Dec. 4, 2023
Season 3 Ep. 9 //"Less Presents, More Presence: Christmas on a Budget"
In this episode, we tackle the stress of Christmas' commercial side and the high spending it often involves, especially for families with tight budgets. We share personal stories about celebrating Christmas with our young kids when money was tight, giving you a real look at the ups and downs of those times. We'll talk about the unrealistic idea of a perfect "Hallmark Christmas" and remind you that family and togetherness mean more than gifts. We open up about how tough financial times can aff...
In this episode, we tackle the stress of Christmas' commercial side and the high spending it often involves, especially for families with tight budgets. We share personal stories about celebrating Christmas with our young kids when money was tight, giving you a real look at the ups and downs of those times.
We'll talk about the unrealistic idea of a perfect "Hallmark Christmas" and remind you that family and togetherness mean more than gifts. We open up about how tough financial times can affect us emotionally and how much community support can help.
This episode isn't just about reflecting; it's a helpful guide for families dealing with financial limits during the holidays. We stress that being there for each other is more important than the presents under the tree and invite you to share your own holiday experiences and challenges.
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WEBVTT
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What do you remember of your Christmases when you were a child?
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Is it all the fancy gifts, and you made a list for your Santa parents?
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And you got everything on that list?
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Or, do you remember the times that you had a special occasion at Christmas?
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You had something special happen at Christmas.
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It was family time.
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You did carols, if you liked carols.
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You ate fruitcake, if that was your jam with your family.
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You had all those memories.
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What do you remember?
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There's a cultural pressure right now that we are feeling currently.
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I was doing some research and this year in 2023 they're expecting a 1.
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3 trillion dollar worldwide retail Consumer amount of money being purchased over Christmas.
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There is a reason for the season, and it isn't the gifts, not that gifts are bad, but we have to look at our family, and today we want to talk about finances and having small children, finances and being married, and what that looks like.
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Because when you're not having the amount of resources you would love to have, Christmas is something that can be quite daunting.
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Welcome to another episode of Amplified Marriage.
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I'm Natalie and I'm Brian, wherever you are, whatever you're doing.
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As you hear us say, always grab a tea, grab a coffee, a snack, get cozy and comfy.
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We're so glad you're here to have our chat
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today.
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And just for your listening pleasure, if you happen to miss the last well, two weeks ago, we did an episode kind of wrapped.
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up the silent strain.
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We did tension, fear, and a couple others.
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This last one was all about just the misconceptions about those relationships, misconceptions about tension in marriage.
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And so if you get a chance, it'd be great if you go back and listen to that.
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Today we're talking about, I don't know what topic that's, I guess, near and dear.
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To our hearts we've titled this, and perhaps this will be a Christmas series because we're, you know, we've got three episodes before the new year.
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This is a
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working title.
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This is not like the final, you know, don't, don't give the title because I don't want people to be like, Oh, that's the, they didn't use that one.
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That's right.
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But you know, for us, when we had littler kids and I mean, we've got, you know, well, one adult and two teenagers.
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Back when we, when they were younger, yeah, we just struggled incredibly with finances and especially around Christmas time and, you know, generally we struggled our kids are like, we were poor,
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They think when they can't get Pepsi that
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we're poor.
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And if we're, you know, defining poverty by how much.
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Christmas gifts.
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I mean, you have and how much Christmas, then yeah, we were dirt poor.
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Wow.
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And it just, it got us talking about what are some of the struggles with this season coming in and that was just the first thing that popped to my mind was the pressure to provide a Hallmark Christmas movie Christmas for your children.
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And what does that look like when you physically count?
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Well,
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I think that.
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Like, I have a, I have really strong opinions about Christmas and I think partially because we've had to live it with our own kids, but also this attitude that like, even when I said before, the, the way we look at Christmas without with the way that we, that, that nor the culture is telling us you have to do this.
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You have to have make a list is very commercialized.
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You have to put, make the gifts that you want.
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We believe in our house and we do this.
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It's all about family.
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It's all about you.
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We're not going to get the kids know that if they give us a list of 10 or 12 things they really want, they're going to get a couple, they're not getting the whole thing.
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That's been the way it has been in our house because we don't want our kids to think that well every Christmas they're going to get everything they want because as our kids, you know, anyone that has kids that's listening to this.
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This is you're gonna realize that as your kids get older their tastes get more expensive If I ask my 18 year old what he wants for Christmas He's telling me some kind of PC part that way that that costs like 400 Yeah, my other son is a musician and if I ask him what he wants for Christmas, it's some kind of 400 MIDI keyboard or plug in thing for his guitar like that it changes and so there's just so heavy undue pressure Unneeded pressure on parents to provide what you said earlier, which is a really good way to put it a hallmark Christmas, a hallmark Christmas that really, ultimately, in my opinion, and I would say just to take the pressure off yourself, in my opinion, it is unnecessary
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and you know, When I was just sharing this with Brian earlier, but back when our kids were little, we didn't have YouTube and Instagram and all these, you know, you tick talk if you're into that, which we're not people sort of like influencing, you know, Some of the videos that have come across my newsfeed have been like look at all the things We're buying our kids for Christmas, and I was like well isn't that kind of fascinating?
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Because it does one of two things and yes, you know if you have the ability to provide a Miraculous Christmas for your kids all the power to you.
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Yeah, and this isn't this isn't a
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I yuck your yum Cuz
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you can do that.
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No that not at all but a lot of people can't provide that for their kids and so yes, they can choose not to watch your video.
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That is very true.
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Yeah.
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So we're speaking from non socialized or like we didn't have the social influences that we have today when our kids were little.
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So you know, we.
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And we beat ourselves up and the guilt was just as fierce, and the shame was just as fierce back when we didn't have YouTube and all of these platforms the intensity of the feeling of not being able to provide Christmas as, as what you imagine Christmas is supposed to be.
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And yes, we know Jesus is the reason for the season, but there's an element of blessing.
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Be and being a blessing to others and to our children and that we just could not provide
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also just a reality of Of what we're inundated every single day with when it comes to christmas Like you go on to what you said what you go on to instagram you watch any commercials and we don't have cable anywhere But you watch anything anywhere at this time of season Everything is pushing you to buy buy buy and get that perfect gift or get the diamonds for your like here We're talking about the strain When you have little children, there's a strain, even when you're just early married to buy the perfect gift and it has to be expensive.
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And yes, unless you've had those conversations, that can be a tough conversation to have in general about finances when it comes to Christmas time.
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Because like, it's interesting because as an adult, when I need something, I go and buy it.
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Right.
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And at Christmas time, the things that I want, well now, yeah, now because we have the finances, but there's, there's things that like, if I'm looking, I really need to replace my earbuds.
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It's not like an end of world thing if I don't get it right now, right?
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Like it's but as an adult I'm gonna wait until it's feasible and then I'm gonna go out and do it Right, which is generally if it's on sale.
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Yeah, and and if it's one of those things that like but that's just that's it That's a luxury.
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That's not a necessity.
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That's just a luxury exactly when
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our kids were little we went without Oh, yeah.
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So they did not.
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And so, you know, painting a picture what that looks like.
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Our kids needed boots or our kids needed clothes or our kids needed snow suits and winter clothes.
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We lived in a northern climate, which snowed all the time.
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It was cold.
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And so we were duct taping our boots because our kids needed, they, they got before we got.
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Yeah.
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And, and it wasn't because, you know, we weren't self caring.
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No, it was legitimately so that they didn't freeze to death, right?
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Like,
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yeah, we're in the north.
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They need to have warm clothing.
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Well, and then there's times I just remember where we'd eat less or I would go without a meal because we had groceries or two days away or we're
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eating macaroni and cheese and they're eating the last of the chicken and
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rice, right?
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Like Just like I remember like doubling up on like pairs of socks because one pair had a hole in them, but I needed not to have holes.
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I put another pair over top and I couldn't wear in the gear.
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Just I need to be extra warm as you do what you like.
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Just a little little things that you do.
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I remember always scavenging laces from other boots to fit the ones that I had.
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Exactly.
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And.
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Like you had a job and we still had rent to pay and we still had gas to put in the vehicle and and food to put in the fridge and this is like 16 years ago.
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It was way cheaper than it is now.
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And so like all of our rent and our bills and our hydro and our gas and all of that was paid.
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Which meant there was like no money left over for any extras.
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So when we're saying, you know, we were, we providing Christmas as far as the commercial side of Christmas and being able to buy our kids presents was really challenging because there wasn't extra money to do that.
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Well, I remember a time when we were early married and even early with kids that you're like, you can't get a coffee today.
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We have to have every That 2 will be the difference between us being able to pay off a bill and not being able to pay a bill.
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Exactly.
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Now, having said that and this is just a plugin for finding community.
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Yeah.
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At this time of the year, especially because we were plugged into a really great church and we had community.
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And that wasn't to say that we leached off the community by any stretch of the word.
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We went about doing what.
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What we'd always done and we were on a very strict budget.
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Yeah, and The Lord used that like the community that we were involved to bless us and and they did yeah, and so we never Even when it felt like, oh, we've got our last like 1.
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50 in the bank, Lord.
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Somehow, by his miraculous provision we'd get a gift card for a superstore.
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We'd get a gift card for Walmart.
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Or we had a gentleman in our church at the time.
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That wasn't
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just at Christmas.
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That was No, like that
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was throughout the year, right?
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But, you know, we really, I'll speak to me.
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I really felt the guilt and the pressure to not provide.
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CHristmas gifts for my kids.
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And so,
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and I, I, I didn't feel the Christmas gifts so much as just the overall pressure as the breadwinner of the house to be able to look after the house.
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Right.
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Right.
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And to be able to, as long as like our, and it was never like I was carrying that weight without you knowing about it.
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It's not like that's a surprise to you, but men carry that weight when you're the breadwinner of the home and that's your.
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And that's what you need to do.
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And it's not when Natalie's not where Natalie's worked a lot, like even when the kids were young, she always had a part time thing happening, cleaning, blah, blah, blah.
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But there's just this weight all the time that it's not just Christmas, whereas you're focused on Christmas.
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I'm thinking, Lord, I need to, I need to pay rent every single month.
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I need to make sure that they have clothes and shoes and school supplies.
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School supplies are embarrassingly expensive, right?
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Like I need, I needed uniforms when the kids were at the traditional school or we need to, they need teeth when the kids get older.
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Like all of these things that happen that I'm just constantly mulling about, like I want to be able to take them away on a vacation.
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Yeah, there was no vacation.
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There was no vacation.
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And like, We had people pass away in our family and we couldn't even afford unless someone helped us come down, which happened a few times because it was even embarrassing.
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Right.
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And, and that's the thing is that it, for us, it was less so for me, but still embarrassing when someone or my mom or my brother in law Jeremy would be like, Hey, I'm dude, I'm, I'm here to help.
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Like, what do you need?
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Like, and we had that kind of thing, right?
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Like it's embarrassing.
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But there's times that we couldn't do trips and come down and because someone passed away because we just didn't have the finances to be able to take it from Alberta all the way to BC, which in our van back then was still 200, 250 there and back just in fuel because it's a van,
00:12:53.200 --> 00:12:53.669
right?
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And, you know, it, it seemed as though every time we had, we, we got a little bit ahead, there was some catastrophe where like our van cost 3, 000 to fix, or all of a sudden we needed a new tire, and like we're speaking from experience, this legit happened.
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At one, at one point, I remember me and you just, and this was back when the van was still like relatively new ish, it was only four or five years, just thinking, what's the point of saving money if every time we get ahead, we have to blow it?
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It was on like what?
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They're not stupid things like,
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well, things we don't want to have to, you know, repair the car.
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We'd like for that money to be used for something else.
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Yeah,
00:13:35.139 --> 00:13:35.690
like we want to.
00:13:35.690 --> 00:13:38.850
Yeah, we like, let's get all that we need for school or for food.
00:13:38.909 --> 00:13:43.950
And every time we had any kind of substantial amount of savings, it was always our vehicle for quite a few years.
00:13:43.950 --> 00:13:46.529
It was our vehicle that has burned us like it was so annoying.
00:13:46.970 --> 00:14:04.514
Yeah, but it was it was hard and it was humiliating to have to at one ask for help and to lay our pride down and I'm speaking to myself, lay my pride down to receive the help as in the food bank.
00:14:04.995 --> 00:14:08.195
And that was a hard one that I remember.
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That was a hard one to swallow.
00:14:09.950 --> 00:14:19.639
One year specifically when you or someone we knew had signed us up for a food bank because we would not sign ourselves up because it was so embarrassing.
00:14:20.179 --> 00:14:24.690
And it came time to like get it and I said to Brian, Brian's like, like, should we go?
00:14:24.690 --> 00:14:26.200
And I'm like, well, you can go.
00:14:26.570 --> 00:14:28.445
There's no way I'm going.
00:14:29.164 --> 00:14:30.855
I was just so embarrassed
00:14:30.865 --> 00:14:32.524
and And I, I went cause
00:14:32.575 --> 00:15:32.225
I understood it And you went and I was just, I remember like Oh, I'm getting emotional I just remember feeling so discouraged Because, like, in my mind, you've reached the bottom If, if we're at a food bank And I was like, Lord, like It was just the most humbling Yep I'm so grateful For the food bank, but there was a lot of emotions as you can still tell it, it put an into perspective how one blessed we were because of the generosity of others donating to the food bank so that they could be a blessing to us.
00:15:32.325 --> 00:15:32.914
And how
00:15:33.245 --> 00:15:35.894
helpful the food bank was to lots of people,
00:15:35.955 --> 00:15:39.625
the food bank, it was, and it wasn't, it wasn't a.
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No, but your mind plays tricks on you if you are in a position where you are needing that kind of help and it was one of those things where it was like I could, I could hold onto my pride and my children could go hungry or I could let go of the pride and just be like, you know what, this is, this isn't going to be forever and we will be in a position one day to be able to return the, the generosity.
00:16:14.059 --> 00:16:14.440
Right.
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So, oh, I say that to say if you find yourself in, in the similar situation, it's not always going to be that way.
00:16:28.730 --> 00:16:35.850
And I say for the ones who are in a position to be a blessing, what a great time of the year.
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yOu know, and we're in a position now where we can be that blessing and we can pay it back and we can pay it forward so that other people who might be feeling the weight.
00:16:48.585 --> 00:16:51.054
At this time of the year, maybe that will just ease it a
00:16:51.054 --> 00:16:51.475
little.
00:16:51.585 --> 00:16:52.815
Yeah, absolutely.
00:16:53.245 --> 00:17:01.294
It, I remember after I came back and you saw all the food that they were giving away and that wasn't even the only time there was another time.
00:17:01.585 --> 00:17:12.575
We'll get to that in a minute, but I remember us talking about it and then subsequent weeks after that, the following week or two and how it was in that moment that we realized that.
00:17:13.430 --> 00:17:23.720
aLmost this, this, we eat the pride, we push back on it and we're like, we're have to, we're going to have to ask for help and how that in the future made it for us so much.
00:17:23.730 --> 00:17:36.480
It's still hard to ask for help because you know, we're self sufficient people, we're independent, but it also paved the way for us to be able to look back and be like, Hey, people blessed us immensely and took care of things.
00:17:36.480 --> 00:17:37.430
I remember one year.
00:17:38.609 --> 00:17:40.220
I don't know who signed this up for this.
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I suspected, but they would always deny it to my face.
00:17:43.589 --> 00:17:47.500
But the one year we get a knock on the door, I got a phone call myself, my work cell phone.
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And I'm like, hi, this is Brian because I worked sometimes I worked with drug addicts and sometimes I get phone calls at like eight o'clock at night and I get this phone call from someone, Hey, this is something from a camera, the name of the Canadian shoppers, no Canadian wholesale, Canadian wholesale.
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Every year someone puts a name in.
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I'd like people put names in multiple names, like probably a hundred names will go into this thing and Shoppers Wholesale will bless one or two families, right?
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And so I get this phone call saying, Hey, this is Canadian Wholesale.
00:18:14.525 --> 00:18:15.694
And I thought I had a wrong number.
00:18:15.694 --> 00:18:18.275
I'm like, and I laughed on the phone.
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He's like, yeah, this is Brian.
00:18:19.224 --> 00:18:23.525
He said, no, we don't know that you're coming and said, Hey, well, you redirected them to me.
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It was like, yeah, no, I think I was like, now, did you, did you sign up for anything?
00:18:27.365 --> 00:18:29.115
And you're like, no, I was like, okay, what's going on?
00:18:29.434 --> 00:18:31.815
So literally five minutes later, this truck pulls up.
00:18:31.815 --> 00:18:32.214
No, no, no.
00:18:33.484 --> 00:18:34.414
What do you, what do you mean, no, no,
00:18:34.414 --> 00:18:42.724
no, because this was on, we were expecting our daughter on a Tuesday and so they had phoned on like, Oh
00:18:42.724 --> 00:18:43.704
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
00:18:43.704 --> 00:18:44.265
pregnancy.
00:18:44.394 --> 00:18:44.855
Yeah.
00:18:44.865 --> 00:18:49.884
They had phoned and they said, Hey, it's, you know, we got your name and you, you, congratulations.
00:18:49.884 --> 00:18:50.315
You won.
00:18:50.325 --> 00:18:52.184
And myself was like, Oh, scam.
00:18:52.634 --> 00:18:52.875
It's a
00:18:52.875 --> 00:18:53.255
scam.
00:18:53.464 --> 00:18:53.795
Scam.
00:18:53.795 --> 00:18:54.194
That's what I mean.
00:18:54.204 --> 00:18:54.464
It's like,
00:18:54.464 --> 00:18:56.315
did you sign up for anything?
00:18:56.315 --> 00:18:57.724
Like, I'm going to tell you where I live.
00:18:57.755 --> 00:18:58.075
Yeah.
00:18:58.265 --> 00:18:58.644
Anyways.
00:18:58.644 --> 00:18:59.914
They're like, they laughed on the phone.
00:18:59.914 --> 00:19:03.529
They're like, I know it seems hokey pokey, but it's legit.
00:19:03.680 --> 00:19:04.660
I'm pretty sure they didn't use hokey pokey.
00:19:04.670 --> 00:19:07.299
And so I was like, whatever, we'll see if you show up.
00:19:07.309 --> 00:19:09.589
So Monday, the day before our daughter was born.
00:19:10.404 --> 00:19:11.865
A what?
00:19:11.865 --> 00:19:13.585
It was a five ton cube
00:19:13.595 --> 00:19:15.295
van, but it was
00:19:15.295 --> 00:19:21.644
big, showed up and it was just like bag and boxes after boxes.
00:19:21.644 --> 00:19:21.845
They
00:19:21.904 --> 00:19:27.414
outfitted all of our kids with complete snowsuits, gloves, to scarves, jackets.
00:19:28.095 --> 00:19:31.275
Boots they gave us food to last us like two months.
00:19:31.275 --> 00:19:35.934
They gave us they gave us gifts the kids gifts of the unborn baby Gifts.
00:19:35.934 --> 00:19:38.224
Yeah, we had they gave us diapers
00:19:38.224 --> 00:19:45.325
and wipes which you know for those who are new parents that is blessing It's
00:19:45.325 --> 00:19:45.865
costly.
00:19:46.134 --> 00:19:46.384
Right.
00:19:46.615 --> 00:19:50.694
And so they, they gave us all this stuff and I just, I'm standing in there just in awe.
00:19:51.115 --> 00:19:52.154
Like what is happening?
00:19:52.154 --> 00:19:55.615
And Natalie is standing in the kitchen, just kind of like crying.
00:19:55.615 --> 00:19:57.755
You're crying in the kitchen while you're about to have a baby.
00:19:57.755 --> 00:19:58.845
So you're like, I'm done with this.
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00:18:56.315 --> 00:18:57.724
00:18:57.755 --> 00:18:58.075
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00:19:03.680 --> 00:19:04.660
00:19:04.670 --> 00:19:07.299
00:19:07.309 --> 00:19:09.589
00:19:10.404 --> 00:19:11.865
00:19:11.865 --> 00:19:13.585
00:19:13.595 --> 00:19:15.295
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00:19:35.934 --> 00:19:38.224
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00:19:45.325 --> 00:19:45.865
costly.
00:19:46.134 --> 00:19:46.384
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00:19:51.115 --> 00:19:52.154
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