Annie's 7 month photo shoot

Are you tired of seeing pics of my beautiful little girl yet? Well, I'm not. Never know if this will be the last baby for us, so we're living it up with the pictures!! We have a tradition in our family that when our babies are 6-7 months old, we have them photographed in a little metal tub with a rubber duckie. Last month was Annie's turn. My friend Kirsten just happened to have a metal tub, so she got the job. I think she did fabulous!! Here's one for a preview. Click HERE to see more.

Almost Breathing

Almost breathing...that is the best way to describe how I am feeling. The past week has been likely the most emotional, crazy week of my life. Last Monday, Mike went back into the mobile home park office to request the fax (see previous posts). When she refused to even look at him, he removed the mouse from her hand, put it next to her hand, and said to stop ignoring him, that this had to get done. She then refused to do anything while he was there, stating she was going to call the cops. He put his fist on the desk, telling her basically how ridiculous this is & how rude she was being. She then proceeded to call the cops in front of him, and locked him out once he came out to the car to tell me what was happening. Keep in mind, I could see what was happening and at NO time did he ever threaten her life in any way at all. Cops arrived, talked to everyone involved, and let us go without any issue.

Later that morning, we got a call from another potential buyer, stating he finally had all the money together to buy & move the home. Hallelujah!! I was thrilled! So at this point, we knew we'd be moving, but not sure exactly when.

Fast forward to Tuesday night. At about 6:45 PM, I opened my front door to find a letter taped to it, stamped by a deputy or constable, stating we had 3 days to remove our family, belongings, AND home from the property or would be heading to court. Wow. First time we've ever had an eviction notice. And we ALWAYS pay on time. This time, Maria took it past the cops letting Mike go, twisted the story into a HUGE lie about her life being threatened, and was taking the power into her own hands by trying to evict us. Mike then spent most of the night looking up the legalities of evictions, discovered we had some rights to extend our stay a bit longer and fight back, but at that point, I had FINALLY hit the end of my rope emotionally. We were downright mad & the kids were totally confused & scared. I was then determined we would leave ASAP. Well, when ya have to work full time and take care of kids, 3 days is just NOT possible!

To be sure that we were still in the right, knowing she went about the eviction process incorrectly, we proceeded to put in a 30-day notice and paid the last 30 days of lot rent, doing everything involved to cover our tracks just in case. Meanwhile we worked with the buyer to speed things along as quickly as possible. As of Friday night, we had the moving truck half loaded. Mike was originally scheduled to work on Saturday, but at the last minute got it off, thankfully able to help us all day Saturday. We continued packing, loading, cleaning, and doing tear-down of the house to help out the buyer. By Sunday morning, we were outta there! Note, at this point, we still did not have any money from the buyer...going on trust being in such a hurry. Oh, I forgot to mention, we also got word that the park manager was wanting to press charges against Mike. So, we had no idea if cops would show up again or what would happen!

Now I failed to mention, in the mess of all this, I still could not stop thinking about a home I had looked at about 3 weeks earlier. Somehow we knew something was going to happen & I guess you could say we were preparing. Seems to happen that way repeatedly when we move. I believe it was that Friday, we signed papers to put an offer on a home in Brigham City, near my family's home. Thankfully, after minimal negotiations, the offer was accepted.

This is not a simple sold-moved-done situation. Nothing would surprise us. We still would not be shocked at all if the manager tries to come after us for anything. People talk about taking losses on homes because of the economy. Our loss came to over $10,000...not just based on what we could have gotten (that would be over a $15,000 loss), but over $10K directly out of my checkbook. That was a painful one to swallow, but a price we finally decided to pay for the safety and sanity of our family. We call it bail money. That was one major reason we decided to look in Box Elder county. We got a loan with $0 down because of being in a rural area, and the sellers have agreed to pay our closing costs.

My parents rushed down last weekend to help us move. On the way, my dad felt strongly impressed to write a bill for congress to basically give more rights to mobile home owners. I do not doubt the Lord's hand in this, knowing I hit the end of my rope, but that we still couldn't back down and leave all these families without help after our attorney didn't do his job. This may be a long process in the works, but hopefully with good results in the end. Thus, almost breathing. I feel like I can't fully breathe until we know this is all completely done.

This has been a truly bitter-sweet situation. The bitter has been blatantly obvious with all my recent rants. But I would be so ungrateful if I didn't find blessings among all of this. We have gained so much knowledge through this process. But most of all, we have met amazing friends & ward members along the way. We would not be the same without the experiences we have had, and for that I am grateful. We are going to miss St. George and all our friends there, but are also excited for this next chapter in our family's life.

Here are a few pictures of the house being almost ready to move, and the last a picture of the house we put an offer on.

Thank you all so much for your continued support.