Wednesday, such a beautiful Fall day!

     The colors outside are stunning.  I love the mornings when it is misty and the fog shows off the colors in a blur.  This is only really effective in the fall when everything is so bold.  My backyard is amazing.  I will try to find the camera to take a picture for you.  It won't be as amazing when I have to rake up all the leaves.

     The shop was super busy yesterday.  I have plenty to do and I need the money so I am pleased.  I have $240.00 squirreled away already with more to come.  Military uniforms out the ears and I don't like those, also lineman jumpsuits that need new zippers.  But someone has to do them and that someone is me.  I think I will embroider that on a pillow sometime.

     Kids thought my voice was a hoot last night, little buggers.  Tonight is my light night so I will get plenty done in the shop.  I did get the spare room and bath cleaned and also the kitchen.  I even mopped the floor last night between the studio and the bank.  Hubby had run to the church to help the new clerk with a report.  I just took the 1/2 hour to clean up the kitchen.  This morning I started the laundry and hope to get that out of the way today.

     I need to balance checkbooks and get some money transferred around, also need to get the desk area cleaned up, but I don't want to.  Whine, drooping shoulders......

     I had a mom come to me last night with problems.  She has been with me three years and her daughter is a cute little girl.  She is a single mom and a hard worker.  She really hurt her knee at the rest home where she was working and has to have surgery.  She gets around okay just cannot lift.  Of course no insurance and two kids.  She tries so hard to give her kids the best.  Anyway she cannot pay tuition and is ready to pull her daughter.  So I am going to have her come over once a week and clean the house.  Just scrub the bathrooms and the floors.  She is scheduled for surgery some time in November.  I was not using a housekeeper right now because I was trying to save money.  I'm out the tuition anyway so this is a save on both of our parts.  As the studio gets busier going into the Holiday season this might be a good thing.

Saga Cont:

     "The Father"  was (yes past tense) a Cad.  With a capitol "C".  He was a drinker, smoker, gambler, womanizer, and any other form of bad habit he had it all.  But he was also handsome, funny, charming, generous and the life of the party.  Dad was a burden.  Once my parents divorced and believe me they needed to divorce dad became the responsibility of my sister and I.  Now you might ask why?  Because this was a man who could and would not take care of anything himself.  We enabled him.  My mother enabled him and now we would take over.

     I could write a book on dad, but I will just tell the parts where he became involved with Richard.  Dad and Dar (his wife)  came to visit me a couple times in my little bunk house.  They did not stay long as they always had to get back to a bar somewhere, both were heavy drinkers or Dad had a poker game he could not miss.   They lived a precarious life financially and were anxiously awaiting the day dad turned 65 so they could they retire and live off the land so to speak.  Dad was already showing some signs of early dementia probably brought on by his bad habits and drinking.  His health was not good.  Dad and Dar decided to move back to his boyhood town of Turtle Lake ND.  I thought this was a good idea because he seemed to know the area better, but I worried about them so far away.  It is a 17 hour drive from my house to Turtle Lake and dad had a way of always having an emergency.  I would get to know that drive very well.

     Dad's big move was 2 years after  B was born.  This was probably the worst year of our financial life.  I don't know why I say that as I can look back at many years as our worst year of financial life.  He and Dar had purchased a small home (cute on the Outside) for $1000.00.  That was their total savings.  The house had severe water problems in the basement and was not livable.  It had a nice big lot and a beautiful lawn but could not be fixed.  So I with B flew out to Bismark.  There are no good flights to this part of the country.  Dad and Dar picked me up in a car that had no seat belts and the back end was going out.  We swayed back and forth down the highway B puking the whole way and I was trying so hard not to throw up.  Dad never bought anything but a big old Chrysler a Cadillac.   All were 20 years old and in bad need of a paint job among other things.  We stayed with cousins whom I could tell wanted us out like a bad smell.  Dad was oblivious.  I found another house this one without water problems and hooked them up with agencies that could help with no cost to them.  Hubs and I purchased this house for $1000.00.  The county came in and insulated the house and put in a new furnace.  Dad had to side it.  But they provided the siding.  Dad was handy when he wanted to be.

     It was a cute house, I would have lived in it.  The trip was full of harrowing experiences that I can laugh about now.  When I returned home Richard was very interested in the fact that you could purchase a home for so little and it was in the middle of great hunting country.  Richard had a brother and a sister that lived in Minnesota, he would be closer to family.  Richard and I took a trip out to Dad's the next summer.  Richard dropped the girls and I off at dad's and he continued on to his brother's.  Dad seemed to be happy, the house was clean although they had way too much stuff and the yard was nicer than any yard I had growing up.  He also had a huge beautiful garden.  But it was obvious that he was having a hard time with money.   Hubs told me to look for another house as a rental to help him out and we found a really nice stucco place across the street for $3500.00 and a lake lot with an old condemned trailer for $700.00.  Dad was thrilled.  The house was actually much nicer than the house that he lived in and he could rent it for $350.00 a month.  He had a lake lot to go fishing on and if you didn't mind mice and vermin a trailer to get out of the rain.  Dad and Dar were able to pay us back for both of these properties with the rents.  Richard was charmed.  He and my Dad were two peas in a pod.  Although Richard had a much better work ethic and none of the bad habits Dad had acquired over the years, he and my father became fast friends.

     So once a summer our family including Richard would take a trip back to the Dakotas.  Dad's place became increasingly worse with every passing year.  Dar was a hoarder and they drank way too much.  It was embarrassing but he was my father and I felt responsible for him in his somewhat feeble old age.  I remember the last trip we took before the blow out with Richard, my eldest daughter looked out at Dad's now slovenly backyard full of Treasure(junk) and said, "I can't believe  you came from this."  Well I did.  Dad was getting in trouble with the small town codes.  He was ordered to clean up the yard and mow it and also to remove old junk cars and trailers, cut the grass, remove the snow.  We purchased him expensive equipment to help, a huge riding lawn mower as he had 4 big lots to mow and a very large snow blower.  This seemed to help.  He seemed to be able to make it and I felt that we had done the right thing.  He was happy and he could exist with his small pension, SSI and the rent.  I did not know it at the time but my twin was also sending Dad a stipend every month.  She also it truth be told gave me a great deal of money.  I could help dad because she would help me.

     Upon the sale of Richard's house he went straight to Turtle Lake and bought a nice home with a shop.  This house was right next to the first property that dad had purchased.  So Richard was gone, but not gone.  We had no real contact with him for about 3 months.  This was the time it took us to close on the home we live in now.

     During the Richard debacle and the sale of our home on the first day it was on the market I was a little overwhelmed.  We needed to find a place to live and I did not want to move back into an apartment.  Hubs and I went for an afternoon drive looking at houses.  Just driving around looking at places we could never afford.  We happened by a house that had a sign out front that said owner contract For Sale.  This was a very nice secluded older neighborhood.  Hub's stopped the car and said go get the paper.  I argued with him.  We can't afford that house or this neighbor hood, don't waste my time or get my hopes up.  But he insisted, so I begrudgingly got the specs. It said that the home had been used as a rental and would not take a bank loan. It was being sold as is and the owner would take bids but he had to have at least $15,000.00 down.  Well we were the lowest bidder but had the most to put down.  We had $35,000.00.  We got the bid.  I could not believe it and neither could the realtor.  The only sad part about this was that I knew in my heart what I owed to Richard for this home.

     Our little bunk house was a treasure.  It had a beautiful fenced yard and a lovely garden.  Each room was adorable and the kitchen and glassed in porch were perfect.  The house had new wiring, it was in perfect shape.  It was small but still had 4 bedrooms, and 2 full baths.  It had more storage than any house I have ever lived in.  We would never have sold that house for the money we did without the care and concern of that man.

saga cont:

     I have been constantly interrupted by customers can you believe that?  How rude!  Hitting the machines.

Have a great and productive day!

Kim