<prompt> Human: We are a family of 4 and live in the Seattle area. For some reason it feels like when we get a few steps ahead, we then take twice that back.2 adults and 2 kids. Both kids are under the age of 16 and in school. We have a single income of 135kyr. Mortgage, 1 car payment, all the usual stuff. We have 8k in credit card debt at 8 interest rate. My wife has 36k in student loan debt. We also have a 401k loan that is 700 a month until October 2014. We took that loan to get the down payment on our house, which is a bad idea I know. But so is paying just as much rent as you would pay for a mortgage on a house. I felt that was a risk worth taking. But then again I could be wrong.We continue to live paycheck to paycheck, which just seems silly to me considering how much we make. I feel a lot of it is tied to splurging, but excessive splurging on food. Like last month Im going to guess we spent 1200 on food. We were on vacation so thats a bit higher that normal, but not much.Any tips you could provide would be great!  <response>: How are taking a vacation when you have 8k in credit card debt and havent paid back your 401k??It sounds like you are simply living beyond your means even though your means are significant I know Seattle is expensive though. Have you checked out rfrugal? Some of the ideas in there are a little extreme for the average personfamily but I bet you can pick up some tips in there that work for you. My advice is get a handle on your spending by monitoring it closely you will be appalled at where much of your money goes, create an emergency savings, get rid of that CC debt ASAP, pay your 401k back and that will free up a lot on your monthly income for saving, investing, fun, etc. 