty good at sticking to the budget anyway).

Then I took on my new job and for some reason that has ended up costing us more than I'm making (for now). I had to start my own business as an independent contractor, so there are start up costs there, and I thought that was it, however our lovely Canadian government has decided that working at all while on mat leave should be a huge pain in the ass. They stopped my mat benefits and although I went into the service canada office, then called twice and then made a report online to make sure they knew I was doing things legit, I still had to mail in a form outlining my business and stating that I do need to remain on mat leave. All this so I can continue to work 8 hours a week. They will decide by the end of September if I'm allowed to continue with benefits or not. Oh gee thanks... in the meantime we'll live off Ryan's salary and my new income.

VENT: Mat leave pays 55% of what you earned in the past year before you go on mat leave. I was told I was high risk while I was pregnant (thank God they were wrong about that) and needed to quit one of my jobs. Fine, anything for my baby. But... that means I am getting 55% of what I earned working mostly part-time for the past year. Why am I not allowed to supplement my family without consequences, and what does the government care when it's my money they're paying me? Totally perplexed as to why we can't all just have mat leave like England.

Anyway, we're okay. All our bills are paid, we have a roof over our heads, food in our bellies, we still have money in savings and we even have enough left over to still do some fun things. But money is tighter than it has been in a very long time, and we're both looking forward to when we're okay with me taking on more clients (which would mean being away from Addie more days and neither of us want that yet) and Ryan's Christmas bonus.

Maybe we'll win the lottery this week. That would be nice.