a hodge podge

We closed on our house yesterday. We are now official homeowners. (How did this happen? 2 kids and a mortgage!)

Even Emma seemed to understand and all day was so relieved to have “home”. I only moderatley panicked before, during and after closing. I can’t take it back to the store if I change my mind! BUT we are excited.

After the closing, Daniel and I first came to the house before getting the girls from my parents and THIS was posted on the windows:

What!? They were warning stickers stating the house was under surveillance and demanding that a Certificate of Occupancy must be obtained before moving in.

WHAT?!!?

The stickers were signed and dated for yesterday. Posted the day we purchased our first home. Talk about immediate stress. We literally only owned the home for minutes and there was already a problem. I called the number posted, and prayed in the Spirit while on hold. The unhelpful man told me to call a different number. No answer there. I call back to Mr. Unhelpful. Another number is given. They, also, are unable to give me answers but think the inspector who posted the signs might know something. He has one office hour per day and is unreachable. But where and who I question out loud, has my answers. What is wrong with my house and why weren’t we notified or red flagged in an inspection?

The inspectors secretary explains that he gets all of his orders from the city and it is the city that will have all the information I need. She offers me a phone number….it’s the first phone number that I called twice. To my delight, someone else answers. I explain my situation and she takes my name and address and the name of the inspector.

“Oh really? He just walked in for a meeting, please hold……holding…..He’s says it’s your lucky day. Take the stickers down. The city only wanted to start monitoring it because it has been vacant!”

Thank You, Jesus.

Once we were given permission to enter our own home, we photoed our first keys and unlocking. Daniel also carried me over the threshold and proceeded to walk around the house saying “That’s my toilet, that’s my light fixture, that’s my ugly kitchen floor”…and then he did “snow angels” in the carpet. (Why not!? It’s our house, right!?)

We brought the girls back took our first family photo and showed them their room. Emma was so excited she was jumping and dancing in her no-longer-gold room.  

We had a wonderful dinner last night with our families and our pastors. We had subs on a blanket in the living room floor and prayed for God’s blessing and protection over our home. Daniel also enjoyed his first game of pool with his brother.The four of us “camped out” together on the living room floor last night.

Today we were busy painting. We have a crew lined up for Saturday to help us move in all our belongings.

It’s good to be home.

Our Anna Bear is One today. I am in awe.

Exercise and I (me? I?) aren’t the closest of friends. We don’t speak much. BUT. We were reintroduced by Anti-Suck. A-S actually recommended that we join a gym. So we did. Wanna know the crazy part? I like it.

Our cool gym has child care and at $3 for one hour of me-time it is more than worth it. 

What else do I like about it, you ask?

I LOVE that I get to listen to the music that I want to…uninterrupted.

I like that as I’m squatting to type this as my computer is on the couch, my bum is a bit sore.

I like that I only feel a bit intimidated walking in. That’s a lot less than I had anticipated.

I like that I get to pick the music.

I like that on the bike, I can put my head down, close my eyes and talk to Jesus…with my music of choice as background noise.

I like that a friend from church works in the childcare and the girls love her.

I like that working out is turning my life into one that does not…suck.

We are continuing to pray through this process but we decided that we should apply to see if we could get preapproved for a mortgage. If we did not get approved, then we’d know we were not to buy a house and if we did get the word to buy it would already be set in (pre)motion. We heard today that we were approved. And continuing in the spirit of preparation we felt that no matter where we move we know that we really want to purge and get some clutter out.

I quickly perused through the kitchen and gathered an overflowing laundry basket of things. Anna was helpful in the decluttering process.

                                     

I recieved an email late last night from our landlord. The owners have decided that they want to sell the house…What?!? (We’ve only been here three months…I’ve not even posted pictures of my cute little house for you all). My first response was to panic and think of all the work that we’d have to do. Then I heard the Holy Spirit question, “Will you trust?”. We will choose to trust.

I shared the exciting news with Daniel, we prayed together and visited Proverbs for some wisdom. Here is what we were met with:

Are you confused about life, don’t know what’s going on?…Leave your impoverished confusion and live! Walk up the street to a life with meaning. (Prov 9)

Talk about a word in due season.

We do have a great peace in this odd time. God has been doing something in our hearts - a course correcting, a calling to a more disciplined, focused life. On our way home from Chicago, we developed an “Anti-Suck Plan”. It’s good. And then this…I think God is working something real good. We will be spending a lot of time praying in the Spirit to get this right. We are really determined to hear and follow. Exciting, no?

We are only a half a day into our trip and are having a great time! We are currently just outside of the city and are getting ready to pack up and head into Chicago. So far we:

• had a great time in the car (the girls slept a good part of the drive)
• ate traveling snacks
• saw a Muslim family praying to Mecca at a truck stop
• took Anna swimming for the first time
• let Emma swim “by herself” with floaties for the first time (she LOVED it!! we left go of her and she started giggling uncontrollably!!)

Here are some pictures!

We were reading this book to the girls last night and had our faith strengthened! Here’s what we read:

I watch and wait for my seed to keep it’s promise.

Mmmm. These are some seeds I’ve been planting lately:

My son, do not forget my law…

   Fear the LORD and depart from evil. 
        It will be health to your flesh,
      And strength to your bones… 
 Happy is the man who finds wisdom,
      And the man who gains understanding; 
       For her proceeds are better than the profits of silver,
      And her gain than fine gold. 
      She is more precious than rubies,
      And all the things you may desire cannot compare with her. 
      Length of days is in her right hand,
      In her left hand riches and honor. 
       Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
      And all her paths are peace. 
      She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her,
      And happy are all who retain her.

From Proverbs 3.

What Word have you been thinking about this week?

It’s obvious that I am huge fan of Shane and Shane. Here’s one reason why:

Vision of You

Awaken what’s inside of me
Tune my heart to all You are in me
Even though You’re here God come
And may the vision of You
Be the death of me
And even though you’ve given everything
Jesus come

Come free us, King Jesus
It’s the only way that freedom’s given
From You and You alone
In the work You’ve already done
For all we have are songs,
Unless You come

Here we are, Lord
In this place
Crying out for
Your embrace
To hear Your voice
More than songs
Please come
Jesus come

As I pulled cat urine carpet and pad from our living room and hall today I was thinking of new and exciting ways I could blog about cat pee. Looking back, I wish the largest contributing factor of drama to my day was stinky carpet.

One of our window frames is broken - it won’t stay up. It’s been like that since we moved in - there was a piece of wood used to hold the window open. We didn’t think much of it because 1) we hadn’t opened our windows much before the last week or two and 2) it was behind our couch and pretty inaccessible. That is until, today when we were pulling up the carpet.

Emma was looking out the window and we told her several times not to touch the window. I finished telling her for literally the fifth time in twenty minutes, turned around…and heard screaming. She knocked the wood out and got her hands crushed by the very heavy window. I am thanking God that some of the wood got stuck in the window so the whole weight of it wasn’t on her baby fingers. I thought her fingers would be broken because it is so heavy and she immediately had huge blisters and some bleeding. We took her to the E.R. It was our first trip there for one of our children.

The hospital was more tramautic for her than the window incident. It was new and scary, she was in pain and to top it off she hadn’t napped yet today. The poor baby. Through the x-rays and blood pressure tests she kept crying to go to the “Mickey Mousey store” (The Disney Store) as we had told her earlier in the day we would do soon.

We were told a good report: no broken bones! and headed off to the Mickey Mousey store where you better believe she picked out some fine princess goods. She ended up with a silver princess cardigan, a silver princess skirt and an Emma- sized Fuggarugga doll.

As it stands, my baby girls are sound asleep and my living room smells better.

To give the moms a break Daniel is leading worship on Sunday for the first time in a looooooong time (since our church closed in ‘06). The girls were helping him practice. Emma was helping strum and Anna was organizing his music.