Family Archives - Traveling Wallet

21Sep 2017 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Our plan: The 21 day California to Michigan road trip

In case you didn't know this SoCal family is relocating to Michigan. To kick off our mini retirement The Roamers are heading off on a 21 day cross country road trip from California to Michigan. The count down says I only have 9 days and 11 hrs until this adventure starts. I get asked why move to Michigan? [caption id="attachment_1692" align="alignright" width="169"] Michigan. Family? Check! Snowy Fun? Check! Happiness? Check![/caption] In Short: Family and property. Mr. Roamer & Jr's dad are both from Michigan and most of their families are there too. Moving to Michigan means we can re-plug ourselves into the family. As for property, California is a very prohibitive market. While we could take on a massive loan to buy a home here. We are choosing not to.…

04Sep 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Our San Francisco Vacation and other July Expenditures

Family, Finance, Travel

July is long gone by now. School for my son has started and I am here playing catch up. My monthly expenses were previously reserved for email subscribers but with our up and coming 4 month mini retirement I wanted to share it here. Why? Since I am going to share how much this adventure costs us, you will need some baseline data to compare it against? Therefore, I will be including the July, August and September expenses here on the blog. (more…)

26Jun 2017 by The Roamer 4 Comments

Mini retirement update: Slowly moving forward

Family, Mini Retirement series

Hey there, if you’re new I am going to be publishing a monthly series where I document our journey to this years One Goal. The goal: to take a Mini Retirement. Take 4 months off of work to travel internationally to Ecuador and El Salvador and permanently move to a new state, Michigan. The launch date of this adventure is October 1, 2017. This is our first time going through the process of planning a mini retirement. By the end of this series I hope to have a tried and true checklist to go by for all our future mini retirements. Wish us luck and follow along on the journey. As of today the count down clock say 14 weeks and 4 days. May to do list: There are some rolled over…

24May 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Where have you been? Our travels so far

Family, Travel

Do you know everywhere you've been? I'd like to know. When I was around 5 years old, I flew out of the US to Ecuador where my father was born. I lived there for about 2 years in a house and went to school. Though I was young, the experience is etched in my mind. It's an important part of my identity and it ignited my desire to travel. As I grew up, I wanted to fly to El Salvador where my Mom was born. It would happen when I graduated high school, I told myself. Then it turned into after college and then it was just "some day". Someday I'll make that dream come true. Today is the day for that dream. (more…)

12Apr 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Mini Retirement Monthly Update: Passports? Yes, please!

Family, Mini Retirement series, Travel

Hey there, if you're new I am going to be publishing a monthly series where I document our journey to this years One Goal. The goal: to take a Mini Retirement where we take 4 months off of work to travel internationally and permanently move to a new state. The launch date of this adventure is October 1, 2017. This is our first time going through the process of planning a mini retirement. By the end of this series I hope to have a tried and true checklist to go by for all our future mini retirements. Wish us luck and follow along on the journey. This year all I really need to focus on is getting from here to that mini retirement. A major component of the mini retirement is…

03Mar 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

My one goal this year

Family, Mini Retirement series, Retirement, Travel

Yearly goals are a thing for me. They have been since I got pregnant with my son in college. I really do attribute my success in finishing school, after having a kid, to the focus that goal setting gives me. Back then I used to do it every semester, but now I set yearly goals. I have a tendency to over do it, but this year I am not. This year I have ONE goal. Usually I separate goals into categories: family, money, work, travel. Then I choose 3 or 4 or more for each category. ( If you don't believe me, check out my goals for 2015) This year just ONE. The goal: (more…)

31Oct 2016 by The Roamer No Comments

Our California Road Trip and 4 must see views

Family, Parenthood, Travel

Mr. Roamer made a beautiful desktop background of our recent California road trip. I look at it and remember. Oh yeah, I still haven't told you how it went. So today lets talk travel & family. If you haven't heard. We are moving to Michigan in about 1 year. This caused us to rethink our yearly vacations. We decided to cancel our Michigan trip, in favor of checking out California. It's funny how that works. We've lived here for over 5 years and have only seen a few places. Opting instead to fly out of the state during our time off. This year was different. (more…)

30Sep 2016 by The Roamer 4 Comments

The BIG NEWS, A big international trip.

Family, Travel

I want to travel. Not jump on a plane, gone for a week living in a hotel travel. I want sell-all-your-stuff don't know when I'll be back, kind of travel. Reading about nomadic families seeing the world makes my heart burst. Mouth water, tingly all over. But lets face it. Or I guess I should say not "lets" but "I". I need to face it... Mr. and I just have different temperaments. Along with different upbringings. Non-stop travel is a super hard sell. For more reasons then you can even imagine. But I am soooo excited to say that we might just be heading in that direction. Our family won't be packing it up to go (more…)

11Aug 2016 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Our California road trip: The plan

Family, Travel

As a young adult in college hearing about a family's need to take yearly vacations was odd. Hearing about yearly cruises or trips to Disney world didn't make me think of the middle class. The people who spoke this way were surely raised in an upper class life style. Growing up our family took some vacations but they were not a yearly occurrence and we weren't jetting off to far off places. Actually they were few and far between and mostly involved camping. As a full fledged adult I have to admit that I have bought into this yearly travel lifestyle. Through all our challenges, traveling has always remained in the forefront. Even as we tackled our student debt and then became debt free. Even after a lay off. We continue…

30Jun 2016 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Weekly Pain & Gain: Schools out for Summer

Family, Weekly Pain & Gain

It's official summer has started and the heat is on. We are practicing smart home cooling and so far we haven't had to use the air conditioner. But all is not well in the Roamer home and so we have some pains to discuss. (more…)

17Mar 2016 by The Roamer No Comments

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

Family, Parenthood, Savvy Spending

"Ireland, it's the one place on earth That heaven has kissed With melody, mirth, And meadow and mist."* Is St. Patrick's Day another hallmark holiday? (more…)

04Mar 2016 by The Roamer No Comments

Vacations, Where to stay?

Family, Travel

We like to go on vacation. In that sense we are just like the average american. But googling "average american vacation budget" tells me that the average american spends way more then we do on vacation. What's up with that? This post is part of my 30 day writing challenge. Each week I will be focusing on one topic. This week I have chosen to focus on travel. If travel is your thing don't forget to come back everyday until Monday when I choose my new topic for the week. There are lots of costs associated with travel the plane tickets, food, knickknacks, activities. Oh yeah and accommodations. Accommodations the big surprise (more…)

26Oct 2015 by The Roamer 1 Comment

Weekly Pain & Gain: Halloween and Dancing

Family, Savvy Spending, Special Occasions, Weekly Pain & Gain

This month is really one of my favorites. I really have lots of fun during Halloween. Pain October has had some un welcome surprises in the automotive department. Like I mentioned we are in the process of getting ready for a move and things have gotten a little harder thanks to car issues. Currently we are down to one vehicle and because of our imminent move this has caused a lot of issues. This automotive issue is being felt with time limitations and later will be felt with our wallet. However, the dollars are less of an inconvenience then the time constraints. Right now we are in serious need of flexibility but instead we are now more constrained. UGH! the timing couldn't be more off. It is frustrating and truly…

09Oct 2015 by The Roamer 2 Comments

A year off from work, Why? & How?

Counter Culture, Family, Finance, Parenthood

I have been wanting to take a year off from work for a very long time. As the year gets closer to its end I have a lot to contemplate. A young mother The whole idea started after giving birth to my son, he's 7 now. See I got pregnant while attending university and due to the situation I didn't even take my full 6 weeks off to recoup. I had deadlines and metrics to meet if I wasn't going to become another drop out statistic. There were plenty of breaks thanks to the academic school term and because of how close I live to campus I spent lots of time back home with my baby. But I still felt I was missing a lot. I remember telling my significant…

04Sep 2015 by The Roamer 6 Comments

Goals: 2nd Trimester Review 2015

401K, Family, Finance, Saving, Yearly Review Series

At some point this trimester I realized I needed to focus my efforts. It's not that it's impossible to work on multiple things at once. It was more the fact that I needed to do a lot of learning. See sometimes you have all the foundational knowledge to accomplish something you just need to take up the challenge to push yourself farther, harder. But that wasn't the case for a lot of what I was trying to do. I didn't have the background. So one task would split into several other smaller things that I needed to learn first. In essence my one goal might actually require me to jump 5 hurdles before even being able to address my goal. I knew that on some level. That was part of…

03Aug 2015 by The Roamer No Comments

Weekly Pain & Gain: Crazy crane lady

Family, Weekly Pain & Gain

That was almost me the crazy crane lady. Pain Last Monday I shared with you the unexpected turn of events with my Craigslist ad. People wanted to put in orders. Well that wasn't exactly what I had planned but I decided that yes I would venture into this world of pre-order items. It was for a wedding and I decided I would not gouge them for using the "W" word. But the Short lead time could not be ignored. Not only that there were lots of special requests and no time. After hearing the order request I ran a few number and determined that yes I could do that, but it would be tight. I was being optimistic. However, after 17 messages back and forth and still no solid commitment…

28May 2015 by The Roamer 3 Comments

Quarter 1 review of goals

Earning, Family, Finance, Saving, Travel

Actually I guess its not a quarterly review as much as a trimester review. Jan- April. So part of making goals public is that they help you with accountability right? Well things have not been going well on all fronts. I am just going to hit these all fast and hard... Is what I was going to say, but who am I kidding :) Starting from the top and working my way down. [caption id="attachment_1136" align="aligncenter" width="225"] Picture of the goals I carry around in my planner. The one in my planner is actually all marked up.[/caption] Spiritual Awareness Let see what we have on here?.. Attend 4 churches in a year( attend 4 times a month ) 1 2 3 4 Write in Journal, reflect 15 min what…

15May 2015 by The Roamer 6 Comments

Family Travel: Colorado 2015

Family, Savvy Spending, Travel

The months are flying by and I am keenly aware of the fact that summer will be upon us. Summer is usually filled with lots of travel and high sticker prices to match. We enjoy travel ourselves but this year our trips were schedule outside the summer window. We took a trip to Colorado and we plan to take a trip to Michigan in winter this year as well. Traveling efficiently is something I am becoming more keen on. It wasn't something I use to worry much about. I could sleep in the car, travel in a bus or drive all night when I was younger but as I am now in the trenches of parenthood and marriage my trips require I take other certain things into consideration. Still I…

15Apr 2015 by The Roamer 4 Comments

Biking with Kids: Our 1st Trip to School

Counter Culture, Family, Parenthood

We are on our way to Badassity. Monday we move on to a new challenge. Biking long distances with kids on a time constraint schedule with only one parent! The time part and the 1 parent here is the new piece. We spent time preparing for this trip by talking about it for a few weeks before hand and getting some of the logistical information. Like is there even a bike rack at the school?Answer. YES. [caption id="attachment_1050" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Minnie Roamer letting me know she is ready to ride her own bike.[/caption] So we woke up early got ready and set out. We rode the route we usually drive since it has a bike lane in some areas. The only adjustment we made was taking some different streets so…

31Mar 2015 by The Roamer 3 Comments

One More Year Syndrome

Earning, Family, Finance

I have given up writing beautiful prose.(don't laugh) Instead of just not ever publishing because of limited time I think I'm just going to start publishing my thoughts as they come. Some I think would be useful to my readers and other well they might just be good practice for me. (Besides it's not like I can't go back and delete the really bad ones) So here goes you have all been warned. Actually what I should have is a weekly wrap up like so many other bloggers have. But again then I wait because it's unfinished and never end up publishing because the moment has passed. So let's get started. I'm suffering from the one more year syndrome. But first let's take a step back. Life changes so fast.…

Category: Family