I'm Back!!

Mornin', Ya'll!!
I've been back a week or so now, but I'm only getting the occasional quiet time alone to gather my thoughts so I can write in here. And I'm not sure how long I'll even stay awake, because it's after 2 AM and I'm sleepy.
But anyways... where do I even begin?? I know, I know... at the beginning. But I've slept since then... how am I supposed to remember it all?? LOL
Ok.. let me think.......
After we moved all our stuff into storage, we still couln't find any place to rent. So we had to stay at my parents' house for a little bit. I hated it. Absolutely and completely. Don't get me wrong... I love my parents. But one house was never meant for two families, especially when there are two women who have run their own households for too long and are set in their ways. I hated it that my dogs had to stay in her nasty basement and that she complained daily about the 'dog smell' ...that was all in her head (because somebody was constantly taking them out or else they were gone with us). I hated it that she blatantly played favorites with my dogs. She loves Buddy and would always baby-talk him and talk about what a nice sweet dog he is, then turn around and say really mean things about Maddie, like that she cain't stand her and wouln't care if she was in the middle of the ocean with a rock tied around her neck. I hated it that I couln't discipline my kids without getting one or the other of them (my parents) upset. I hated it that she had her nose in every single aspect of our business. Like just because we were staying in her house, she had a right to know our every thought. I hate "you should..." "ya'll better..." "Now K., when he gets his check, you better make him..." "you better not be spending your money on that, you need to save it for...". Anyways, so after a week or so, I was starting to adjust(if you can call it that), and then right out of the blue, her pastor throws us out! My parents rent their house from their church, which is why he even had that authority, but still... I mean, we weren't causing any trouble, we weren't destroying the place... if we even left something laying in the wrong place we got told about it by mom or scowled at by dad! But he up and makes us leave. And not like he quietly came over to the house and asked us to leave... no, he waits til they got in church for prayer meeting and atarts praying and loudly 'telling God' "They've got to go!!!" I'm still trying to figure out where the love of Christ is in that! So, whatever... he let us stay one more week til the kids were out of school.
Every night, when Dave got home from work, we'd leave. And every time we'd leave to go anywhere, we had to take Maddie or both dogs with us, even if we were going to the store. Most nights we were going out driving around looking for 'For Rent' signs in yards, or going to look at the ones in the paper or that someone told us about. Every time we'd see another door, it would slam in our faces. It was almost like we were being forced to stay at my parents', but then that door slammed in our faces too. When we'd look at a place, it either cost too much rent, or it was too small, or it had a second floor and the bedrooms were all on it, or if everything was ok about it, someone else would get it right out from under our noses.
So, since we had to leave there and nothing opened up for us, we went to a motel to stay for the next two weeks.
It's not cheap to stay in a motel, so I went to the phonebook to call around and see where would be the least expensive. That was the 'Stay Inn' in Marion. What a mistake!! We went there, knowing that it was all we could afford since my parents were actually fronting us the money, but when the guy showed us the room we would have to live in for two weeks, it was all I could take. I broke down and cried. For a long time. The place was moldy and mildewed, nasty, tiny, had cigarette burns all over the microwave and tiny fridge, poorly patched walls, unpatched fist holes in the walls, and just felt dirty, even though all I was doing was standing in the middle of the room. So we started back to my parents' house and decided to go check at the place where we had spent the first night before resigning ourselves to staying at mom & dad's. Al Smith's Place. Come to find out, it cost the same for the weekly rate, it was twice the size or more, clean, freshly painted, had a big corner shower, a kitchenette sink by the door, a microwave and half refrigerator without the cigarette burns... the total opposite of the other one! So it had been about an hour and a half, and Dad and Dave went back to the Stay Inn to get our money back because we weren't going to be staying there. At first they weren't going to give it back. They said they had to wait til the next day if they wanted to discuss it further. Then when we went back the next day, they were only going to give back half. After going through a major hassle and mom writing a letter threatening going to the police and writing to the editor of the Marion Star newpaper, and contacting the Better Business Bureau and the Attorney General, and I don't remember who all else, they decided to give back the part that went on the credit card, but not the cash. No way! I can be as stubborn as mom when it comes to money... so I stayed right there arguing with her til she agreed to give back all but $9. And I would have gotten that $9 too, but by then we were pushing too close to the time we needed to pick up the moving truck, so Dave made me quit arguing and leave.
Anyways, so we ended up at this really adorable place that had a cottage garden feel to it.

Here it is looking through the gazebo...


then a pic of the left half (it was basically shaped like this --> |_| with the gazebo at the top)


Here's the gazebo... isn't it just beautiful??


And then here is our room. We were on the end... but even though there is a door there, it's only for looks. Our door was in the back.


And now that I've gotten you caught up to what happened for the first month, I'm going to quit here and post about how we 'found' our house and up til now in the next post. I won't guarantee that it will be tomorrow or anything, but I do promise that I won't post anything else til I get the whole story told. Fair enough? And if I remember things that need to be posted in this first half of the story, I'll either update it or else add it to the end of the second half.