This past Friday was the opposite of last Friday.

The sitter came, and the kids were totally composed. When I left to run errands, they barely noticed. So I was in a good mood as I headed out to Village Thrift and Target. At Village Thrift, I was looking for a few kitchen items, like a new large pot for cooking pasta. I didn’t find the kitchen stuff, but I did get some clothes and shoes for my daughter, in the next size up; some seashells to use as decor for my sister’s shower; new/better mittens for my son; and a large coffee mug for my husband (per his request). Total = $29.

Gymboree dress

I could spend hours there just taking pictures:

Where all the must-have toys of yesteryear end up

Most useless gadget ever?

At Target, I returned some toys that didn’t go under the tree ($59). So I should have ended up ahead of the game, but then I started poking around Target, and left with a poster frame and two new pillows for the couch. I probably shouldn’t have bought them. But my husband has been bitching about a lack of comfy pillows for the couch ever since we had it redone, and I’ve been searching for a frame for my art print for a while.

And I felt all rich anyway, because the whole time I was out, my phone was blowing up with people suddenly wanting my Facebook yard sale and craig’s list items. (But none of that ended up translating into actual sales, not yet anyway.)

I did finally sell my black-and-white dress on Thursday, for $25.

So as soon as I got home I placed the picture that I bought last spring in the frame and hung it in my kitchen. I love it!

“Haunted by the ’80s”

But perhaps the most exciting part of my Friday was that I REMEMBERED TO USE MY REUSABLE BAGS! I turned down bags in Wawa and Target, since I didn’t really need them, and I brought my reusable bags into Village Thrift. Maybe a new pathway has been created in my brain and I’ll remember all the time now!

Actually, the most exciting part of Friday was when a snow squall swept over us out of nowhere while we were all eating dinner at King of Pizza. It was like a mini-blizzard. The kids loved it.

A nice end to a nice week. I did well with cooking and using up food (ok, we went out to eat one night, but we had a gift card from Christmas), and took care of a lot of paperwork and bills. I did a lot of soul-searching and numbers-crunching on the real estate front. Basically, if we moved to a smaller house, we’d reduce our monthly payment and our utilities, and we’d have a house in better shape and that has amenities we lack now, like central air and a fireplace. If we stay here and refinance, we could reduce our payment to about the same amount, but would still have no central air, a basement that needs work, an exterior that needs new siding, etc.

There are four houses for sale now that I’m interested in, three of which fit this scenario and one of which that would be even cheaper but which needs some work. I almost pulled the trigger and set up showings, but didn’t. We’ll see. Right at this second, sentiment is trumping reason, and I just want to stay in my big old money pit where I rocked all my babies and came downstairs in my wedding dress.