Yay!!!! Good news!!!!!!!!

We had our interview this week for food stamps. We found out that we have $991 in food stamps. Then starting August 9th we'll get $668 each month until we go over the income bracket. The $991 was from June and partial July.

We also found out that we'll be getting at least $500/mo in cash aide which can be used like a debit card so we can pay bills and buy diapers and other household items. This money combined with whatever jobs we get will help us to pay our credit cards, get our phones turned back on, and MOVE OUT!!!!!!

"Moving on up, to the east side... Du wah deluxe apt in the sky...."

Slide show

Here's a slide show that Ian put together. Some of these you've seen, and some are new. There's a picture of my mom with Hunter in there (they're sitting on the couch). There's a picture of Margaret, Hunter and I (outside a restaurant), and a picture of Terri and Hunter (she was our attendant on duty at the laundromat). Otherwise, it's pictures of Hunter, McKenna, Ian and I. Oh, I forgot the pictures of Hunter with her grandpa Fitzgerald. There, that should answer all your questions.

2nd round of pics

Here's the blackberry, raspberry, etc bushes. I love having fresh berries in the morning with cereal. And we get them with dessert depending on what we're having.
Here's the little bit of grass that they have. This is on the side of the house.
Here's the fruit bushes again with rock landscape in front of it.
Here's the back of the house. The door on the bottom puts you at the bottom of the stairs. The deck puts you at grandma and grandpa's room.
Here's a picture of the side of the house. The 2 sliding doors are for the living room downstairs (left) and the food storage room (right). The sliding doors that are covered on top by blinds is the side entrance to the living room. Under the deck next to the sliding doors is a storage area for their trash cans, recycling cans, and burn cans.

More pictures to come hopefully tomorrow.

Pics I promised

Ian was playing with his balloon and took a pic of the Spiderman hat he made. He looks so serious.....
I'm holding McKenna and Ian has Hunter. My mom made the dress, as it was mine, then Hunter wore it, now McKenna.

Here's the pics from McKenna's blessing. I'm sorry it took so long to post these. Left to right: Ian's dad, Ian, McKenna, friend Scott, bro-in-law Scott and friend Paul. These were the guys that were in the circle not including the bishopric.

On a happier note, I found out that a Sears nearby is hiring, and I tried to fill out an app. It told me that since I worked there less than 90 days ago, to contact HR to set up an interview. I got home and called and got it set up. I'm having the paperwork faxed over today and hopefully when I call on Friday, they have something for me. We could both use this good news, and the money.

Thanks for all your support from the previous post. I'm glad that I have so many viewers of my blog, and I'm happy to report that things shoud get better from here on.

How much more?????

The question for the week is: How much more can we (or me) handle??? We started off Saturday with Hunter getting heat stroke, so we drove home after having driven 40 miles to the storage unit, for a 10 min. job. Then on Sunday we found out we had a flat, but luckily we had a road hazard warranty so Sears would cover it. Monday we put on the donut and drove the 40 miles to Sears (yes, we really are in the middle of nowhere) and had them put on a new tire. Since it wasn't repairable but it wasn't a total blowout, we still had to pay $25 for a new tire. Not bad when it's a $60 tire but still more money than we had. Ian and I headed to the mall across the street (the Sears auto center isn't connected to the Sears). I had my job interview for Destination Maternity and Ian was going to let Hunter play in the playyard in front of the store and twist balloons too, to see if he could get some tips from doing balloon animals. After 2 hours, he made $10 and I had my interview where I was told to wait for a phone call by Friday.

Tuesday was an okay day. We didn't do much, except go to the library and Hunter's doctor's appt. After her appt I decided to call Addy (our landlord from the condos) to check on the deposit. Here's what she said: "I'm really disspointed in you. I showed up and there was trash on the front porch, the carpets were completely stained, the oven was dirty, the blinds were filthy, there was trash in the garage. Plus, I got a report from the complex that you left mattresses and furniture (which isn't true, by the way) and now i'm being sued. I have a board meeting on Wednesday and I'll know more how much s*** I have to put up with and then I'll send out a letter explaining where your deposit is going". Needless to say I started crying. Though Ian and I didn't ever pay his parents rent to live there, nor did we pay for the security deposit, that's $2,000 that his parents will never see. The carpet is cheap and we've TRIED NUMEROUS times to clean the spots with carpet sprays, we did a Rug Doctor from Stater Bros. If she wanted to, she could have the carpets cleaned by professionals and it would be cheaper than replacing them, but no she's just going to replace them and cost us more money. The blinds were cheap and never worked right in the first place. We had 2 of them that tore off and so they wouldn't hang. We did PLACE some small furniture items by the dumpster (lamps, bookshelves, etc) but we didn't put them IN the dumpster. When we took more trash out 10 min. later all the furniture was gone. We only had 2 people come to help clean, bless their hearts, you know who you are. I WISH I would've planned it ahead of time so I could've gotten some definite commitments from people from church. We were at the condo 'til 10:30 trying to clean it up, and we still had to leave it a mess. We ran out of time and energy, had a 10 hour drive the next day and still needed to check into the hotel. It scares me that it'll hinder us being able to rent again. We're not filthy tenants, and it hurts to hear that.

Wednesday (today, well okay for the last 5 min it will be Wed) we headed to the library. I had called using grandparent's home phone to reserve 2 computers since they only have 2 computers in the whole library, and Ian and I both needed them. We got ready and headed out, but were running behind so I thought i'd call to let them know we'd be a little late. Dial the number and I get this message: "your phone has been temporarily suspended". Of course I told Ian and he wasn't too happy. We did our thing at the library, and we came home. Ian was upset at that point, because we have $9 to our name, 4+ accounts in collections (between credit cards and our electric bill from IA that still needs to be paid), a little under 1/2 a tank of gas left, and now our cell phones have been turned off. How are we supposed to get a job if the employers can't contact us???? How are we supposed to turn our phones back on if we can't get a job???? So, Ian and I have spent the day being depressed and trying to figure out what to do. Ian can go to restaurants on Friday nights and do balloon animals for tips, but that requires a 20 mile drive each way. Then Saturday he could go to the mall and playland again and make some more tips. Again, that's a 40 mile drive each way. How does this all work out???

How many more trials can we endure?? We're doing our best filling out job applications for ANYTHING, we're trying to help out around the house, look for a place to live, etc. This also doesn't help since the 2 places we really want to live won't take us or want too much from us. The income restricted apt. complex wants the following documents: birth certificates from each member living there (those are in storage which aren't accessible right now and we don't have McKenna's), and the last 2 years of tax returns (to make sure we didn't make over what we can make to live there.. those too are in storage SOMEWHERE. I'm not good at keeping things filed). The 2nd apt complex needs us to have a 6.0 score or better when they check our credit. They want to make sure that we don't have any evictions, we don't have ANY accounts in collections (we failed that one), and we have a certain credit score (which I know we don't).

Please tell me when the good things will start coming around. I really need some faith right now, cuz I'm scared that we won't get out on our own until September. We've been married 3 years and 4 months now and we've only lived on our own for 1.5 years. How much longer are we going to live with family?? We have worse arguments that turn into yelling matches when we live with family, and our marriage is in shambles. We need to be out on our own, but when will that be???

Please help... I miss all of you tons and wish I could have all my friends in one place.... Hopefully I'll have some better news next time I update on here.

We're here

We're here in Dutch Flat, CA (but this blog comes to you from Applegate, CA) and loving the weather. It's been in the 90's but being in the deep woods it doesn't feel like it. It's been nice feeling secure at night with the sliding glass doors open, the windows open, the cars unlocked etc. The weather is nice and cool at night with it in the high 50's to low 60's. The weather this week however has been in the 70's during the day which makes it nice to sit out on the back deck with grandma and grandpa and just relax.

We've been here for 8 days now and haven't stopped moving. We slowed down for 4th of July weekend since most of the apt complexes and businesses were closed. We enjoyed a parade on Saturday where it goes around the town twice because it's so small. The fire truck even drove in the parade and tossed a teddy bear to Hunter, and she loved it. Of course an 8 yr old girl thought it was hers, so I had to snatch it out of her hands. I let her have all the candy though. I promise there's lots of pictures to come when I can get them uploaded. We had a bbq on Sunday at Kelly and Leslie's and then started again on Monday. We've been to the Galleria mall in Roseville three times and still haven't walked the whole mall.

I have a job interview Monday at 12:30 for Destination Maternity, Co. which includes Motherhood Maternity and A Pea in the Pod. They were the only store in the mall that was hiring out of the 10 applications that I picked up for other stores. Ian however is still looking for jobs. He's been applying online for Kaiser (which is a doctor's office/hospital in CA), Hollywood Video, AT&T, Best Buy, FYE (For Your Entertainment), and some other stores. He's also working on getting himself enrolled at Sierra College so he can finish up his AA and do some web design classes. Then he can get himself a career and we'll be on the ball then with a steady career and hopefully by then I can stay home with the kids. But, that's still at least a year down the road.

We're taking it day by day, and now that I know where 4 libraries are that are close to us, I promise to update my blog more often and I promised my Aunt Joy that I would put up some pictures of where we're living and the kids.

Until then....