We bought a house!
Were we house hunting? Yes and no. We've often gone back and forth in a casual house hunt. We've found a few houses here and there that we thought might be nice...but we never felt certain. We'd take a break, I'd look on zillow every now and then and then get frustrated and give up. Then Michael would take a turn looking and back and forth we went for at least a year.
Then one day in December a new listing popped up. It was around the exact same time when someone approached us with interest in our house. It wasn't even on the market.
We took a look at the house and we just knew. We knew it was the one for our family. The kids were thrilled and it felt like "home." We wanted to place an offer but what about our house? It seemed like that was working out too...Until it didn't.
We had several showings on our house the first week but nothing solid. As things moved forward with our contract on the new house, we had tough decisions to make. Would it be contingent on the sale of our house? Would we trust the Lord to take care of the details?
We kept praying, "Lord, we sense your peace but if this is not your will, please close the doors." He wasn't audible in His answer but we both kept sensing Him moving us forward. One step at a time. "Go before us, Lord." It was obvious at every turn, that was exactly what He was doing.
We made it through the holidays hosting family and loading up everyone, including our giant doodle, for multiple house showings. As the new year approached, I asked God very specifically, "Lord, please let us have an offer by the end of this first week of January."
Here's what you need to know. I don't like to lay a fleece before God giving Him the parameters of how He should work. But I admit in my anxiousness and in the reality of what needed to happen for us to make certain we could buy this other home, we needed this to be "a done deal."
If you read my journals, you'd see me doing my best to cast my anxieties on Him and working hard to find the balance of trusting Him to move and taking a step of faith. On every single turn, we kept feeling His leading to push us just a little bit forward. We never felt the door close. We just knew the Lord was going to have to work this out.
And then it happened. On January 6, we got the news. An offer was being submitted. A contract had come in on our house after minor negotiations and it was truly the hand of God working out EVERY DETAIL! We found out it was a family who had looked at the house before Christmas. They had liked it so much, they listed their house for sale and it was sold in just a few days. The offer wouldn't be contingent on anything and we were all free to continue moving forward. How could this be?! Only God...
On January 17, we closed on our new home. On January 26, we'll officially move in. After a fresh coat of paint and new carpet, we've been moving things all week and it's starting to feel like "home." Once the rest of the furniture arrives, we'll no doubt start to settle in.
It's hard to believe this is our last day, our last night, in our home at Benchmark. I look around and see signs of "us" everywhere - the fixtures we painstakingly chose, the tile we debated on for the bathroom floors, the backsplash in the kitchen - I can remember standing in Home Depot and seeing it on display and knowing it was the one we wanted. Our name is engraved in the concrete pad underneath the back porch. "Wright 2013" It was the year we were married and the year this house was built. Of course I'm sentimental and there are mixed feelings as we prepare for our last day here. The purple door is where my growing bump was documented each week of my pregnancy with Violet. This is the only home she's ever known. The walls tell stories and hold memories, but even more significant are the reminders of what's underneath. The 2x4's have scriptures written all over them from when Michael, Eli, and I came in during construction and wrote verses in each of the rooms and prayed over the house being built. No doubt the history of this home in our lives will be a significant memory for our family.
And just like that, we're moving on, preparing to make new memories, to establish a new home for our family and the changes that life brings. We're excited! I admit I woke up at 5 a.m. with nervous excitement anticipating our big move. No doubt there will be feelings of sadness, the hardest part leaving some of the best neighbors and friends we could have ever asked for. Some of these ladies have been part of a bible study in our home for the past 4 years becoming a part of my community and people I could call on for anything. They will continue to be friends, they just won't be right around the corner.
This is the story of us buying a house. We're saying goodbye to Benchmark, thankful for all the life we've lived here and the memories this house holds for our family. We're saying hello to our new home excited to see the next part of the journey God has for us.
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