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Dec 15, 2014    |       7 comments

An Early Christmas

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Christmas came early this year!

Look what hubs surprised me with….

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Yay!!! A kitchen table!!! Wahoo!!!! For those of you following along, I’ve been wanting a new/new-to-us kitchen table for a long time now (I first mentioned it on the blog way back in August – see here)

Things just weren’t working out to make that happen though. First, our income dropped right around that time. Second, I couldn’t find one for free (I’ve been diligently watching freecyle and posting ads there for months). Third, I couldn’t find a decent used one on craigslist that fit into our budget.

And so we continued to just make do with what we had (which was a high top cocktail-style table with 2 chairs for hubs and I, and a separate child-sized plastic table for the girls. The girls had grown tired of the arrangement and were not thrilled to have to eat by themselves (sad face). But then a couple weeks ago hubs surprised me! I came home to a new table and chairs that accommodates our whole family! He was able to find a floor model on sale for $100 (including chairs). It would have cost more for delivery, but he was able to throw it in the back of the truck and transport home for free. Win!!

Plus, look how happy the girls are to get to sit at the same table with Mom and Dad and all eat together!!!

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Priceless!

Dec 13, 2014    |       3 comments

Counting my Blessings

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With all the “poor me” attitude I’ve had lately (see here), I just have to share a super kind thing that happened to me last night.

After this conversation about teacher gifts, it sounded like the best thing to do was get each teacher a $5 gift card, a nice note, and a hand-colored picture from the girls.

So Friday we decided to drive around and look at Christmas lights as a family. We turned on some Christmas tunes and headed to Starbucks. I was going to spend from my eating out budget to indulge in a couple hot chocolates for hubs and I, and use from my other budget to buy the $15 worth of gift cards for our kids’ 3 teachers. We place our order, pull up to the window, and are informed that the car in front of us paid for our entire order – including the gift cards!!!!

Hearing about these “pay it forward” lines is so commonplace now and, yet, I’ve never had one happen to me. I was floored! Of course we paid for the car behind us, but their total was only a whopping $5 (compared to ours, which was going to be $22).

I still feel guilty about having the car in front of us pay for our entire order! If it had just been drinks I wouldn’t feel so bad, but I feel guilty about them essentially buying our teacher gifts for us.

With all the big spending we’ve been doing lately (on root canal, car repairs, etc.), I’m going to take some time this weekend to count my blessings and be thankful for the kindness of strangers!

 

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