When my mom married my step dad, whom I believe is Satan in the Flesh, and that's being NICE, we weren't allowed to bring things from our old home INTO the house he had bought. All of our personal belongings, except our clothes (
the exception to that being my mom's clothes) were put out in the garage.
Today, my mom called and told me to meet her at the house, we're going through the garage.
She was pretty mad. Turns out, Step dad doesn't want my mom IN the garage, period. Doesn't want her at the house unless he is right there, and has gone so far as to not let her drive herself anwhere, not even to MY house. He has been insisting on driving her everywhere, and has been trying to keep her away from the house.
Until today. She told him, I'm going. He wanted her to wait until Friday, when the auctioneer is going to be there, and he said he would drive her over.
Didn't happen.
Ernie gassed up my Jeep and we hightailed it over around noon. We left around 4:30 pm. We managed to wade through every box on the three tables that were
supposed to be our belongings. There is A LOT of things missing, and some things my mom refused to give up, even though they were ripped up, ruined, and she hadn't seen it in 16 years.
Some things we were genuinely pleased to see again.
I found an entire box of my belongings from my childhood. I was good, though, I didn't keep most of what was in the box.
I found an old homemade cat shaped pillow, that my grandmother had made me. That cat pillow was always on my bed. I had completely forgotten about her. She was made by my grandmother (who is living in a nursing home and is the late stages of Alzhiemers) to match a kitty bedspread she had bought for me. I still have the bedspread somewhere. The pillow was chewed in her stomach area by mice and the ears were chewed up and she smelled mildewy. Other than that, she was in OK shape. I made the very hard decision to toss her out. I actually put her in the burn barrel and burned her.
The next thing I found was one of my favorite childhood book,
Leo the Lop. I remember reading that book over and over and over. Amazingly, my book was still in mint shape. This book came out of my box, but my mom snatched it from my hands and said she might let me have it later. She wants to read it to my sister because that's a book she's been wanting to get again. I was a bit miffed. E almost snuck the book for me, but he didn't. It was very, very, very hard for me to leave that book behind.
I will admit, I squealed like an excited kid over my next two finds. First, I found the last toy I remember my mom ever buying me. It is called a Sweetie Kitty, and she's blue and white. I remember the day I got that kitty as if it was yesterday. It's one of the few good memories I have with my mom. I was happy to see she was in decent shape, obviously played with and loved, but no water damage, no mice evidence, not even that bad of a smell. She went into an empty box for me to bring home.
The next item I found and squealed over was also a toy, but this one my Dad had bought me. My real dad, not any steps or any of mom's boyfriends, but my Dad. It's Sundance, one of the original My Little Ponies. Dad had come to visit us in 1988. I was 9. Same year that we had that awful July 4th, but again, this was a happy, good memory of my Dad. Those, too, are very few. I can remember that day as well.
I realize these are toys, but they both represent something to me, of good memories of my parents. Something that is rare.
I also found some Clifford the Big Red dog books that were in my box, books that I had got from Scolastic book orders when I was in 2nd grade. Both of my Clifford books looked almost new. What's funnier, is the reason I was so into Clifford the Big Red Dog in 2nd grade is because my 2nd grade teacher's name was Mrs. Clifford. Mom didn't try to take those from me, thank goodness.
I found a homemade Cabbage Patch doll that my other Grandmother had made for me. I kept her, too. She is not in bad shape, but is a little dirty. I'm going to wash her and maybe pass her on to Katie.
Somethings I got that were not mine"
A set of cookbooks that were my mom's. She used to have the whole set of 12, but book 3 is missing.
Black Beauty, classic book that was printed in the early 1900's
Dishes that used to belong to my grandmother.
Nothing that I brought home were items that were needed, most of it was nostalgia, and that's all, but I kept to my one box, and I didn't even fill that box. I didn't take anything that could be considered trash, although my two toys that I kept might not be understandable to someone else.
I didn't find the ring my Dad bought for me. We did discover that someone has already rifled through all the boxes of things, and there are several boxes of stuff missing.
We also found where the woodburning cookstove is. It's white enamel with black trim, looks very nice. It's buried under my Step Dad's antiques, but we're hoping to have it unearthed by tomorrow. We also hope to pull a lot more stuff out tomorrow. Especially since it's calling for nicer weather tomorrow.
My mom shouldn't be keeping a lot of the stuff that she is keeping, but I can't convince her.
We also found a packet of pictures, from when I was nine and my dad was up visiting. Would be the same time I got the toy pony from him. The pictures had got wet and were stuck together, and even the negatives were destroyed. I cried. I have hardly any pics of my brother and me with our dad, and these were pics of Dad taking us fishing.
It was a pretty emotional day, but we did get a lot done.
It is a part of life, and Autumn had a good life with you guys. She was a cutie. 
Hope you are as well. 
It was kind of funny. 
