I am so over them.

Gareth and I have had to work hard over the last ten years of marriage (that’s right, coming up to a decade of The Cowlzies) to find harmony when it comes to spending money.  We come with very different ideas so the work is meeting in the middle or closer to one of our ends, but we meet and that’s worth working at.

Most of the time we just have to make decisions about one purchase and it’s not for a huge amount of money, so agreement is found argument free-ish.  However, since coming to New Zealand it’s all about the big stuff; renting a house, buying a house, buying a car and now, how to spend the set amount of money we have left after the purchase of the house to make it liveable.  The list looks like this:

• washing machine
• tumble dryer (so necessary in the land of no central heating)
• fridge/freezer
• two sofas
• spare double bed for visitors
• a proper bed for Big Girl Minnie
• a gate and fence for the front (so the children can’t get to the road)
• curtains for Minnie and Jackson’s rooms

There were other things on the list but they’ve been dumped…for now.  Already we are way over the budget and then we realised we had to pay for boring stuff like:

• solicitor fees
• house and contents insurance
• insulation in the new roof (vendor paying for roof, phew)

Now it comes down to priorities and, for me, the lowering of expectations.  We are currently on the long and arduous search for sofas that are practical, fit the room, attractive, comfortable and on budget…prayers for a miracle gratefully received.  Hey if God can create Willamina and Jackson Cowles then he’s got sofas somewhere for us.

No matter how things come and what comes first I am excited, we nearly have a home and it’s lovely and I can’t wait to be the hostess.