Something Beautiful

"Won't you look down upon me, Jesus. You've got to help me make a stand. You've just got to see me through another day. My body's aching and my time is at hand, and I won't make it any other way." ~James Taylor


Usually when I know I'm about to blog, I sit here for a good 20 minutes, sometimes an hour looking through music to use as my theme. Tonight I knew exactly which song I wanted: "Fire and Rain". If you don't know the song, please download it, or you can go to http://www.songlyrics.com/ and type in the name of the artist or the song in the search bar. The lyrics will pop up, but there will be an option to listen to the song somewhere on the right side of the page. It's just so beautiful, and it speaks to me. He talks about how he's had good times and bad times, but how God is always there. At least, that's what it says to me.

Speaking of good and bad times...Last week we were served an eviction notice from our landlord. I hate using the word "lord" when I'm not talking about my Savior, don't you? There are plenty of things I'd like to call him, but for the sake of being kind, I'll call him "the owner of the house". So, anyway, yeah...evicted! I've never been evicted before! And honestly, at first, I didn't argue. We had not been the most consistent tenants. We have been late with the rent more than a few times. But, it's not by choice. When times were really tough, we chose feeding the kids above all. And lately, Larry has been working very hard and he got a pay raise on top of that. We hadn't been late with a bill in a long while. So, after the owner left that day, I thought: Wait just a second! I started looking through every file folder and drawer and cabinet and box we had with papers in it. I found every receipt I could find. I went down to show him what I found and he presented me with a list of every month's rent from November 2008 until now. He went back and charged us a late fee for every month on that list. Including the months we were not late! Plus, there were months on his list that showed we either didn't pay all of the rent, or we didn't pay it at all, when in fact I had receipts that showed otherwise. He claimed we owed him over $1500!

I gathered all my receipts and took them to legal aid to see what I could do about the eviction. They said unfortunately there wasn't much they or even I could do about it because I didn't have every single receipt, and owners sue their tenants all the time, so they said that judges are use to hearing sob stories with not proof. That I can understand.

We had until the 6Th of May. What were we going to do? The only money we had saved was for our vacation coming up this summer....which I'll get to in my next blog! =) All I could think about was how disappointed my kiddos were going to be. Larry said that he had a bonus coming up, and as of the moment, it wasn't for sure that we would have to miss vacation, so I took that as a sign of hope.

The very next day I started doing what we all do when we're looking for a place....I made a job out of it. I looked in all the papers. I drove around and looked for "For Rent" signs in yards. I even called a few friends I knew that owned properties. But, who was going to rent to people who were just evicted? Last year when we wanted to move, we looked hard core and got no where. Larry said then: We should just stay where we are for now, save some money, and pay some more stuff off our credit like we are, then just buy a house in a few years. So, we stopped looking.

When I say we looked hard core, I mean it was HARD CORE! We looked at everything! One place we looked at was a mobile home. Right off the bat, I'm not thrilled. I could just picture Larry wearing one of those white tank tops, and the girls in Daisy-Duke shorts, me always bare-footed, and Joey's face with crusted food around it at any given time of day. But, as Larry reminded me...it was a place to live. So, we filled out the papers and actually ended up qualifying for the loan. But, I left it alone. I like the idea of waiting it out here much better than living in a trailer.

I wanted to give up looking again, but this time it was different....we HAD to move. Relentlessly, I picked up another paper last Thursday. Low and behold, guess what was in there?? That same mobile home! Larry said that he thought it was a blessing, so, of course I had to call! Turns out, the lady that did our original paper work...it was her first day on the job...she remembered us by name! I thought that was so sweet! We went out there and looked at it again. I guess before I didn't notice all that this place had to offer. I mean, it is brand-spakin' new! All the stuff, like the stove, dishwasher, fridge, toilets, still have the tags on them! We talked to the park management again. We filled out a few more papers to make our old file current. And well, we are now home owners ourselves! YaY! *Toss confetti in the air* WooHoo!!

It's in a park, so we really don't have much of a yard. But, there's a lake right across the street, and a pool, and a play ground for the kiddos to play in. We close on Friday. The girls and I have been working our tails off trying to get this house ready to leave and our new one ready to build a life in. Garfield is getting a little upset at all the boxes laying everywhere. He keeps giving me that: "I'm not going to like this, am I?" look. Sometimes I look back at him like: "You and me, both".

We're suppose to be moved in all the way by the 24Th. We are also having a yard sale tomorrow to get rid of the junk we had that was too nice to trash, but took up too much room for the new pad. If you're reading this between 10pm & 10am (Tues.-Wed.), please pray that it all goes swimmingly tomorrow. I don't think I'm very good at hosting yard sales. I've only had one other, and I'm going to be dragging out all the stuff that didn't sell from that one tomorrow.

If we're this busy now, then I suspect we'll get more busy soon. So, I may not be on here for a while, but I will post pictures on Facebook as soon as I can!

Thank you all so much for taking time out to read this!

God is GOOD!