all4money with INTENTION

Just to give a bit more info on this corner of my house...

The table was FREE. I saw it at the county dumpster site (we have a swap shop there). I had to literally fight a lady for it because I would be darned if I didn't leave with it --- I saw it first!! The table was in absolutely perfect condition and I didn't have to do a thing to it.

The books were FREE. My mom bought a boxful of books at a yard sale for like a buck. She gave me a few and voila.

The rod iron basket the balls are in was $1 at Goodwill.

The metal tray the books are on was $1 at Goodwill.

The 2 wooden candlesticks were just $1 at Goodwill.

The little jack-o-lantern thingys (I think they are luminaries?) were $3 at Goodwill... it was a brand new box of 12 of them and they are so blasted cute, that I had to buy them. I put a couple in this corner and I think it looks good.

The small pumpkins you see were FREE. A coworker gave me a basket of pumpkins and gourds a few years ago when she was cleaning out her stash. Love it!

I know you can hardly see it, but there is a huge rustic basket on the bottom shelf of the table holding our magazines. I bought a lot of 5 baskets at an auction recently for $1. So the cost of this one, I guess is like 20cents. I love this basket.

The Woodwick candle and Bath and Body Works candle below it (wrapped in jute twine) were FREE. I got these as gifts a few years ago.

There you go... proof that decorating doesn't have to be expensive.

What do you get when you go out and buy a bunch of ping pong balls, plastic baseballs, and an assortment of twine?




...use a bit of hot glue gun action and you get a lot of decorative balls! These would be so expensive if you bought them retail and I just love the way they look!

Remember my last post where I gave you a preview of those 2 ugly plates? Well, with a good coat of black paint, I am now using them (along with cheese domes) as cloches -- (before I knew what the word meant, I had to google it so don't feel bad if you have to as well). Perfect fit for the 2 cheese domes I had laying around - I had glass plate bases for these but the black plates just gives it more substance, ya know? Not bad for a 50cent plate!

Before:




After:

The Christmas 2008 frame now houses a monogram (simply printed from the computer) of our last name... doesn't it look nice!?


The old ugly bronzy picture frame holder got a good coat of black paint and voila... looks much better (It's holding up the 'F' picture frame. That picture frame started out HOT PINK but again, black paint to the rescue-- same with all the other frames you see.)

Oh, and see that mirror in the background? Not the cheap $1.50 one I got this past Sat. but this one is much bigger and is another thrift store find from last week - priced at just $20 but I was able to talk down the store manager to $12! It fits perfectly above our mantle.

The cheapo, but new pillar candle I got for 0.25cents, looks nice on top of the $2 tall rod iron candle holder I got from Goodwill last week!


More to come with all my other goodies from the yard sale find this weekend... but in the meantime, look what I found at Goodwill today for just 0.50cents each --- aren't they purdy!? NOT! Just wait to see what I plan to do with these...

I don't normally go to yard sales just because I usually don't have any luck finding anything cheap enough around here (where I live, yard sale prices are crazy) and I don't like driving around aimlessly either -- so I tend to stick with shopping at thrift stores. But, anywho, we were heading home from our soccer games Sat morning and I noticed a big "indoor yard sale" sign at a local Moose Lodge. It was about 11:00 so I knew they were probably going to wrap up soon, but I figured why not? To my delight, they were letting everything go at 50% off sticker so I grabbed up some stuff and spent a whopping $6! Here's what I got:

*a fairly big mirror in great condition - just needs cleaning up
*a darling stuffed bear picture (but I really just wanted the frame)
*a brand new picture frame (sticker on it said $14.99 from Kohls) -- of course the matting says Christmas 2008 but again, just got it for the frame
*2 small wood shelves
*new pillar candle - I have just the spot for this baby
*candle stick and hurricane
*large glass vase
*2 small votive glass holders that I hope to do something cool with
*3 brand new boxes of Christmas candle stuff: votive holder, 2 votive candles, and small pinecone/berry mixture in each box
*brass picture frame/plate display holder
*bag of green grass/moss stuff for crafts
**a black rod iron cool candle holder thingy (my DH claimed this one ASAP to display one of his little collectible figurines on so it's not in the pictures below)

I think I scored pretty good with my $6! Stay tuned for what some of these items will be transformed into!

Busy, busy, busy...

I helped my mom with the 4th and hopefully, final yard sale of the season on Sat. We made $422 total. She kept $200, gave me $200, gave my oldest DD $10 and my youngest DD $12 (she sold $2 worth all by herself). My sis and her hubby was visiting and we all camped out in my mom's yard... gosh, it got COLD overnight, like bone chilling cold. We knew it would be cold so we covered up the kids pretty good but we didn't do so well for ourselves. At around 6am, DH and I decided we had enough and went in the house and slept for a few more hours. The next night, the girls slept out in the tents again but DH and I didn't even attempt it so we stayed in the house like the chickens we are. Sunday, we had DH's family reunion to go to as well. All in all, a very busy weekend, but enjoyed all the family time.

Today, I took my $200 cash and spent it at the local thrift store. I had been looking for a treadmill and/or elliptical machine for months now -- looking at craigslist, newspaper classifieds, and thrift stores. Lo and behold, this thrift store which is on the other side of town and one that I hardly ever go to, had a ton of exercise equipment -- and better yet, a big sign was up that said "1/2 off Exercise Equipment". Yahooie! I got an electric treadmill for $75 and a small elliptical for $40. I think that is a good deal for both pieces... sure, they aren't the most lavish machines but they do the job and are in great shape. Now, I have to figure out where to set up my new "home gym" in the house.

I have recently gotten way into "vintage" home decorating as well. There are a ton of great blogs out there that I am now addicted to... showing lots of great pictures of projects people do with thrift store finds, crafting projects, broken and old furniture, and basically, other people's trash. I have always enjoyed going to thrift stores but it was mainly for clothing deals. I always looked past the home decor stuff but now it's got my attention. I've bought several small pieces at Goodwill and look forward to tapping into my near-nonexistent creative side! I figured I would try to start with some simple Fall decorating ideas and see where that might lead me. Stay tuned...

I'm starting to get interested in revamping old stuff and really getting into estate sales and auctions. At the last week's auction, I bought a box lot of stuff that I just really had no idea what everything was... but for $2, it wasn't a huge risk. There were some cool finds in the box -- here is the smallest desk fan I have ever seen. Isn't it the cutest thing?! I took the picture with a ruler next to it for you to see the size... barely 5 in' tall. Love it!

Both DH and I get paid on the last working day of each month... that means that our next payday is Aug 31. Don't you guys hate having to wait til each payday? It's torture sometimes!

We will be getting some "extra" funds this week though which will help. $227 from my employer as travel reimbursement and $480 from my flexible spending account. I so underestimated our needs for the spending account this year... I elected for just $480 for the entire year and we ate that all up in one month's time. What I didn't account for was that our youngest DD would need glasses which cost a fortune. Oh, well - better some than nothing, I guess. So, that's an additional $707 that I will get to play with this week and that will hold me until payday. I just like to "book" the monthly contributions to our various accounts in my spreadsheet and can't do that until we get paid each month. I'm such a dork!

DH and I can't decide on whether to use our "extra" money to put as a down payment on a piece of investment property or to use the money to pay for the installation of a heat pump/air condition unit for our house?? The property we are looking at is listed for $79k. It's an older brick home that we plan on spending about $10k to renovate and then either rent it or sell it (whichever comes first). I have always wanted to get into real estate investment and have been looking for something, almost daily, over the past few years. We'd offer $60k on it and go no more than $65k.

OR, we can pony up around $8k to install AC in our house. We currently live in the mountains where it only gets really hot about 2 months out of the year. We've lived in our house for 4 years now and haven't really thought about installing a whole house unit until this year. Since the tax credit will be expiring this Dec, we thought we'd look into it now. We currently have two window units for the bedrooms and that works out nicely for sleeping in comfort. But, the main living spaces do get pretty hot when it gets over 85 degrees outside.

So, we have to decide if:

(1) We take this chance to jump into the real estate investment arena (the recession hasn't really hit our area at all in terms of dropping real estate prices). If we get that house for $60k, we'd put 20% down or $12k. It would take about $10k to fix it up which puts our total investment in at about $22k. The mortgage would be approx. $350 per month and we could easily rent the place out for $700 per month bringing us a gross profit of $350 per month. Or, we could try to sell it for around the $110k price which is lower than the prices of the neighborhood bringing us a profit, before fees, of $28k.

OR (2) we can take $8k and invest it in our own home to install AC. We currently use gas forced air (propane) and the yearly cost of propane for us is about $1k. I'm told the cost for heating the house with a heat pump will save us tremendously in heating costs over the course of the year. And, there is that little thing of comfort during the hot months with the AC available. We had our house for sale for 2 years and just took it off the market with absolutely zero offers. So, we can enjoy the heat/AC now and it would be an additional selling point when we do put it back on the market next year.

I know the common sense approach is probably to go with option 2 and get the AC unit but my gut keeps telling me to not let this investment property go... I want to definitely start small and not get in over my head with real estate investing and this particular property will allow me to do just that.

Thoughts?

We are interested in renting out a small booth at a local antique mall to get rid of some of our junk (but good stuff). The rental fee per month is $65 and the store management gets a 10% commission from every sale. We can just go month to month without locking ourselves to anything long term. Unless I've done the math incorrectly, we would need to sell at least $73 to just break even each month which I do think is very doable ($73x0.9-$65). The store takes care of everything and we just need to keep up the inventory, pricing, and presentation. What do you guys think of these kinds of things?

Today is the first day of school for the kids (and DH since he's a teacher). I am so thankful! Money goes out the window during the summers because they (DH and the kids) eat out nearly every day for lunch. It drives me batty... since I work all year long, DH takes the kids and runs errands and whatnot in town and stops at a fast food joint just about every day. During the school year though, I pack them lunches so we save a ton of money on food while school is in session. We've spent so much money this summer so I am very glad to see some "normalcy" come back into our financial lives.

Ever felt blah with life? That's me, right now... just blah. We just got back from a week at the beach and you would think that I would feel refreshed and whatnot. But, instead, I feel blah. Maybe, it is because of all the money we spent -- not on stupid souvenir junk -- but on food! We went with DH's entire side of the family so there were 13 of us total in a 4 bedroom condo. We split the groceries 4-ways but I think we got the short end of the stick... see, our little family of 4 don't eat much, especially when it comes to condiments. I know that sounds strange, but DH's family wanted and bought 2 big tubs of butter, jelly, cream cheese, ketchup, mustard, whip cream, hot fudge, nut toppings, fancy flavored coffee and fancy flavored cream for their coffee, etc... and then there is the junk food. They bought boxes of Little Debbie cakes, tons of donuts, several bags of chips, cakes, cookies, etc. No wonder they are all plus-sized! Geez. I always knew that they loved to eat, especially butter, but this was one of those in-your-face moments, you know? So, for a week at the beach, we had to spend almost $100 for just groceries --- that we didn't eat but just a little of! Yes, that is right--- it was nearly $400 for all the groceries that was bought for the entire family! Outrageous! And then, DH's mom always has to eat dinner at a restaurant each night (not fast food or Subway kinds of restaurants). So, even though our little family tried to eat reasonably, we still ended up spending an average of $40-$45 each night for 6 nights! So, for a week at the beach, our family of 4 spent about $350 for just food! No wonder I'm feeling blah right now.

Oh, and I just have to share... one night we made ice cream sundaes. Great summer treat, right? I proceeded to make our girls a small bowl of ice cream. DH's sister makes her kids these gigantic bowls of like 4 scoops of ice cream smothered in hot fudge, whip cream and nuts ON TOP of apple pies. Now, believe me, I'm all for having a treat... but I added up the calories for this outrageous concoction... it was over 1,000 calories! She made one for each of her 3 kids, herself, and DH's parents. They ate every bite of it!

Back story... DH has the summers off and stays home with the kids. I have to work year round. DH is a night owl and doesn't go to bed til 2am most nights so the kids fend for themselves from the time they wake up (around 10am) to when he gets up around noon. I'm at work by 7am and get home around 6pm (Mon-Thur) during the summer months.

My parents live in the next county over but have a place here where we live and when they are in town, my parents like to cook ethnic dishes for me (we are Asian). DH (who is Caucasian) always teases me about how they always want to feed me. Well, my mother asks me to come eat dinner with her when I get off work today. I said ok. I call DH around 3pm and tell him this and he gets mad at me! He said in no uncertain terms, "What about us? I'm your husband and you have kids to see too. Will we not see you all day?" I respond that I should be home around 7pm so it's not that late. He asks if mom was going to make something he and the kids would eat and I said no (they don't eat a lot of what my parents make). We then get into a argument because I consider it a very nice gesture for my parents to take time to cook meals for me but he said that they should consider him and the kids as well and make stuff everyone would eat. That made me so mad... I mean, it's not like my parents are getting any younger and I enjoy the time I get to spend with them. They are Asian, therefore they make the food they know how to make...I'm not about to ask them to make up a batch of chicken pot pie or something just so DH can eat it too. Geez. I told DH that he is being selfish and that he is more than able to fix something for him and the kids to eat. Heck, I'll come home and fix them dinner if need be but oh, I was f@*!!& mad at his attitude. I finally told him that there was just no more to discuss and hung up.

So, was I wrong? Was I getting mad for no reason?

So, I helped mom with her yard sale (continuation from a few weeks ago, see earlier post) on Sat, July 3. We were open from 7am to 2pm and made a grand total of $489! She gave me $300 and she kept $189. We have one more to do this year at her place of employment scheduled for Aug 7 so hopefully we will get rid of all our stuff that day.

DH sold some more of his "A" stuff and has $1400 to do with as he pleases. He wants to use this money to buy a 2009 Honda Ruckus (basically it is a moped) that he's found on craigslist. The guy is asking $1700 for it which is right around the book value for it. DH is going to meet up with him tomorrow to see the bike and if he likes it, I told him to offer the guy $1400 cash as a firm offer since that's how much he's got. DH thinks that is not enough, that $1500 would be more reasonable and then they might settle in the middle at $1600. DH has never been a good negotiator so I'm afraid that he'll sway from a firm $1400 price (if he really likes the bike). I mean, it's not like we don't have the extra $200 for this but... you know how our budget conscious frugal minds work here on SA! At $1400, that is like a discount of 18% off the asking price... anyone have this kind of luck negotiating a deal before with a purchase off of craigslist?

Well, it's June 30 which means payday for DH and me (we get paid at the end of each month). We currently put away $970 into various savings (Roths, mutual funds, etc) automatically for our paychecks and have done so since Jan when I got my last raise. Since we paid off all our non-mortgage debt last month, we are also going to add another $525 into savings this month (amount varies to our needs each month). Also, I get a "bonus" twice a year, in June and Nov. So, the net of my June "bonus" is $1,115. That is going into savings as well. In June, we also received the remaining balance in our medical flexible spending account of $276 and got reimbursed for some travel expenses in the amount of $653. With the extra $400 in yard sale proceeds from a few weeks ago, the amount that went into savings for the month of June is.....

yard sale = $400
travel reimbursement = $653
flexible spending reimbursement = $276
bonus pay = $1,115
regular monthly savings = $970

Total = $3,414!!

Our goal right now is to re-build our emergency fund to at least $20k (we took a portion of this fund to pay off that last credit card) The balance with June's contributions is now $6,281. We don't count our Roth accounts or our mutual fund balances into our e-fund balances so it's good to know that those are there in the event of a MAJOR emergency (those have healthy balances)...

Now, July will be a different story as all we are expecting are just our normal paychecks. The "extra" money in June sure was fun to play with though!

I am weighing in at 115 lbs this morning... the least I've weighed since having children 11 years ago! However, this means I have 7-9 lbs left to lose to reach my target weight of 106-108 lbs and I just have 23 days to do it... guess it won't be happening unless I step into high gear and exercise like a crazy woman each day until then. {{Insert Big Sigh}}

Let's see what determination can do these next 23 days!

1. We decided not to move forward with the lot purchase idea. We just couldn't justify paying anywhere near the $99k they are asking for just a 0.5 acre lot. Even if they took $60k for it, my mother told me that it was still way too much to pay for such a small piece of land. We'll keep an eye on it and see what kind of activity actually happens on it though.

2. We are moving closer toward buying a small fixer-upper though as a rental (then a flip once the market really picks up). We have decided to focus on the neighboring county which has much lower property values and finding a house listed between $80-$100k. We have lined up with our realtor to look at 5 houses on Sat that fit this criteria so we'll see.

So, anyway, these are the decisions we've made today... who knows what we'll decide on tomorrow though {{wink}}. Aahh, the joys of real estate.

3. We have another scheduled showing tomorrow. So, in 3 weeks, that will make 5 showings. Activity is definitely picking up but now it's just a matter of someone making an offer on our house! C'mon, people! Whatcha waiting for?

I'm continually searching for something to invest in and I've got my eyes on a piece of property. My main criteria is that it's got to be flat and accessible (we live in the mountains). I've run across a listing that has been on the market for nearly a year now. It's smack dab in the middle of town and is flat as a pancake. We would build a nice but not extravagant house on it for us to grow old in...

Only problem is that the price is outrageous... they are asking $99k for this 0.53 acre lot!

Looking straight at the lot from the road (the lot is basically all the high grass that you see)



Looking at the lot with the neighboring house on the left (for your frame of reference of how the lot lays flat when the tall grass is mowed)


The house is in a neighborhood so I don't have to worry about major traffic issues and as you can see, it's super flat. There are also no trees to remove or any grading that has to be done.

The kicker is that a development company bought this lot back in 2007 for exactly $100k. I don't want to pay anymore than $60k for it but I know they'll just laugh at me. Sigh.

Added: I found a picture of the lot with the grass mowed down.

Sat morning, I had a yard sale with my mom at her house. We pooled together our stuff as well as all the money collected to be split at the end. We "opened" at 7:00am and had to shut down abruptly at 11:30am because it started raining. For 4.5 hours of work, guess how much we made??? A whopping $559.50! That's nearly $125 per hour! My mom gave me $400 and she kept the $159. We still had so much stuff left that if it hadn't been for the rain, we probably would've made $200 more. We are planning to sell the rest of the stuff in another yard sale on July 3. My mom is the ultimate salesman... she could sell sand to a guy living in the desert!

Ok, our scheduled second showing came and went. DH got home and saw that no one had been in the house. All the lights were on and nothing was touched. He was so upset because of all the effort we put into this showing. I emailed our realtor to see if she had heard anything about why the other realtor and her clients didn't bother to come like they were supposed to. Heard nothing all night. This this morning, I checked my email and see a feedback form from the other realtor. Apparently, the clients were supposed to look at 2 houses yesterday, ours and another, both second showings. After they saw the other one for their second time, they decided to go ahead and put in an offer on that one! The deciding factor was that it was in town and ours is not (ours is just 4 miles outside of town). Geez --- another opportunity to sell is gone and now we are back to square one. At this point, it feels as if we'll never sell this house! UGH! How frustrating!

Stuff we did for the showing today (second visit for this family)-

Outside: I bought 3 hanging baskets to put around the front covered porch. I bought a new plant to put in the flower garden (there was an empty spot there where I had to remove a dead plant)... 3 bags of mulch later, the flower garden looks great! DH weedeated the entire yard and some of our neighbor's too. He then spent about an hour cleaning up the gravel coming onto our driveway from our neighbor's driveway - weird situation here where we share a main driveway which is paved but the neighbor's didn't want to pave their part of the driveway going to their house so there's always gravel traveling down the shared main driveway. The neighbors just don't take care of their yard like we do so we have to do it a lot of the time.

Inside: All the rooms are tidy and clean. No clutter anywhere. I bought some fresh cut flowers to put in the kitchen. I set out some individually packaged snacks, candy, and water on the dining table with a printed note saying "Thank you for considering this great house as YOUR next HOME! Please enjoy the refreshments." I cleaned all the bathrooms, no clothes in the washer or dryer, no dishes in the dishwasher, and most of the cabinets have been straightened up nicely.

Now, we just have to wait until 2:00 when the showing is scheduled. I really, really, really want this to be a success with an offer attached to it! Pretty please with a cherry on top!

We have a second showing scheduled for tomorrow! Cross your fingers for us that these folks love every square inch of the house and want to put in an offer after looking at it again.

Back story on this family. They are from out of town. The husband is starting this fall with our local university and so that is why they are moving into the area. Our house has all 3 bedrooms on the second story and they liked having them all together since they have one small child and another on the way (instead of the more popular master on the main level floor plan). They also indicated after they saw the house the first time that they liked our finished open basement area since it provided them an extra family room space. When they came through town the last time, they looked at 14 houses and picked their top 3 (one of which was ours), so we made the first cut and that is why they are coming back to look at ours again.

I'm so excited for the possibility of how this may turn out. I'm going to buy some fresh flowers for the porch and for the inside of the house today. DH mowed the yard 2 days ago which is awesome since we've had rain the past couple of days and today as well. With a thorough cleaning tonight, we should be good to go. Can you guys think of anything else I could do to make our house stand out tomorrow?

Wow, at this rate, I'll be at a slim 106 lbs on my target date of July 22. Now, I realize that this may be that initial weight loss that will eventually stabilize itself out as I go along, but I'm still excited. I am trying to work out at least 30 minutes if not an hour each day and so far so good. I'm also watching my portion size.

It's amazing how it all just boils down to will power and determination. That's the way it is with me... if I 100% commit myself to doing something, it'll get done. I can't just want to do something half way--- else it'll never get done.

I just registered our family for a 5k race that is happening in a couple of weeks. It's $25 for each person, which for us means $100. Yes, this sounds like a lot but it is going towards cancer research so I think, if anything, it'll help our kids to understand that sometimes we need to give to good causes (even if it seems like a lot of money) when we can. We'll just cut back somewhere else in our budget this month.

Friday night - our youngest DD had a campout at school. It was DH's turn to do the camping since I did it when our oldest went through it a couple of years ago... it turned out to be a great night for everyone as I had a super time with our oldest just by ourselves. We rented The Blind Side and snuggled in with some popcorn, while DH spent the evening with little DD roasting up smores with all the kids.

We took the kids to see the musical "Wicked" on Saturday -- none of us knew a thing about the story but boy, was it a show! We absolutely loved it! Great music and the story was fantastic. The 2 hour drive to get there and the $300+ price tag for the four of us to see it was absolutely worth it.

Sunday was spent with my entire family -- sisters and their families were up for the Holiday weekend... had fun eating and just hanging out with each other.

All in all, a wonderful weekend but now, back to a boring no-spend week (since we spent a lot this weekend).

1. DH and I agreed to a "no spend week" starting today, Monday, through this Friday. We are going to see if we can make it through 5 days of absolutely no cash going out at all. Our cupboards are full, the cars have about half a tank of gas each, and we don't have anything pressing to worry about this week. Cross your fingers!

2. I started on May 22 to buckle down and lose the last 10 pounds that I need to before our beach trip in July. I even put on my 2-piece suit and had DD take my "before" picture! Ugh. I'm at 118 lbs now and want to reach 108 (better yet 105) before July 22 rolls around. So far so good. On Sat, May 22, I started out running (and walking) in a 5k race. Then on Sun morning, I worked out with Fit TV for an hour and took the kids to the local park with the dog -- walked for another hour or so. Then this morning, I worked out with Fit TV for half an hour and will be running at the kids' track practice tonight for another hour. Believe me, I'm not a runner but I am intent on losing these stubborn pounds. Last April 2009, I got on the exercise regime and lost 15 pounds putting me at my current 118 so I can't complain. At least I've been able to maintain that weight for a year and didn't gain it all back... now I just need to lose that last 10 and I'll be good to go!

3. I have such a positive outlook on my life right now and it feels so good. We paid off all our non-mortgage debt just last week or so and look forward to June when we can start saving our money more instead of sending our money to creditors. No car loans, no credit card debts, no personal or student loans - life is good

On April 17, I posted the two week picture below of the cucumber seeds we planted using the method suggested by cptacek... here is the pic again:



And now 5 weeks later, on May 24, look at my beautiful cucumber plant!



The smaller pot on the left contains the seedlings from tomato seeds I planted a couple of weeks ago.

I've never had luck with seeds until now so thanks so much to cptacek for giving me the idea to do it this way.

I have cucumbers, tomatoes, and watermelon coming up so far and look forward to June when I will transplant these guys outside.

Ok, so I got my MBA in Dec 09 with the intention to further my professional opportunities with it. I got a $2500 raise at work because of it which I'm so grateful for... and now with my MBA, I am qualified to be an adjunct (part-time) instructor at our local community college. So, I just mailed off the application and my transcripts. I indicated that I want to teach accounting or business administration courses... I think it would be a nice challenge and something different for me to explore -- I could teach at nights/weekends and this wouldn't interfere with my "real" job. Heck, it can't be that hard, can it? Does anyone out there do this too? I would enjoy the challenge and of course, the extra income would be cool too.

Please send your positive energy our way. We've had our house listed for 2 years now and no offers. The feedback has consistently been that the house is wonderful, priced well, and in excellent condition. So, why no offers? Who knows? We had a showing last Friday evening but no hopes of that one turning out in our favor (the realtor said the buyer liked another one better that they say that same night).

However, we just got a call from our realtor that there is going to be another showing tomorrow at noon. Please, please, please let this be the one! We are just tired of having to clean the house (and we clean it up spotless for every showing) and not 'living' in it, you know? We are very fortunate for NOT HAVING to have to sell the house due to any financial hardships or anything like that so we know that we are inconveniencing ourselves and it's our own faults since we DON'T HAVE to move anywhere. But, we just WANT to move... alas, the house is on the market and we aren't going to give it away by undercutting the price way low, so on with the inconveniences.

We visited my parents this weekend (they live just 30 minutes away) and had a conversation about their next door neighbor's house. The lady that owns that house is very elderly and hasn't lived in the house for years now. She lives with a daughter somewhere and her kids just pitch in to have the yard taken care of and they come and take care of the inside of the house every other week or so. My mom has been eyeing this house because she wants us to buy it when/if the family ever gets around to selling it since it's a great house. Well, we've had this conversation many times over the years and I've always replied that it would be too much of a commute for us (we currently live 5 minutes away from our jobs). However, this weekend, my mom said that SHE would buy the house if we would live in it and take care of it. We wouldn't have any mortgage or rent at all and could bank that expense into our long-range savings goals. Needless to say, I got excited over this prospect even with the 30 minute commute issue. Hmmm... just something to think about!

First, let me say that I absolutely hate running. My theory throughout life is that I will only run if something or someone was chasing me! Well, last night during the kids' track practice, DH and I decided that we would actually run a little (gasp)! We've walked during their practices which has been great but for whatever reason, I felt motivated to run last night. So, 4 laps on the track is equal to one mile and that is what I did. Granted I didn't run the entire 4 laps at once but broke it down into manageable pieces, 1 lap of running, 1 lap of walking, and repeat. We did a total of 3 miles last night. Anyway, what an accomplishment for me! Heck, I may keep trying to run a mile during each track practice (twice a week) and before summer, I might actually be in pretty good shape. I turn 35 years old tomorrow so maybe this will help slow down the aging process for me... ha ha. The ladies at work made me brownies today for my b-day which were so good! This counteracts the running I did last night but who cares? The family is going to participate in the girls' school fundraiser tomorrow which is a 5k race/walk so see, it all evens out... Life is a balancing act, isn't it? So, even though my birthday isn't until tomorrow, I plan to welcome it with open arms and look forward to another 35 great years!