Our Place

We found our place! It's in between Hard and Rock.

I know, I know... cheesy.   I couldn't resist. My little attempt at adding humor to a tough situation :)

We are still looking for a place to call home. We put an offer on a place, but it was just not a good idea. It was a stretch for our budget and had a lot of costly issues including needing a new roof, and garage door, and all the appliances. We kept going back and looking closer and each time discovered more issues that were going to cost more money. But it had such potential, was a good location compared to anything else we had found in this area so far, and a much better size, so we just hoped we could make it work and do a lot of repairs ourselves and fix things up in time. We were getting more nervous about going into this house, and then we found marijuana growing in the backyard. :-P It is legal to smoke in Washington, but not legal to grow your own, and marijuana has traditionally been a gateway drug. We learned that meth use is pretty prevalent in this city, and that even someone smoking meth 2 or 3 times could leave a dangerous level of residue in a home. (And it's highly addictive - chances are if someone does it once they will do it again.) The home was bank owned and the husband of the last owner died before it went into foreclosure. We read an article stating that bank owned foreclosures in this price range were highly likely to be meth houses, and especially if they had a lot of trash in the yard and this and that and the other thing that perfectly described this house. Google street view from a couple of years ago confirmed crazy amounts of trash. And there was that little laid out patch of marijuana with supports for it to grow on testifying to previous drug abuse on the property!

The five leafed clover we found growing in the backyard.

 --I would be very surprised if the house did not test positive for meth, but at that point I was just kicking myself that we'd missed that patch of marijuana and half the other issues in that first walk through and ever even put in an offer on that property! Well, we were very lucky we had a change of heart when we did and were able to cancel the inspections we'd scheduled and back out of the offer with our earnest money. We both feel good about our decision to back out and move on. But now my hope that a home was so close in our reach is gone and the weary search continues! I hope that Heavenly Father has a plan for us. Sometimes I just feel he is leaving all this up to us to figure out, and I would much rather just be handed a step by step instruction! Yeah, I'm glad he lets us make our own decisions. I am just so tired! I don't even feel excited about getting into a house right this minute because I am so tired and it just sounds like a lot of work. But I know part of that is just the result of me staying up too late 2 nights in a row. I always feel better in the morning. I'm trying to carry on and count my blessings. I know there are people out there going through much worse than I. This experience is a perfect illustration of how one person's choices can effect so many more people than they imagine. I am so grateful for the gospel that has kept me free from so many worse troubles & addictions, and for my family and their great examples and loving support. So I am trying really hard not to feel completely overwhelmed and discouraged. I am really ready to be done searching for a place to live and just live in it! --- figure out the other things that we need to in our lives, and give more attention to the amazing little girls entrusted to our care who we've been much too snappy to lately.

Prayers are welcome!