Something I really like about our new house is the landscape design package that came with it. It’s nothing fancy or exotic, just simple and easy to maintain. I love plants and flowers, but the reality is I will probably kill most things I plant. Recently, we added some enhancements to our landscaping, such as cement curbing and some flowers. Again, getting back to me killing stuff, we did not want to spend a ton of money. We decided to have cement curbing laid around our landscape beds because it was cheap but looks good. It is colored to match our brick pavers and the wet cement was stamped to have a basketweave pattern. People are shocked when they hear how cheap it was. So far three other neighbors are using the company we used. I should get a kick back. For plants, we determined how much sun or shade they would receive and picked out stuff we liked. So far, everything is alive and colorful and it has been over a month! New record!

A good landscape designer will listen to what you want, and and how you want to use your yard. Do you want an English garden? Huge trees? A pool and party area? Your budget will allow you to only do so much, but landscape design is totally worth it.

I listen to a lot of sports radio, and one of the frequent advertisers is this place offering to refinance your house with no closing costs. Always looking to save a buck, I came home Friday night and submitted our info online, expecting to hear from people on Monday. HA! People with sites that offer online secured loans work on Saturdays…and the calls started around 8am. After talking to a few people that specialize in homeowner loans and personal loans this week I decided the offer wasn’t for us. I think we’re going to wait for refinance until we have a bit more equity in our home. Our current loan isn’t bad, I was just hoping to find something better, especially after hearing these commercials saying how we could do these loans without paying a dime out of pocket.

I put our old gas grill to the curb a three days ago with a “free” sign on it. The grill is still there. It may not be great, but for free, I would have thought someone would have scooped it up. I guess people expect a new stainless steel Char Broil or something. Jeez.

When people talk about money, you hear things like, “I’m a spender.” Or, “I’m a saver.” I think I’m a little bit of both. I was a saver before getting married, and even had some stock from my company tucked away for a rainy day. Once my wife and I needed a house and had kids though, my rainy day had come. It was nice to know when we shopped for mortgages that we had a down payment thanks to that stock I had purchased. I know that not everyone out looking at loans has a down payment, and it made a difference for us in the rate and terms that we got. Once the mortgage lender determined that all of our current accounts were in order we were off shopping for curtains and home insurance.

That was 4 or 5 moves ago, and thanks to the equity we built up in our last home, we were able to build a new home, which we moved into last May. One of the best pieces of debt advice we got was to not be afraid of using our credit cards, as long as we used them wisely. By that I mean that a little debt is good, as long as you pay it off in a timely fashion. Lenders like to see that you’ve used credit wisely and paid off debts in advance. Instead of closing old accounts, we paid them off and left them open, to show that we have willpower too.

Tuesday was a beautiful day. Not too hot or muggy. I mowed and edged the lawn and have a few plants to put in the ground. Top the day off with a cookout on the lanai and a cold brewski.

Now that we are finally in a situation where we have discretionary income, I have been looking at some budgeting software. While it’s nice to “waste” money, or not worry about spending $50 on something foolish, it still kills me to blow money on certain things. I’ve been thinking about using some budgeting software to track expenditures to break down where it goes. At the same time, there’s a part of me that does not really care where the money goes, as long as there is some in the bank and the bills are paid. I still can’t help but cringe when the Wife wants to buy Yankee candles instead of a candle of the same color from Target.

Work, work, work. That’s all I’m good for. I bought a wall accent gimmick at Bombay Company on Sunday. I’m sure the Wife will want me to hang it tonight. I am looking forward to the fighting over the placement of said piece:)!

Saturday was planting day. I had the day off and I spent it putting in some new plants and mulch. Recently we had cement curbing installed around our landscaping and decided to extend it all the way around the house. This created new planters to do something with. I planted flowers plumbago, verbena and dwarf azalea. Yes, I love flowers. In a non-fag way.

What a beautiful day today was. The weather was magnificent…just like last Tuesday when I spent the morning and early afternoon doing a little detailing on the Wife’s Explorer. She had to go to the office today and took my car. So, after dropping the kids at school and hitting the local greasy spoon for breakfast, I started on her car. Washed, waxed, armorall’ed the interior, rain-x on the windshield.

Too bad I had to be at work today.

Tuesday we had landscape edging installed at our house. We had cement curbing laid down around our landscape beds and all the way around the house. The curbing is brick red to match the pavers on our walk and entryway and has a basket weave pattern. Looks awesome! Next, the really fun part…

Fighting with the wife about what type of plants to put in the ground.