Retire In Style Blog Too

I am all about living a positive life and most of my writing reflects my Pollyanna attitude. Playing golf, walking, shopping, travel and pursuing any interest that crosses my mind is the way I would live forever if I could. But when I took a big fall, reality came to call. Facing the truth about my mobility was hard. That is when I began looking into a way to  purchase an affordable stairlift . Look at this beautiful chairlift. (image:  Fcerrato ) I had fallen on the golf course here in Arizona and sprained my ankle severely. After I regained my dignity, I visualized what I would do if I had been at home in Oregon and had to navigate the stairs we climbed to get to our bedroom and laundry. What was I going to do about all those stairs if I didn't get well? All I could see was me crawling up and down the steps several times a day. I am not a small woman so my husband definitely could not carry me. (Poor man!) Moving to a new house crossed my mind immediately. But my i...

I am always looking for ways to give more at Christmas time. Although our list is not horribly long, we do have 12 grandchildren. We want to be generous with them. In the past we have given gift cards or cash to family and friends but we are finding that there are ways to give better gifts. Here is how it works. Take a look at any gift card you have received but have not used. I bet you have some. It is estimated that over 2 billion dollars worth of gift cards went unredeemed during 2012.  If you are smart, you will find a way to put those cards to use. That is where you might want to use a company that will buy your gift cards.  Gift Card Exchange : If the gift cards you are re-gifting are for stores that are not convenient you can get extra value for the card by exchanging for an Amazon gift card.  Cash for Gift Cards: If the person you are buying for really needs a cash gift, sell the unwanted gift card and give cash. Make it easy for them. Buy Gift Cards:  Buy y...

Have you ever thought about how you have changed since you retired? Maybe you went back to school to learn to be something totally different. Or have you created your own "Discipline" combining skill that you had learned from other stages and ages? Remember when you were in college and you studied a discipline like math or art or accounting? It seems that we can create our own discipline combining talents we already possess. That is what I want to talk about today. It all started with my email and a link to SumbleUpon. The next thing I knew I was looking at a weblog posted by an artist named Candy Chang . First of all I want you to know that I am not acquainted with Candy Chang. But I do know that I love her website and better yet I love the range of her creative nature. She has given a TED talk so you know she is remarkable. She has done everything from a chalkboard on her house grown into a book to an exhibit in Las Vegas called Confessions . After the death of someone she...

House for Sale...as is! Very quiet and isolated! (Gary Langley Photo, 2013) This may be everyone's worst nightmare. You find the perfect house and it turns out the neighbors are yellers and night owls. It would be enough to make anyone cranky I suppose. I was reading about a guy that bought a weekend house out at the shore or someplace equally a expensive sounding. The house was down the street from a small theatre company. All the neighbors had screen porches so they could enjoy the summer evening. It was just perfect. It all started I think, when the neighbors visited until all hours of the night on the porch in the summer. Then Halloween came and the theatre company opened their haunted house. Evidently the actors were very good at their jobs because the screaming began as soon as the doors opened and continues until the haunted house closed. That was bad enough but at least they were only open in October. He could stand that...then this year they decided that, since they were s...

With the cost of living going up in the United States, Florida is becoming further and further out of reach as the go to for retirees. Many who are retiring now are retiring abroad and believe it or not, this can be attained by just about anyone. The number of people who have retired outside of the U.S. has more than doubled since 2006 and have a budget at low as $40 a day. This can actually be a very financially savvy way to retire. Most retirees want somewhere a little warmer with less expensive housing and more affordable healthcare and this is doable in most countries outside of the U.S. Many of the inexpensive and appealing countries available lie in Central and South America, India, and Southeast Asia. If retiring abroad is an option that appeals to you, there are some factors that you should consider when choosing your destination.  Budget When considering another country, while it may be much less expensive than the United States, you will want to budget out you...

I subscribe to the NYT's online. It costs me $20 a month and I often question the wisdom of paying for the news from them. And then they put something on the front page that makes me laugh. I am a sucker for a good laugh and I will in fact pay $20 a month just on the off chance that there may be one coming soon. And here it is... Giving a Wife Her Front Yard Burial...No Matter What.  The first paragraph went like this: STEVENSON, Ala. — James Davis figures that his first mistake was asking permission. If a man promises his wife he will bury her in the front yard, then he should just do so. New York Times Stevenson Journal  (Notice that Mr. Davis has left a place for his name on the grave marker. WOW!) I know...I should not laugh at this but, see, I am 72 so I live very close to the time when I will be telling someone where to put me. Oh, I promise it will not be the front yard of our home. Still, if I were inclined, I suppose I could make some wonky request on my death bed whi...

It rained 6' that week. My garden had gone to sleep and all the flowers had been dead headed. The trees were only beginning to show a hint of the cold that was to come but I felt like a snow goose ready to fly south. I don't think it was about the rain or even the cold though. I think is was about the people that inhabit my life. Children were off to school. Parents were going into that rainy season working mode and we needed to go out into the world in search of new scenery and flowers that were just beginning to grow. I like the road trip from Oregon to Arizona. It gives me a chance to bring my soul along with me. When I fly, it takes two or three days for it to arrive. In the meantime,  I am walking in a dream. Driving takes three days so it is all good. The change in scenery as we travel along allows a gentle transformation. Entering the Columbia Gorge at Sunrise (Oregon) (iPhone) East end of the Columbia Gorge...the desert begins (Oregon) (iPhone) Wind generator above the ...

If you are on the road like us, you know that your smart phone (my iPhone) can save your bacon....over and over. My husband and I just finished our journey from Oregon to Arizona. I know what a difference that device has made for us.  Here are the 9 we used just on this trip plus one I want. Gas Buddy mobile app...this app can find you when you are on you phone. It gives you a list of gas stations that are nearby along with the price of gas. It can make a difference...for us it was $.20 per gallon. Over the length of a trip it is significant. Twitter mobile app...I follow local Twitter, keep in touch with people on the fly. Instagram App allows me to post photos to twitter and facebook. If you are a blogger, you know that being personal and up to date is important. Facebook mobile app...this one is for family more than anything. But I do have a lot of followers. Timing is important for twitter and facebook.  Be sure to post when the most people are using the apps. FourSquare...

Zooming along! We travel a lot. When we are on the road, the GasBuddy.com App. Here in Utah we save 21 cents per gallon at the same chain by going 14 more miles. It's a no brainier!

Quality of Life in the UK, Pensions and the Top 3 Dream Retirement Spots  Guest Blogger,  Mario Vitanelli is a writer and blogger who specializes in international politics and finance, retirement and investment for    www.QROPSGroup.com . His areas of expertise include European, Asian and the Med region's economic policy; SIPP schemes and QROPS. When away from his keyboard, he enjoys photography and appreciates the rest of the Vitanelli family’s endless patience with his football dependence. There’s nothing like starting off an article with a couple of depressing facts. So here they are: a recent analysis found that the UK ranked the second lowest in the whole of Europe for quality of life. Only Greece was rated more poorly. No doubt in response to the discontent suggested by these polls, one out of every eight Brits expressed their desire to live somewhere that isn’t Britain. Perhaps you’re among these discontented? If so, where would you want to go? Everyone has di...

I have never met a cellar rat I didn't like! In case you don't know, those are the people making very good wine in the basement or the bathtub but do not have the money to fund marketing a business.   That is where Tim, my Naked Wine guy, comes into the picture. ( Naked Wine is a "crowd sourcing" or "customer funded" system run by NakedWine.com.)  He calls me occasionally and my husband and I discuss what we want shipped to our house. It arrives in a day or two. As a result of that exchange, a "cellar rat" somewhere is being support with money and a place to market their product.  An article in Forbes talked about how the money from this organization helps winemakers: With seed money to get started, winemakers are now able to focus on the core of their passion — winemaking, not financing. “Because winemakers don’t have to waste their time and money selling to us, they make a profit, with massively reduced risk,” says Gormley. “And we get great win...