Getting things done a little at a time.

We are finally getting Central Air. This is something I have wanted since we moved into our house almost 5.5 years ago. We have had a swamp cooler which as most Utahan's know, is no good during the REALLY HOT summer days. But we have managed with it so it just seemed pointless to spend a ton of money on something else. 

This year however we put in brand new spanking windows. They have made a huge difference. our house holds the temperature better than before, and the noise levels are much lower when the windows are closed. In July there was a shooting in the park across the street. We thought the noises was from a bird tapping on our window. nope it was gun shots. Weird.

Anyway, the swamp cooler decided this summer to make bad noises. scary like it's going to fall apart noises. so we haven't used it. It's been freaking HOT in the house, but we've made due with fans. I thought for sure my power bill would be lower with the kids gone and no swamp cooler going. But, it didn't go down as low as I would have thought. (although after hearing about everyone else's power bill, I'm not complaining!).

We decided to pull some money from Dan's trust and put in Central Air. Bill and his friend will do it for $3600.00 and change. That includes a new Heater as well as the Cooling unit. The heater in the house now is currently the one that was original to the house. This is good. We've decided to take most of the Trust Money and put it towards upgrades on our house. We need: new garage door, fence all around the yard, and a new deck as the one we have is rotting beneath our feet. Since this is the house we plan to die in, I figure this is an investment into our future.  We are very fortunate that we are not upside down in the house. Although the property value has gone down steadily for the last 3 years, we are still above our owing price. (This years property evaluation put us at $147K estimate and we owe about $137K.

We also have spoiled ourselves a bit. We broke down and bought a new TV for our bedroom.
The TV we have is Dan's old TV and who knows how long he had it before we got together. A few weeks ago we were watching Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 1, and at the beginning it was so dark. I kept saying to Dan: "I don't remember it being this dark. Wasn't there a room full of people in this part?"

So then a few days after that, we watched it again on our Big TV in the basement, and sure enough, there was a room full of people.  So we started looking at TVs.  I wanted a flat screen skinny TV. I found a decent sale on a 32" with a DVD player. But when we looked at it, Dan was not satisfied. The guy at Shopko, where we were looking, showed us a 40" model by Toshiba that was on clearance for only $100.00 more. We looked at it and Dan fell in love. So we splurged. but then we needed all the extra cables, and a new DVD player and $650.00 later.... And we still have to hook it up. HAHAHA.

Another Plan is to paint the spare bedroom. I've been planning this since the kids moved out to Alaska. but alas, the money, time, and energy have eluded me. however I'm hoping to get Charlotte's son Josh out to maybe do the painting. He owes me some monies, and this would be perfect. I have some grand ideas, and so I hope he's willing and able to do them. My goal is to have this done by end of September. I hope to have the new fence and garage door done by then too. Plus Dan and I need to clean out our stuff from the Garage. We did my auntie Elaine's stuff a few weeks ago, and boy has that made a GIANT difference.
I have some wood projects planned for Christmas and I want to get started. Found a great deal for a Bandsaw on KSL and bought it. Now I just need to get things organized in the garage so I can play.

I need Beth and friends to sneak over to my house and organize my craft room for me. I can't seem to get the time or energy to do it. lol.

Just gotta get a little done at a time. But it's gonna take a long time....