A little bit debt free... or debt unburdened?

Today is the closing day for our refinanced mortgage. By taking advantage of lower interest rates, Mr W and I were able to refinance our mortgage, add $45k to the mortgage for debt repayment, and: 1) not increase our semi-monthly payment OR 2) not increase our mortgage term. I played the banks fairly hard I think. Once approved by ING at 4.34% I called CIBC where our mortgage resides to see if they could get us a better deal. They came back at 4.3%, which ING countered at 4.29%. In the end, ING was far superior in response time and customer service. CIBC simply dropped the ball - taking several days to get back to me with an offer, whereas ING responded within hours of my emails. ING also allows to pay back up to 25% a year without penalty, a huge advantage for us to eventually start paying our mortgage down.

So while we are obviously not debt free, the debt burden has been lessened. Our monthly debt repayments have been reduced by hundreds of dollars, and we are saving thousands and thousands on interest. We still have our government student loans to pay off, which now seems achievable. This will be our first debt goal. Our mortgage has amount is still considerably below assessed value too, just in case things start to fall in this neighbourhood. In 2008 our house still increased in value by 6%- a slow down, but not a downturn yet.

Ahhhh spring. Time for reworking the finances :) Mr W is also away welding (although it is -32 with windchill in Prince George- Nancy I guess everywhere slightly north is cold too? Especially compared to the south coast!) which he often does in the spring. My bulbs are up, and yes, today we have a snowfall warning!

Since I have been posting finances lately, and little about the little boy, here is a recent pic from one of our geocaching adventures.

On breastfeeding

I have had an awkward relationship with breastfeeding the little babe. I can`t say I love it. I can`t say it is the worst thing in the world. There are moments I hate it. Moments it is pretty cool. For the first six weeks it was the most painful thing - the baby wasn`t draining the milk (said the lactation expert) and so I was experiencing pain for several hours after a feeding. Now it is mostly better, although it still hurts sometimes. I like the convenience of it, I like how much the little one LOVES it. Does it keep him up more at night? It must, I am feeding him every 2 hours right now, though to be honest, he used to be a much better sleeper. I love it though, at those moments when I have him snuggled up to me and he is oh so content. Our little world is compressed into a little bit of space which is me and him. I don't know I am going to miss it when it is gone though.

And I must say I think that our society has gone a little too much "pro-breastfeeding" only in that you are made to feel very very guilty if you use formula at all. Yet I see many other mom's skulking in the formula aisle at Wal Mart too. After all, don't we all need a break? Doesn't Dad need the chance to bond with his son/daughter too? Yes, it is possible to pump, but when that was an option for me, it didn't give me the time away from my breasts and breastfeeding I needed (mainly when it was very painful to feed). Sometimes, it is best to leave all the guilt alone, and let people make the decisions for themselves that get them through the day I think.

Financial Post: Firing the investment specialist

Previously, Mr W and I had been dealing with an investment specialist at our local credit union. She answered all our questions and we were both pleased to move our RRSPs to be managed through the credit union. But then she left. And I had an uneasy feeling. A letter arrived in the mail in the fall saying the new person would be calling us to discuss our investments soon. Nothing happened. I hadn't received a statement for a very long time, so I decided to make an appointment to discuss my RRSPs and to start the process of opening an RESP for the baby.

The new investment specialist and I did not hit it off. He was late to the meeting, unprepared to talk about my RRSP (ok, the little it is, but still it is my money), had no advice on what to do in "these financial times", and could not set up an RESP because he had to leave at noon. We definitely got off on the wrong foot when he couldn't tell me how much I had originally invested (my principal) compared to what I had in the RRSP today.

He did show me his top 4 mutual funds for investing in an RESP. When I asked about management fees he looked surprised and said I was the first person ever to ask him this. Really? Three of his top 4 mutual funds contained at least one major holding of oil from Alberta oil sands. When I questioned the stability and long-term outlook for oil, again, he looked surprised and asked why I would be worried about this. Since Mr W has worked in the oil patch we tend to follow things closely, and right now things are the worst they have been in a very long time. It does not mean it won't rebound, but with the US, a major buyer of this oil, continues to push a "Buy US" attitude, these companies may never reach the capacity they enjoyed at the height of the summer last year.

I left the meeting feeling very unsettled with another appointment for the weekend to set up the RESP. Once I got home though and talked it through with Mr W we realized it just wasn't going to work. I went online to one of my favourite financial bloggers, Four Pillars, and read through their RESP information. Because Four Pillars and Canadian Capitalist are very clear on how they set up their RESPs I finally understood the advantage of investing in index funds, and managing our own portfolio. As well, MoneySense Magazine, which I received in the mail that day, had an article on the Couch Potato Strategy, giving me more confidence to take this path. I called the investment specialist back (he didn`t answer of course) and left a message to cancel our meeting, saying simply we had decided to look at other options.

We have not set up the RESP yet, being embroiled in mortgage refinancing right this second, but we will soon take the money out of the savings account for the little guy and get it all worked out.

Gardening in February

I was out in my garden yesterday afternoon for about an hour, so Mr W had to phone his parents who live in the interior to gloat, uh, I mean, tell them about it. I have snowdrops poking their heads up, but Mom has hers in full bloom! Lots of other little things coming up, so I took the opportunity to clean up the dead stems and prune back some of the bushes that got overgrown. Here is a picture of last year's garden in the spring...

I have been hiking quite a bit too, and a few weeks ago my friend and I packed our sons up to the top of one of the local mountains. It was a glorious day and warm enough to shed several layers, at least in the sunshine. We sat at the top for about an hour eating snacks and getting a tan.

The little boy loves to eat eat eat. His first taste of new food is always met by a puzzled look but after he tries it again a few days later he seems to like almost anything. Cheerios are is current favourite, probably because it is such a challenge to pick them up that most end up on the floor, which attracts the dogs to his high chair, and he LOVES the dogs.