Excitement!

Our house is abuzz this week. It has been a great week and it's only Tuesday! First, as you know we are getting ready to drive to Utah, on what we originally thought was going to be Friday night, but it turns out that we are able to leave on Thursday night instead. I am excited that we will be able to spend another day there with the family and getting to see everyone will be very nice. I'm really looking forward to the trip, though not necessarily the drive. If you have a chance to send up a prayer for us between now and then, we'd appreciate it. Specifically please be praying for the drive to go safely as we'll be leaving Thursday night after Chris gets off of work, and driving through the night. I plan on napping that afternoon when the kids are napping, and sending them to bed early so that I can get a few hours sleep before Chris gets home, then I will drive the first part of our journey while Chris sleeps and then he can take over after a few hours sleep. I'm sure once we get there we'll probably crash for a few hours, letting the kids play with the family there, then we'll be refreshed and ready to go after that.

We also found out this morning that we did get the house on Pershing. I am so grateful to a friend of mine from our MOPS group that encouraged me to call the lady on the house, even though it wasn't going to be ready until the 20th of April. We are moving into a 3 bedroom 2 bath house, with about a 1/4 acre back yard. The house is mostly hard wood floors, with the exception of the kitchen, bath and family room. There is some cosmetic work to be done, it needs painting and work done in the bathroom (it's fully livable) but we are being allowed to paint it whatever colors/decor we want (with the exception of black) and she is paying for the cost of materials. She has also said that we will work something out in regards to the cost of labor, which probably means taking the cost off of our rent. We're across the street from a peach orchard, and allowed to have as many peaches as we want when they come in bloom. I can't wait as peaches are my favorite fruit. I think once I start seeing them bloom and produce fruit I'll be waiting with baited breath. The house has a brand new fridge, stove, and sink in the kitchen, and a new toilet and sink in the bathroom. That kinda stinks because we just bought a fridge thinking we'd need one in a house that we were going to rent, so we're going to sell ours. We have a 6 month used stainless steel side by side fridge for sale now if anybody knows someone who needs one. We bought it off of Craigslist from someone who used it to decorate houses she was selling, and didn't have any room for it. She had only used it for about 6 months, and most of that was light use just for the contractors/people working on the houses to put their lunches in. I'm sooo excited and can't wait. The owners of the house are also planning on selling the house in the next few years, which is about the same time we're planning on buying, and they're willing to do a lease option with us as well if we are interested in that as the time goes on. It is a little bit of a jump in price, so we are having to buckle down our finances a bit more, but we're also going through Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University, which is teaching us how to better manage our money, so I think we can do it!

On the Financial Peace University thing, I highly recommend it to anyone! I've learned so much in the past three weeks, and am looking forward to the next 10 to get on top of our money management issues and start saving for retirement/college for the kids. I'm excited that we're paying off bills that we haven't been able to in the past, and we're looking forward to getting completely debt free! I want to be able to call into his radio show and yell, "I'm COMPLETELY debt free!!!!" and retire comfortably knowing that my children will have a secure financial future and not have to worry about them getting caught in the same trap that we've been caught in so many times before and have struggled to get out of. It has also strengthened our communication over money. Dave's approach is simple, easy to understand, and if you use the tools he gives you, it works. I've heard nothing but good things about the program in general and am completely satisfied with what I've seen so far. I hope that you will consider it if this is an issue in your life, it's changing ours, and has changed hundreds of others!