Moving on Up/Down in the Valley

First I want to say again, there was an earthquake early this morning on the coast of Ecuador. We are alright. Please send your thoughts and prayers to those involved. Information is still coming regarding the severity of the earthquake so we have no idea as to the extent of the damage. Only that this was a 6.7.

Now to catch you all up on where we've been.

You may remember, if you are an avid reader of this blog (or at least somewhat consistent) that we recently endured another rainy season in March/April. I woke up at 4:30 one morning to find that our carpet had become a used beach towel in dryness and feel.

Well we got our rug cleaned and continued to live our lives. After about two weeks I got really sick with some sort of respiratory thing that I just couldn't shake. I stayed home from school and rested on the couch and it wouldn't go away. Then Shannon got it. Boom! Light-bulb moment of realization. Sometimes it takes us a bit to connect the dots on the seemingly obvious. Our home was infested with mold from the rain invasion. By attempting to stay home and rest on the couch, I was lying down in the very petri dish of rotting wall spores.

Cut it all Out!

We got a hold of our landlord, who didn't want to pay to have a worker come out and look at our place, so we called our own. Low and behold, our cement wall behind the couch was rotting away and would have to be cut out and replaced. Our ceiling had similar damage. Best of all, our hard wood floors would have to be cut up because the mold had taken hold of that area too. Our living room was a rotting, decaying swamp of moisture and sickness, but with paintings!

Our repair guy said it would be about 2 full weeks of work, 9-5 Monday through Friday. Then it would be three more weeks before the walls could be repainted. We called our landlord again with an estimate for repairs, but had already decided to get out of there. We didn't want to continue to inhale toxic mushy wall remnants so we began to look elsewhere and told our landlord we were leaving.

Storage and Fireplace

Kitchen Space for Days

By divine intervention, or simple coincidence, a teacher at our school had a sister who was renting out an apartment. Furnished. In a nice area. We went that night to look at it and we moved within a week.
Now, we are happily settled in to a new apartment with grass and a yard. It is relatively close to school, and it's beautifully surrounded by gardens and fruit trees. We made out pretty well. Plus, BONUS, there aren't parts of the house decaying as we live in it. WIN!

Our Front Yard