Little house on the .... hill

Seven months ago we purchased our house!  We had just driven cross country from California to Ohio and were itching to move along with the closing process.  We had put in an offer on the house over Halloween Weekend when I was in North Carolina for a visit and Adam was still in California.  The month of November was an exciting one as we awaited word as to whether or not our offer would be accepted.  It was and the closing arrangements proceeded.  At first, we were told we would acquire the house by Thanksgiving, then it got pushed back to early December, then for sure by Christmas.  As the days crept forward and the holidays approached then passed, with still no closing date in sight, we accepted the fact that the new house was not going to be acquired on our timeline but when the timing was truly right.  So, come early to mid-January, we found ourselves scrambling one Thursday to get the funds to come through for our mortgage prior to our early Friday morning closing date.  It turns out the closest bank for us was a FOUR HOUR DRIVE AWAY……eeek!  

Fortunately, our awesome mortgage consultant we had been working with in California suggested we find a financial advisor office instead of an actual bank.  A text to a colleague revealed that there was in fact a financial advisor office through our bank office 45 minutes away from us in West Virginia.  So off we drove to WV, the afternoon after our closing meeting, coordinating calls from the CA branch with the WV branch in spite of the three hour time difference.  When all was said and done, we spent four or five hours in the lobby waiting on calls and faxes to come through, met the mayor of Wheeling (go figure!), and appreciated the woman who was helping us by staying overtime for an hour after the branch had physically closed.  We had walked out of our closing meeting having signed the paperwork and had the keys to the house that morning but the money had not come through yet…..which is why the rest of the day was a frantic dash to get the money to go through all simply because our bank does not have a location less than four hours away from here……whew!

So, that was an exciting beginning to physically acquiring our house back in January in spite of hiccups and unexpected delays along the way.  This all happened the Friday before classes started for the spring semester the following week.  Gone were the plans I had of painting and replacing the carpet before school started back up for me.  No more could I plan to help Adam unpack and get settled in since I would be spending my days back on campus teaching again.  However, it all worked out in the end!  I reconnected and got to spend a lot of time with a family member through removing wallpaper together and painting that might not have happened had I had more time to do it by myself when not working.  Adam was able to put things where he wanted and get settled in his own way without my input which is probably what was needed at the time amidst dealing with so many life changes.  It’s amazing isn’t it how life works out in spite of what you thought were failed circumstances at the time!  

Along this journey back in November, our mortgage guy, Greg, had sent an email to us when he noticed the Jeremiah 29:11 signature in my email.  He said that was one of his favorite bible verses and appreciated seeing it in our various email communications. 

Megan,

I’m so excited!  I didn’t look at the bottom of your email yesterday, but I had printed it out, and I was happy to see what caught my eye!  Jer 29:11 is one of my fav verses! 

 God bless,

Then, later that day, he followed up with this message:

Ok, now this is wild… I have a Bible app on my phone.  You’ll never guess what the verse of the day is!  It’s in Jeremiah…Wow!

What a nice little Godicidence.  :)

Soooo, when the lady in WV asked if we needed to say anything else to Greg in CA as we were winding down this crazy busy closing day, I quickly blurted out, “Yes!  Ask him what the daily verse is and to email it to me!”  The lady gave me an incredulous look to which I said, “Please just do it.”  I could tell when she repeated the question into the phone that Greg understood my request.  That night, when Adam and I got back to the house I was renting at the time, I opened up his email to read these words:

Matt 5:14

“You are the light of the world.  A town built on a hill cannot be hidden.”  Good stuff!

Oh my!  Good stuff indeed!!!  What Greg did not know was that our little house sits on a hill and offers us a majestic view.  In fact all of our new town is upon a hill.  Campus is affectionately dubbed, “The Hill” and in the winter time as you cross the bridge from WV into Ohio, and see the lights twinkling atop the hill amidst the bare branches of the trees, you see that the campus, and the spirit, indeed cannot be hidden.  I hope that our little home, and our marriage, do act as a light to others and through hospitality and kindness, they feel welcome always, not only in our home but in our lives.  So, that, my friends is the story of how we acquired our little house seven months ago today (well, minus a day since this happened on January 8, 2015!).

There it is!  Our house officially after the closing meeting but before the money came through at the ninth hour that evening!!

This is the backyard view picture I took during one of the times I looked at the house last October.

Don't you just love our front yard view?!  I can't wait until the leaves change color in the fall and the trees on the hills are bursting with color!

Below are some videos I took last fall during some of my preliminary visits to the house.  This particular visit involved my cousin driving in from PA and meeting me to act as an informal "inspector" for Adam and me.  Billy buys houses and flips them so he knows what to look for and what to avoid in a house.  I took the two videos below while he was talking with the realtor elsewhere in the house.  One video shows the master bedroom and other bedroom while the other shows a quick glimpse of the living room, kitchen, and back yard.  These videos, and Billy's report via a Skype chat with Adam after this visit to the house, helped Adam to "see" the house from the opposite side of the country.