“One of the reasons people give for not giving gifts is that they can’t afford it.  Gifts don’t have to cost money, but they always cost time and effort. If you’re in a panic about money, those two things are hard to find. The reason these people believe they can’t afford it, though, is that they’ve so bought into consumer culture that they’re in debt or have monthly bills that make no sense at all.

When you cut your expenses to the bone, you have a surplus. The surplus allows you to be generous, which mysteriously turns around and makes your surplus even bigger.”

- By Seth Godin in “Linchpin”

I’m interested in this sort of grassroots fundraising ideas, but I’m not sure how open people will be to paying an extra charge on their phone bills due to the donation they made. What if the phone company setup two “bills” one for the phone services they provide and one for the extra donations, applications, ringtones and such we buy? Kind of like how on my iPhone. I have a bill from Apple for any applications I purchase or music I download, plus a bill from AT&T for the service?

Jessica successfully started the preschool at Chicago International Academy, and I was able to launch a new website for them (www.ciacademy.org).

I’ve got big dreams for this next year and I am looking forward to what God will do in and through me. I’m looking forward to the adventure!

Merry Christmas Everyone & A Happy New Year!!!

The house we're working to closing on.

Buying a home is a long process we’ve found over the last few months. Armed with our first accepted offer, we are now plowing through the piles of paper work necessary to get the loan process going. At the same time I’m lining up inspectors, a lawyer, and hopefully contractors next week to help with the rehab work, especially in the kitchen and bathroom of the 2nd floor unit.

The house (3528 W McLean Ave, Chicago, IL 60647) is a 2 unit home with a unit on each floor and a short 6 ft. basement. In the backyard on the alley is a 2-car garage.

Inside the 1st floor unit is mostly just studs, electrical, and insulation. It needs drywall and a floor. Plus a new bathroom and kitchen since those are just pipes sticking out of the frame walls and floor right now.

Inside the 2nd floor unit is are mostly plastered walls with some drywalling necessary. The kitchen is not there in this unit either, but the bathroom is partially put back together.

The basement has been flooded, so everything needs to be pulled out (gutted) so that we can get rid of the mold and junk that is everywhere.

We’ll need two new water heaters, 1 new HVAC system, and a bit of roofing repair on the garage.

We’re currently at $85,000 without doing any repairs, so we’ve got some room to include repairs in our mortgage. We’ll be getting a FHA 403k loan which allows us to roll some of the repair costs into the mortgage in order to hire contractors instead of doing it all on our own.

This Saturday we have our home inspector coming out to check out the house. I’m especially concerned with the structural integrity of the house since it was built in 1890. The one benefit of a house this old is that we don’t have to worry as much about whether someone accidentally built the house over the edge of our property. After 20 years being uncontested, it basically becomes grandfathered in, so we don’t have to worry about that part at least.

There is a lot of work to go on the paperwork side of getting to a close on the house, not to mention getting all of the quotes on the repairs and such. A fun month ahead that will turn into several years of repairs! Yippee!

I’ve been reading the book The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less by Barry Schwartz. It’s been a fun read to as he examines how we make our decisions (and how badly we make them), plus why we can live in a generation with the most choices but still not be happy.

Two thoughts I’ve taken away so far from the book are this. First, the premise of the book…The paradox of choice today is that while we say we want to simplify our lives, we also want more control over the details of our life.

Second is that we get the most happiness when we have fewer choices, but more control over our lives. Doesn’t that at first glance conflict with itself? We want choices, and we’ll be happier if we have a few, but give us too many choices, and we’ll never be happy. (which actually reminds me of another book I’m working through, but that’s for another post).