We Interrupt Today's Friday Freebies to Bring You This...

Have you ever noticed that expenses come in bundles? Spring brings with it a myriad of fix it projects for homeowners. We are certainly no exception and with two houses, sometimes this can be a bit overwhelming. We've got a masonry chimney that needs repointing and relining to the tune of $1600, a house that needs to be repainted, a deck that needs some boards replaced, a roof that needs replacing and just yesterday the check engine light in my car came on. Aaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!

On the positive side, our CSA pickups begin the first week in June. Since these were paid for months ago it will feel like we are suddenly getting free veggies and this will take a big chunk out of our food budget. On the other hand, June is still 5 weeks away. What do you do in the interim?

Fortunately, we've recently had a few expenses eliminated, namely my car payment, and others decreased, mainly our auto insurance. These will help but we need to tighten our belts a little bit more to get these things done in a timely fashion. My posts for the next few weeks will be focusing on living with almost zero spending.

The first thing I'm doing is beginning to sprout daily. By starting a new container or three every day, there will be a constant supply of sprouts. This should help bring down our food budget. I also recently encountered an incredible sale on organic diced tomatoes, which I stocked up on. This will help too.

After much discussion, we've decided what we will do and what we will be hiring people to do. In our opinion, roofs and chimneys are work for best left to professionals. We'll be handling the deck and house painting ourselves. Right now I'm grateful that our house is just a "small" straight ranch. It makes for easier painting and less expensive roofing.

We've opted to paint the house the same color so we can avoid the strife of colors bleeding through. We have friends who painted a very dark colored house white. It became such a chore as they put on coat after coat of paint trying to get the house bright white.

AS for the check engine light on my car, I'll find out Tuesday. The last two times my check engine light came on, the car needed a new transmission. American Honda was kind enough to replace it no charge both times since its a known problem with all their 1999 Odysseys. I even got a call last time from a representative from American Honda telling me to call her if it happens again, alluding to the the fact that they would pay for it a third time. The silly car only has 125,000 miles on it and its a Honda for heavens sake. Our dinky little Saturn had 232,491 miles on it when we sold it and it still had the original clutch. I'm not impressed by my Honda ownership experience at all.