How We Achieved Southwest Companion Pass Status in 2019

Southwest Airlines and their branded credit cards offer an insane travel opportunity that make them worth their weight in gold. THE COMPANION PASS The Companion Pass stipulations per southwest.com “Companion Pass is the benefit that allows you to choose one person to fly with you, free of airline charges (does not include taxes and fees […]

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2018 in Review and Goals for the New Year

  In spite of my not having worked the first three months of 2018 (against my will, for once), financially the Warckens crushed it last year. I didn’t start working until the first week of April, and just to show how much of a sugar mama I am, I made more in my first two […]

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What Would You Do With A Million Dollars?

  When we moved from Oklahoma to Arizona I drove the Subaru, Sheila, and Greg drove the Tundra, who he named Percolator? Harvey Judgerson? I can’t remember. The point is, I had a lot of hours to listen to financial podcasts and think about money in the solitary comfort of my own vehicle. How much […]

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How Much Would It Cost NOT To Work This Summer?

  I’m nearing the end of my contract- only five weeks left! As always, when we’re facing the end we have to decide whether I’m going to extend, or if I’m going to find another nursing contract elsewhere, or if we’re going to take a few months off to do what we really love, which […]

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Big Island on a Budget

  Hawai’i is notoriously expensive but there are lots of ways to keep your trip reasonable, not limited to sleeping in your rental car, eating nothing but pb&js, and showering at public beach parks. PSYCH! Okay, we dabbled in those things. Greg and I just spent an awesome, like ready to move there, 8 days/8 […]

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20+ Ways to Work Less This Year

  It’s not that Greg and I don’t like to work, it’s just that we want to work on our terms, in between big chunks of time off. Since 2013 we’ve averaged just 7.8 months of employment a year, and that’s including {{{shudder}}} an entire year working full time. Side note: In that year we […]

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40+ Ways to Travel More this Year

  I love helping people travel more. Not as much as I love helping people get their finances under control, because that always takes precedence over vacations, but almost. Obviously the Warckens love to travel, and we are massively fortunate to be able to do it so often. We make it a point to set […]

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Hilton Status Match Through 2019

  For a limited time Hilton is offering free status match to their Honors program. If you have elite status with any other hotel programs you can apply for a free match on Hilton’s Status match page. Chase IHG cardmembers get automatic Platinum Elite status and the past two years we’ve both used ours to […]

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Greenland’s Arctic Circle Trail

  Greg and I love heavy pack, set up camp, snuggle all night in a cold tent backpacking, but having a roof over our heads in the backcountry is an unbelievable luxury. After we hiked the Laugavegur and Tour du Mont Blanc trails in 2016, I started researching other hut hikes around the world. And by […]

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2016 World Series

  Unless you don’t have a pulse, you probably heard the Chicago Cubs won the World Series last week.   Greg and I got to go to games 4, and 6, and were incredibly, undeniably, unbelievably (I won’t say lucky because it wasn’t luck) fortunate to have seen the Cubs’ 108 year drought come to an end […]

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