Tuesday, February 12, 2008

All grown up!


It is hard to believe that we have lived in our house for 6 1/2 months now. Time has flown by! Life is so much different now that we are home owners. There is still a part of me that misses the apartment life! We had so much more time on the weekends and if anything ever needed to be fixed, we just called the office and they came right down. Now we are stuck fixing everything. We are responsible for the whole house! That's a lot! We were so naive going into the whole thing. A few days before we closed on our house, I remember Brian saying, "Well, we should be able to knock out all the painting in the first weekend!" Are you kidding me? We are STILL painting! We were lucky to get the first room done in the first weekend. And the only reason we accomplished that was because we stayed up until 3 am several nights. We actually thought that we could tear down all this wallpaper and paint every wall in 2-3 days! WOW! Our painting total 6 1/2 months later is 2 bedrooms, the kitchen, the dining room, the laundry room, and 2 bathrooms. Only 5 rooms to go, plus the garage! Haha, so much for 2-3 days!

Growing up is hard to do! When we first moved into our house, I had a really hard time with it. I was very emotional for the first few weeks. I had moments where I truly thought that I would never feel comfortable in this house. I didn't want to grow up and be an "adult". I had to do some major soul searching and truly rely on the Lord for strength through the whole transition. I remember the first day in our house that I was home alone. My parents had just left and Brian had to go to work. I was in tears! I didn't want to be alone in this unfamiliar place. This wasn't my home. I was in a strangers house, but with all my stuff. That was very scary to me! I sat on the couch and spent more than an hour journaling and praying. I was desperate for the Lord to comfort me in such a scary time. I went through so many emotions during that afternoon. But after spending that time with the Lord, I had so much peace. That day was a turning point for me. Even though I still felt a little out of place in this big house, the Lord continued to give me peace and in many different ways he showed me that everything would be "okay". That experience taught me so much. I'm sure most people think that I'm crazy to be so upset about moving into a new house. Most people would be thrilled. But I think that being the "baby" of my family played a role too. I have always been the "baby" and really wasn't ready to give that up. (I'm still not willing to give that up!) Moving into a house made me finally feel like a grown up. Getting married wasn't even as big of a shock for me, for some reason. Don't get me wrong, I was so thankful that the Lord had provided us with a home, but I just wasn't prepared for the shock of it all.

Through this whole experience I have grown so much. My dependence on the Lord has grown so much. My relationship with Him has grown drastically and I can honestly say that moving into this house is the reason for this growth. For once in my life I can actually say that I am being consistent with my quiet times. Since moving into this house, I have actually spent time in the Word (almost) daily. But even if I miss a day here of there, I still think about it and get right back on track the next day. Before I would have just missed a day or two and then it would all go down hill from there.

Now I look back on that time in my life with a giggle. I love our house now and couldn't imagine living anywhere else. The Lord used this transition in my life to grow me in so many ways. For that, I am so thankful!

1 comment:

Amy Middleton said...

aww snow! I wanna see some updated pics of the inside soon! :) I know what you mean with the whole fix it yourself thing, that hurts! haha. It does make you feel all grown up, huh!