Paid in Full

Well, it is a happy day!  After 40 years of house payments, we have officially paid off our mortgage.  Our house is paid for, free and clear.  This is a goal my husband and I have had since his retirement 12 years ago.  That goal being that when I retired (which was 2 years ago) our mortgage would be paid off.  It took 2 extra years but we reached that goal. 

In this day and age when seniors are worried how far their money will go in retirement and what kind of "paring down" they might have to do to survive, this is quite a load off our minds.  My husband and I have spent quite a bit of time working on what we have to have and what we can let go.  We went from 2 cars to one.  We now grocery shop once a month and have been stocking up the freezer and pantry.  We have locked away the credit cards to be used only in case of emergency.  We use cash whenever we want something and if we don't have the cash, we don't get it.  It may sound like we don't have any fun now that we are both retired, but that is not the case.  If anything, we are
enjoying our lives much more than when we worried about the credit card balances, mortgage payments, etc.  Yes, it would be great to be able to afford to go away every winter to AZ and/or NV to avoid all the snow, but at least we can afford to run away for a little while to escape the winter nutsies and enjoy the fact, we won't have to give up eating or a warm house to live in to afford it.

Memorial Day 2016

 On this Memorial Day, let us remember all our veterans whether active or inactive.  Theirs was the true acts of courage and selflessness.  Without them, we would not have the freedoms we have today.  Thank them and/or their families for their service.

Happy Day!!

I admit it.....my husband is addicted to lawn mowing.  He loves it and since we live on farmland, he has lots of opportunities to mow and mow and mow.  The greatness of his addiction to it was evident these past 2 weeks.  Ever since the weather got better, he has been working on our lawnmower to get it ready.  Now this lawnmower is old and he has nurtured it for the last 2 years to make it thru another summer.  This year, however, it was not going to make it no matter how much he did to it.  So, my husband made the ultimate decision to get a new one.  He went one morning to the store and returned with a big smile on his face saying he had purchased a new riding lawnmower.  When I inquired as to the price, he started off by saying, "now let me tell you about it first."  This is not a good sign.  It turns out he bought one of the top of the line mowers and paid a fair amount of money for it.  I was not happy but since this is his only vice, we will overlook it.  It couldn't be delivered until Saturday and wouldn't you know that after all the heat and sunshine of last weekend and the 5 days of rain this week, our grass has grown very high and the dandelions are reproducing like crazy.  Seeing the lawn like that was very hard on him.  It made my husband as antsy as a kid on Christmas waiting for Saturday.   This morning (Saturday), we got a call at 7:30am to let us know the mower would be delivered later this morning.  My husband was up, dressed and waiting patiently for it.  The truck just came and, what a sight, a 70 year old man all excited watching them take it off the truck.  Lawnmower Christmas has come to our house!

On behalf of...

On behalf of my son Eric's birthday today, I am posting one of my favorite pictures of my sons.

Inspiration 5-23-2016