Tuesday, 10/2/2017 – Another trip to the Co-Op, this time to pick up our check for the second half of September.  From the 15th – 30th, we made $107.03 (plus got $35 toward our monthly rent from my mom for selling her stuff at the stand during the month), bringing our total profit, after September’s rent, to $163.45! (This was reflected in September’s extra income, despite picking up the check today.)  Overall so far, after rent, we’ve made $359.90 from selling our crap at the Co-Op stand.  Until we started displaying our my stuff for sale, I really didn’t realize how much shit I had displayed in crammed into this house!  It feels really good to be decluttering and making some extra money in the process.  It’s really hard to believe that just two months ago I was wondering how in the world I’d ever be able to unload all of my crap, and now I’m beginning to wonder how long we’ll actually need to keep the stand…

Thursday, 10/5/2017 – For prosperity’s sake…

Friday, 10/6/2017 – My to-do list really took off the past few days, so, I found myself, again, not having enough time to go to work.  So, I didn’t.  Instead, I spent the day being productive with life stuff and got a ton crossed off my list.  Loaded our Co-Op stand up with more stuff and did a thorough inventory of what’s there compared to what I think should be there, and will investigate the discrepancies after our next check.  Did a ton of laundry, caught up on a bunch of non-profit commitment work that I’d been slacking on, fought some malicious attacks on our website and got pumped for GOING SAILING TOMORROW!

Saturday, 10/7/2017 – Sunday, 10/8/2017 – We went our first sailboat show – the US Sailboat Show in Annapolis, Maryland.  Since it was a pretty huge show, it got it’s own post here.  We also took part in the First Sail Workshop on Saturday, 10/7/2017, and wrote about our experiences – Josh’s here and Alexis’s here.

Monday, 10/9/2017 – Columbus Day so no work for Alexis, a TON of writing about our boat show and First Sail Workshop adventures and only 210 Monday’s to go!

Tuesday, 10/10/2017 – Just another day at the office…

Friday, 10/13/2017 – In an amazing feat, seven family members were able to coordinate their schedules to have a family dinner at our house.  Filet mignon and a few hours of family laughter and love made a great Friday evening!

Tuesday, 10/17/2017 – Alexis’ 6 year employment anniversary.  Only 4 years more to go until I’m vested!  We’re keeping a close eye on the state’s pension reform, which is scheduled to begin 1/1/2019.  The rumor is that there’s going to be an option for current employees to convert from pension to 401K, which is going to give us some options to explore…

Wednesday, 10/18/2017 – We spent the evening with my Mom, celebrating her birthday.  Pizza, wings and Italian sub bonanza, topped off with a huge slice of chocolate cake with peanut butter icing!

Thursday, 10/19/2017 – Sunday, 10/22/2017 – Josh headed to his company’s beach house for some fishing and winterization of the company’s boats.  The dog and I stayed at home, with a long, LONG list of things to get accomplished.  The guys had a great weekend fishing (despite a pretty windy Saturday!) and hanging out at the beach house.  They even remembered to take some pictures!

Saturday, 10/21/2017 – Another trip to the Co-Op stand and another check!  The first half of October netted us $138.61.  Still going strong, purging, pricing and selling!

Monday, 10/23/2017 – I decided to make a good faith effort toward being an official adult and figured I had a good excuse to take some time off work for an exhilarating adult trifecta – bloodwork at 2pm, dentist appointment at 3pm and eye doctor appointment at 6pm.  How exciting is my adult life?!  It was a LONG day, but, no bad news from any of the appointments so I can’t complain!

Tuesday, 10/24/2017 – Josh’s 36th birthday!  Since we’re focusing on paying down our debt, we avoided the typical “stuff” birthday presents and expensive dinner out and, instead, opted for homecooked New York Strips and registering for a Discover Scuba class at the local YMCA for November 7th!  The Discover Scuba class is something we’ve been talking about doing for a while and it worked out well as an experience gift instead of more stuff.  We’ll be writing more about the class, for sure!  I also had the first ever Small Living, Big Life shirt printed for Josh for his birthday from CustomInk.  It turned out GREAT!

Saturday, 10/28/2017 – We spent the day taking care of house projects and making favors for Josh’s Aunt’s upcoming wedding.  What a fun project to be tasked with taking care of!  60 pint jars filled with Warm Apple Pie and labeled with gross, Halloweeny labels.

Saturday evening, we headed to an official dinner date with one of Josh’s former co-workers and her husband that we hadn’t seen in 3ish years.  It was GREAT to reconnect with them after 3 years and even better that we fell right back into a few hours of conversation, despite the years of disconnect.  They’re in the midst of arranging their pieces into a more “freeing” life, too, so it was cool to compare notes and talk about future plans.  We agreed that we’d do better at getting together more often and I sincerely hope that we all hold to that because I enjoy spending time with them a lot.

Sunday, 10/29/2017 – I’m continuously amazed by the wildlife where we live.  While I’m looking forward to big changes in our surroundings in a few years, I’m going to miss spending a Sunday watching this all day long…

Tuesday, 10/31/2017 – Josh and I both took half days from work so that we could head to Kent Island, this time for Josh’s Aunt’s Halloweeny, costume wedding.  The wedding was great, we got to break out our favorite Halloween costumes and it was good to see some family that we haven’t seen in a while.  My favorite part was definitely releasing the lanterns into the dark night sky…so cool!  We opted to stay the night on Kent Island to avoid any deadlines, time schedules and concerns about driving two hours home after drinking at the wedding.  And, really, you can’t beat waking up to a beautiful view of the water!

And, just like that, it’s goodbye to October and hello to November – lots of hunting, lots of eating and starting the winter-time work around the house!