Trying to get this house is order is more difficult then I thought! We're trying to clean/prepare for baby/stage the house to put up for sale and it's going waaaay slower than it should be. I'm torn between making the perfect baby room vs. one that's as simple and rudimentry as possible so that if this house does sell we can pack up and leave with little hassle. I wanted to move my old furniture from my parents house into the babies room but now it seems silly if we're going to move it out so soon. We're thinking in the meantime to just steal some furniture from the spare room so that room doesn't look so cluttered and use that in the babies room. It's sort of an ugly brown wood (I got it for free - from my grandpa's house. Hard to pass up a deal like that.) so I figured the most palatable color that's not too blah that would go with it is a light green. Light green matches the green leaf I bought at Ikea to put over the crib too so I guess it'll all work out. Decisions, decisions! There's just too much to think about! And now break time is over, so I best be going.

One more thing - Savings will be up to $2250 once pay checks hit on Friday!

So my husband and I are thinking about making a big change. We Are living in a 1250 square foot home in a a bad school district. The idea has been for us to stay here a few more years and then sell the home once the baby gets close to school age...

With me being being 6 months pregnant now, the plan was to amass quite a bit of savings so that I could take off for a few months and then work part-time for a few months. Obviously this would put financial goals on hold (for probably a year or so). My mom has offered to do daycare for us once I return to part-time and then full-time work, but I would have to pick the baby up from her house. The problem is they live 45 minutes from my work and home and so it's going to be quite taxing for a while until I get used the commute. So yesterday, for the heck of it, T and I stopped off at an open house just to see what's out there. Turns out we LOVED the place and when we saw the price tag, it was so affordable we couldn't believe it. We went back home and started crunching numbers and realized that we could buy our "forever" home in the next school district over (which is Very good!) and have plenty of money to spare (the 30 year mortgage would be identical to what our 15 year mortgage is now). The issue then becomes that our current home is probably worth exactly what we owe on it. I was talking over yesterday with my mother how T and I would be willing to sell this home and break even knowing we would be moving to our forever home but with a baby on the way there's just too many things going on right now. That's when they offered to let us move in with them for a couple months. My mom said she would be able to more easily help with daycare so it would be less of a strain on her, help us not dip into savings to pay for my maternity leave (since my parents said they would charge us only 200/mo rent), plus actually add to savings so that we would have more money for a down payment on our next home (which doesn't necessarily need to be the home we just looked at, but would be in the nice school district). Although it seems a bit weird to be taking a step backwards and moving in with my parents, I have to admit the offer is more than a bit tempting with a baby on the way. Plus with us living at their house T and I would be able to help with their fixing up so that they could put their house up for sale possibly next year and move closer (that is, if my Dad comes around to it. As I get more and more pregnant and he becomes more aware he's going to be a grandfather I think he's getting into the idea of selling and living closer to us.)

So I think the next order of business is to sell this house! I can't believe we're doing this! More updates to follow!

After reading Jeffrey's Grocery Coupon Guide, I've decided I need to get my grocery bills in check! I spend about $80-100/ week for only 2 people (that includes groceries, house supplies, kitty litter, etc.) and I know it is WAY more than I need to be spending. With 3 months of baby leave fast approaching, I'm going to take the time to be domesticated and learn some of the things that I should've done long ago (i.e. Cooking and Couponing!). This Sunday I plan on picking up the Sunday paper and seeing the manufacturers coupons and what I can do with them. I'm trying to find some good websites that will match Weis store reward card deals w/ manufacturers coupons to get those super low prices. If anyone has any good ideas let me know!

It's a little sad that I'm wishing the week away just so I can pick up the Sunday paper and see how I can save some money - Haha oh well.