MN to TN: JUST KIDDING!

Have you ever watched a movie where a person is really put through the wringer in some insane ways and eventually they just start laughing hysterically with that crazed look in their eyes?

Yeah, that’s totally not been me or anything, I was just curious.

I mean, well… maybe it’s been me.

See, I was supposed to be giving you all an update on our little fixer upper in the foothills of the Appalachians in East TN.

That’s what I was supposed to be doing.

But that was a whole week ago, right??? Just an FYI… a week is forever in the world of house buying.

So, here’s what happened: We’ve been staying with my grandparents in North Carolina, but on Saturday last week, Derek and some of his family were out at our Tennessee house dropping off some of our furniture and boxes. We hadn’t closed the previous Friday as we were supposed to, so we had early occupancy written into our contract.

Now, I think I said before that we found a small house on three acres of flatland right in the area we were hoping for. We knew it needed a little work, but it seemed like the perfect option! Derek was going to do the couple things it needed before we moved in middle of June.

But see, every time Derek went to the house, he would return having found one concerning issue after another that would take an incredible amount of time and money that we hadn’t planned for. The previous owner was DIY guy, but it wasn’t all done right.

Let me put it this way:

To do what we wanted to do with the house, we would have to undo many things that had already been done, but were done wrong, so that the doing of what we wanted to do would take twice the time because of the undoing of what had been done followed by the doing of what we wanted done. (That makes total sense, right???)

The above picture isn’t the house… it wasn’t quite that bad… I just wanted to give you that lovely overwhelmed feeling we had.

Now, my sweet hubby is forever an optimist and I the pessimist. So as I began to worry about what looked to me like a potential money pit, I was hesitant to say too much, seeing as I tend to see the glass as half empty. But truth be told, I also wasn’t as thrilled after seeing the place and the neighborhood in person as I had been online. But I decided that was simply my spoiled, American mentality and I’d get over it. But then, I also realized that regardless of how conservative TN might be, after spending a few weeks on the NC side, closer to family as well as where I’d grown up vacationing and relaxing, I sort of wished we’d chosen the NC side. Not to mention the summers are much hotter in the foothills than in the mountains and I despise intense heat. I was even becoming slightly depressed when I thought of making the move… but I figured it was too late to change my mind, so I tried not to dwell on it.

But then came this past Sunday night. Derek told me the next morning that after I’d fallen asleep, he’d lain there awake and anxious over our approaching closing date and all the work that would need to be done to get it ready for us. Not to mention he was scheduled to start work on June 14th, so there was a bit of a deadline. He told me he’d been looking at other properties. Whatttt????? Somehow that didn’t seem like a good sign.

Still, we rose Monday morning and headed to our little house in TN to take another load of furniture. We were pressing on. But when we arrived, we decided to give it one more walk through and talk it over. Before long, we found a few small things and one BIG thing that were nearly impossible to fix. He and I looked at each other in disbelief.

Now what????? We were supposed to close in five days and more than half of our possessions were already there.

So, we sat down on the front deck and started praying. It was certainly the best and only idea at the time. After praying for wisdom, and quick at that, Derek looked at me and said: “Ya know, we were supposed to close this past Friday but it got pushed off… what if that was God’s grace to us?”

And in that moment, we decided that rather than bringing another load from storage… we needed to load everything up and take it back. There were details coming to light we simply hadn’t known and couldn’t ignore. We’d have to back out of contract.

After an exhausting day of heave hoeing and heavy lifting, we drove back over the mountains to my grandparents in a bit of a daze. What in the world had we just done??? We knew it was right, but now we were finding ourselves with nowhere to live and time ticking.

(Note: My amazing grandparents are so hospitable and have given us no deadline for moving out… but let’s be real, I have three loud little boys and I never want to take their kindness for granted! I know they are accustomed to much quieter days than they are currently experiencing. I respect that and intend to return those to them as soon as possible.)

And thusly began some intense, heart to heart conversations on where we really wanted to settle. We realized that how conservative a state is can change quickly and without notice… so maybe it wasn’t best to base our whole decision on that. I also looked at the homeschooling laws in NC and found them incredibly preferable to TN. Not to mention, as I said before, since moving south I’d felt a peace and assurance in this little valley in the mountains that I simply didn’t feel when I crossed the state line. (Not saying feelings are everything but I do think they matter!) This place had the feeling of home and familiarity that East TN simply lacked entirely. And of course Derek felt the same since Western NC has always been home to him.

Annnnnd, just as we finished a time of prayer over the decision of where to land, Derek’s phone rang and the local branch of the same company that had offered to hire Derek in TN called him about his resume and offered him a job in NC. Derek had put in a resume at 10:00 the night before but we hadn’t really expected to hear back right away.

I must say… that kind of sealed the deal for us. And we both feel so much more at peace.

So, rather than MN to TN, it looks like it’s going be MN to TN …to NC!

Now, does having a peace mean everything has fallen perfectly into place?

Nope. Y’all, we’ve spent the past four days realizing that basically every house for sale or rent to be had in this area is getting snatched up quicker than you can smack a skeeter (there’s some southern terminology for ya.)

We’ve looked at so many houses, I’m going cross eyed and have a nearly constant stress headache. We spent all day yesterday going to see homes that looked like PERFECTION from the photos but simply wouldn’t work for all kinds of reasons… like no heat/AC, or an impossibly steep driveway, or a beautiful house (with a mini trailer park in the yard that wasn’t in the pictures), or a gorgeous house so far out we’d have to “road trip” to get anywhere. And most things a wee bit more than we wanted to spend. I began to feel anxious every time we’d pull up to the next house, knowing something would be wrong.

By the end of it, I had that crazed laughter of insanity going.

Yes, I’m having some spazzed out moments… moments where I’ve been incredibly discouraged… moments where I’ve felt tired and worn out and just done with it all.

But God is still good, I am still his child, and I can walk faithfully as I wait to see what he has in store. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll get what I want, but it does mean God will provide what HE knows is good and best for us. That is where is my hope lies.

If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

Matthew 7:11

This current circumstance has certainly found us more prayerful and that in itself is a blessing! It’s good to keep in mind that God’s timing is not ours, and following him sometimes requires being blind and trusting that He sees and knows all. My stressing won’t accomplish a thing. I’ll take a lesson from Psalm 127:

Unless the Lord builds the house,
    those who build it labor in vain.
Unless the Lord watches over the city,
    the watchman stays awake in vain.
² It is in vain that you rise up early
    and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
    for he gives to his beloved sleep.

Now, I’ll leave you with this…just this morning we put in an offer on a cute little bungalow for sale in a quiet neighborhood, (not a common find), in just the town we want to be, right in the sweet spot of our price range… and it had only been on the market for two hours. But I can’t tell you what happened… cause I’m still waiting to find out myself.

Till next week!