Mer-Bear!

Meredith Showalter is one of my favorite people ever.  :)  And she's preggers and super cute and due REALLY soon which makes me really, really excited!  On a side note, we also have pretty much the same life, so of course I think she's pretty cool.  ;)  We graduated from UNC together, she's a speech therapist in an elementary school, her hubby is a youth pastor, etc... except I'm not pregnant!  :)  But... Mer I want to play with Mason all. the. time.  

Mer, I love you & can't wait to hold little Mason!  

Jehovah Jireh

In college, my small group studied the different names of God and the one that always had a special meaning for me was Jehovah Jireh, which means the Lord will Provide.  Because I was responsible for paying for my schooling, this was a truth I clung to when finances stressed me out (which was fairly often!).  And it was always cool to see how the Lord provided for me.

Throughout our house-buying process, I have been amazed by how many times Aaron & I have seen the Lord provide for us and how perfect His timing was!  Here are some examples of God's provisions and His timing that we've seen while we were working on our house:

1.  We bought the house through the Good Neighbor Next Door program, which provided a good way for us to be able to afford a house without worrying about a large mortgage.  
2. GNND is a program for classroom teachers.  And Aaron's no longer a teacher.  We closed on the house in May & by July we realized he was going to be switching jobs.  Perfect timing.  :)
3. We took the Financial Peace class at our church in January 2010 and really starting keeping a budget and saving intentionally for a house at that point.  If we hadn't started really saving diligently, we wouldn't have been able to save up money by November, which was when our house was listed & we put in a bid.  By the way, if you haven't taken Dave Ramsey's class, I highly recommend it.  We loved it & it's been incredibly beneficial!
4. Patience is not my strong suit.  Ask Andrea, our realtor.  :)  I emailed her multiple times every day to check our progress.  We originally were hoping to close on our house by Christmas 2010 but because of a hiring issue with the GNND program, it took f.o.r.e.v.e.r.  It was driving me crazy.  But looking back, I'm so thankful that we weren't able to close until mid-May!  Because Aaron & I both worked in the schools & had the summer off, we were able to do a lot of the work ourselves... and save money.  If we'd closed in December, we wouldn't have been very useful.  And we were able to save a lot more money to put toward renovations since we had almost 6 more months to save up.  Because of the logistics of the GNND program, we had to pay for all the renovations out of pocket, so being able to save longer was a pretty big deal.  We were actually able to do all the renovations we wanted & came in about $1500 under budget... which means if we'd closed earlier, I wouldn't have been able to put in the second bathroom...  Needless to say, I'm so thankful God didn't listen to me about speeding up our closing date!  :)  
5. God provided us time-and-time again with friends and family who helped us with our renovations!  Jeff is a family member & he helped with the construction projects and plumbing.  Our friend Jake helped with the electric work.  And numerous people came over to help us paint, knock down walls, paint, put up walls, paint, landscape the yard... and paint some more.  :)  We're so grateful!!

Seeing how the Lord orchestrated all the details of our home was incredible.  Our God really is great!  
(PS. The Proverbs 31 devotion actually talked about Jehovah Jireh today, if you're interested in reading it.)

Before & After Pictures!

We finally moved into our house on July 29 and then it took about a week to get all the boxes unpacked & everything hung on the wall where it belongs.  Here are a few pictures of each of the rooms when we first bought the house & how they look now after 2 months of hard work.   :)  It's so nice to finally be living here & enjoying our home together!!

Front of the house: Before

Front of the house: After

Before

After

Backyard:  Before

Backyard:  After

Backyard: After

Backyard: After

Backyard: After

Floorplan:  Before

Floorplan:  After

Living Room: Before

Living Room:  After

Living Room:  Before

Living Room:  After

Living Room:  After

Guest Bedroom #1:  Before

Guest Bedroom #1: Before

Guest Bedroom #1:  After

Guest Bedroom #1: After

Guest Bedroom #1:  After

Guest Bedroom #2/Den: Before

Guest Bedroom #2/Den:  Before

Guest Bedroom #2/Den:  After

Guest Bedroom #2/Den:  After

Guest Bedroom #2/Den: After

Kitchen: Before
(they used it as a utility/laundry room)

Kitchen:  After

Kitchen:  After

Kitchen:  After

Dining Room: Before

Dining Room:  Before
(Obviously part of it was their kitchen)

Dining Room: Before

Dining Room:  After

Dining Room:  After

Guest Bathroom:  Before

Guest Bathroom: After

Guest Bathroom: Before

Guest Bathroom: After

Hallway: Before

Hallway:  After

Master Bedroom:  Before

Master Bedroom:  After

Master Bedroom:  After

Master Bedroom:  After

Laundry Room:  After
(We moved it out of the kitchen & into the master)

Master Bathroom:  After
(We added this bathroom in our bedroom)

Master Bathroom:  After
(We added this bathroom in our bedroom)

Home sweet home  :)

The coolest part about this house-buying and house-renovating process was that Aaron & I were amazed over-and-over at how God orchestrated the timing & the financing of this house perfectly and how we could see God's fingerprints all over this process!  I am also so grateful to my husband for all the hard work he put into our house this summer!!!   Thanks Aaron.  :)  I am so blessed.