Is in want...

I seriously need to stop torturing myself by looking at homes on zillow and what not but I just can't help it.  I am in WANT...in WANT of a house.  I am tired of chucking over a thousand dollars each month into nothing but a place that does nothing but keep cutting the hours they are open and don't even attempt to fix the main office that had a major fire in February.  And by not fixing it we have lost access to our pool and gym...hmmm anger brewing.

Ok so to step back after a mini rant and realize that I am lucky enough to have a roof over my head and a very loving husband and that we both have jobs.  But even on the days that we remember all that can't a girl be just a little annoyed...

On a completely unrelated note...

I still love getting mail addressed to J and S Mooneyham.  Eight months have gone by since we got married and I still can't get over the fact that I am a MOONEYHAM!

Birthday: FUN, FUN, FUN, FUN, FUN! (a slight homage to Rebecca Black)

The biggest reason I haven't blogged recently is that this weekend was my birthday!  It's hard to believe that we are already half way through April!

I had a wonderful birthday weekend thanks to the benefits of ones birthday falling on a Saturday.  I had dinner with two other couples (our besties) at the fabulous Maggiano's and stuffed ourselves with Italian food.  Then we headed to M and M's where we ate the incredible SQUIRREL cake Mar Made!  Saturday we took it easy and I got some new running shoes...oh and best of all Jon got me a Kindle for my birthday!  On Sunday, Mar surprised Lyss and I by taking us to CUPCAKE CAMP!  We tried lots of samples of lots of different cupcakes from lots of different bakeries around the area!  Afterwards we wandered to the Arboretum and saw the amazing Cherry Blossoms in bloom!

But enough about my birthday.  One of the best things that happened this weekend was that we took a look at where our finances are and it turns out that we are in a good place.  It looks like we will easily have a good amount of money saved by the end of July/August (which is when we are planning on getting our pre-approval)! We are so excited to see that our savings is finally amounting to something... WE NEED OUT OF OUR APARTMENT!!!!  Ok I suppose that was a little dramatic but these close quarters are really starting to get to us and since we got married 8 months ago it seems like we are stuck in limbo.  It's difficult to create a life together when living in an apartment seems so temporary.  So here's hoping that we can make it through the next 8 months (or hopefully less) and then we can get on the right track...setting up our life together in our own HOME!

 

Feeling some good vibrations

Some days you just wake up in a fantastic mood and that was my Tuesday!  I normally am a friend of Monday (I like getting back into the routine) but Tuesday is more of an enemy than a friend, except for yesterday!  As I drove Jon and I to work I told him...for some reason I am in a great mood today and it felt awesome to feel that good on a Tuesday (of all days).  It might be due to the fact that we are committed to getting back in shape and are currently on week 1 of the couch to 5k program (if you haven't heard of it, it gets you running a 5k in 9 weeks by gradually increasing your running time) or it might just be that I slept really well.  And the best part is that feel good feeling was present all day! The day ended with a free ice cream cone from Ben and Jerry's and by spending a quick 20 minutes with some of our besties!

Some days are good because you make them that way and other days are good because of the amazing people you surround yourself with...yesterday had both! :)

Just working on my timing...

I really and truly do have every intention of keeping this going... so here's me getting back into the swing of things!

We had a wonderful weekend which started out with a trip to Best Buy to buy a new router.  Ours was so bad we were resetting it at least once a day.  But the awesome thing about this new router is that we can connect our GIGANTIC (as in its physical size) external hard drive (which holds an impressive 150 gigs) so that we can transfer things to it wirelessly.  Which means we can move big and important things like wedding photos and music to it.  And all this in turn guarantees that my computer will keep working so that I can blog it up with all you fine folks!

As far as a house goes nothing new has happened on that front.  But that's ok at this point in the game it's still about saving!  We did take a walk through zillow.com a few nights ago to see what kinds of homes are available in our price range around these parts and I think we will be able to find something we love, something that we can turn into our own little cozy place to hang our hats every night!

Practicing our Home Improvement Skills

Today was a completely productive day.  We started off by meeting our friends Ben and Alyssa (also read as friends who have a car that is bigger than ours and therefore able to transport larger loads) at Home Depot.

We bought a new bed at the beginning of the year.  A new, fancy king sized one where two people and two cats can sleep comfortably the whole night through.  Anyway the bed we bought is a captained bed which is excellent for two big reasons 1: it has a ton of storage (we're talking drawers on the sides and at the end of the bed and in the headboard itself) and 2: because it's raised up we didn't have to buy a box spring (which can cost quite a bit)!

The only small downside to a captained bed is that it requires a bed board, something to lay on top of the slated boards so your mattress doesn't sink through.  We however didn't opt to buy a bed board while at Mor Furniture because they were rather expensive and thought it to be more economical to purchase plywood at Home Depot and slide it under the mattress ourselves.  All in all a great idea...except our only vehicle Cecelia "the white lightning" (a 2000 Dodge stratus) couldn't fit the two boards we needed.  So we waited until our dear friends had a free day in their weekend (and in the mean time we also procured a Home Depot gift card) and then got the boards we needed.  Jon took it upon himself to round the edges of the boards with a jig saw before we put them in!  So now they are in and we can't wait to see how our sleep goes tonight!

***SIDE NOTE: I am still getting used to this blog thing so of course no photos were taken of the bed boards...but I am working on it!

Besides getting the bed boards in, we also did a little patch work on our Kitty Towehave r in the living room.  We got it for our kitties, Chewbacca and Wicket, during Christmas 2009 and there is one area in particular that they have scratched so much that the carpet was completely torn and it exposed the wood underneath!  Not only was it ugly but the kitties have since resorted to scratching other things...like the couch!  So with a little rope and some staple gun action we were able to patch it right up!

Here is Wicket modeling the new and improved tower!

And lastly, we always end up putting our coats on the dining room chairs instead of back in the coat closet where they belong.  To solve this dilemma, Jon bought an official coat rack while I was gone on vacation.  He waited until I was back so we could jointly decide where it should go.  I pulled out the ole stud finder, located studs near where we wanted the rack and then helped Jon with the level.  We screwed in the rack and are oh so happy to have a home for our coats (or at least a more convenient one than the coat closet)!

  

And as you can see we also found a home for one of the wedding gifts from my sister!

We both couldn't stop smiling all day as we were so elated to be doing some things for ourselves around here.  It also helped solidify our joint desire for a home of our own and we can't wait to tackle more hands on projects in the (hopefully) not too distant future!

The Harder You Try Not To, The More Likely You Are To Rebel

See them?  That's who we are trying to be... but today we weren't.  Today was one of those days where the need to indulge was just too strong and neither one of us could really control it.  We didn't go on too crazy of a shopping spree and some things were even necessities, but sometimes you just gotta shop!

Jon and I did good last night and instead of eating out (as per norm on Fridays and Saturdays) we headed to the grocery store, got some amazing burger ingredients and headed over to our dear friends house to have some dinner and catch up!  But somewhere in dreamland last night our good deed to ourselves went unnoticed and the urge to splurge hit us square in the face.

First we hit up the library where I had some CD's for school and two of Chelsea Handler's books waiting for me.  Then we headed to the mall where Jon got some brand new running shoes from New Balance and while they weren't cheap, they were on sale and getting healthy is of a greater importance than saving money for a house anyway.  Who's gonna live in the place if you're dead!?  Anyway, then we had some lunch at Panera before heading over to Target.  I got some awesome dress up clothes for my class and then I scored some super comfy, but still feminine pajamas (I am known to wear exclusively sweats: pants and shirts in the fall, winter and spring) and Jon got a couple shirts!

After that we were Ross bound because Jon's work was holding a sock drive for adults in need and we figured we could get more for our money there.  Sadly socks didn't happen, but Jon snagged a few things for work.  Poor guy (my words not his) has to wear button up shirts and ties everyday!  Anyway we then decided to hit up Costco for socks and we got most of our weekly shopping done while there as well.  Buying in bulk really does save in the long run and I have a very nicely stocked freezer with all sorts of yummy things, including some awesome pork tender loin that was just $1.99 a pound!

Anyway like I said, not a major budget breaker but still we did go out of the norm and do some weekend shopping!  We are still learning and trying not to restrict ourselves too much at one time. For now the focus is creating a balance between saving and spending.

This just might be who we really are...for now!

"Let me come home, home is wherever I'm with you"

If you haven't figured it out by now, this new blog is going to be centered around our search for our first home and then if I truly keep this up, perhaps it will continue into our blog about life (I am not setting too high of expectations).  I am hoping that this can be a way to record this time in our lives and at the same time share the experience with those around us.  I am also hoping that this can be place where I can share inspirations and receive advice and input from others. We are headed down a new, unfamiliar and exciting road as we attempt to buy a house and I really can't wait to share it!

Now as you can see from the title, I really do feel that home is wherever Jon and I are together.  But seriously can't a girl dream of a nice home, where I can paint the walls, fill it with new furniture and decorate it to fit our tastes?  So far, the steps that we've taken towards actually purchasing our first home has been one, major and often times difficult task: SAVING MONEY!  Now we are both fortunate to be working full time and we both have great benefits but still it's a challenge to sit down and say ok 'X' amount each month will be going to savings.  It's difficult to go from essentially being able to do whatever you want, whenever you want to all the sudden having to make the decisions like is it worth it to go to the movies or should that money be saved for a house?  Now at this point and time I can rationalize that yes it is worth it...but in that moment it's hard not to take the nickel today instead of the dime tomorrow.  So we're learning...we're trying to find the balance between some fun now and still saving for the future.