This was the show I watched last night. It was a great show and got me a little more motivated with some great ideas. There were four people on the show talking about retirement. David Bach, Barbara Cocoran, Phil Town and Laural Langemeier. They all had a different story as to how they became Millionaires and steps to retiring. Pretty interesting. The next show is set to air on CNBC for June 17 at 9:00 p.m. about becoming Debt Free.

I have two extremely tall Elm trees, probably 40 feet or higher. Well, they both budded this year, the leaves opened and now it looks like fall around here. The tops of the trees are completely dead. They have both died from Elm Disease.

Now, I have to take them down. They are ten feet from my home and used to keep my home shaded in the summer, but I can run the risk of them falling on my home.

Just one catch, one of my trees has been used for my telephone pole forever. My house is just a little to far from the pole to connect without the line being to close to the ground. We do have a solution and the trees must go.

I am now going to put a garage in that area. I have been wanting a garage, just unsure where to put it until now.

My brothers are going to take them down and one of my brothers is using the wood to heat his home this winter.

For May, I have spent:

$446.40 on groceries
$204.13 on eating out
$216.26 on gas; and

Totaling $866.79/month or $216.69/week on just these three areas alone. These are some of the areas I am going to try to tweak.

It has been five months since starting my Total Money Makeover.

I had listed all my debts, real estate that I owned and other items that either deplete my money, time or exhaust me. I wrote everything down and said "what can I do without" and "how can I lower my overall expenses". I went through each category and either eliminated it, reduced it or sold it.

I have sold off a piece of vacant real estate that was costing me more in upkeep than it was appreciating, lowered my homeowner's and vehicle insurances $700 less per year, eliminated some cell phone plans and went to pay-as-you-go phones and have added to my rapid debt reduction and have paid off two debts so far.

For May, I have spent:
$446.40 on groceries
$204.13 on eating out
$216.26 on gas; and

Have started my two summer jobs, which I will use the money to rapidly reduce my debt over the next three months. I can't wait to see where my debt is at on September 1st.