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Archive for March, 2007

Yay! Honeymoon Update!

March 30th, 2007 at 02:17 am

My mother offered to get our plane tickets to Peurto Vallarta for our honeymoon. This took me by surprise and it is a nice offer as we can have memories to cherish for a long time.

If you read my earlier post, the resort for 5 nights was paid for by a friend who is using her timeshare as a wedding gift.

I am also happy because it means I stay closer to my lower budget for the Wedding.


Why is life soo good lately? I am so not used to this.

Modular Homes - Just venting

March 27th, 2007 at 12:38 am

I have no idea why I need to vent about modular homes. I think it is because of the stigma I get about them from my co-workers and friends. I can not shoot my mouth off at them so I guess I will vent it here. This is not intended to shoot off of anyone's remark on the forum. There has been no one saying anything insulting or offensive at all. I guess just for me to release some pent up thoughts.

I have been pondering on this over the last few years.... In some areas like the SF Bay Area, it can be ridiculously expensive to live here. Why I stay? Many reason including the deaf culture and many wonderful opportunities here. Fortunately my fiancé has a house so I am no longer in a "rent" situation to worry about this. But have many times thought of buying modular homes as I have seen some really nice ones. I have a friend who turned down an offer of buying a modular home because someone convinced her it was bad investment. She is a single mom of 3 and been renting only 1 or 2 bedrooms apartments. This 3 year old modular home had 4 bedrooms and was cheaper than her bad area of the city run down apartments. Since then she has gave up finding a better home and work two jobs just to make ends meet.

I know the value of the modular home usually does not go up in most cases and can go down. They are built better than some of the traditional houses.

We do strive for the best investment and value for our money but I have come to the conclusion that I don’t think it really matters for some families. I see this as a happening thing in our future where populations are overgrowing (especially in cities) and the division among the rich and poor is even more visible. Even there are families who does own a very expensive home and can not sleep well at night because of the risk they might loose their house due to debts.

Stability for us and children is really important to a more abunditful lifestyle. If it means having a strong home where you can raise your family, who cares if it increase value later on or not if you are in a situation where housing is just not affordable. It is too bad that modular homes and double wide trailers has the stigma and stereotype as it does now days where affordable housing is just crazy. I can still see it as a happy home and a good investment in health, emotional, and mental health. It can even leave room to save for retirement and savings vehicle.

But that is just me!

Honeymoon

March 23rd, 2007 at 06:28 pm

Okay Okay Okay I confess! I am going to splurge here.

Original plan was no honeymoon but to hide at our house for a week so we can save money for house renovation.

A good friend who is one of my bridesmaid offer a week at a resort in Puerto Vallarta (Mexico) for 5 nights as a wedding gift. All I would have to come up with is the plane tickets, soon to be hubby passport (I got mine already from past trips) and the all inclusive meals for $40 dollars per day per person.

I do not believe I will get this great offer again so I should take advantage of it.

Yes it would mean spending more money on the whole wedding thing than planned but I want to do this. It will be paid in cash but it would put some house projects on hold. That is okay... I am afraid soon to be hubby will want to start working on the house if we stay home for our honeymoon.

Is it my attitude or is it reality?

March 1st, 2007 at 07:18 pm

Lately I have been preoccupied with work. It is a compliment that I am given new responsibilities on the job as it shows I can handle growth and fast pace. However, I am finding that I am given too much because I am still hanging onto the old responsibilities since I am the only one at work that knows the inside and outside of some programs.

Even though I slave away some days working really hard to complete things on my daily workload, there are times I feel burnt out and just do not have the energy keeping up with everything. This leads to a vicious cycle of off days and catch-up days which is very exhausting. Sometimes I work extra unpaid hours so I can get it done by deadline. For the past several months, I have an extremely tough time waking up in the mornings...mostly because I am not ready or afraid to face the well know busy and stressful job heading up.

What is going on in my mind? Working extra hours hurts me since it is a one hour commute time from work to home, it would mean I don’t get to see my sweetie as much and house get unattended.

I am worried I just won’t find another job that nearly pays as well and have the wonderful benefits.

Also it’s just so much stress at the job but why am I still there? The managers and co-workers are amazingly supportive and encouragers, they find ways to allow me to do my work the best I can by providing technologies and sign language interpreters and so on. The pay is good and benefits, health insurance and 401k matching is outstanding.

I am battling with quitting since I am feeling way more stress I out to feel but I am not sure if its because I need an attitude adjustment (often) or it just mean that I am ready to move on and find a job that suits my new lifestyle with my soon to be fiancé.

As a woman, I don’t want to ever fall in the trap that I am taken care of just because I will marry someone. I want to be financially, emotionally stable whether I am on my own or not. However, the career driven life is just not always for me although I have behaved like that in the pasts due to determination to pay off my debts. Life is too short and it’s amazing how green the trees can be.

I don’t want to be one of those who slave away at work just to buy a fancy house, car, and materialistic things and never be remembered for anything I do but what I had.

I go back and forth with being over concern about taking care of myself in a materialistic worldly ways of financials and shelters and so on while taking care of myself spiritually and emotionally. Finding a balance would be the goal but where that balance is hard. Partly because any direction from my home is at least 45 minutes to get off the hill and reach the closet town. sighh......