Gosh, we talk about money every couple of days. And, every Sunday I balance the check books and talk to him about what farm expenses are coming up that week. I handle all the investments, taxes, tracking everything, and I'll have him look at the spreadsheet with the current bills and the projected expenses to let him know how we are doing and what I need coming in from the farm in order to keep er rolling.
I keep getting sideswiped by bills I don't know about ahead of time, though. This month we have a $900 crop insurance bill due that I found out about earlier this month. I tried to have him tell me the known bills in January so I could plan for it, but he simply forgot about this one. Next year will be much easier to plan for, because I'll have everything we spent money on this year itemized out.
The one big fight we've had so far (only married 5 months) is that before I took over the bills he never kept receipts. I need him to keep them for two reasons...checkbook balancing and tax deductions. If we don't write off all the expenses we legitimately can, that is like missing out on a 25% discount. It took about 3 months for him to get in the habit of grabbing the receipt whenever he buys something, but now it is automatic.
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