The last several days have been busy around here! Bill and the boys built new steps to the entrance off our living room over the July Fourth holiday. We rarely use that entrance and haven’t been able to for quite a while now due to the steps having rotted out. But it’s good to have it fixed and be able to use it, just in case we have an emergency and need another exit. That project has been on the “to do” list for quite some time now. At one time we had planned to greatly expand that small deck entrance area, turning it into a screened-in covered porch, but whenever funds get set aside for the project, they get diverted for some emergency expense. Probably it’ll be one of those things we do just to fix it up around here when we finally get ready to move and sell the place.
And yesterday I set up a brokerage account with E*Trade. We knew we were going to have to cash in some stocks for David’s college tuition and the first payment is due August 1. Somehow I didn’t think it would be a huge deal to set up an account and get the stocks traded and cash into a money market fund. I also didn’t think doing it locally with a broker would be as expensive as it turned out to be when I called for quotes. So instead of going the easy way with lots of hand holding and someone else doing the grunt work, we went the cheaper route and I will get plenty of new learning experiences! Isn’t that what you get when you don’t get what you wanted? Experience?! So two things done off my lists . . . and hundreds more to go, or so it seems.