I am still working on commissions, but it's happening very slowly. Things have been absolutely so hectic here, but they are coming along.

My husband and I are moving by September 20th. We have had the absolute worst experience with our current apartment. Everything from a flea infestation from a neighbor to a bat in our front room to a leak that lasted a month, springing over our bed just six days after we bought a new mattress to a homicide in the parking lot. Even worse, something in the apartment or around the building is making our pets sick. All four pets have seen the vet repeatedly since we moved in, including one life-threatening issue in one of our pets, totaling $1700 in bills for unexplained illnesses. The vet has repeatedly suggested it might be environmental, which confirmed that we needed to move. And, as you all know, I've been sick a lot myself. It's not connected to the building but rather my condition, Multiple Autoimmune Syndrome, but I spent the first four months here nearly blind, and the next five months in and out of the GI specialist and hospitals with an end diagnosis of Celiac Disease and a Vitamin D deficiency. I really can't say that we've had a positive moment specifically associated with where we live.

Between my medical bills, my husband's student loans and the pets' vet bills, we're broke. But we're still trying to move. Our lease is up September 25th, so we're hoping to lease a rental house before the 20th. Most, but not all, of our problems have been directly connected to living so ridiculously close to a bunch of people who aren't properly taking care of themselves in some form or another. My husband and I feel that a rental house is absolutely the only way to go.

We currently have an application in on one. We'll hopefully know if we're approved by the end of the day tomorrow. If so, we'll owe $633 for the deposit and $300 for the pets within 24-48 hours. Ouch. Ouch ouch ouch.

I've been taking extra hours at my primary job to try to make up the difference. I've been working myself into the ground. So when I come home at the end of the day, I pretty much pass out in bed first thing. The stress from all of this is causing my MAS to flare, so the days I do have off, I often feel sick. In fact, I was diagnosed with stress tremors the other day. Tremors make it kind of hard to draw, so I have to wait until I'm calm enough to do so.

I do have a personal fundraiser through a well-known fundraising website to help us with moving bills which has been helping. I won't link it publicly, but if you'd like to donate, please message me and I'll send it to you. There are some rewards, like a physical thank you card mailed to you, a print of a drawing I did of our pets "signed" by them and more. It explains the whole situation much better and outlines all of the vet bills. It's going to cost us about the same amount of money to move as the vet bills were in the end. I have a hard time seeing that as just a coincidence. The campaign covered our application fees and we're about $200 from having the deposit.

I do still plan on having some sort of sale to help cover moving costs. I really kind of need to have it now-ish. But I have current commissions on me, and I absolutely refuse to start taking new commissions until my first batch is complete. That's not fair to the commissioners who have waited now almost a month for their artwork.

At this point, that's about all the update I've got. If you have any questions, let me know!