I went & paid February’s rent this morning, hoping to get the house keys, but they aren’t finished working in there yet, so hopefully we can have them tomorrow or Sunday, especially since we plan to move on Sunday. Anyway, since I’m frustrated & anxious, I’m trying to find things to keep me busy, since everything is pretty much packed besides the computers, game consoles & TV. Since we’re going to need one in the living room anyway, I’ve been surfing the ‘net, looking at discount rugs and trying to decide what colors to go with. We’ll be replacing our couch & loveseat as soon as humanly possible, so I can’t base the decision on the colors of those. We’ll probably just go with brown for the new stuff, I guess I can choose whatever I like, in that case.

I’d like something that fits in with the rest of the house, which has a lot of cottage-in-woods features, so I was thinking maybe a braided rug or something like that. I just really want my home to feel cozy & warm & comfortable, since that’s the feeling I get from it every time I walk into it. I know they’re a little on the higher end of my budget, but I think it would be worth it, so I’ll probably start saving up for one as soon as we can.

Keep us in your thoughts & pray we get those keys before Sunday, that’s the only day we can use the big truck.

I’m going to go in & pay the rent for February tomorrow & pick up our keys. Saturday, I plan to go over & clean a few of the carpets, or as many as I can until I run out of cleaner, anyway. Sunday is the big day & I can’t wait. We have our utilities set to change over to our name on Monday, and hopefully we’ll get this place cleaned up by Wednesday morning & be done with it. Rhi & I plan to start on that tomorrow, which will help out a lot. There are a lot of things that can’t be done until we get rooms cleared out, but there is still stuff we can do now.

I got the bedroom done the other day & found a bunch of gifts for her in the bottom of the closet, that I had bought a couple of years ago & put in there, we’ll use them in the bathroom now, since she’s already seen them & we both like the same shower stuff. It was pretty funny, though. I also found some band buttons I had bought for Erin that Christmas, but the package was so small & they had so many gifts that I didn’t even realize he never got them. He enjoyed them when I gave him the package the other day, so it’s all good.

So, anyway, I’ll very likely be quite busy over the next few days, but I’ll try to check in as I can & certainly after our cable & internet are installed on Monday. I can’t wait to get over there & start taking pictures!

I really like the way we’ve been able to pack for the move this time, because we actually have time to sit down & go through things before we move anything to another place. I got ride of a ton of clothes that either don’t fit or were dated today & felt great that I wasn’t going to waste time & energy moving things I’ll never wear to yet another house.

I found a lot of great things in my closet, too! I found my grandma’s quilting projects, which I intend to try to finish. I found a bunch of needlework kits that I’ve bought at thrift stores over the years, along with sewing patterns and such. I plan to choose one project at a time, finish it & then choose another until they’re all done & I have beautiful things to hang in my home. I’ve really excited about that, too.

I found photos from when the kids were younger & a puppy picture of Bear & Lucky’s kitten picture, which both made me a little sad, knowing they’re both gone, now. Yeah, I found junk & things we didn’t need anymore, like websites to get a life insurance online quote, or things the kids referenced online while we were home schooling. It was a fun little expedition, though & I was pleased with almost everything I found. I’m happy that the bedroom is almost finished, everything we get done makes our move next weekend that much easier & faster. We’re really hoping that we can start moving on Sunday the 31st, and with any luck at all, we’ll be finished by that night.

I can’t wait to get moved. I’m so impatient to get started & just get out of here. I just want to get started living there, you know? We’ve been here for a long time, and it was an okay place to live, it’s just started going downhill over the past couple of years or so. The last guy who bought the park was going bankrupt & wasn’t doing any up keep or even cleaning out old trailers so new people could move in, then he just started randomly selling them off. I hope the people who bought them don’t get screwed not that he’s been foreclosed on.

Anyway, he really didn’t care what this place looked like or who moved in & as a consequence, it’s very trashy here now. I haven’t really felt safe here for awhile & it’ll be good to get out & into a real house, it’s been a long time since we’ve lived in one. I can’t really remember how long, I think Rhi was in 3rd grade, maybe just started 4th & now she’s almost 20 – so 12 years? We’ve lived one modular & two trailers in that time.

I can’t stop thinking about my house & making plans for it, at the same time, I still can’t believe we got it & keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. I want to get a pattern to make some roller blinds for our bedroom & maybe the living room, too. I already bought fabric to make a cute curtain for the kitchen & if I can find more of it & afford it, I’ll make matching curtains for the dining room, too. I want to paint the kitchen, but I can’t decide what color, so I’ll have to live there awhile & then decide. The living room needs a fresh coat of white paint, it looks a bit dingy in there right now, but that’s okay, we’re happy to do it, honestly. Now if the first would just get here, we’d be happy campers!

While we were waiting to hear whether we got the house or not, Dawn & I went to the store & bought the fabric for my new booth walls & a pattern for my dress for the Royal Procession this year. The booth is going to look really nice this time around, we went back to our original Autumn theme (which is pretty striking in July) & I got several fabrics in fall shades to make striped walls from. I still need to find something for the roof, but that’l wait a bit. My dress will be done in a very light Celadon and probably a white chemise, I think it’ll be lovely. I plan to start on both things as soon a we get moved & I get my sewing area set up. I may take one of our booth tables back to the house so I can set it up as a cutting table, too. I have a new sewing table that I inherited from my grandma, so while we’re moving I’ll send my current table to Dawn’s since she said she wanted it.

I plan to start working on the kitchen her in a few minutes, but I want a cup of coffee first, in the hopes that the caffeine will get rid of the rest of this headache & warm me up a little bit. It’s very cold here this week & always trying to snow, I’m ready for Spring already, for sure. I always find odd things while we’re moving & wonder where they came from, like prenatal vitamins when I haven’t taken them for 20 years, you know? I know that stuff ends up here when people forget them, I put them in a cabinet & forget & then years down the road I have no idea where they came from, but it’s still funny when it happens. Well, I’m off to make a cup & switch laundry.

We’ve been super busy the past few days, getting ready to move & celebrating my birthday. We did the house we were wanting, we just aren’t sure exactly when we’ll be moving in, but no later than the 5th of February. The living room is packed & ready to be moved over, I’m sure there is a bunch of stuff under the furniture, but that’ll get taken care of when we clean up afterwards. I’m hoping to be able to get a hold of some nice furniture for the living room in the new house before we move, but I’m not holding my breath or anything. I wish they had left the couch & love seat that were over there, but since they didn’t, we’ll figure it out, we always do.

There will be so many things needing to be moved between houses that I feel like I need to learn how to build muscle fast, so we can get through it easier, but, in my heart, I know we’ll have enough help that I probably won’t have to do anything but unpack & organize while stuff gets brought in & maybe fix a big meal for everyone who helps. I’d love to be able to do that, because a home-cooked meal after a tiring day like that is always great. Maybe I’ll get my crock pot set up early in the day & get something cooking in it so it’ll be ready when we’re done for the day. I actually think that’s a great idea!

I’m so ready to move, I can’t wait to be out of here.

We haven’t moved for almost 7 years. That’s truly a record for us, since neither of us have lived anywhere that long as adults. We’ll be moving out by the end of the month, we have two places to go, we’re just waiting to see which one it is. I look forward to getting out of here & not having to put up with the things that we currently deal with. There is so much that I won’t miss, like the stupid kids skateboarding in front of my house & hitting my walls with their footballs & the screaming & noise. I imagine Troy will sleep much better when he’s on night shift, because the neighborhood seems to be much quieter.

I’m also dreading it. I hate moving. We have so much accumulated crap in this house. We’re going to be so busy this next week. Thankfully Troy had already taken vacation days this week as a birthday gift to me, so I won’t be doing it all alone, for a change. I still won’t have time to get bored & find myself zoning out while reading apidexin reviews, but that’s not a bad thing, really. I hate being bored. Anyway, if I’m scarce the next couple of weeks, you know why!

Have you ever had one of those days where it felt like the world took a colon cleansing pill and then sat on you? Yesterday was one of those for me, at least the daylight portion of it was anyway. We went out to get ice & such, came back, checked the mail & I had a notice of a subpoena that got sent to a bank regarding me. I don’t have any accounts at any banks anymore, not after I was garnished in June, so I was more annoyed than anything. This is the bank that Troy has our car loans through, but we don’t do anything but that with them. He has a checking account at another bank, but my name isn’t on it, at all. I do worry about it a little, we can’t afford to go through it again, but I’m trying to stay positive.

We got home, I read that notice & then someone came & taped another notice on our front door, telling us that the trailer park had been sold & we’d need to sign a new contract with the new owners or have 3 days to move. Considering that the meeting with the new owners is tomorrow & we’ll supposedly have 3 days after that if we don’t sign the contract to get out.. umm.. excuse me? My January rent is paid in full? It’s still January! We’ve been month-to-month here for 6 1/2 years, I’m not locking us into a contract to stay in this cesspool any longer than we have to. I started looking for a new place yesterday.

I’m stressed out & worried about too many things right now. I just want to crawl in a hole & come out when everything is settled & done. I hate this, one thing after another, it just drives me crazy.

I just noticed a couple of days ago that I was getting a cold sore. My thoughts on that were, “Of course! It’s almost my birthday & I wanted to look halfway decent for my party.” Hopefully it’ll be history by the time my party happens, though, since that isn’t until the 23rd. But honestly, it never seems to fail. Anytime I’m really looking forward to something I either end up with a huge cold sore or a horrible acne breakout. Every time.

I usually get cold sores in the summer if I let my lips get sunburned or chapped, so I try to avoid that, especially right before faire. One year, my face was peeling horribly AND I had two huge cold sores, I felt like a had a horrible disease & people kind of looked at me that way, too. That had to be the worst faire for me, I think. So, anyway, I did let my lips gets chapped, I was somewhat dehydrated after being sick & I knew it would probably happen. Tomorrow? Buying Abreeva.

We sat down after our board meeting the other day & decided that we really want to build a new encampment for faire this year. We’re going to use the metal frame & roof from my first booth, which was one of those nice gazebo type things and build wooden walls to go on the outside. We plan to have a door that opens & closes & two windows with flower boxes. We’re going to paint it to match the cloth roof & then use a darker brown to do a quick trim job & make it look Tudor-style. I’m really looking forward to it, so we can have nice place to store our stuff.

We’ll build a new eric to keep the mundanes out, too, using pine poles & tiki torches, set in buckets with Kwik-Crete & we’ll make the fence part by string rope on the poles/torches. It’ll take up storage room when we aren’t using it, but it’ll be a much better way to secure our area & make things look much better. We’re all really looking forward to getting started & will hopefully be able to as soon as tax refunds start coming in. It’s going to be a lot of work, but I think we’d all rather have something really nice that we can use year after year, instead of continuing to replace pop-ups & trying to make them look good (and failing), so it’ll be worth it.