Well it has been two years since I have been able to afford to fly anywhere. The winds are apparently in my favor right now. I heard from my sister who has a client that has offered the use of her condo and car for my DH and myself, all free and on the beach, so we are off on vacation on Thursday for nine days. How great is that? A free condo overlooking the beach and a car. We are so excited, it has been a long time since we have been able to go away and with this gift of generosity we can afford to go. Our airline tickets were $514 and because we have a full kitchen and barbeque grill at the condo, we can cook in and lay by the pool. I bought two books to read while we are there.

Regarding the mortgage business, things are picking up and I think I can see some recovery. With the new $8000 tax credit to first time homebuyers (can't have owned a home in the last three years), I'm expecting to see more purchase activity. This could be a good time to turn our finances around.

My DH is refinancing our home and dropped our rate from 6.50% to 5.25% and he consolidated some various debts he had left over, thereby reducing our monthly debts to give us some breathing room. We have done numerous improvements to the home and it appraised well. We are now working on the yard and doing some pretty extensive landscaping. However, having a contractor husband has it's faults, they work all day long in the business and don't move too fast at home. I'm sure by summer end we will have things looking nice outside.

Yesterday, I staked off my gardens for the summer. I've got two large plots, one for regular crops of corn, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, potato's, radishes, carrots, beets and etc. The second plot will be for my vine crops; cucumbers, squash, summer squash, zucchini, pumpkins and in the far corner of the plot I'm putting in 4-5 blueberry bushes. This will add to the yard appeal and save money in our monthly food budget. I will can and freeze veggies throughout the summer.

Think summer; I'm so glad the snow is gone.