Designing a Barn

I had the most fun today! And it didn't cost me a single penny....YET!! It will eventually cost quite a few pennies but I won't mind parting with a single one. I spent the day designing my "barn to be"!

See that funny little picture up there? That's my land and my house in PEI. Ya gotta love google earth:) The first thing, and probably the hardest was deciding where to place my barn. So many things had to be taken into account. It's not just about the barn - it's about where my "forest enhancement project" will be located, where my vegetable garden would grow the best, where my laneway will be, how big my kitchen and mudroom extension will be, how large the deck addition will be, where the existing trees are and so on and so on. And most importantly it can't block any of my fabulous views of Casumpec Bay!

Ok, I have that part figured out. Now I have to decide on the style of the barn and how big it will be and how much I can afford to spend. Here's what I know so far: it will be roughly 20' x 24' or  28', it will have a lean-to on one end for storing wood, it will have either a half-loft or full-loft to use as a writing nook and artist's studio/workshop, and a covered porch along one side. Haven't fully decided whether it will have a gable or gambrel roof yet.

It needs to be large enough to hold our car and a tractor plus gardening tools. It will provide storage for the necessities of country life but will also be a sanctuary for those creative hours I will be spending on writing, carving and other artistic pursuits - perhaps a dark room? a pottery wheel? woodworking?

Tonight I shall dream about my barn and the many ways it will fill my well to overflowing. Oh yes, I may need to attach a chicken coop to it somewhere too!

Did I mention that I love barns?

And sheds?

A Little Glimpse of Me - OR - Waxing Philosophical

 I made a realization today. Yeah, happens sometimes. But I have to back up a little before I tell you what it is. Maybe you'll have guessed by the end of my post.

One of the words Michael has used to describe me is "unpretentious". And he's right on. Pretentiousness is one of the few things I abhor. Pretense of any kind is just an illusion and pretense that someone is "falsely important" or better than someone else leaves me cold.  The consumer trappings to prove one's "importance" are just that - a trap (and probably a debt trap to boot!)

Can you guess where I'm going here? Maybe to a simpler, though not "easier" lifestyle in PEI? When many people my age are planning their retirements around European tours and luxury condos in Miami I am planning on living in a home that will be heated with a woodstove and a basement floor made out of dirt and several inches of gravel. You could say that my lifestyle will be even "less luxurious" than it is now. Why is this ok with me?

Simple. I am not used to luxury and wouldn't know what to do with it if I had it. (Although I could also very easily argue the point that I do live in luxury if you compare my lifestyle with the several billion people in the world who live on one or two dollars a day - but that's a different post entirely.)

I am a little odd. While co-workers and friends sold their homes and moved into bigger, more comfortable surroundings over the years I remained in the condo that I bought as a single parent when I earned less than $25,000 a year. We're talking no dishwasher, a noisy hotwater tank, not the best neighbourhood in town, no air conditioning, small yard etc. Even when my income doubled, tripled and quadrupled I have remained in my condo. While people I knew traded in their car every year or two for the latest model I continued to drive my old compact car with rollup windows and power nothing.

And today I figured out why and you won't have guessed this part. 

It's because of my mother and father. I have never aspired to live a lifestyle beyond what they were able to provide for me and my four older siblings. Don't get me wrong - they made several improvements in our pioneer-aged home over the years and each one was cause for a major celebration. For example, I can remember vividly as a 3 or 4 year old watching our 150 year old home get jacked up so that a basement could be dug out and cement foundations poured then an oil furnace installed. Goodbye oil stove! However, we didn't get to say goodbye to icy cold linoleum bedroom floors though because the furnace ducts didn't reach to the second floor LOL!

Ye Olde Oil Stove pipe visible behind us!

I remember the day we got a clothes dryer.  We felt like the Rockefellers! Of course we were only allowed to use it in the winter so we wouldn't have to struggle trying to fold frozen bluejeans from the clothesline. Another HUGE event was our acquisition of a television!  My very clever mother used to enter jingle contests and she won a TV!! Holy moly! We were rich beyond belief! Never mind we had to push up the livingroom window in order to turn the aerial, and in winter we'd have to first pour boiling water on it so we could make it turn! Oh, the memories:)

To me the furnace, the dryer, the TV - these were luxuries. And I've never really moved past that, I've never wanted more. We kept chickens and appreciated the fresh eggs everyday. We had a strawberry patch, raspberry bushes, a peach tree (well it was technically on the neighbours property...tee hee, don't tell anybody!), a pear tree, and row upon row of beans, potato hills, corn, carrots, cucumber patch, squash patch, rhubarb patch - you name it my dad could grow it!

Luxury was canned strawberries spooned over your vanilla icecream in the middle of January!

So moving to an old farmhouse out in the countryside in PEI is a bit like "going home". I've always been a "tough cookie" so the walk down our long driveway to the little postoffice 1 km away doesn't faze me - I'll get there even if I have to ski!  Imagine what I'll save on gym memberships:) Maybe we'll put in a cement basement floor and maybe someday I'll buy a dishwasher...maybe not. We do plan to travel, and we'll save up for our trips. We want a screened meditation hut in the centre of our forest - we'll save up for that too. The goal is to live life as an adventure, to live consciously and unpretentiously.

We're well on our way!

PS: the opinions expressed in the above post are strictly those of the writer (and her partner) and are not meant in any way to offend those with differing views.

Crofters Lane Avec la Neige!!

The previous owner and renovator of my PEI home, Leigh, just posted

some winter pictures (early winter - just a wee dusting of snow - this is

actually the first snowfall on Nov. 28th!, hmmmmmmm, I

guess this would still be FALL, not winter - yikes!)

on Facebook today so thought I would share one.

That reddish area to the right of the house is a

thicket of bamboo - I didn't know it turned

red in the winter - so pretty!

Doesn't it just look like a postcard!

I love the sky in PEI - that would be a good travel brochure slogan!

"I love the sky in PEI!"

I've never seen the stars like I can at night from beside

the firepit at Crofters Lane.

Crofters Lane

OK, now bring on all the comments about how much snow there is NOW!!

Goals for 2011

http://www.executivesbranding.com/1745/setting-career-branding-goals-for-2011/
Anyone interested in setting career goals should follow this link!

So I want to set some SMART goals for 2011. I'll try to be serious for a while as I figure out what my goals will be.  My first assumption is that for a goal to be a goal it has to take you somewhere other than where you are right now AND that is should be an improvement on current circumstances. Goals should be attainable (so no pie in the sky), measurable (oh no, more math), and have an ending point...ie. one day, one month, one year, when hell freezes over... (Oops, my serious hat fell off, just let me get it back on...be back in a sec...

There. Ok, here goes...

Financial Goals:

I'll start with the goals that are easy to measure (with a calculator in hand).

• Save another $5000 for my TFSA (at $650 savings/month this should by attained by August, 2010)
• Save $2400 for RRSP contribution (at $200/month beginning March 1st this goal will be reached in time for next year's taxes (Feb.29/12)
• Save $2250 to add to my Emergency fund bringing it to a total of $3000 by year's end
• save $1500 for Christmas by Dec. 2011
• Pay a total of $17,400 towards debt by Dec. 31/2011 (this includes $1200/month on Line of Credit and $250/month on PEI mortgage
• maintain $100/month to World Food Program (now on automatic withdrawal so I won't miss a month due to forgetfullness!), and make six NEW Kiva loans this year ($150) in addition to reloaning the $$ that is repaid to me from previous loans
• TRY to spend a maximum of $225 twice a month on groceries
• TRY to spend a maximum of $100 twice a month on gas (this will work out til the end of June and then will have to adjust due to doing a ton more driving in the summer - like to PEI!!! My Crofters Lane jar will help to cover summer driving.
• Through a variety of methods (snowflakes, budget leftovers etc) increase amount in Crofters Lane jar from $360 to a minimum of $650 by June 30

Personal Goals:

• ride stationary bike 3-4 times per week and record mileage in sidebar
• lose 10lbs by 2nd anniversary (April 18)
• list books I read in my sidebar & read one non-fiction book for every five non-fiction books I read (increase learning)
• plant 50 trees at Crofters Lane this summer
• declutter the basement by June
• organize my cajillions of digital photos by the end of January
• make at least one person laugh each and every day
• use http://www.spendingdiary.com/ daily to track my spending
• get out into nature a minimum of once per week

Nothing too earth-shattering, I am keeping "attainability" in mind so that hopefully I won't give up. Also some goals are achievable sooner than the end of the year which is tooooooooo loooonnng of a time to stay motivated for EVERYTHING.

* I also reserve the right to make adjustments throughout the year depending on circumstances - both positive and negative...for ex. I fall and break my leg thereby not being able to ride my bike...or...someone dies and leaves me a cajillion dollars...or...I get fired...well...you get the picture:)

Weeky Wrap

http://www.integratedmortgageplanners.com/blog/

(Photo in header taken August 25th in Goderich, ON which is on Lake Huron)

News Beat: 
That sound you're hearing is my huge sigh of relief that the "accident saga" is finally over. Cora is now safely residing in her very own parking space in front of our home. Cora is a dear little thing who looks great for her age, is very peppy and has very moderate drinking habits. And even better she has already saved me a pile of dough.

Who could have foretold this little windfall:  after picking up the cheque for cc
I then paid for Cora in full and had $2,548.00 profit!! I spent $129 at Canadian Tire for a set of 4 rubber floor mats for Cora, a new "telescopic" snow brush and an Obusform Massage Cushion that fits the car seat, plugs in to the data plug and provides both heat and massage:) :) :) (I carry all my stress in my back:() ps - it also works on any chair (like the one I'm sitting in right now and ohhhh it feels so very very good...)

Once at home I immediately transferred $2,000.00 to my Line of Credit leaving $419 which combined with my current balance of over $200 in my misc budget is going to buy Cora a brand new set of snow tires to ensure a safer winter on the road. I'm so happy I could sing a showtune - aren't you glad this blog doesn't have audio??? - believe me you should be!

In other news...that $10 bill I had in my wallet since last Sunday? I put it into the Crofters Lane jar this morning plus another $5 from $$ I withdrew today to bring the jar total up to an even $300.  My hydro bill was down $10 from last month so it ended up being under budget by $28 this month - it really does pay to power off everything before going to bed each night.

Still have $150 in the gas budget so I plan to take Cora out on the highway this weekend and drive to the trailer in Bayfield. This last trip to retrieve some things we need here at the house over winter was postponed due to the accident. So I'll see how Cora handles on the highway:)

And this is exciting (to me)...I am featured this week in Angela Barton's weekly edition of Thrifty Threads - check it out!!

Heart Beat:
DD is very fearful about getting behind the wheel of a car but this weekend I am going to encourage her very strongly to drive Cora with me beside her. She learned to drive on an identical gold Cobalt so I am hoping this will decrease her discomfort level. This will be a tough one but she needs to give it a go.

Really enjoyed working with my team of 7 educational assistants this week - they really are an amazing group of people. This morning was pretty rough - Michael couldn't stop picking at a hangnail to the point he was grabbing any object he could to dig away at it - nothing we did could distract him from self-injuring and he began to headbut his EA. He lives at a group home as he has very challenging behaviours and I had to call the staff to come and administer anxiety medication.  They ended up taking him back home. Tough day, but handled well.

Weekly Wrap

News Beat:
That's another week gone by. We had quite the mixed bag of weather this week ranging from gorgeous sunshine (got outside for brisk walks with my students) to today's football weather - cold, wet and muddy! The good news though is my school's football team won their semi-final game so Go Crusaders!

On the financial front: wayell (that's my southern accent attempt) I didn't keep that $20 dollar bill in my wallet but I still have two $5.00 bills so I'm only half disappointed...nah, who am I kidding? I'm over the moon to get through a week and only spend $10.00! (that was for my one weekly beer after my volleyball game on Wed. and Red Roaster coffee that I drank at the local library while using their wireless internet on Thurs. The other 3 days were no spend days - woot!  I think I'll just pop that $10.00 into my Crofters Lane jar and start myself off with a new crisp $20.00 bill for the coming week - that puts a big smile on my face! That's $10.00 closer to my next summer's trip out to PEI! =)

My heating bill (natural gas & I also have a gas dryer and hot water heater) was $25 under budget so I added that $25 to my misc spending which now sits at a robust $280 (that's for the rest of Nov.) I took the $152 I would normally pay for property tax (but have a holiday this month and next month as I am on a 10 month payment plan) and socked it into my Christmas fund and now have enough to book my DD's and my annual Christmas trip to Toronto. 

It's a Mirvish package deal - we are going to see Rock of Ages (love story set to the music of the 80's - Don't Stop Believin....), eat at a New Orleans style restaurant, stay at the very upscale Sheraton Hotel downtown, go see The Warrior Emperor and China's Terracotta Army  at the Royal Ontario Museum and shop at the Eaton Centre.  Well, my daughter will shop and I will hopefully resist the temptations that will surround me, make me weak, bend my will, torment me aaarrrrgggghhhhh!  BUT, if my DD wants to buy me a Christmas gift I'd be ok with that tee hee =)


My DP gave me an extra $100 this month for our budget and I immediately socked that away in the Emergency Account so hurrah for an extra payment towards that goal!

On the down side I find that the rental car I have uses more gas than my little Cobalt. Oh poo.  And I just got notice that my condo fees are going up by $25 in 2010 - pretty big increase:(

Heart Beat:
DD went back to her classes on Wed. & she should only have to have the cast on for a few more days. It was touch and go there for awhile as she attends the University of Western Ontario and the professors were in a strike position but managed to achieve a tentative deal by 3am Wed. morning. So between school and her boyfriend I haven't seen too much of her since Tues. night but we stay in contact by texting and I go into her room when she's sleeping and kiss her sweet cheeks (she doesn't even know:)

So far NO CHEATING on the BUY NO NEW CLOTHES pledge (yay me) and only a wee bit of cheating on the diet...ssshhhhh....don't tell anybody!!  Weigh in on Monday - eek! Here's how I cheated: beer on Wed. night (no it wasn't even lite beer), broken pieces of warm brownies that we made today at school to go with our lunch (well, I couldn't serve the broken bits now could I?), a couple of teeny tiny glasses of red wine mixed with some fizzy water...that's about it...hey that's not so bad:)

Whew - marathon post!
Cheers!

Weekly Wrap

Heart Beat:

Dear Daughter continues to improve. She had a friend over today and they worked on school assignments all day. Now she is relaxing with yet another Harry Potter book.  The pain is more manageable and she is sleeping better: she said to me yesterday that all she can do is keep telling the truth to whoever asks about the accident. While waiting is hard it's not nearly as hard when we're doing it together.

Financial Beat:

It's a wrap! The end of another loooonnnng week and for me, the end of the month. I get paid on the last day of the month and if it falls on the weekend then I get paid on the Friday prior making today - PAYDAY! Gee, it seems like it just was payday last week but it's been two weeks! Wow, time flies even when you're NOT spending money - what a concept!

I met my goals for this month - I paid down the line of credit by $1000 (plus the interest) and saved almost 30% of my income - $1400 (split between TFSA, Emergency and RSPs).  My Christmas/Birthday account doesn't get a weekly/monthly deposit as it was an afterthought and didn't make it into my original budget so it is the recipient of any extra money I can squeeze out of my misc., food and gas budgets. The past two weeks I didn't use any of my gas budget ($150) as DD and DP (dear partner) fed the car so that $$ went into the Christmas account.  I also slip spare change and whatever else I can wring out of an already squeezed dry budget into the Crofters Lane Jar as well as any snowflakes that come my way.

Today I spent just $88 of my next $250 for food as we are very well stocked and spent only $15 on gas for the rental. I'm not going to put much gas in it at a time as I don't know when I'll be returning it. No more news from the insurance company so the state of limbo continues. I'm a lot calmer about it all today - it's out of my control for now so will just have faith that it will all unfold as it should. I have appreciated the support and advice from you all.

November will be a "mystery month" for now as we wait to hear about the car. It will have some sort of impact on the budget and I will likely have to rework the numbers somewhat. To what extent remains a "mystery"! Just one more challenge to meet with humour and perseverence:)  The good news is that I don't pay property tax in Nov. and Dec. being on a ten month payment plan so that will be another $304 going into the Christmas fund which will almost bring me to my goal so YAY! for Christmas:) Other goal for November - start my 10 lb. weight loss goal - GO ME!

Weekly Wrap & Crofters Lane

Crofters Lane

Today MCM of TO asked me what is Crofters Lane? So glad you asked! Crofters Lane is a magnificent little acreage near Alberton on PEI - it is home. It is the culmination of a years long search for "just the right place" to retire to...an early retirement I hope.  I've spent the past few years scouring the MLS listings, finding many an idyllic home/acreage just to watch it get sold to someone else. This past summer when I saw the homes for offer I impulsively decided to drive the 1626km. there to check them out in person. 
(This was kind of  out of the norm behavior for me - I don't usually do things that spontaneously though I had the foresight to slow down and get pre-approved for a mortgage before I left for PEI! You know, just in case :)

Even though I got the pre-approval I really didn't plan on buying anything, I wanted to check out the island, see if I wanted to live there and have a nice summer holiday. HAH!

View from front porch

Check out August's archived posts for my journey around the island looking at four other properties before finding that house #5 was the one for me. Within hours of arriving at Crofters Lane I was signing an Offer to Purchase.


View looking east from front porch

 My partner and I tossed around a number of names for our new home and we finally decided upon Crofters Lane. I wanted to recognize our .4km laneway which we walked up and down every day while we stayed there, coffee in hand, birds constantly flitting back and forth between the red berry laden trees, and acknowledge the scottish "crofting" way of life that we plan to emulate- a lifestyle that is environmentally friendly, thrifty and sustainable: a few chickens, a few goats,  a large vegetable garden, some fruit trees, a wood stove & some tilley lamps.



The "Lane" part of Crofters Lane all .4km of it

 Until I actually retire I need to be extra-frugal as I carry a mortgage and maintain my condo and my trailer. If I can keep my costs low now and in the future then I plan to take a reduced pension and retire two years early.  So Crofters Lane is my motivation and the reason I squeeze the life out of every penny that I make. Oh no, wait, that's my scottish blood!


View from the lane

 Weekly Wrap:  I made it til Friday without spending the last $20 in my account so that goes into the Crofters Lane Jar. We did really well with spending over the last two weeks and actually had a surplus of $154.69 (didn't spend all of the $ allotted to food and gas) AND I had set aside $50 for my cell phone and the bill was only $33!! So I tucked another $120 into my Christmas fund raising it to $200 and left a bit extra in my misc. spending as I need to cover a $60 bill for winterizing my trailer (forgot about that!)

Two huge raspberry patches behind the house & backed by our forest

My final pay for October is in my account and every cent has a place to go except for $131 in misc. spending for the next two weeks. There's also a good chance that I won't need all of the $80 ear-marked for natural gas as I haven't had the furnace on yet and I usually come in under the $80 I set aside for London Hydro so barring any other forgotten bills I should make it through October in the black!

And that's a wrap!

Oh Money - Where Did You Go??

Last Friday I once again took $40 out of my misc. account leaving me with a mere $22 to see me through until payday next Friday.  No problem, I thought, I won't spend it all. 

Hah!

It slipped through my fingers faster than water.  I had loaned myself $10 out of our Crofters Lane Jar because I was going out to breakfast with some girlfriends and didn't have time to go to the bank. So the first thing I did was repay to jar. OK, down to $30.

Later in the day when we arrived at the trailer we found that the hydro was off. It seems that someone who had perhaps closed their trailer for the season had flipped off the wrong switch. Easy problem to solve but everything in the fridge was spoiled. It wasn't much - nothing in the freezer and mainly condiments and drinks in the fridge. We needed cream for coffee in the morning so off I went to the variety store as the grocery store had just closed. So a measly little pint of cream and a newspaper was about $6.00.

Then I spent close to $20 on a nice bottle of wine to drink around the campfire. See how quickly my $40 disappears?? Nothing but loose change left.

This morning I decided to treat everyone to a coffee from Tim Horton's as we lazed around the house.  Loose change?  Gone!

So now I face the remainder of the week (4 days til Friday) with only $22 left in misc. spending. $10 of that is earmarked for my volleyball game Wed. night. So looks like I'll have to have a couple of "no spend" days between now and Friday.  Can I do it??

I sure hope so!

Weekly Wrap

everystockphoto.com

All in all not too bad of a week, though I have a confession to make...

When I was summing up my spends the other day I forgot to take into account something I bought on the internet.  I joined a website called TeamBuy.ca which is a "groupon" type site where something is offered for sale at a reduced price and if enough people commit to buy it then a coupon is provided for up to 50% off.

First of all the offer of a free cupcake at the best bakery in town suckered me into signing up to receive emails about the offers in my city. (God I'm easy aren't I??)  Then if that wasn't bad enough there was an offer from my absolute favourite restaurant owned by friends of mine and where my partner actually works a few shifts each week. It seemed meant to be. $50 worth of scrumptious food and drinks for $25.  Yes, I thought - this will save me money! I haven't eaten there for so long because I am saving my money for Crofters Lane. (Of course I now realize that if you have to SPEND money in order to SAVE money then you haven't really SAVED anything)!!

So I am going to bite the bullet right now and make a payment on my credit card instead of waiting for the bill. So knock off another $25 from the misc. spending total. I did take out $20 on Wed. so I could buy a beer after volleyball and with the $12 I had left I bought a glass of wine at the event I went to last night (Ecolivinglondon), put $2.25 in the Crofters Lane jar and have $5 left in my wallet.

I got a few freebies this past week that somewhat helps to compensate for my indulgence. Actually a lot of freebies now that I think about it. Said restaurant gave us a huge and I mean huge bag of frozen carrots, broccoli and cauliflower as well as a big pile of Jamaican patties they had leftover from selling out front of their restaurant downtown on car-free Sunday. Then Michael (my partner) happened to be at a Starbucks on Tuesday night when they were closing and he knew one of the people working there and they gave him all their leftover food - sandwiches, wraps and a couple of oatfudge bars. Yummy! And today I brought home some leftover food from a wonderful Thanksgiving lunch my staff and I made for our students: huge dish of mashed potatoes, gravy, salad and a GIGANTIC pumpkin pie from Costco. There - I feel better now.

everystockphoto.com

I love FREEBIES!!

So to tally up - I spent $12.63 at the grocery store today (yogurt, juice, more salad, bread) and have $50.74 left til Oct. 15th - that's enough I think. And after deducting $25 for my "dinner out" coupon I have $62 left in misc. spending. The gas account is at $107.00 because Michael put gas in the car and so did my daughter so I didn't need to fill it up til today's $43.00. So far so good (she said crossing her fingers...)

So what do you think - should I cancel my membership to Teambuy.ca?? Also - lesson learned on the lure of credit card buying - it seems like you're not really spending anything until you get the bill in the MAIL!!