One step closer

It's been a long few years! Richard put his house on the market a few months before we got married in hopes that it would sell quickly. Unfortunately, it didn't and the boys and I moved in with him and the kids in August 2013.  The boys slept on the two couches in the living room. With every showing we were so hopeful that they would buy it, but no one even put in an offer! The guilt of having kids sleep on a couch with no space to call their own was growing over each month that passed.  I tried to remind myself that it was only for a season, but it was hard.

Then there was a completely different issue of moving into a home that was still very much the essence of Richard's late wife. Which is not completely a bad thing. We knew we wanted to sell and didn't want to sink a lot of money into redecorating, but I have walked a very fine line of trying not to change much in a home I have lived in for over a year, yet internally struggling with always feeling like a guest in a place I'm supposed to call "home". I haven't seen my dishes or pots and pans or furniture or pictures in over a year...

But today we came one step closer. We closed on OUR home!!!

In our wishful thinking that Richard's house would sell fast last summer we found this house. 4 bedrooms, 4.5 baths 4000 sq. ft. and a huge shop all on 18 acres for the kids to enjoy. It was perfect in our eyes. But Richard's house never sold. We prayed diligently for the house to still be available and be cheaper whenever ours sold. 6 months went by and we noticed it was taken off the market; it didn't sell but the owners just took it off the market. Then in the spring a new  student came to Baylee's school and through a few conversations, Baylee found out she was the niece of the owners of that exact house. Richard ended up going to one of Baylee's track meets in hopes to find them and see what was going in with their house. They ended up exchanging numbers and once Richard's house went under contract in June he called them and they said they were still interested in selling and would drop the price significantly if we kept realtors out of the process. Prayers answered!!! We moved into Richard's parents' house mid-July and have been grateful for the place to stay during this transition. 

So, today we signed a million papers for a home we feel God marked as ours over a year ago! We are so excited to move in and make it ours and give all seven of us space to call our own!!