SOLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I will warn you upfront that this could be one of my more emotional blogs. I am feeling such a mix of emotions right now (relief, joy, nostalgia…oh too many to name!) You may not even want to read this one for it most definitely will be hard to follow, but I want to put it out there so I will remember.

We were supposed to close on our old house on February 29. On Monday, February 11, we received word that the buyer wanted to close on….February 15!! (It became official at noon today!!) Hey, that was great news, but of course a great scramble ensued! My gut reaction was WOOOHOOOO!!!! It’s FINALLY going to be over! And then I got sentimental.

You see, when my first husband and I divorced I was 28 years old. I moved into an apartment and vowed to buy a house by the time I was 30. It wasn’t an easy task for a young single mother, but I was committed. I paid off my debts and built up my savings and 17 days before I turned 30, I made an offer on a house. The offer was accepted and I closed 1 week after my birthday. Before deciding on the house, I looked at HUNDREDS of houses over a period of about 6 months. I really believe that when you are house hunting, you just “know” when you walk into the right one and when I walked in, I knew. It had PLENTY of room for the two of us, and was warm, homey and comfortable. Tyler and I packed up our modest amount of “stuff” and moved into “our house.” Tyler was almost 6 when we moved in and during our time in that house, he went from a sweet little boy to a handsome and helpful young man. During our time in that house, I found my wonderful husband and we added two sweet babies to our crew. We both put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears (and maybe even a cross word or two) into updating our space. The house saw us through MANY life changing events and it served us well. We have learned that the gentleman who purchased the house is a single father. He has plans to make it a wonderful home for his daughters. I am thrilled to know that children will continue to grow within its walls.

Goodbye old house. Thanks for the memories, for the shelter, the warmth, the place for our family to grow and learn.

Despite feeling a little nostalgic about the old house, I , for the first time, am feeling at “home” in our new one. Sure, we’ve lived here for nearly 8 months, but as long as we had two mortgages, I couldn’t shake the feeling that it could be a temporary thing. We have enough furniture to function, but we have done very little personalizing. Monday, I bought paint for the kitchen. I am ready to make this house our home. The excitement most people have when moving into a new home was somewhat tempered for us and I am FINALLY starting to let myself get excited!! I am finally allowing myself to love the things I love about the house and thinking about how I want our space to look. This house is special to Aaron and me because WE picked out the features TOGETHER. It is OURS. While we are not sure how long-term it will be, we hope to be settling down for a good little while. Til now, I haven’t had the guts to blog about the new house. It seemed premature. But next week, when the dust has settled from this crazy, hurried week we’ve had, I will tell you all more about it!

Here’s to home sweet home.