Awake

Little victories

Last night was my tutoring appointment with "Ruth". We didn't do so much tutoring as go to Fred Meyer, she armed with two $25 gift cards and a need for two very large packages of pull-ups.

I sat in front of Ruth's apartment for about 10 minutes waiting for her to come. Finally her roommate came by and I asked her if she was at her mom's. She was, so I walked over. There were a lot (by that I mean, A LOT) of people in her mom's apartment, so I took the opportunity to check out Famo and Isha's bed situation. They are in beds in their own bedroom, but the mattresses are old and smell moldy, in their words, they're "broken". (Ah, the language barrier.) There is a box spring and two twin mattresses that need replacing.

Found out last week that a woman from church who's daughter is my 4s class wants to get rid of her twin boxspring and two mattresses.

So yeah, that'll work.

No bunk bed needed after all. What they do need is one or two chest of drawers. Right now clothes are folded on top of a one-drawer nightstand. Not too useful. Some help that I will need this Sunday evening when I go over there to deliver the mattresses (if everything comes together, that is) is some help removing the old mattresses and an old lame-o desk that they received. (I guess they tried to put it in the dumpster but the manager caught them doing it. Oops.) I don't know what to do with old mattresses that stink. They need to be dumped. The desk can go to Goodwill. Any ideas for mattress dumping? And, anyone got a pickup truck and some muscles I could borrow Sunday evening?

But overall, things are settling down with Ruth. I'm not nearly as worked-up and worried about her as I used to be and she is starting to get some real support (financially and guidance-wise) from her dad, which I didn't even realize was there until a couple weeks ago. And I don't know where she got those two $25 gift cards for Fred Meyer, but she knew from our previous field-trip there a couple weeks ago, that it was a good place to get stuff like diapers. She's off food stamps now because she's getting steady and consistent hours from the hotel she's working at. So there are still struggles, but things are settling down a bit. It's a good thing.