Moving to a different city, only an hour away, isn't quite so earth shattering to most folks. But to me, that meant P.A.C.K.I.N.G. I think moving might be one of the bigger stressors in life, probably because there is so much tied to it. An interesting thought to have to pack up boxes only to have a certain 17-month-old take everything out, no? Kudos to you military families that always have to pick up and go! Growing up, I only moved a total of four times. I only remember having to pack and move, once. After being married, we've moved five times. This move will be our sixth.
What this meant for us was: having to sell our home that we are completely upside-down on; holding off from telling anyone until other parties involved were told first for Hubs' job sake; feeling isolated during a part of this journey that we would like to have had people walk with us; and trusting that God would show us exactly what He could do apart from what we knew we could not.
Basically, what I am telling you is these past couple of months, I have been CRAZY...in a calm way. Is that even possible?? I have never been told that I am discreet but inside I felt like I was going insane. I wonder if that has anything to do with my extroverted side.
The other side of what has been going on has been nothing short of miracles and God calming our fears, one after the other. In this housing market, I knew it might take a long time for our house to sell. We also knew that we were completely upside-down on our house. Go ahead, say that we. are. crazy. Now that you feel better after saying it I'm going to tell you the rest of the story.
First, Hubs & I met with our Mortgage Lender. He is an amazing, godly man who not only prayed with us but read from Psalm 30. He told us he knew God would lead us and this whole situation, even if it didn't seem logical that things would work out.
Second, we met with 'the Realtor'. She is someone who handfuls (quite literally) of peeps recommended to us. She had also been a part of some home sales that, clearly God had worked out. The first time we met (on February 7th - and you'll see why the dates are important as you read on), we found out we went to the same hairdresser, laughed and then I flung my full cup of coffee at her, from the kitchen counter. She not only dodged the coffee but she offered to clean it up! Poor girl. We scheduled to meet the following week, on Valentine's Day.
She came over, sat down with Hubs & me and we talked numbers. (Mind you, in prepping the house just for the first visit and knowing that it had to be done for the house to be on the market, let's just say that my sweet little family had no idea what OCD was until this happened!) Did I tell you that numbers make me nervous? They do. And when I look at facts, it makes me more nervous. We looked at the market analysis, decided on the sale price of our home and then 'the Realtor' told us this: "We have a meeting in our Realty Office to let all the Realtors know what is in process and what might be coming. I told them that there was a family interested in selling there home in your area. Another Realtor said she had a client looking for a house in the same area. Would you be interested in having her look at your house?" Are you catching this? She asked us if we'd be interested in having someone come look at our house before we put it on the market NEXT MONTH. Of course we gathered ourselves and said 'YES'! A couple hours later, 'the Realtor' called and asked if we'd be O.K. with the potential buyer coming to see the house TOMORROW. I realized at this point that getting the house spic-and-span and getting rid of all our clutter was never going to be a reality. The fact was, we had no idea what would happen so we needed to have the house as clean as we could get it. All you need to know is that we are still recovering things from our house that we have hidden in spots that I did not even know existed!
The next afternoon (the 15th), there was a cleaning frenzy and.......a poor little baby with diarrhea. Frenzy was not even the word at that point. We were taking off sheets, running the wash, lighting candles, spraying rooms down, a quick bathe for the littlest little and sweating bullets. Oh, and hiding things. All of the sudden I hear, "SHE'S HERE." And here was my response, "WHAT?? SHE'S EARLY. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? SHE CANNOT BE EARLY."
It was the person's Realtor. She kindly said she was early and would wait outside until her client arrived. We set the flowers on the table, took a final glance and headed out the door. This Realtor said her client was running a few minutes late but that they would definitely be out of the house in an hour, max. Sweet because we were going to run an errand and get dinner for the fam.
An hour and thirty minutes later, we drove up and saw that they were still in the house. Um, it simply doesn't take that long to see 1480 square feet. I was just hoping that they didn't get buried under all the things we hid after they opened one of the closets! So then, we became those people. We had parked six house away, trying to feed the three little birds the dinner we had picked up and trying not to spy on the Realtor and client walking out of our house. Of course Special K is standing up out of his seat, pointing and staring, asking who those people were coming out of our house.
They finally left, we scrambled to get in the house, get everyone fed and ready for bed. An hour after we came in, we got a phone call from 'the Realtor'. She said, "She wants to put an offer on the house on Saturday." Hubs was gracious and after he hung up, the four of us (minus sleeping baby) were jumping up and down, hugging, and I was bawling my eyes out on the floor. We knew that we would have to wait for the offer, the appraisal on our home and for all the money and papers to be squared away. That didn't stop us (me) from being hysterical and thanking God for how He has our backs.
The next four days seemed to take forever. Each few days seemed to bring another cold or sickness with a child. There were more doctor-visits, tylenol administered, vitamins issued and sleep necessary. We got a call on Saturday (19th) from 'the Realtor'. She came that afternoon when the kiddos were resting, to look over the offer. We'd have to take some time to think and pray if we should accept it. That night, Hubs & I knew what we thought we could handle. 'The Realtor' came over in the morning and we had a counter-offer. We waited for two days (22nd) for the response. This offer was a tough one but we know what we have and know that our God is the One that provides. We accepted on Wednesday, the 23rd. Today, the 24th, we JUST got an email for an apology for the delay but that the buyer will initial the papers later this afternoon!
A wise friend told me the other day, "Give the money graciously back to the LORD, Julie." Oh, if you only knew how wise those words really are, friend. As we wait, will you pray with us? Will you pray that the appraisal on our house would come in right where we need it to? Will you pray with us that on the other side of this, God would provide for and show us exactly where we need to live? We are praying for our future neighbors, community, the new campus that Hubs will be working with, schools for the kiddos and for our new church family. And we are saying to the LORD, "Where you go, I'll go - I will follow You."
We are thanking God that we won't have to be in OCD, cleaning-frenzy mode for the months to come. Also that we won't have to pick up and leave the house at any moment, with napping littles. It is bittersweet to leave the place that God called us to, 7 1/2 years ago. It is with sweet sorrow that we leave the place where we started our family with just the two of us and ended up with three beautiful kiddos.
The Goodbyes will have to wait until later. We're not ready yet. We have four more months to savor. Here is a part of a song I'm listening to right this very moment:
The other side of what has been going on has been nothing short of miracles and God calming our fears, one after the other. In this housing market, I knew it might take a long time for our house to sell. We also knew that we were completely upside-down on our house. Go ahead, say that we. are. crazy. Now that you feel better after saying it I'm going to tell you the rest of the story.
First, Hubs & I met with our Mortgage Lender. He is an amazing, godly man who not only prayed with us but read from Psalm 30. He told us he knew God would lead us and this whole situation, even if it didn't seem logical that things would work out.
Second, we met with 'the Realtor'. She is someone who handfuls (quite literally) of peeps recommended to us. She had also been a part of some home sales that, clearly God had worked out. The first time we met (on February 7th - and you'll see why the dates are important as you read on), we found out we went to the same hairdresser, laughed and then I flung my full cup of coffee at her, from the kitchen counter. She not only dodged the coffee but she offered to clean it up! Poor girl. We scheduled to meet the following week, on Valentine's Day.
She came over, sat down with Hubs & me and we talked numbers. (Mind you, in prepping the house just for the first visit and knowing that it had to be done for the house to be on the market, let's just say that my sweet little family had no idea what OCD was until this happened!) Did I tell you that numbers make me nervous? They do. And when I look at facts, it makes me more nervous. We looked at the market analysis, decided on the sale price of our home and then 'the Realtor' told us this: "We have a meeting in our Realty Office to let all the Realtors know what is in process and what might be coming. I told them that there was a family interested in selling there home in your area. Another Realtor said she had a client looking for a house in the same area. Would you be interested in having her look at your house?" Are you catching this? She asked us if we'd be interested in having someone come look at our house before we put it on the market NEXT MONTH. Of course we gathered ourselves and said 'YES'! A couple hours later, 'the Realtor' called and asked if we'd be O.K. with the potential buyer coming to see the house TOMORROW.
The next afternoon (the 15th), there was a cleaning frenzy and.......a poor little baby with diarrhea. Frenzy was not even the word at that point. We were taking off sheets, running the wash, lighting candles, spraying rooms down, a quick bathe for the littlest little and sweating bullets. Oh, and hiding things. All of the sudden I hear, "SHE'S HERE." And here was my response, "WHAT?? SHE'S EARLY. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? SHE CANNOT BE EARLY."
It was the person's Realtor. She kindly said she was early and would wait outside until her client arrived. We set the flowers on the table, took a final glance and headed out the door. This Realtor said her client was running a few minutes late but that they would definitely be out of the house in an hour, max. Sweet because we were going to run an errand and get dinner for the fam.
An hour and thirty minutes later, we drove up and saw that they were still in the house. Um, it simply doesn't take that long to see 1480 square feet. I was just hoping that they didn't get buried under all the things we hid after they opened one of the closets! So then, we became those people. We had parked six house away, trying to feed the three little birds the dinner we had picked up and trying not to spy on the Realtor and client walking out of our house. Of course Special K is standing up out of his seat, pointing and staring, asking who those people were coming out of our house.
They finally left, we scrambled to get in the house, get everyone fed and ready for bed. An hour after we came in, we got a phone call from 'the Realtor'. She said, "She wants to put an offer on the house on Saturday." Hubs was gracious and after he hung up, the four of us (minus sleeping baby) were jumping up and down, hugging, and I was bawling my eyes out on the floor. We knew that we would have to wait for the offer, the appraisal on our home and for all the money and papers to be squared away. That didn't stop us (me) from being hysterical and thanking God for how He has our backs.
The next four days seemed to take forever. Each few days seemed to bring another cold or sickness with a child. There were more doctor-visits, tylenol administered, vitamins issued and sleep necessary. We got a call on Saturday (19th) from 'the Realtor'. She came that afternoon when the kiddos were resting, to look over the offer. We'd have to take some time to think and pray if we should accept it. That night, Hubs & I knew what we thought we could handle. 'The Realtor' came over in the morning and we had a counter-offer. We waited for two days (22nd) for the response. This offer was a tough one but we know what we have and know that our God is the One that provides. We accepted on Wednesday, the 23rd. Today, the 24th, we JUST got an email for an apology for the delay but that the buyer will initial the papers later this afternoon!
A wise friend told me the other day, "Give the money graciously back to the LORD, Julie." Oh, if you only knew how wise those words really are, friend. As we wait, will you pray with us? Will you pray that the appraisal on our house would come in right where we need it to? Will you pray with us that on the other side of this, God would provide for and show us exactly where we need to live? We are praying for our future neighbors, community, the new campus that Hubs will be working with, schools for the kiddos and for our new church family. And we are saying to the LORD, "Where you go, I'll go - I will follow You."
We are thanking God that we won't have to be in OCD, cleaning-frenzy mode for the months to come. Also that we won't have to pick up and leave the house at any moment, with napping littles. It is bittersweet to leave the place that God called us to, 7 1/2 years ago. It is with sweet sorrow that we leave the place where we started our family with just the two of us and ended up with three beautiful kiddos.
The Goodbyes will have to wait until later. We're not ready yet. We have four more months to savor. Here is a part of a song I'm listening to right this very moment:
My Story by Addison Road
If this is my story, if this is my song
Then I want to be a part of something beautiful
If this is my journey, then show me your road
Wherever you lead me in this world I want to go
There’s just too many times I only think of me
‘Cause I get so consumed with my opportunities
When my last breath brings me to the feet of God
I want to hear him say I lived for his glory.
Wow, Julie...that is amazing. It is so great not to have to worry about all that you said, the picking up at a moment's notice, etc. I agree that moving is THE PITS, packing and such. We are still living with boxes everywhere and in between two houses. ugh. But, your attitude seems so great. Congratulations! Praying for your future.
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