Piano and Planting

We got our garden planted yesterday afternoon and I also planted my three earth boxes. Yay! I absolutely LOVE the fact that we work for ourselves now. Brett got a couple of jobs submitted to the county yesterday afternoon and so we celebrated by taking off a little early and planting our garden. I didn't think we were going to get to that until this Sunday. Here's what we planted:
Earthboxes - grape tomatoes, sweet red peppers, lettuce and carrots
Garden - okra, acre peas, green beans, pole beans, watermelon, cantelope, cucumbers, pumpkin, squash, zucchini, and we're going to add a row or two of corn when we go get seeds in the next day or two

I'm having an internal struggle with this piano situation. Apparently a piano is an unnecessary expense. Who knew? :) I really want one but again, it's not a need. I know Dave Ramsey would probably tell me that I should not be buying a piano right now. He would tell us to wait until we are done with baby step two which is paying off all non-mortgage debt. Thing is, we are going to be on baby step two for a very long time and the kids will be more than old enough to start piano lessons by the time we get there. I posted an add on craigslist about how I wanted a piano for myself and my kids to learn on but didn't have much to spend on it. Two people emailed me within a couple of hours. Neither have their piano listed as they want to make sure it goes to a good home so they are just keeping an eye on craigslist to find a good home. Each piano belonged to their family for over 50 years and was played by their mother and by themselves when they were younger.

One is a Cable-Nelson that was built in 1951. I have a picture and it looks great. He is only asking $200 but it is in St. Augustine Beach so we'll spend about $40 in gas to move it. The other is a Lester and she wants $250 for it but it is right here in Lake Butler. So as far as money goes, it's probably about the same. I'm still waiting for the serial number and picture of the Lester to check into it. From the research i've done, they seem to be about equal as far as quality goes and they are both about the same age. There is one other piano that's only $100 but it has no name or serial number anywhere on it and the key are all chipped up on the ends. The $100 sounds great but from what i've read, cheap pianos like that may not stay in tune. If this is going to be the first instrument the kids learn to play then it's very important that it stay in tune. This way they don't learn to hear notes wrong.

Brett was all for the $200 piano (or the $250 that's close by) over the $100 piano that we don't know anything about until yesterday when we were planting the garden. That's when he started with the "what would Dave Ramsey think about us buying a piano" thing. In my head I know he's totally right buy my heart really, really, really wants a piano. Oh what to do!!! Our Financial Peace University (FPU) class is having a big yard sale together on May 3rd so I was hoping to fund the piano that way but that's over a month away. I guess I could start selling some stuff on eBay. But then Dave would tell me to use that money towards our debt. Ugh! Sometimes I hate being so financially responsible.

Just for the fun of it, i'll leave you with a picture of the Cable-Nelson piano built in 1951. It really is pretty and appears to be in great shape for it's age. The picture that the seller sent me is really high quality and I am able to zoom in on the keys and see that they are not chipped at all.