Time With Children is Fleeting, Learn How to Make it Count!

• Time with kids is limited (00:30)
• Bucket lists (03:27)
• Discussions with your spouse (06:43)

Quote for the episode: "What are the things that I want to do with my kids before they go off to college- before they start making their own path and their own decisions?”

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Welcome to the Enjoy More 30s: Family Finance

podcast, the only podcast dedicated to making life more

enjoyable for young families by hitting on the financial topics

that tend to weigh on us, stress us out and distract our focus

from simply enjoying life.

Hello, and welcome to the Enjoy More 30s: Family Finance

podcast. Today is the fifth overall episode in our initial

series, "Your Money Mindset", and it's titled "18 Summers With

Kids". So what we're going to cover today is what you need to

know about the relatively short time we have with our kids, and

what you can do to make sure you're getting the most out of

it. I don't know if you've ever come across a poem before that's

called "The Last Time" poem. If you're wanting to think about

your kids growing up too fast, and just flat out crying, it's a

it's a really great one. It speaks to how whether it's

putting our child to bed, or washing their face, or reading

them a bedtime story, there's always going to be a last time

we're going to get to do it. And the thing is, we won't ever know

when that last time is. You know, our kids aren't going to

say, "Hey Mom, tomorrow's gonna be the last time I want you to

read me a bedtime story." You're just gonna walk in and try to

read them a story, and they're not gonna want it. And I

remember when I told my mom I didn't want her to sing me

bedtime songs anymore, you know, because I was too old and mature

at probably the age of seven or something like that. And now I

sing those same songs to my children, and the thought of my

daughter doing that to me, now, is pretty crushing. I know, it's

gonna come at some point, and that means that she's growing up

and doing everything that she needs to do. However, whenever

it does happen, it's going to be something that I really miss,

and I'll wish that I could have savored the last time that I got

to do that a little bit more.

So, what do you need to know? I'm an advisor, as you know, and

my job is supposed to just get people to, you know, save money,

right? And that's not really how I look at it, as you should

probably see by this point in the series. It's about having

you be able to spend as much time enjoying life and making

life as enjoyable as it is to you, however you may define

that. And that's really what my job is. All these investments,

insurance and everything else- these are just the tools that I

have at my disposal to try to help everybody do that.

When it comes to our children, if you think about it, we only

really have 18 summers with them. After that they're off at

college, they're maybe working during the summers, things of

that nature, so we have a relatively limited time. My

daughter is four right now, so I already am four of my 18 summers

in; doesn't feel like that- it's gone really, really quickly. And

I want to make sure that I'm planning vacations and all that

stuff, and that's why the previous episodes are so vital.

If I know what track I'm on, and I know what I have to do to

protect it, I don't have to waste any mental energy on any

of those previous unknowns. And now I know how much extra that I

have for living.

So what you can do. What I would recommend is making your 18

summers bucket list. Now, we've probably all heard of bucket

lists before and they're generally, you know, "before you

die I want to do..." and that may be you know, skydiving or a

trip to Hawaii or whatever it might be. However, that bucket

list kind of approach can actually be pretty helpful for

us today. What are the things that I want to do with my kids

before they go off to college, before they start making their

own path and their own decisions? Maybe it's a pool,

like we said, vacations, etc. You know, if we set a list, then

we have a much better chance of actually achieving it. And the

timeframe there, you know, a kid at one is different than a kid

that's at 18 or 19. And so if you have multiple kids, how

those time frames overlap, can give you an idea of, you know,

how much of a window do I have to do that hiking trip, or that

trip to Disney before they feel like they're too old for it or

anything like that. As you probably can tell, I'm a big

Disney fan and so Disney's kind of always on Lauren and I's

list. But whatever that is, if you have a conversation with

your spouse, and you go through kind of what are the things that

when I'm, you know, older and my kids are grown up, what are the

things that I'm going to look back on and say like "wow, that

was really fantastic- that was a really, really fun time, a fun

event." I can give you a personal example of something

that kind of came about this last year in 2020. With

everything everybody was going through, we couldn't have our

normal large get together. We usually go to my side and see 50

people, we go to Lauren's side and see another 50 people- and

we weren't able to do that this year. And what we decided to do

instead, is we rented out an Airbnb up in New York State. It

was this beautiful, beautiful home that was restored, an old

farmhouse; tall ceilings, and very, very unique house. And it

had enough bedrooms for our family, and then my mother and

Lauren's parents, to kind of all stay. And we had a Thanksgiving

that was kind of an overnight Thanksgiving stay. And it was

really, really great and really special. And with the kids so

young, they were really excited to see their grandparents there,

and it was fantastic. It's something that we really think

we will always remember- us and our parents, and even the kids.

And that's the kind of thing to be thinking about. How can we

make memories like that, in the right time where the kids fit

that kind of an activity? If my kids were 16 and 18, they may

not get as much of a kick out of, "Hey, you know, we're having

a giant sleepover with our grandparents." So it was pretty

good for the fit for us today. So again, that's the kind of

thought process, what can we do that we want to get accomplished

so that we can look back on it with fond memories- things that

nobody will ever kind of forget, and though will mean a lot to

us.

The second thing, what you can do, if you haven't taken any

action yet, re-listen to the first number of episodes and

again, discuss them with your spouse. If you're taking steps

forward to remove some of these anxiety items, again, we don't

want to just be checking boxes for the sake of checking boxes-

checking off that we did something more with our savings,

or that we got life insurance. We want to be taking action that

relieves anxiety and frees us up to be able to enjoy today more

so than we were able to yesterday when those things were

weighing on us. So quick summation- make sure that you're

making a list- a bucket list- discuss it with your spouse, and

really take the time to look at, "hey, this is a limited window,

let's make the most of it with our kids and the time that we

have and the things that we really want to make sure that we

do."

As always, thanks so much for tuning in. If you enjoyed this

episode, please make sure to review us on Apple podcasts or

wherever you listen. There are literally millions of young

American families out there I'm trying to reach and help just

like you. The next episode coming up is titled,

"Investments Should Be Boring", which may seem like a little bit

of a weird title, but it's going to go into some of the mindset

items of how we should be approaching investments, and how

we shouldn't. So thanks as always for tuning in and I'll

talk to you again soon.

The conversations on this show are

Joe's opinions and provided for general information purposes

only. They do not constitute accounting, legal, tax or other

professional advice for your specific situation. You should

always seek appropriate advice from a financial advisor,

accountant, lawyer or other professional before acting upon

any content or information found here first. Joe is affiliated

with New Horizons Wealth Management LLC, a branch office

of TFS securities Inc and TFS advisory services and sec

registered investment advisor member FINRA/SIPC.