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Ok, I know it's been an exasperatingly long time since I posted here, and all kinds of things have been going on this year.  Let me attempt to recap:

On a visit to give us our belated Christmas present, our 'uncle' Ray mentioned that his daughter and son-in-law were trying to sell a duplex they used to live in and had been renting out for the past several years. I said, "Oh, really? We'd been thinking of buying a duplex and renting the other part out to (my best friend) Dan." This was a scenario I'd always hoped would eventually arise, but as the days passed and we presented the idea to Dan, it became obvious that buying this house would save both us and Dan money. Dan's apartment complex is nice, but his rent had kept increasing each year, plus he had to pay extra each month for his cat and his car port, and it was starting to become more expensive than he could afford. Plus, he lives on the opposite side of town from where he works, so he spends quite a bit on gas each day. This new house would cut his drive almost in half. (It is only 3 miles north of where we formerly lived.) For us, with Dan paying one flat rent payment to us each month, it would end up costing us much less than what we'd been paying for our mortgage on the old house. So, we took a look at it, and decided to go for it. We were approved for financing for the total amount of the house so we were able to buy it before we sold our old house, which gives us time to move the stuff we *really* want into the new place (which is smaller, but much nicer and in a much better neighborhood) and then we can just junk what won't fit or that we don't want. This has proven to be a daunting task, and my hubby and I have been a bit naughty and procrastinaty in this department.

We went to Art Van and bought a couch, loveseat console, futon cushion, bed box and new mattress on a do-not-pay-for-two-years deal, and now have our first ever set of brand new and NOT hand-me-down furniture. I have claimed the smaller bedroom as my 'music room', a place for my computer and my massive collection of cds, component stereo equipment, and lava lamp/indirect lighting. This is my haven into which I can escape when James drives me insane with his seeming need to fulfill a daily quota of television watching ;-)  Also, since he works from home, it gives me a place where I can listen to music without having to turn it down or off every time he gets a call from his work.

We will have to cover the mortgages on both houses for June, since we got a break in May after closing on the new house and refinancing the mortgage on the old one (which is nearly $300 less after the refi!) and since we've planned for that we will be able to cover it. Then in July we will start getting rent from Dan which will help offset the cost of both mortgages until we DO sell the old house.

This is, as you can imagine, quite the undertaking, as we are having to sort through approximately eight years of accumulated clutter. Since we are both pack rats by nature, I will be forced to seriously weed through stuff and get rid of a lot. I will be donating a frightening amount of unworn clothes back to Goodwill. I am also trying to recycle as much of the cardboard as I can from the move and that I'd had saved up in our old basement for the purpose of a move, as well as donating any books we no longer want to the local library (this includes quite a few large computer and programming manuals that we do not need.) So I'm trying to actually throw out as little as I can, and pay forward as much as possible.

More in the next entry--we bought a new electric lawn mower and have to run back to the old house to get the long outside extension cord thingy (since strangely enough, the mower did not come with a cord of its own.)

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Elizabeth Orr

April 2017

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