As if.

Ugh.  You've all seen the pictures of our house in West Union. Disaster doesn't begin to describe it and I just want to be done.  I don't want to spend time on Hotsauce's day off to clean that house... AGAIN!!

It's really, really, really discouraging!  This will be the third floor that we've put into the kitchen.  That's a lot of money... not to mention that the hall and the bathroom need new floors too.

The whole house needs paint.  Not to mention the walls need to be mudded and sanded.

When need to replace two interior doors, a light fixture, lots of trim and we're rebuilding the cabinet under the kitchen sink, because mold isn't a great feature in a home you're trying to sell.

But, you know all this.

I must say that the last time when we went to the house and started busting out the tile floor with hammers and pry bars that I actually enjoyed myself.  It helped relieve some of the stress!  I also felt like I was contributing to the project.

Today there wasn't much for me to do.

So I cried.

Or maybe I didn't do much today because I was crying?

I know fussing, pouting, crying etc. doesn't go over well for my children, but I gave it a shot today.  Turns out that it doesn't fix anything... and neither do I!

It's so frustrating to pour so much money into a house to try to sell it and not have it sell.  So we find renters for the time being and only charge them enough to pay the rent, insurance and taxes and they destroy it.

It's so very frustrating to be in the midst of taking care of our own debt and striving to honor God in that decision only to have this major set back.

I felt like laying on the living room floor and kicking my feet and screaming, "I DON'T WANT TO PUT MY MONEY INTO THIS HOUSE WHEN I COULD PUT IT INTO FIXING MY OWN!!!!!!"

In the midst of throwing my little HUGE fit a very wise and loving man told me that God cares for us, He cares for our situation and He has always provided mightily for us.  He stopped work on the house and had us all join in a circle to pray, asking God for what seems like a miracle... that our work wouldn't be in vain and that the house would finally sell.

Wouldn't it be great if I always had faith?  Even just a smidgen?  I've seen God at work so many times before... I've seen the miracles that he has performed in my own life and yet a little work and a little bit of money and I'm seeing mountains.

As if God can't make a man out of the dirt.
As if God can't part seas.
As if God can't make bread fall from the skies.
As if God can't make a donkey speak.
As if God can't tear down walls with trumpet blasts and a shout.
As if God can't make the sun and the moon stand still.
As if God can't cause Armies to win by throwing hailstones.
As if God can't heal a woman by having her touch the cloak of Jesus.
As if God can't make wine out of water.
As if God can't roll the stone away.

As if.

As if a few hundred dollars, some broken doors and a new floor will ruin us.
As if all is lost.

Oh, me of little faith.

That's my girl!!

We received a less than normal tax return this year.  Hotsauce wisely made some changes at the beginning of 2012 so that we would receive more of our money during the year instead of lending it to the government.

That being said, it was still a very nice return. :)

We decided to budget our return before we wasted it... in years past Hotsauce and I would both make separate plans and then get mad at the other one for not knowing what the other was thinking!!  Another thing that I would do would be to drop hints of things that I "needed" ... aka new shoes, a dishwasher, always leather furniture, and who knows what else.  Hotsauce would agree that these would be great things to do if we paid off this bill or that bill first.  Once the money was deposited all bets were off and since there was no real plan our tax return was nickeled and dimed away.

Maybe you've been there?

Well, not this year.  Every dollar is budgeted.  Not all of it for something fun... but not all of it for the debt snowball either.

One plan that Hotsauce had was to bless each child with $50.  This budgeting stuff is hard and they have had to miss out on some fun things.  So shouldn't they get the chance to have some money of their own to decide how they'd like to spend it?

Hotsauce walked in from the bank carrying the cash in his hand.  Emma spied it immediately and asked (jokingly) if she could have some.  You should have seen her face when her daddy handed her a fifty dollar bill. 

That was fun.

Word spread fast.  And soon others were asking if they too could have some.  As this played out, Hannah, the oldest, wasn't asking if she could have some.  On the contrary she looked rather disturbed, as though she might start crying.

I asked her if she was going to ask Daddy for some money and she shrugged her shoulders and turned her face away from me.

Something was wrong with this kid.

When we pressed a little harder she started crying... she gets that from her mom... and finally she said that she didn't want the money.

We tried guessing why she didn't want it, worried that she might be concerned that we needed it more than she did... but no that wasn't it either.  So why wouldn't she take the money?

She finally told us...

"I don't want it because I didn't earn it."

Yep.  That's my girl.  Nine years old and far more responsible than most adults in America.

Smart, pretty, responsible, funny and most importantly loves Jesus.
Boom goes the dynamite.

About the rental property...

 We have finally made it back into the rental house in W.U.

It was destroyed.  As was to be expected. They still haven't paid their rent for February or March. As was to be expected.  Sometimes I just don't have words.  So take a look for yourself.

Under kitchen sink.  We assume they didn't call about the plumbing problem because of the condition of the kitchen floor.  You do not want to know how bad the water in that pan smelled.

Broken tiles in the kitchen.

More broken tiles.  There were almost 40 broken tile in all.  We had to rip out the tile and the sub floor and will have to replace the whole thing.

The wood floors were completely redone prior to the tenants moving in.  They're destroyed.

Hole in the wall.

Someone kicked a hole in the wall in the master bedroom.

Stole a light fixture in a bedroom.  Who steals a light fixture? 

Ripped out the motion light outside of the house.  It was there 2 days before we got possession of the house.  They had the "decency" to leave the light on the kitchen counter.

Laundry Room. Sick. Sick. Sick.

Door torn off the hinges.  Two days prior to them moving out these were properly in place.

Hole punched in door.  This was one of two doors that had holes.
I haven't mentioned all of the holes in the walls... but there's only so many pictures of holes I could post before things get repetitive.

So I will leave you with this final picture of loveliness.  That's the basement floor with a bunch of garbage and a few piles of dog crap.  Yes. They let their dog crap in the basement and lived with the smell of it permeating the entire house.  Have I mentioned sick.sick.sick???!!!

So this is what we're dealing with...

This is officially declared a no drama area...

Around mid-morning we received a call from our Realtors office.  They received insider information from the gas company that our renters (who we're trying to evict) are having their heat shut off today.

After a little investigating we also found out that said renters are also shutting off their electricity.

The good news is that they are voluntarily having these things disconnected.  Which means that they're likely on their way out the door.

As those of you in Iowa are aware of there's a nasty Alberta Clipper moving in and the weathermen are saying that we can expect 12 inches of snow tonight.  Most people do not voluntarily have their heat and electric turned off in the midst of a blizzard so we made the assumption that they're moving out today.

This leaves us in a bit of a quandary.  We have not been notified from our renters that they're moving out.  And from what the Sheriff's Office has told us is that they tried serving the eviction notice to the tenants 4 times before successfully serving it to them on the 5th try.

We were also afraid that these tenants would shut off the heat in an attempt to have the pipes burst before we took possession of the house.  Yet, if they shut the heat off and we transfer it back into our names will we end up footing the bill for the heat as well as the unpaid rent???

This defines quandary. 

Hotsauce immediately starts pouring over code sections of Iowa law to see what our options are... Turns out our options are:

1. We get screwed
2. We get screwed
3. We get angry, lash out, yell, scream, holler, throw things, curse the law that protects criminals and not law abiding citizens, write a letter to our Senators and then we get screwed.
4. We pray, trust God, and rejoice in the day that the Lord has made.

Or something a little more like us...
5. Get angry, yell at lawmakers who can't hear us ... and then remember to pray and trust God.

I know.  We stink at the whole pray first option.  Maybe someday we will figure it out.

Maybe we should pray that we remember to pray first, but of course we'd forget to pray to pray first!

Bean and I prayed together that what Satan means for evil that God would use for good.  That He would take care of the pipes and the overdue rent and our bad attitudes.  And then I gave my girls a short lecture on how they need to pay their bills when they're adults.

A few hours after praying Hotsauce received a phone call.  I knew immediately from his body language that this woman (ironically named Joy, though she has brought us none) on the other line was our tenant.  It took her about 3 sentences to get Hotsauce worked up... though by the grace of God, he found it in himself to be kind.

Sidebar: I really admire that man.

By the end of the call she told him that they would be out tomorrow, the house would be clean, they would leave a forwarding address and drop a check off with the amount owed by the end of this week.

Glory to God in the highest.

By the way, we went ahead and transferred the heat and electricity into our names.  God is faithful and will continue to see us through this!

Please pray that things go accordingly and that we would be able to get the realtor in soon and get this house sold.  We could use a little less drama around here.

Can I get a witness?

Hotsauce and I were going over our debt snowball to make sure that we are still plugging away and getting the job done.

Just to recap we started our Total Money Makeover journey in September of 2012 and in October of 2012 we went to our first Financial Peace University class.  If you have not read the entire book or done the class I would completely recommend it.  Check either out at www.daveramsey.com and let Davey know that The Fiscal Misfit sent you! ;)

This journey has completely and utterly changed our lives.  It has changed the way that Hotsauce and I respond to each other and given us common dreams.  We started an online shop called "Turkey Bottom Haven" and work side by side as the snowball melts a little bit each week.

So what did we find when we looked at our debt snowball?  It's been 6 months and we've made some headway. 

In September we had $21,610.45 more debt than we carry today.  Um, whicka, whicka what?? So before you go crazy thinking that we're the most amazing people that you know (though we probably are) I will give you glimpse on how that happened.

First of all we've paid off $10,679.37 out of our earned income.  This would be either from Hotsauce's job, from Turkey Bottom Haven or odd jobs.  That means that we've paid off $1,779.90 of our debt on average each month.  BOOM!

Now that still leaves $10,931.08 of debt that's unanswered for so what about that debt?  We call that the God Factor.  We had a credit card from a home improvement store that my Hot Hotsauce Husband did some wheeling and dealing on and they forgave $900 of what we owed.  Eat that credit card company! ;)

But, that $10,000ish leftover was not a deal that we struck.  Instead it was presented to us out of the blue.  I have 2 student loans that have been tossed from one lender to the next and has been in forbearance more times than I can count.  In the beginning of February we received a letter from our lender that they would forgive $10,000ish if we paid x-amount. 

Now you probably remember the $1,300 dash that we did a few months ago?  Well after we paid that off we did not celebrate as we wanted because we "stole" from other envelopes to get the money we needed.  We did not want to repeat that episode.  So we started by praying.  We asked God to provide the money we needed if He would have us to pay off this debt.  If He didn't provide we would know that He had other plans for us. 

He provided.

*Insert happy dance here!*

It seems to me that so far God has essentially matched our debt payoff dollar for dollar.  Can I get a witness?