the house talk and ode to a cozy apartment

so, mr. soup and I finally had "the house talk." we've had many house talks, but this one we actually discussed exactly where we both want to live, what type of house we want and how much we want to spend. Afterwards, we drove around the perspective neighborhoods to look at houses (so much fun by the way). However, the houses we want are way out of our price range, so any hope of moving at the end of this school year was shot. We are shooting for Spring '11. Our goal for this year is to aggressively save and pay off debts (credit cards and my car loan), so that we can get an affordable rate. We're still going to look at foreclosures too, but we want to prepare to pay the market-value for a good house.


Some things we both agreed on were that we do not want to move to the suburbs and by suburbs I mean far north like McKinney, Allen, etc. That's just not us. We do want to stay near the Richardson suburb area (I know Richardson is a suburb, but it's not a true suburb). We want to stay in the area in which we live now. Not the exact area, because the homes surrounding us are listed at half a million dollars (no joke), but there are some nearby that are less than half that price that we could afford. We live in an area that has excellent schools (for when/if Abby comes to live with us), great shopping (for me), and great restaurants (for all of us!). The homes are larger and older (most built in the 1960's) than most areas, so they have lots of character. Surprisingly, most of the homes have four bedrooms which is what we need if we're going to start a family in a few years.





So, since we're stuck here for a year and a half, I want to focus on the good things about our little apartment. I know I focus on how small and cramped we are, but it is pretty spacious considering what you get in apartments these days. Our apartment has more square feet than some homes. Our complex was built in the 1980's, so there aren't any cool architecture features. However, the bedrooms are large and we have tons of closets, cabinets and other storage features. We have so much storage, that when I moved stuff to prepare for my brother-in-law to move in, I didn't have to part with too many items; just a couple of shoes and a few shirts! We have wonderful vaulted ceilings and our apartment feels like a little cottage. It's so cozy! We live in an area that is safe! I never feel scared walking my dogs at night. Like I mentioned before we live near good shopping, restaraunts and schools.



Okay so other good news:

My hubby recieved a very generous stipend from his school! Woo-hoo! We're going to use part of it to buy a new laptop! Yay! So, now we just need to research what type of laptop we want to get! There are just too many out there and it's hard to decide what is best. Ugghh. We want a mac notebook and we found one for $929, so it's a little over what we wanted to spend, but I read it's a better investment in the long run!

I'm so proud of him for earning the stipend! He worked so hard last year and this summer and it really paid off!



I got my 2nd master's degree! This is my first degree with my maiden name and my married name on it (and probably my last degree!) Yes, that's right all four of my names are on my degree. In my heart I knew I couldn't leave one off because I started the degree with my maiden name and finished with my new name. I'm so glad to be done with the program. The 18 months went by fast, but they were definitely tough!

My brother-in-law is here! He flew in today! Yay!

Murad begins his internship tomorrow! We're getting so close to the light at the end of the tunnel! Yeah!

That's it for the Campbells!