A Modest Accomplishment

I recently received the following text message from our bank: "Checking withdrawal posted for $876.10". This was the final payment on our home and land loan, and we are for all intents and purposes debt-free. Now in our mid-fifties and after thirty years of marriage, we are the proud owners free and clear of our home and land, three old cars, an old travel trailer and three kayaks. We've also managed to build an emergency savings account and invest a bit for retirement. Here I'll reflect on how we accomplished that.

How to Build a Cooler out of Foam Board

[You can also watch the video tutorial posted on my YouTube channel and/or view this photo album]

I would love to have one of the modern high-performance coolers, such as the rotomolded style, but we don’t actually need one badly enough to justify spending the money. But I wondered if I could build something comparable out of foam board for a fraction of the cost. 

So I built a small prototype, process described below, and here’s what I learned. I could NOT build a comparable cooler at a fraction of the cost. Nonetheless, I had a ton of fun and while the example I built would not stand up to the “Yeti” style coolers, it is quite functional and looks pretty great, IMHO.