MIA!

Wow, I hadn't realized how long it's been since I stopped by here. A lot has been going on!

Where to start?

We found out we'll be getting about $9,000 in a lump sum payment. I'm not going to go into the gory details about it. I'll just celebrate. :) It may be a little less - we'll have to see what happens. We should have it in hand by the end of January. With another similar check in June! And summer school payment in August!

That means...we could be debt free except for the house & student loans (and some/much of the car) by the end of the summer. Plus be able to pay for new gutters in cash.

How cool is that?

We've been carefully planning how we're going to be spending this money. We did decide to buy me a cheapy laptop for school/work purposes. I'm doing a lot more freelancing for other schools and for the state, as well as taking classes as we can afford it. I also have a student teacher this spring and will not be able to access my work computer as much. This will be perfect. It was $400 at Best Buy on super sale.

I found some great deals on after-xmas sales. For now, no list, but it was awesome.

We had a terrific holiday. Time to relax, and had dinner with my sisters at my mom's house.

Umm...

I have one more week off - we don't return until Jan 5th. I plan to spend some time in the basement getting things in order. It's such a disorganized mess down there!

We did make some sales on ebay - not a ton, but enough to help us get some traction during the holiday season. It would be so cool to have some extra money next Christmas. Not for presents, but for helping Mom out, donating. And after xmas sales. :)

Okay - enough for now. There's a ton of backstory on a lot of the points here, but I don't want to make this a giant entry. We're off to breakfast in a few minutes - an extravagance that puts an end to the holiday week. Have a terrific New Years!