<p>Part of the reason we sold our lake house is teenage son had no wish to be 45 minutes away from his friends. If we had one now that he is at college it would be a lot different.</p>
<p>Owing a second home takes more work than you would think. We had our lake house set up so we didn’t have to haul too much back and forth (I kept clothes there and the pantry was stocked). Still, it takes some work - having to buy fresh groceries (for both houses), hauling coolers and having to close and clean the lake house (including the boat) before leaving every weekend because we were never quite sure when we would be back. For example, you don’t want to leave dishes in the sink or even the dishwasher if you aren’t going to be back for a while. Nor would you leave dirty towels and clothes to marinate for weeks. You need to go through the refrigerator and remove food that could go bad. It all takes time - it would take us 1-2 hours to close up the house each weekend. Then when you get home, you have to haul in and unpack everything you took to the lake, Personally, I was okay with it because I wasn’t working. We sold it for a variety of reasons that really had nothing to do with the work involved and sometimes we wish we had not. We’ve talked about getting another one but I’m in no rush since I’m working right now, I don’t feel like I have the time to deal with it anyway.</p>
<p>3bm103, BIL/SIL have a hot tub set up in their (unfinished) basement. It’s a little strange, but she has fibromyalgia and needs a lot of physical therapy.</p>
<p>A new Janome Horizon sewing machine, which has a powerful motor, lots of bells and whistles, and an 11" throat area. It would make free-motion quilting a lot easier. It’s approx. 3 thousand dollars:(. I intend to torture myself by test driving one at the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Convention later this month. A girl can dream can’t she?</p>
<p>A new bathroom. please. I love our home and everything about it – EXCEPT the 1970s era upstairs bath with brown! fixtures, including the most hideous 6-foot square shallow, absolutely useless jacuzzi you have ever seen. Because we live in a vertical, 19th century attached rowhouse in an urban neighborhood with narrow, one-way streets and byzantine parking restrictions, this project is going to be a bear (and I have the contractor quotes to prove it). But hopefully this year…I have been patiently waiting for more than 10 years…</p>
Thanks a lot, all you CC folks! I am now $400 poorer!
After reading this thread last week, I could not get that Vita-Mix blender that I posted about out of my mind. I recalled seeing them on the shelf at our Costco recently (unusual - I’d only seen them at “shows” before) and I took the plunge to go buy it. Gone! So they checked their inventory online and found a couple at a Costco about 40 minutes away. I went right over and got the second-to-last one there. It had become an obsession! But I am now the happy owner of a new Vita-Mix. I’ve used it a few times already and I do love it!</p>
<p>^^^ H is dying for a Vita-Mix. Keeps telling me how great it would be. I keep telling him all we have to do is wait about 3-4 more months when my parents realize that the one they bought a year ago has only been used 1-2 times. I’m happy to take the hand-me-downs. They tend to be very impulsive buyers - unlike all of us here who have thought through all these purchases!</p>
<p>Rom828,
Could you ask your folks if you could borrow their Vita-Mix to see whether you would actually USE it? Chances are that your folks wouldn’t miss it much and it could gather cobwebs in your house instead! LOL :)</p>
<p>The good thing about Costco purchases is that you can return it if you later get tired of the purchase and/or find it is gathering cobwebs in your home. ;)</p>
<p>Ditto Orchestramom. What I wouldn’t give for a huge master bathroom, with a couple of sinks, big ole shower and bath unit, jacuzzi (of course), and enough room so I don’t bang my legs and arms so much I end up bruised from using the bathroom, showering, drying off… sigh. Maybe my retirement condo in the south will have this.</p>
<p>HImom - great idea. They live 500 miles away, but on our next visit, I’ll ask. I guarantee that when I do, my step-dad will say “just take it and keep it”! Which means H will be happy but I’ll have to figure out where to store it!!</p>
<p>“If I could save time in a bottle”… I’d be itching to buy back some time when the kids were younger. We didn’t get to do enough together due to schedules etc. (But ha, we did get plenty of soccer). </p>
<p>I used to have a housecleaner every other week. It can be great with the right worker (mine has moved away and then back and then away again). She was trustworthy, and I knew that she used some of her earnings to help raise her grandkids,. I felt good about giving her the job. I liked having the forced reason for us to clean the clutter ever 2 weeks so that she could do a good job cleaning.</p>
<p>This pre-cleaning for the cleaning person is a BENEFIT of having someone in to help clean. It forces you to pick up, put away, attack the clutter. I really think it’s kind of a two-for-one deal. You have to tidy up, and then you get the cleaning help.</p>
<p>Even twice monthly cleaning is a huge help because you can get all the floors and bathrooms cleaned at once.</p>
<p>I just scratched… For the price of that bag I got 4 first class RT tickets (thank you, Alaska Air for treating your frequent flyers well) to HI!!! Which means DH and I will be supporting HIMom’s economy twice this year. Someone else will have to support Italian artisans :)</p>
<p>Hey, our state thanks you! We were just told we have a deficit in the neighborhood of $880 million or some such, and unfunded liabilities for our state workers in the neighborhood of $1,000,000 or so. YIKES!</p>
<p>I’m not itching any longer! Thanks to another CC member who posted that there was a great deal on refurbished Nooks - I caved and bought one! $79 and $5 shipping . </p>
<p>Since I was really leaning towards a Nook, this will give me a chance to see if an ereader suits me - if I love it, then I’ll pass this one on to one of my kids and maybe go full guns for a Nook Color!</p>
<p>Now…the NEXT thing I’m itching for…some new leather furniture for the sun porch…</p>
<p>So on Page one I posted that I wanted an ipad, but my Dell Mini was working find and I did not NEED one. Well, can you believe it the HARD DRIVE failed on my Mini? Not really happy about it, but I am going to replace it with an iPad. I got a Boot Volume error, I had to boot it from my Windows disc. Sometimes it is a Windows file problem and can be repaired. Not mine. I had nothing much saved on it and nothing important lost. To be honest I would have rather not had to replace it now. But it was my work computer that I kept on my desk to use to check email and do quick things during my work day. I need something, and so I will replace it with my “itch.”</p>
