Friday, October 15, 2010

Blessed and Bewildered

I thought when I started this blog that I would write on here more often, but this has just been the strangest year and I'm not really sure what to make of it. Its now October, 5 months from when our house "exploded."  We still have no kitchen or dining room and our heating system is still about 2 weeks away.  This experience has been so difficult for me because I am a stay at home wife and my home is such a big part of who I am. I like my house to be cute, clean and uncluttered. Well it might have some resemblance of cute, but the other two are nearly impossible right now.

However, in the midst of this I know I am OK. I have a wonderful husband who loves me and who  is cool as a cucumber (unless he's stuck in traffic) :)  So none of this really phases him. He doesn't fully understand how difficult this is for me, but he tries his best to listen and to stay positive for the both of us. I am also thankful for the parents I have and for how easy it is to talk to them. I have a special relationship with them and I can talk to either one of them about absolutely anything. My dad's quote of the year has been "And this too shall pass." :) Our house may be falling apart, but I'm thankful for the loving people I have around me to help me deal with this.

So on a happier note I went and bought my pumpkins from the cute 94 year old man who lives on the road behind our house. :) I wasn't going to do any of my usual fall decorating, but it does feel good to have some sense of normalcy. Also on a much happier note, we should have our new kitchen by Christmas! ;) I know that sounds like a long time, but we have a lot to do before it can be installed.

Ok so enough rambling, just wanted to give a glimpse of what is going on in our life. :)

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

The Tears Came

I had been trying to be strong ever since this happened to our house. I am a very sensitive person who normally can cry or feel hurt very easily, but the tears just weren't coming.  That is until a few nights ago, and when they fell, they FELL! I was so proud of myself that I was handling things so well, but after six weeks of limited use of our home and really a limited version of our normal life, there was no stopping it.

I know that we still have so much to be thankful for and I want to be strong and trust in God more than anything. I think I felt like a bad Christian to admit this was hard at first. It was also difficult because many people around us (very well-meaning), believed this was a great thing and our whole house would be transformed. That was hard after being so scared by the actual power surge and also not being a well person, it doesn't take much for my health to go down hill. So it was hard to have to act like this was great for other people sake. So I think that the tears were a good thing and a much needed thing. God and I have had many talks in the last few days, my heart has been very sad and exhausted, but I know that He hears and that He loves me. I love how the Bible tells us that the Holy Spirit will intercede for us when we cannot even audibly express how we are feeling.

I know that we will be OK, that God has a purpose in all of this, and that Dan and I will have our sweet simple life back at some point. Hopefully we will be even closer to each other and closer to who God wants us to be. It makes you nervous though when God allows things like this to happen.  We are a little scared of what he is trying to teach us and prepare us for in the future. Dan's fear is that all this had to happen right now because little people who look an awful lot like us are coming soon. :) We were kinda hoping to start with a puppy first, see how that goes. :)

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Trust and Obey

"Use what you have today, and don't worry about what you don't have. God will make up the difference of what you lack, if you will just give Him what you can."

Today I feel like I am lacking many things. We still have limited power, our kitchen and dining room are completely gutted, and there is a large trench dug through our walkway leading up to our house. Anyone who knows me, knows that all this dirt and chaos is my worst nightmare.

So why did God allow this to happen to two people who have believed and trusted in Him since they were very young? Were we not trusting Him enough? Were we not staying close enough to His path? These were questions I asked of myself quite often when I was very ill with lyme disease. Why did God allow me to become so sick and to feel like I was left behind in life. It was hard to be that sick, not able to use my education, and to feel like my purpose had been taken from me. But God provided a new life, a wonderful life, but worlds away from the life I had planned out for myself. The girl who was going to go on and get her doctorate in psychology and live in New York City, is now a country housewife with a growing interest in gardening. I also have a wonderful husband, that the independent girl I used to be never knew she needed. :)

So if God can turn by illness into a blessing, surely blessings will flow out of these inconviences. I mean it is God's house, He has the right to transform it into what he needs and wants it to be. Normally, a situation like this would bring me to tears, but it hasn't. In fact, my husband has been bracing himself since this happened for their inevitable arrival. :) Actually, the only thing that has brought me close to tears is the fact that God didn't allow me to have even one scratch or bruise during such a dangerous situation. And even though, the house was damaged, it is still here and did not burn down.

There's gonna be some hard and messy weeks ahead of us, but I have no choice but to trust God and hand this all over to Him. We will get through this, and probably have character oozing out our ears to show for it! :)

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Life Changes In A Flash

On Monday May 3rd I was having a wonderful afternoon. It was a beautiful sunny afternoon, the lilacs in my garden smelled amazing and the smell traveled throughout the house. I was making a great dinner and waiting for my hubby to come home. 24hrs later was a much different story. We had storms earlier in the day, which caused a tree branch to fall on the power lines that run along our property line in front of the house. The line began to fall and cause huge explosions every ten to twenty seconds. It was absolutely terrifying!! I am so lucky that I was not hurt and that our house did not catch on fire. However, it was not spared completely. We have to have our 2oo year old house completely rewired. We also lost many electronics and appliances and will have to take down walls to fix the electrical.

So here we are in our house with partial amenities. Kinda like camping in our own house. We will be here for a week to 10 days and then we will have to leave for about 4 weeks while the work is being done. My husband says it is a blessing in disguise. I am waiting for the blessing to be revealed. He has such a positive outlook on life in general, but especially in this instance. Having something like this happen is especially hard when you are a stay at home wife. My little sanctuary has been wounded and disturbed. I am just thankful that God has given me such a happy little hubby to help carry me through this time.

So I am going to trust that God does indeed have a plan and a reason for why this has happened. I still love our little home, but I can't wait to have her back as my little sanctuary. :)

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Our House

Our house was built in 1819 and I love that about it. I love things that are old, antique and unique. When my husband and I went out on our first date, he asked me where I wanted to live someday. I answered a yellow farmhouse in the country with green shutters. He added that he would also like to live in the country and have his own barn. So here we are in the country, a gray house (it used to be yellow) and a nice red barn for him. Our house is very old and many projects lie ahead of us, but I know this is the house that God picked for us. We had a very small budget when looking for houses and our little hearts got broken on several that we were out bid on. I am a girly girl and my husband loves tractors and dirt bikes and building and fixing things. So this is our way of blending our interests together. He is very talented and is able to build and fix just about anything, and I am right here waiting to decorate it as soon as he is finished. :) I love our little old house and the life that we have here together. Its so exciting to finish projects and check things off our to do list, but that is only a small part of what God has envisioned for us. Its all about balancing God's plan for our lives, while we love this little place he gave us. This is something, I am still trying to get a grasp over.