4/3/14

I'm not being very creative with the titles for my blog posts. I guess it's because I look at this as more of a journal, in which case I would just write the date at the top of the page and begin my entry. So, here we are. It's April. I haven't written in about a month. After my last blog post, The Holy Spirit really helped Chad and I to try to push ourselves to the max to get our home ready for the housing market. When I tell people that we are "getting our home ready for the market" I don't think that everyone realizes what that means, nor do they have an idea of how much time is spent going in to that process. For us, it has meant that every second of "spare" time and every ounce of energy has gone in to making our house look like someone else's. That's right. You read that right. This house is now someone else's house. Whose house is it? That is yet to be determined. I believe God has a family in mind for this house, and they will come along, hopefully sooner rather than later. Our house will be listed on April 8th, which is next Tuesday. So, what have we been doing to get this house ready? Packing, packing and more packing. 7 years in this house means we have accumulated a lot of stuff. The process of packing has also meant purging, and it was been cathartic for me. We have sold some things as well. We have painted some rooms, taken down all "personal" effects, cleared off every countertop and de-cluttered every corner. Every cobweb is gone, and all of the little imperfections on our walls have been "magically erased." We have new countertops and a new faucet and sink in our kitchen. I wanted to do that 2 years ago, but alas, other home improvement projects became a priority...like brand new windows, which we hope will help sell this house. So you see, without that "lived in" feeling...those cobwebs, and scratches on the walls...without those and without the bits of clutter here and there, and without our photographs on the walls, this house is not ours. It's just a house. It's not our home. Not anymore. As I took down the family photos and packed them away for our new home, I cried. Suddenly the empty feeling of this house matched the empty feeling in my heart. I grew to love this house. I love the memories that have been made here. I brought home two babies to this house. We have celebrated in this house. We have fought in this house. We have laughed...a lot. And, we have cried. But most of all, we have loved. I fell in love with Fishers while living in this house. I grew to love Indiana here, finally no longer feeling like a girl from Michigan trying to fit in. It was in this house that I became a Hoosier. This is my home. Indiana is home now- not Michigan. I used to tell people that I grew up in Michigan. That's not really true anymore. I spent my childhood and young adult life in Michigan. I have grown up in Indiana. And so, where does that leave me now? I sort of feel lost. I know that God has called us to do something- to take over the farm. God has called me to do something that I never possibly imagined. I'm still comforted in knowing that God is taking care of us, and He always will. He is leading the way. But it doesn't lessen the sadness that I am feeling lately. When the sign goes up in our front yard on Tuesday, it will symbolize the finality of it all- the end of this chapter of our lives in Fishers, and the beginning of our new life on the farm.