Well, dh's car just hit 77,777. Is that lucky or what? LOL.

Since most of our cars we bought with far more miles to start, I never thought I would get terribly excited about the whole 100k thing. But this was also the newest car we ever bought. We bought it with around 15k miles. So anyway, it is 6 years old. I can't believe how much we put on it. It probably went years with little driving (when he had our babies). But the last year or so we have used it a lot. It gets such good gas mileage (average 35mpg on the freeway) that whoever is driving farthest gets it for the day. Which pretty much means it will be the main car driven going forward. Dh no longer has to drive the kids out to preschool. The van is good for trips down the street. I mean we will once again take the compact to LA. Not worth paying almost twice the gas. We just really did not think that purchase through very well. We knew it would get a lot worse gas mileage, but yeesh.

So yeah, we are putting a lot of miles on that car.

It's like super car though. (knock on wood). I saw the disdain for 2000 Ford Focuses on the board. But this is a 2001 Ford Escort. LOVE it. If it died tomorrow, who cares. $7888 to drive a car for 6 years with no repairs. Wouldn't have been one of our best car deals if it died tomorrow. (I paid $1500 for a car I drove 7 years). But I wouldn't have a complaint.

We will have to take it in, in April, for another look over. Before our drive to LA. We keep taking it in. Come one, SOMETHING must need replacing. Spark plugs? Belt? Anything? Brakes? I mean, it is a Ford after all.

It's a little super car. We have always had very old cars that need small work every few months. So it is weird to take the car in and say, um, does it need anything? Just never had to do that before. Usually it's, "the car needs something so check it over while you have it." I can't even say so much on the new van. We have been taking that on average every 6 months for something. (usually something stupid, but the mechanic checks it over every 6 months then). So no, never had a car that we went a year and went, "wait a minute, we haven't taken it in for a year. We should get a look over." We like to keep our cars well maintained so we can keep them "forever." So his car boggles my mind. LOL. We spent the most on it to have our mechanic tell us it doesn't need anything. So it goes. So we figure at this rate we will take it in April or May, before our LA trip.

We take it in for oil changes too so it gets looked over a couple of times a year. I just don't trust those people worth squat. But sometimes they find something real to fix. We always get a second opinion. I don't even think they have ever drummed up anything for dh's car, other than an air filter replacement. So even they can't find anything. LOL.

Reminds me, for LA, it looks like we will probably get to use dh's family's timeshare for a free room.

It also appears they are going to Australia this year. O.M.G. I guess lucky to say we weren't invited. We were going to say no to anything and everything this year. Australia would have been hard to say no to. I don't think we could! But I think that is super cool for them. Wow! We would have gone on our honeymoon, but it was the 2000 Olympics there and the airfare was INSANE. We had a free room anywhere in the world and we had a lot of money so we decided Australia. Really, looking back, should have gone. We had the money. Sometimes we are too cheap for our own good. Looking back knowing what I know now, I would do it. Now if we ever go we will likely have to pay for 4, or wait until the kids are grown. Missed opportunity. But as such, it's kind of in the back of my mind. Continents I haven't seen - Australia & Africa.

Well we have a relative there. So they are excited to go. I am relieved in a sense to kind of calm things down on the vacation front. Let them go and tell us all about it. If it is that great, they will probably take us some time. We can hope for that. Sometime down the road when we have more money to enjoy it a little more!

But yes, if we get free room... I am still not sure we will do much more than Disneyland for 2 days as originally planned. We'll just see how our cash flow is. We can add San Diego on our own dime more lat minute if need be.

The D-Land trip, if it was free room, would be $500 for gas and the park. Maybe $100 or more on food. We could budget $600 pretty darn easily though. So that is probably what we will do. I don't think we can justify spending more this year.

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As far as the ROTH efund thing. Still thinking about it.

I have about $1k cash sitting in my ROTH anyway. (Was waiting to have more money to buy a fund). I am thinking of leaving that there as part of my efund, and diverting $1k cash to T Rowe. So I can get the minimum in my ROTH there and not "have to" contribute every month.

Then I can add $4k to dh's ROTH - in cash. & add almost $2k to my ROTH cash. & max out our IRAs for '07.

That would put $7k cash in our ROTHs. Tax sheltered efund is what it would really be. If our liquid cash goes up though, we could easily convert that to mutual funds then.

I liked the idea of diverting some to T Rowe since I already had cash anyway.

I still project adding $50/month to that in 2008 and $50/month to dh's ROTH. Stock mutual funds.

Then I will have another $300/month come September or so. I foresee being able to max out $5k by next April 15th. (Though will likely be $2500 to mine and $2500 to dh's. I just look at as our retirement as one and diversify likewise. So sometimes add more to one than the other).

I think that is a pretty good spot to be in.

I am not going to sweat the second $5k this year. For '08 anyway.

This will be around 17% gross income to retirement in 2008 then. When you include my profit sharing. So nothing to sneeze at.

As for the challenge, I will keep it as is. I Was going to make it retitrement retirement retirement.

Since I will view my ROTH cash as an efund, I am not counting that for the challenge. Would be cheating quite a bit.

Will still go with it. I think part of me wants to focus on building up more cash. Leaving the challenge as retirement monies will give me extra incentive to throw our retirement funds a few extra bones. Otherwise I will likely neglect it.

Who knows, we might max our ROTHs out for 2008 too. Wouldn't that be awesome??? Way too early to say... I like the flexibility of waiting until well after year-end and seeing how we feel. IT means by NEXT April 15th (2009) who knows, we may find a way to max out again. Odds are good.

But I really want to get $5k for 2008 and start contributing the $415 or so a month to get there. Then inch it up until we max out. My goal is to max out by 2010. so when LM starts public school I can tell dh, work if you want, but we don't really need it. Kind of our long range goal. If we can start putting away $5k/year, that is pretty awesome. I am happy with that. We'll easily hit the second $5k once LM is out of preschool. (knock on wood anyway).

Regardless it is a hell of a lot more than we have done the last 5 years. But I like slow and steady... That's why I am going from $50/month to $100/month right now. & then divert preschool tuition to get to $415/month. Then next year maybe I can add $50-$100/month. Then the same the following year. Then we will free up $300/month at the end of 2010 when LM is out of preschool. Then we'll be 32 and maxing out our ROTHs. & then some. & that is how you do it...