Why We Love Our House

Picking up where we left off....that Saturday our realtor lined up 7 or 8 houses for us to see.  One was the house we bought.  We had originally crossed it off the list b/c it was smaller than we wanted. I actually worked with the girl that owned the house.  I Facebook messaged her when it came on the market and asked her if it had two living areas or just the one that I suspected. She confirmed that it was 3 bedroom, 2 bath, with one living area.  While I realize that we are only a family of three, we frequently have multiple overnight guests, especially during volleyball season, and we like to entertain a lot.  We enjoyed the space we had at our home in Martin so much and I hated to take a huge step back from that.

We looked at 'our' house early in the day. We looked around fairly quickly, noticed the lack of space and some work that needed to be done, and wrote it off again. The land was really appealing, but the house just wasn't what wanted or needed.  We looked at all the other houses that were scheduled and again, the lack of land in those neighborhoods was claustrophobic.  Some of the houses were nice, but not enough to get over the tiny yards. I just knew that if we bought one of those houses, it would be a temporary fix and we would be moving again in a couple years. That is definitely not what we wanted.

We decided to go back to 'our' house for another look. The question was, could we add on and make it the house what we wanted.  We walked around the land and the more we talked, the more we felt like it was worth the risk.  We/I tend to play it very safe with purchases and investments, so the thought of taking on something like an addition was a little daunting.  Since there were no other decent options, we decided to go for it.  We scheduled a meeting with a contractor that week to see if what we wanted to do was feasible.  He confirmed our plan and we made an offer the next day. They countered once and we had a deal.

Here we are with the homeowner, Jessica, at the closing. Her husband, Nick, was unable to make it to the closing.

So....what do we love about our house?  Yes, there is a lot of work that has to be done, including the addition that we are currently in the middle of (more on that another day), but we got so many things that we wanted.  It's a ranch, which I love. We really wanted everything on one level. It has an amazing kitchen, better than I ever could have imagined.  It's not an open concept...yes, I'm the only person on the planet that doesn't love to cook in the middle of my living room. We have five acres, but we are still in a neighborhood. We are just outside the city limits, but are still only five minutes to Walmart.  It has a detached shop which is something we had grown really attached to at our last house. When the addition is finished, it will have a sun room EXACTLY like our other house and it will have a guest room with a private attached bathroom.  And, it has this porch...

....and this swing...

After we had initially written the house off due to size, I drove by it one day b/c we were really struggling to find something and I just wanted to see the house.  The neighborhood was lovely, but the road itself was a major turn off. It needed to be paved in the worst way.  There was loose gravel and potholes everywhere.  The night we met with the contractor at the house to see about adding on, I pulled on the street and it looked as if the road had been grated to be paved.  That night I was praying on the way home about the house and our offer, just really seeking direction.  I asked God to close the door if this wasn't a good idea for our family. It was like he said, "I'm even paving the road for you."  The next day, the road was paved.

Everything with this move has just fallen into place. We were able to sell our house to our good friends, Christa & Jordan.  They seem to be enjoying the house and that makes me very happy.

This move will be a lasting reminder for me of God's love for us.  So there you have our move.  We'll chat soon about living through construction...