Postcards from the Funny Farm

Are you a homeowner? If so, you know how long it can take to get the furniture you want in your home. This can be due to limited finances, spare-time, or knowledge of where to buy the stuff you need. My family just purchased it’s first home mortgage so we can relate with furniture envy big time. In our house, we are getting all new stuff as we go but most specifically, we are looking for bar stools.

I ran across a website that specializes in bar stools and they have some really competitive prices when you buy of the internet. For us, waiting for UPS to deliver our barstools is a heck of a lot better than traveling into town only to haggle a price with those insistent salespeople. At (link) there are wooden, metal, wrought iron, and every barstool conceivable there. The pictures are sharp and you can enlarge them to get a better view than if you were right there.

We all know these days you should check a company out before using them. This website is approved by the Better Business Bureau which, for me, was a huge incentive to try them. If you have bar stool envy, get it satisfied online. When they get into your home, your new Bar Stools will thank you!

This blog is about finding your own inspiration. It takes smart readers to hear most of the things I offer. As we all know, pictures are a lot of fun to put on blogs and they can also serve to make abstract concepts like “inspiration” concrete.

The place one lives is one of the keystone determinants of inspiration, as well as mood which is highly intertwined with it. I thought it would be fun to show you my home, the place I refer to here as “The Funny Farm.” The real funny farm is the mental ward and I can guarantee you it is not inspiring there.

BUT … the point I try and make every day on this blog is that anywhere, whether it be the psychiatric lock down ward of a mental hospital or my new magical house, you can foster and create inspiration in your life through psychology. What follows below are many pictures I’ve taken of my new house since we moved in. Enjoy them …

Above is my new pool at the house we got our first mortgage on. I feel a sense of an arrival for many reasons, but watching my babies play in the pool is probably the main reason.

My girls love going in the jacuzzi, even if they can’t quite find their suits. My son, aged 10, has attained an affinity for pool cleaning (seriously!) Lucky me again.

This is a cheap backyaed set we bought for the rental. We will need to upgrade but for now it works nicely.

This was the bathroom nightmare downstairs as we faced it initially. Bank-owned proprties have varied degree of damage to repair we have learned. Sarah got right to work and you’ll see in later photos what a smash-up job she did! It now looks like a model home bathroom.

Sarah’s dad put the center gate on to keep Gizmo from licking my bald head while in the spa.

Sarah got this chandelier FREE on a site called local Freecycler. I think it’s a yahoo group. Anyway, look how nice it is. Again, thank to Sarah’s dad Al, he is a construction tech instructor at our community college so he has all the tools and know-how.

The front (left) of our dream house. As you can see, I’ll need to bring the lawn back as one of my projects. I do enjoy that.

A view of our house from the street. The tree rustles in the wind. When it gets calmer I hope to take the laptop out there feeling the wispy cool summer breeze. This place will no doubt be a source of blogging inspiration.

My liberty is on the right, Sarah’s minivan the left.

Random view of the front room. My piano has been through many moves with me since I was a child. I’ll never part with it ’til I go on to the great beyond then I want my kids to have it.

Nordic Track Treadmill in the “den” area downstairs. It’s also doubling as our workout room. I foresee much inspiration coming from there (already has).

Weights. See if I can do something with these little guns (LOL).

Before pic of the bathroom.

After (wow!)

“Work as if you don’t need the money,
love as if you’ve never been hurt.
Dance as if no one’s watching.”

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Aside: Everyone has told me all my life that California has the highest home values in the country. My wife and I have been checking out homes for the past several months and we’ve found that for our income and credit, we barely qualify. Actually, to be honest, we still haven’t qualified for a reasonable amount but we are told we may. It has got me to wondering what the houses go for in other states. I’ve heard of the amazing properties in Colorado’s Winter Park real estate and I’ve looked into Arizona and a few other so called “cheap states.” The results are mixed. Yes there are some significantly cheaper homes but the teacher pay is also significantly lower. It looks like we are destined to stay in California for now. This is kind of a personal post, or what I call an “aside.” Keep my wife and in your thoughts as we continue to apply and fax and refax and mail etc. in our quest for home ownership. I will be updating our progress here as it unfolds. Currently we are waiting on an FHA loan for 180-200K. There have been a lot of letdowns so far, so we’ll see. We aren’t losing hope.