That will be $16 please....

Friday night, Big D and I decided to go out. We had my FIL come over after the girls were in bed and we went out to get drinks. I can count on one hand the number of times we have gone out without paying for a babysitter, so that in itself was huge, but then we went to a bar/grill that had a drink special - $4 for a pitcher of beer. You read that right, $4 for a PITCHER of beer! I know, I know, it is a college town, there will be drinks specials for days, but knowing and actually experiencing two different things. So our total for the evening

$4 - one pitcher of beer
$8 - appetizer
$4 - tax and tip
$0 - babysitter
$0 - people watching

$16 - total (I am still in shock!)

Night out - adult conversation and no real mention of the kids - priceless! :)

This is why I love small towns...

We decided to rent before buying just to make sure we know where we want to buy, get a feel for the neighborhoods, etc... so we are renting a what could be a really cute house in an established neighborhood - the landlord, however; had no concept of keeping up the house, so cute house = everything breaks and we have lots of bugs!


Small town reality number 1- people actually talk to you at the Park - we found the house because Rabbit befriended our next door neighbor's granddaughter at the park. I started talking to the neighbor and told her we were moving and needed a rental - a few days later - said cute, buggy, breaking down house is ours! :)

Small town reality number 2 - they let you borrow things without question - the day we arrived we had no toys for Rabbit and Hippo, as the movers hadn't arrived yet, so the friendly neighbor had us come over and pick out toys from her grandkids collection so that they could have something to play with

Small town reality number 3 - they offer to do things and actually mean it - when dropping off the toys at the friendly neighbor's house this evening, we were invited in to "visit" in the living room. The friendly neighbor's husband played ball with Rabbit and Hippo while the neighbor and I chatted (me having no clue they still hadn't eaten dinner yet). While talking they asked about the cute/buggy house - and I mentioned the garage door had broken. Well, immediately - friendly neighbor's husband is offering to fix the garage. I of course say - oh don't bother, to which he replies - well let's go over now! He then proceeded to spend the next 20 minutes (again missing DINNER) fixing my garage! And it WORKS PERFECTLY now - holy cow!

Moral - I think I am going to love living in a small town....

New Blog and On the Move...

Welcome to our family blog!

We are family of 4 (and a dog) and we have just packed up the girls (literally - LOL), left the big city of Atlanta and moved to the small college town of Auburn where we know one or two people! Our last name is Gamble, we enjoy gambling, and have just taken a gamble with the move - so I decided "splitting aces" - was a good title for the blog :) You should always do it in blackjack - but you might come up with a 10 or a 2 - you just never know!

I have never been a big journal writer, so this is going to be a new challenge for me. That said, the whole blog is about taking new chances and trying new things, right? So, this will be one of my many new things. I said "weekly" in the sub-title, because I don't want to stress myself out if I can only do one post a week - I figured that was a good challenge goal for me - one a week. I might do more, but one a week should be attainable (let's hope :))!

("Rabbit" and "Hippo" - all packed up)