Welcome to the weekly Saturday Quick Hits and Weekend Reading post!
Wow what a couple of weeks it has been. I didn’t give an update last Saturday because we were up until 2am packing for our move the next day…which required a 7:30am wake up time! Thankfully we had a lot of help and were able to pretty much load and unload all in one trip. Total time: 3 hours. I have a hard time asking people to help with things like this, so it was humbling to see so many people willing to help us out.
Quick Hits
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As I alluded to above, we have the new house and almost all of my free time either goes to working on this site, working on the house, or working on finishing up stuff at the apartment (fingers crossed for our damage deposit being given back to us). For the site I do want to have a full redesign within the next 3 months. I’m not sure how realistic that is because of all the work I want to do at our house. I did buy a few DIY books from Home Depot that I think will really help with little maintenance things like changing light switches and outlets, as well as switching out light fixtures.
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As far as time goes, I have really felt crunched. I have a lot of plans for this site and it’s been difficult to pursue them while also pursuing so many other things. I can prioritize all day long, but in the end there is only 24 hours in a day. What surprises me is how much better I have felt simply by using my lunch hour for blogging or working out. When you have some time to either get ahead or relieve stress through hitting the gym, it can really help you get through those long days.
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I decided to not put in a chain-link fence in the 10 feet or so of our yard that is not fenced off. Since we don’t own any of the fences that currently enclose ours and we want to eventually put in a privacy fence, I don’t see much reason as to why I’d put the time and effort into putting in a chain-link fence that I will just have to gut in a few years. With that being said, I need to figure out a temporary solution so that we can have a dog run around in our backyard without keeping our eye on him at all times. We also need the temporary fence to have some sort of gate on it so our renter can get in and out easily. I haven’t had time to look into this, but if anyone has suggestions I’m all ears.
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In case you missed any posts from this week, here they are:
Monday: 10 Expenses to Consider When Buying a Home
Tuesday: Lost Your Job? 5 Things To Do Right Away
Wednesday: Using the Internet to Build your “Personal Brand”
Thursday: Pros and Cons of Working for a Non-Profit
Friday: Home Depot has really good…Books???
Weekend Reading
Alright so here is a roundup of five blog posts that I enjoyed. I am trying not to overwhelm you with massive lists of blog posts and focus on only a few. Hope you enjoy them!
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Catherine from Plunged in Debt helps you save a few dollars in Stop Wasting Money On Whitening Toothpaste!
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Justin from The Frugal Path shares some tips in Three Things I Wish My Parents Had Taught Me About Money
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Sicorra from Tackling Our Debt asks Is It Possible to Reduce Your Monthly Grocery Bill with Coupons?
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Kristina from DINKs Finance shares The Most Expensive Cities in the World
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Frugal Portland jumps into the real estate market in Moving forward with real estate
I want to end with a shameless plug: Consider following our Facebook page. I try to post a few interesting things on there each week besides just links to our posts. If your an economics geek you will like the post from last night :)
Have a good weekend everyone!
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Good luck with all of your DIY projects and the deposit. I can’t wait to hear about what projects you end up doing.
And thanks for the the mention and have a great weekend.
@JustinatTheFrugalPath Hey no problem, hope you have a good one as well!
Thanks Dude! Good luck with all your home projects- the funnest part of homeownership in my mind! Don’t try and bite off too much at once though, burnout will be inevitable and you’ll just want to give up after a while…we did this and are now just finding the energy to finish, 2 yrs later. Good luck on the blog re-do as well, I have to save some pennies to get some design work myself, for now you’ll all have to deal with some ugliness :) Have a good weekend!
@PlungedinDebt Thanks for the encouragement, I need it! I definitely hear you on the burnout, and I just want to change SO much right away. I’m trying to prioritize, though, so hopefully I won’t burn out too quickly. We took on quite the project…the house would not have been in our budget if the previous owner had put any effort into it before listing.
Wow you have a lot planned! And PS I love the way your site looks, so if you don’t have time to change it, it still looks great and much better than mine haha:)
@SenseofCents Yeah I tend to plan too much and then I burnout and re-evaluate haha. Thanks! I have had some good feedback on the design, but I have a vision in my head that I can’t get out. I always thought your site looked a lot better than mine – the irony is I think most ppl think their sites look worse than they do.
Gary put up a vinyl “snow fence” in his backyard. That seems to work really well. That would be an inexpensive and efficient way to “repair” the piece of fence in your yard. I would also shore up the corners of the fence as some dogs, if they were the size of Aggie, could escape via the corners of the fence. I would also look at that drain that is along about mid-fence, right side, in the back yard. Not sure if an dog could escape there, either. Your home is really great! :-)
Sidebar: I checked out the Roseville zoning ordinance and temporary “snow fencing” is allowed seasonally without a permit. Fences higher than 4′ require a permit from the City and no fence will exceed 6.5′.
@RobertaRenstromNyquist that would be a great option but is it possible to have it with a gate built in? Our renters needs to get through it. Thanks for checking on that!
It is always good to prioritize the work. For your dog would one of those invisible fences work?
Thanks very much for the include! Have a great weekend!
@TacklingOurDebt Invisible fence might work but if I can just block off the last 10-12 feet for cheap then I will be good. Trying to save some money here : )
Hope you have a great weekend as well!