My family last fall… I want to feel this way every day!

It was with no little consideration that I made the decision I’m sharing with you now. Deals in the Mitten is getting a new owner. Today.

For a long while now (4 1/2 years) I have worked a lot of hours sharing deals, staying on top of things and trying my best to run a blog and not let it run me. In a lot of ways I succeeded. I have helped thousands of people save what must be hundreds of thousands of dollars over that time. In another way I feel empty. It took a lot of time away from my family, I often found myself thinking about all the things I had to do for the site when I wasn’t on the site and I never seemed to have the time for anything else I wanted to do.

I started a part time job a couple weeks ago and have picked up some regular online work from home hours for a company in another state. This week I backed off blogging and have barely posted anything to see how I felt and test a different lifestyle… and you know what? I loved it. I’ve simply felt in my heart all week that this is what I need to do. Yesterday afternoon instead of working up until the last second and rushing to get my kids from school and get home, I shut off the computer early, parked 6 six blocks from the school and walked the dog down to get them and took them for ice cream… and felt very content every second of it. I’ve made a hard, but right decision for me.

So, I leave you in the very competent hands of Jennifer. She’s been the owner of So Dough Savvy for a while now and is now the owner of Deals in the Mitten. We have worked extensively behind the scenes over the last few weeks to come not only an agreement, but to also help her learn a little about the things you all like on the site and what match ups I have been posting for you. Jennifer brings with her to the site her sister who has two children to cover deals for the moms and her own mother to help you all save. I am confident that you all will love her. Though I only knew her by her positive reputation prior to talking business, I have gotten to know her more in the last few weeks and feel she is the right person for this site. She loves Michigan, especially the Traverse City area, clothing & shoes and is excited to keep the momentum of Deals in the Mitten moving right along!

As for me. I’m not leaving the blogging world completely. I am just taking it down about 100 notches or so. I have really done nothing with it as today, but if you want to find me, you can check out The Pieces of Mi Life from time to time.

PS – I’ll be sticking around behind the scenes here for a few weeks to help make a smooth transition and fulfill some blogging obligations, but as of today, Jennifer is your go to girl. I know you all will make her feel welcome and love her!

*Thinking* we “needed” something.

And you know where a lot of that stuff is now? Donated for a small tax write off, sold on Facebook for a fraction of what we paid, sent some stuff to consignment or resale shops or it’s heading for a friend’s yard sale for a fraction of what we paid for it. In several cases, things are new in the box with the seals not even broken.

And it’s heartbreaking to me to see it when I know we have debt and are working as fast as we can to pay it down.

I look at it every day and think “If we hadn’t paid $50 for that, that’s $50 less we would owe right now”. And I’m taking the advice of many of you and reminding myself that I can not live in the past. That what’s done is done, the lessons are learned and we approach each new day applying those lessons to our current financial decisions.

We’ve made incredible progress in a short time. And we’ve made some very hard decisions. We are no longer looking at our debt in monthly payments but in overall numbers.

Lesson Learned: We don’t need it if we don’t want to pay for it later.