Halloween, a bonus hour, and a playoff game in Bend we didn't expect to be playing

Halloween was last night. We spent it the way you spend Halloween with kids: costumes, candy, and a general sense that nobody was going to bed on time.

The clocks also fell back overnight, so Halloween came with a bonus hour.

Then the weekend handed us bigger news. Emmie’s soccer team made the playoffs.

The bad news is that the rankings didn’t go their way. The way the seeding shook out felt like a raw deal, and the reward is another trip back to Bend on Wednesday. Maybe it was truly unfair. Maybe it was just math. I’m not the ref, and nobody asked me.

Emmie is frustrated. She’ll tell you that herself. But she’s moving on, which is its own kind of strength at sixteen.

I wanted to make a speech when I heard about the seeding. I’m glad I didn’t.

Here’s what I’ve noticed about frustration at sixteen: it doesn’t need fixing. It needs room. Emmie was upset, she said so, and then she did something I didn’t expect. She asked what time we were leaving for Wednesday.

That’s the whole lesson, and she taught it to me. You can be frustrated and still ready. Those two things aren’t opposites.

Life hands out rough seeds all the time: the job that went to someone else, the bill that showed up early, the plan that got rearranged by something you didn’t control. What matters is the next thing you do. For her, it’s lacing up cleats in Bend on a Wednesday.

I will be in the stands.

Either way, I’m proud of how she’s handling it. A better seed would have been nice. The way she’s carrying this one is better.

Housekeeping, because this newsletter is supposed to be honest. A few weeks ago I shared holiday spending and debt numbers, and last week I quoted Thanksgiving dinner costs. Several of those figures came from last year’s surveys, and I should have said so. The 2026 Thanksgiving dinner survey usually comes out in mid-November, and I’ll share it when it does.

The fresh holiday numbers are in the next section.

The holiday season officially starts today, and the surveys don’t quite agree on what families will spend. Circana found households planning about $779, down from $796 last year, while Yahoo’s study landed at $849, up from $788. PwC puts average gift spending around $708, a 2% dip. The honest range is roughly $700 to $850 per household. U.S. holiday spending expected to dip as shoppers focus on value +2

The number that matters more is this one: 37% of shoppers took on holiday debt last season, averaging $1,223, and most of them expected it to take three months or more to pay off. That’s last Christmas still showing up on the February credit card statement. walnutinvest

Two more details worth knowing as Black Friday approaches:

The one decision to make before Black Friday: pick a total number for the whole season and write it down. Not per person. One total. Everything else (gifts, food, travel, the random stuff) comes out of it. Then, if you use BNPL at all, track every payment in one place with its due date.

THIS WEEK’S ACTION:
Open your notes app and write one line: “Holiday total: $____.” Decide it before the sales start, not after. Takes two minutes.

Note: This is financial education, not personalized advice.

Last night we got an hour back. Most of us slept through it, which might be the most underrated use of a free hour there is.

Today I’m trying to treat it like a gift instead of a loophole for squeezing in more productivity. No extra spreadsheets. No second round of edits.

It’s been a full fall, and November is about to get louder. A small bit of slack is worth protecting on purpose.

I hope you get a little of yours today too.

The result of Wednesday’s playoff game in Bend, Thanksgiving less than three weeks out, and a simple Black Friday game plan so the deals don’t run your budget.