Traveling Wallet

25Aug 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Mini Retirement Update: July countdown

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 6 weeks and 1 days. Holy shiiza! We are in single digits on the weeks. Oh…

20Jul 2017 by The Roamer 1 Comment

Capsule 8: Spring & 2 years of capsule wardrobes

Capsule Wardrobe, Finance, Minimalism

I first started my capsule wardrobe experiment back in July 2015. I had no idea it would last this long. Today I wrap up 2 years of living with capsule wardrobes. All just 3 months at a time. When I started I didn't commit myself to doing it forever, but it has been such a good experience that I have kept going. Spring 2017 was the final chapter of year 2. My 8th capsule. Here is what I picked out and wore. (more…)

14Jul 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Mini Retirement Update: June and growing worries.

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 11 weeks and 3 days. Only 3 months left!!! June to do list:…

30Jun 2017 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Capsule 7: Winter and a Wrap dress

Capsule Wardrobe, Minimalism

The mini retirement is just around the corner, so for year 2 of capsule wardrobes, my goal is to get all my clothes to fit into 1 bin and 1 backpack. Fitting our entire life into 2 cars means No space for superfluous rarely used items. Here were my pick for my 7th capsule wardrobe Winter 2016. You can compare it to last Winter's Capsule 3 wardrobe picks and looks. My last winter capsule I had 40 items. This year only 36, I'm slowly learning to do more with less. (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…

26May 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Capsule 6 & A 10 x 10 Challenge

Capsule Wardrobe, Minimalism

The mini retirement is just around the corner, so for year 2 of capsule wardrobes, my goal is to get all my clothes to fit into 1 bin and 1 backpack. Fitting our entire life into 2 cars means No space for superfluous rarely used items. Here are my pick for my 6th capsule wardrobe Fall 2016.You can compare it to last Fall's Capsule 2 wardrobe picks and looks. (more…)

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…)

18May 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Mini Retirement Monthly Update: Too much in my house

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 19 weeks and 5 days. Can you feel the pressure? April to do…

21Apr 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Capsule 5: Summer, No purchase necessary

Minimalism

Welcome Its spring of 2017 and I am currently living in capsule number 8 and getting ready to close up year 2 of dressing with a capsule. I am 3 capsule wardrobes behind. Here is capsule number 5. I am planning to keep these updates short and simple. This isn't a fashion blog so I don't want to have 3 capsule posts in 3 weeks. I am rolling out 1 a month and in June we should be all up to date. My goal in year 2 ( capsule 5-8) was to get all my clothes to fit into 1 bin and 1 back pack. When I just started out, my goal for year one of my capsule was to test out the majority of my wardrobe. I had lots of clothes I…

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…)

17Feb 2017 by The Roamer 6 Comments

Home Tour & 2016 purge review

Housing, Minimalism

Why a home tour? Well honestly, I wanted to catalog what the house looks like now. After all, the goal is that everything must go. If you are new here, you might not know that the Roamer clan is planning BIG life changes. We are planning to relocate. From sunny California to (more…)

08Feb 2017 by The Roamer 4 Comments

January Expenses and the uber frugal month wrap up

Continuous improvement, Maximizing money

What do the uber frugal month challenge and our January spending have in common? Only that they happened on the same month. So peek through to see our uber frugal month challenge results. How much did we save? How much did we spend? and what was our honest opinion. Finally, whether we think it's right for you. So lets hop to it.. (more…)

16Jan 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

2016 Goals: Year End Review

Finance, Reading, Saving, Travel, Yearly Review Series

It's January, and you know what that means. Goals for 2016 This past year I decided to try something new. I had read that I could be more focused if I just chose one goal and really bore down on it for a whole month. It sounded interesting and logical. It sounded like I would get more, deeper work done. It was also a way to avoid my natural tendency to overload myself with goals. The year before I had jot down 24. Instead this year I could only choose 12 goals for the year. (more…)

09Jan 2017 by The Roamer 6 Comments

Net Worth Update : Our growth in 2016

Continuous improvement, Finance, Saving

Hey Traveling Wallet readers, It's net worth update time. When I first posted my net worth out for the world to see, I wasn’t so sure how I felt about it. I'll be honest I'm still a bit paranoid about the whole thing. It’s probably not a surprise that I feel like I am leaving myself a bit exposed. While I am not sharing my net worth here monthly I do track it regularly. Finally, I decided that giving a yearly snap shot was probably not so bad. (& since Mr. Roamer is on board, then all engines go) Today I will be sharing the growth we saw in the last 12 month period. Sometimes, a year can just fly by, but it turns out 365 days is a lot of time…

06Jan 2017 by The Roamer No Comments

Uber Frugal Month Challenge, Well Why Not?

Continuous improvement, Finance

Happy New Year Traveling Wallet Readers! It is officially 2017 and it's time to use that new years motivation to tackle exciting tasks. This month the Roamer clan is participating in the Frugalwood's Uber Frugal month challenge. When Mrs. Frugalwoods first mentioned it, I was intrigued. But because we are trying our hand at travel hacking. Or credit cards rewards, I wasn't sure we would be participating. Our 3 month deadline to meet spending is Jan 14. That is 14 days, where we would be more worried about spending rather then saving. But we (more…)

30Nov 2016 by The Roamer No Comments

5 Scholarships To Fund Your Study Abroad Term

Finance, Travel

I’ve wanted to travel the world for a long time. Now, I am finally taking steps to make that a reality. I am very excited about next year’s 3 month adventure. But I remember when I was in high school and learned about this wonderful thing. Study Abroad. A speaker came to my high school, and informed me that I could go to school, work on my degree. Then a year or two later, take time to go to a different country and visit, all while continuing to work on my degree. Say what? That is amazing! I was sold! And I have to admit that it was one of the main reasons why I wanted to go to university. But life happened, and I never got the chance to…

13Nov 2016 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Surviving 1 year of colorful capsule wardrobes, and cutting my wardrobe by 47%

Continuous improvement, Minimalism

The traveling wallet is our journey through many of life's facets. That's why I like to cover a few main topics here on the blog: travel, money, family and minimalism. This post is for those interested in minimalism. In this case creating a minimalist wardrobe and purging the items that just hung around. This year I completed a whole year of living with capsule wardrobes. If you don't know what they are, it's when you remove everything from your closet and pick only some of your clothes to live with for 3 months. In my case I choose to hover around 38 items. It included: tops, bottoms, and shoes. In the end I created 4 capsules to cover the whole year. After the experiment I can say its a great gate…

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…

12Jul 2016 by The Roamer 6 Comments

2016 mid year goal review

Continuous improvement, Yearly Review Series

Goals you either hate them or you love them. For me goal setting is what kept me on track once I got to university and had to be responsible for myself. With no parents around to make sure I did my homework and drank my milk I had to figure out a system. Back in university I would set goals every semester but now I simply set them at the beginning of the year. Goals are kind of like resolutions except they are less wishy-washy... Ever since then the habit has stuck because I have seen results. This year I decided to try something new for my yearly goals. (more…)

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…)

03Jun 2016 by The Roamer 12 Comments

What we don’t spend on, and how it maximizes our Saving Potential

Finance

After that amazing feature on Rockstar Finance and all the eyes that viewed my post about Big Savings and Happiness. I thought I should shed some more light on the details. You can get a general idea by looking at our yearly spend but I'm getting really detailed here. Maybe your a Californian and your jaw dropped by last years numbers. Its California! it's super expensive! Or maybe you live in the Midwest and still are spending more then us. How do we do it? Well, we do a lot of things the common American does. Like watch movies, and more movies. But we have a few areas where we are very different. Here's the list of things we don't spend money on. This doesn't mean we never, ever, ever…

24May 2016 by The Roamer 4 Comments

Capsule Wardrobe Experiment Update

Continuous improvement, Minimalism

It's not a new story to open up your closet and find nothing to wear. I hate to admit it, but I was just like that. I was so frustrated once I even posted it on Facebook. I received a flood of comments, full of sympathy, so many of my female friends could relate. Had they been standing next to me I'm sure I would have seen their heads nodding up and down. Woe is us. Last year after connecting with the minimalist movement I learned about something else. Capsule wardrobes. When I first started my journey into capsule wardrobes all I knew was that it promised I wouldn't open up my closet and feel like I had nothing to wear. It was going to solve that problem. So I…

12May 2016 by The Roamer 3 Comments

Net worth update

Finance, Maximizing money, Yearly Review Series

Hi, So it's about time for another net worth update. When I first posted my net worth out for the world to see, I wasn't so sure how I felt about it. Being transparent about you financials is a bit Taboo. It's probably not a surprise that as the sharer I feel like I am leaving myself a bit exposed. While I am not sharing my net worth here monthly it is something I keep and eye on. I decided that I felt that giving a yearly snap shot was probably not so bad. But I am running behind as these snap shots should be coming out during January. While I didn't get the post out I did make sure to record my stats. So in this post I will…

05May 2016 by The Roamer 24 Comments

Big Savings & Happiness, Can you have both?

Counter Culture, Finance, Saving

Last year we saved $72,360. (Deep breath) You have to give it a moment to let it sink in. (more…)

26Mar 2016 by The Roamer 2 Comments

Minimalism without waste

Minimalism

We've been living in our new apartment for 3 months now and moving can have many benefits. For us it was a great excuse to purge mercilessly any items we could so that we wouldn't have to move them. As I spoke about during the great moving purge. As I work towards minimalism, I am also trying to do it without waste. As I removed the excess I want to do so with this quote in mind. Use it up, Wear it out, Make it do, or do without. (more…)

24Mar 2016 by The Roamer No Comments

The Great Moving Purge

Minimalism

While I don't think I had ever heard the term minimalism growing up the word hoarding I was familiar with. There were shows about it after all, and while our home never looked like that. There was enough clutter to make me feel anxious. (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…)