MN to NC: My Birthday Surprise!

So, as I told you all before, landing a house in this area of the country is a chore. The market is crazy everywhere but it would seem this part of the country is having an influx of new residents and our area here is particularly popular.

Anything that comes to market worth having is gone in a matter of a few days at the most. You have to be quick on the draw, available for a viewing at the drop of a hat, and ready to make a heck of a deal. Good gracious, it’s stressful.

The other day, I left you guys thinking we’d put in an offer on a little white bungalow. And I thought we had. But then our realtor told us that the sellers weren’t going to accept an offer for at least three days, and we thought it best to hold onto our offer and submit it later so we could keep searching. (In NC, it would seem you can’t put more than one offer down on a house at a time.) So we put it on the back burner for the moment and kept looking…

That very afternoon, a house came to market that was on a road I’d actually heard of. After google mapping, I realized it was right next to a little retirement community where my grandparents lived when I was a child. This retirement community lay in the valley looking up at the most wonderful mountain view. I remember gazing up at it when I would come for visits, wondering what it would be like to live in such a place. And now the house up on the hill next to it was staring at me on the computer screen.

And as much as I’d liked that little white bungalow, it was right in town so that you wouldn’t even know you were in the mountains, it would honestly be needing an entire kitchen/laundry remodel or even addition before it could be considered livable, and by “little” bungalow… I mean about 800 square feet. (Which is fine for our family, seeing as I love small spaces, but we also love hosting and having company and that would have been a bit more interesting.)

This ranch style home in the valley, on the other hand, had that country feel with the AMAZING view we wanted without having to wind up a steep mountain driveway to get to it. It had a kitchen AND laundry room ready for immediate use. Plus, it offered significantly more space. Not to mention it’s less than five minutes from where my grandparents live now. In East TN we would have been an hour and a half from them. Five minutes was certainly preferable. And we’d be less than 45 minutes from all of Derek’s family.

Soooooo… we went, we saw, we liked, and we put in an offer.

We didn’t necessarily have high hopes, though. The couple leaving right before our viewing was saying they would be putting in an offer as well. And if you could see the setting you’d know why our realtor was warning us that there would likely be quite a few interested buyers.

I knew the Methodist Church in town owned said house, so we wrote a love note along with it, asking the church to prayerfully consider our offer as we’d prayerfully been seeking a home. We did what we could do and kept praying.

We made the offer Saturday with the hopes of hearing Sunday.

Nothing.

We thought maybe we’d hear Monday.

Nothing.

Tuesday rolled around. My birthday. I got up that morning anxious but still hopeful. I headed out for brunch and shopping with my birthday buddy (aka, my Mamaw!) I was so blessed to be born on her birthday 29 years ago! And temporarily bunking in with them gave us the opportunity to celebrate together! From the time I was knee high, Mamaw has been teaching me how to shop, deal find and eat good food, so that’s what we did.

Party At T.J. Maxx

Anywho, I was birthday shopping (for myself) at T.J. MAXX when my phone went off. It was a “Happy Birthday” message from Derek with a link to the house in the valley.

Whaaaaattt????

They had accepted our offer!!!!

I was seriously in shock.

I hurried to find Mamaw. All I had to do was show her the message before she threw her hands in the air, said “Praise the Lord!”, and pulled me in for a big hug. That woman feels joy deeply and it really helped it hit home for me what a blessing this was! She was overjoyed to see God’s kindness to us… (and I don’t think she minded knowing her three great grandsons would be just down the road.)

I have to say, as lovely as it would have been to have heard a few days before (as each day without a home seems longer than the day before), it was beyond a blessing to get this news as a birthday gift. God’s timing is, quite obviously, superior to my own.

(Side Note: We would so appreciate prayer that this will be a smooth process to closing. I am well aware with our past experiences that things can go wrong for many reasons, and I am so hopeful that we will finally be settled in our own home before too very long at all!)

In Closing

I am thankful for so many blessings in this journey but I am also trying to remember that blessings can come in many forms. They come in the form of good days and bad days, open doors and closed doors, rain and shine, laughter and tears. I’m thankful when God says yes but I must also be thankful when he says no… or wait. I don’t want my attitude or gratitude to ride on whether things are going my way. I’m praying in the midst of this that I’ll be thankful in all things.

I pray that, by God’s grace, my own journey as well as the journeys of others (whether seemingly easy or difficult) will help me pursue Paul’s stance in his letter to the NT Church:

I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.  I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. Phil 4:11-13

But for now, I’ll just say, I’m thankful for such a beautiful birthday blessing!

(Tune in next week if you want to hear my current collection of some crazy, silly mishaps that have occurred while moving and settling cross country with three curious, energetic, accident prone little boys. I think there are a few tales in there worth telling!)

Love y’all!