Hip, hip, hip, hippopotamus
Hip, hip, hooray, God made all of us
God's fingerprints are everywhere
Just to show how much He cares
But in between He had loads of fun
He made a hippo who weighs a ton
As I have been waiting for all the details to work out for our house to sell -- AGAIN -- and for us to buy a new house -- AGAIN -- God has been showing me how He is in control of everything, down to the smallest of details. It's obvious "His fingerprints are everywhere." At times, I have felt confused, discouraged, frustrated, and angry. I have questioned and doubted what in the world God is doing, why He is doing, when He is doing it, and how He is going about doing it. When I write that, I feel terrible. And I should. How dare I doubt or question GOD! After all, He is the Creator and Sustainer of the entire universe. If He can speak the planets into existence and keep them in orbit without colliding, I am pretty sure He can handle the selling of our house and the buying of a new one.
Still, I lack faith. I shouldn't, but I do.
And so God keeps whispering in my ear, "I've got this."
He keeps reminding me, "I love you. I always do what's best for you."
He shows me that nothing has taken Him by surprise, that He has been orchestrating every single event to take place at just the right time, and that He knows precisely what He is doing. He has helped me see that I am not in charge. HE is.
Looking back, now, I can see "His fingerprints everywhere." He has had us in the palm of His hand the entire time. I may have felt like we were free falling and going to crash onto jagged rocks, but all along, God was holding us tightly. As the song goes, "Oh no, You never let go. Through the calm and through the storm. You never let go. In every high and every low, oh no, You never let go."
We have prayed from the beginning of this whole adventure that God's name would be praised, that people would look at how things happened and HAVE to give God ALL the credit. Well, He has certainly answered that prayer!
When we sold our house in just FOUR DAYS, I thought for sure God was letting us know we were on the right path and doing what He wanted.
When we made an offer on another house, and discovered it was one of Lawrence's former students, we were even more convinced we were right where God wanted us.
But then everything fell apart. The buyers for our house walked away, cancelling the contract because of a crack -- even though it wasn't a foundation issue, even though our realtor offered to pay out of his own pocket for a structural engineer to come and check it out and confirm it was drought related.
We had to cancel the contract on our new house. We were devastated.
We later found out, though, that when our lender had started the underwriting process for our loan, she discovered I had no credit score. I am almost 30 and don't have a credit card. And I can't get one because I have no credit. Whatever. Without my income we wouldn't be able to get the loan, so the lender made a few suggestions about how to help me exist on paper and build a credit score in a short time.
We added my name to the credit card Lawrence has, that we never use. We started using it to pay for gas once a month and then pay off the bill as soon as it arrives. I got the lender copies of my insurance bills that I have paid on time for the last 12+ months. I did the same with our cell phone bill.
It worked! I have a great credit score! And my name can be on the loan!!!!
Meanwhile, our house went back on the market, and once again we prayed for a quick sale. Days and weeks passed. We had plenty of showings, averaging 3-4 a week! Life was crazy, as I had to be ready at a moment's notice that someone wanted to come and see the house. Then, I would have to get everything cleaned up, daycare kiddos pack-n-plays stashed away, and all four little ones loaded up in the car or stroller depending on the weather. Nap time showings were the worst!!! But, I never said no to a showing, figuring that any one showing could be THE ONE, that those people could be THE ONES who would like our house and want to make it their home. After about 6 weeks of this, I was exhausted and tired of spending more time picking up toys and wiping down tables, counters, floors, toilets, etc. than I was actually playing with my girls and the daycare boys.
On top of all that, a professional stager came to the house to give us advice on how to turn all those showings into an offer. I didn't mind taking the rugs out of my bathroom or putting plates out on the ledge above the kitchen cabinets or taking boxes from the closets to the storage area downstairs. Changing out the family pictures for the international artwork we had downstairs in the office wasn't too bad either. That didn't cost us any money.
Ripping up the carpet on our front step wasn't too hard, nor was "painting" it. I think Lawrence did an excellent job, and it does look 100% better! A bit of advice though: it takes MORE than the 24 hours suggested on the instructions, so don't have a childbirth class the next morning or else you will have to put rugs on your front step that will later stick to the paint and leave a small bit of residue. :)
Painting both the living room and kitchen were a bit more work, as was the master bathroom (no matter how small it is). When she suggested painting our master bedroom, we had to draw the line!
We also couldn't afford her tip of renting a storage unit for all the stuff in our garage (furniture and things we got for free or very cheap to use in the new house). BUT, our realtor is amazing and offered us his garage to store all of things until we sold our house! Lawrence had to move everything on his own, as I had to meet with a doula client the afternoon of "moving day."
Still, with all these changes and improvements, we weren't getting any offers. So, we lowered the price of our house. Discouraging to say the least.
On an up note, though, we had seen a new house and really liked it. We decided to make a contingency offer, just to see if they would even entertain such an idea. They countered our first offer, and our second. We made a third offered, figuring they would reject that one too. After we didn't hear back for about a week, we accepted that it must not be the right house for us (even though we REALLY liked it and thought it was an even better fit than the house we had originally made an offer on). But then, out of nowhere, I get a call from our realtor letting me know they had ACCEPTED our offer!
We would be getting a better house (fenced backyard, on a cul-de-sac, an empty half lot next to us, a creek behind the house, a projector and pull down screen in the basement, a small porch, new siding and roof, a cool storage space, etc.) for just a little more money than the previous house! It has the exact same basic floor plan too, just flipped the other way.
Fantastic! Except, we now had an absolute deadline for when we HAD to have an offer on our house. February 28. That gave us about 6 weeks to sell our house. Our realtor made a calendar of events -- open houses, realtor luncheons, price drops, etc. to ensure that we were doing everything possible to get an offer. And still a couple weeks went by. Showings, yes. An offer, no.
We got our hopes up several times when someone would come to an open house and express interest. But nothing ever came of these potential offers. And everyone who seemed to like our house was an investor. They would buy our house, fix it up a bit, and then rent it out. Not exactly what we had envisioned happening to our house when we moved. I always pictured a young couple living here and raising their family, like we have done. Or, maybe a retired couple with grandkids who would come over and play. But never had I thought of investors. At this point I didn't really care though, as long as someone -- anyone -- made an offer on our house.
More showings, still no offer. So we lowered the price once more. That meant a whole new realm of people would see our house on-line as we dipped under a major price line. And more showing requests did come. Mainly during nap time! Ugh!
One Thursday we had one of these. I drove around for 20 minutes, it was cold and I did not want to unload and reload 4 children into their carseats. The people didn't stay for very long, not a good sign, but I was thankful to get everyone down for a short nap at least.
Discouraged, that afternoon after the daycare boys left, as usual the girls and I went to get groceries. Lawrence has his grad school class on Thursdays and doesn't get home until after 9 pm, so I much prefer getting out of the house than sitting around trying to entertain the girls on my own until bath time. As always, I picked up the house and got it show ready, just in case I were to get a call or text requesting a showing while we were out. I even opened up the notebook with the house information and put the Seller's Letter on the table. Everything was "perfect." Whatever, a waste of time, why bother. But I couldn't not do it. After almost 2 months of this, I had grown accustomed to the routine and simply couldn't leave the house unless it was ready for a last minute showing.
We made our typical trip to Aldi, and I even bought a new item -- veggie straws -- for the girls to snack on while I packed up the groceries. They ate almost half the bag, and a banana each, before I could finish. It was a big grocery week!
We then headed to Hy-Vee, in rush hour traffic, but I reminded myself we weren't in any hurry and decided we might just stroll through the aisles of Hy-Vee to "kill some time." I would rather hang out in Hy-Vee with happy girls than sit at home with cranky ones. Coralyn excitedly asked for cheese and meat and popcorn and a cookie, as they frequently have samples when we go shopping. Well, we did get our cheese from the deli, and they did have some delicious samples in the back. We tried every single one. No cookies or popcorn in the health food section though. After we had everything we came to get, and a few other items that somehow made their way into our cart, we headed to the check out line. I saw a new drink and told Coralyn, "This will be our special treat." I hardly ever splurge, but for some reason I was feeling generous and wanted to do something nice, just for fun. We paid and Coralyn pushed the green button and signed her name :) Then, she suggested we go sit at the tables to enjoy our drink. I figured why not, we had the time. So, we went and sat down and sipped our drink. Then, we put our coats back on and braced the cold while we loaded the groceries into the Yukon.
As we pulled into the driveway, I saw several cars parked next door. I guess the house had indeed sold, and the new owners were getting ready to move in. The girls and I went over to introduce ourselves and welcome them to the neighborhood. I joked, "You didn't like our house?" I even laughed, "We just lowered the price, so there's still time if you want to change your minds." I explained how we were hoping to move soon, but were glad to have some young blood in the neighborhood, as most of our neighbors are in their 60's or older! Granted, we LOVE our neighbors, and I gave the run down on everyone and how nice they are. Then, we made our way home.
I thought it odd that the living room light was on. I know I had turned it off, but then again maybe I hadn't. I was mad at myself for wasting electricity, and money! We walked in and I put the girls down, promising to get supper ready as soon as I could. But when I saw a realtor card on my kitchen table, I was quite taken aback and had no idea how it had gotten there. I never got a call, text, or email requesting a showing. I immediately called our realtor to see if he knew what was going on. Perhaps he had gotten a request and given out the code for the key holder. Nope, Jay had no idea about a showing. I gave him the realtor's info and he did some investigating. Apparently, the notification company had failed to inform me that someone wanted a showing!!!!
Good thing I had left the house ready.
Even better, our house was #1 on the people's list!
Yep, they contacted our realtor and asked some questions. The next day their realtor made a verbal offer to Jay, just to see if we would accept the deal they wanted. We made a few changes and came up with something both sides could agree with!
Early the next week, Jay came over at 9 pm for us to sign a contract!
Perfect timing too, as the next day I would start watching a baby girl and not be able to leave the house for a showing. I would have 5 kids and not that many car seats. So in no way, shape, or form would I be able to get out of the house if someone requested a showing between the hours of 7 am and 4 pm. All of our showings had been during that time frame, except our open houses or a few weekend showings.
All except this one weekday showing from 5-6 pm, that I didn't know about until after it had happened.
And hadn't done anything "extra" like I usually tried to do if I knew a showing was going to take place -- like having candles going until right before we left so the house would smell good, like steam cleaning the carpets the day before or at least vacuuming and doing a quick mop just before a showing. Did I mention that one of my daycare boys had thrown up in the living room that afternoon and I hadn't had a chance to deep clean it before the people came without my knowledge! I guess none of that mattered.
I told Lawrence that night when he got home from grad school about our random showing and commented, "If these people make an offer, it's ALL God!" Oh yes, God definitely wanted to get all the credit. He wanted me to see that "His fingerprints were everywhere," and that He ALONE was responsible for getting this offer. Not any cleaning I had done. Not a nice smell in the house. Not soft music playing in the background. Nope, nothing, absolutely nothing on my part. ALL GOD!
He was all over the details on the other side of things too. We informed the people at our "new house" that we had an offer and checked to make sure the closing date was good with them too. It was. Things were falling into place! In fact, we will have TWO days to get everything moved over to our new house before the new family moves in here.
We had the inspection done on our new house. Only a few small things, and they fixed all of them!
The people buying our house decided to use the previous inspection, so there wouldn't be any way for them to find anything wrong -- big or small -- with our house!!!! All we had to do was make sure we don't have termites. That was confirmed on Friday -- no termites!
We did end up having to fix the crack with some apoxy stuff. Well, a professional company had to do it, but that was taken care on Monday. I didn't enjoy writing the check, but I told myself it is just getting us one step closer to moving, to being able to live out Jesus to the kids at Lawrence's school, to share His love with their families. And so it wasn't as painful to see the cash disappear out of our bank account.
The appraiser also came on Friday and let us know we don't have to make any FHA improvements or whatnot. As long as our house appraises for our asking price, we are good to go. We should find out about that in the next day or two, but Jay didn't seem to think that would be a problem. The appraiser was a believer too and interested in foster care, so we talked about that for a bit. Maybe he will keep that in mind as he makes his decision regarding the value of our home :)
When the termite guy came, the buyer's realtor came along too. We got to talking, and he told me a bit about the family who will be living here. That's right -- A FAMILY!!! The mom just had a baby, the day before they had the showing and hasn't actually even seen the house! When Lawrence bought this house, I was in Haiti and didn't get to see it in person until I moved in!!! Oh, and the family has two other girls, to make a total of THREE girls. Guess what color their hair is? RED! I hope that means they will keep the mural in Coralyn's room. In addition to the playground scene, there is a red-headed girl up in a tree. I really like the mural in Coralyn's room and am going to miss it in our new house, though I am sure I will come up with new ways to make the kids' rooms special. (All other rooms will be painted with more neutral colors and no stripes this time around!)
We are set to close on our house on February 21 and move on the 23rd. We will be in our new house just under a week before we had to have a contract in place!
We will be able to celebrate my 30th birthday in our new house! Lawrence asked me what I wanted for my birthday: a new house. He wondered how I wanted to celebrate such a big birthday: with all our friends in our new house, just hanging out and praising God for the place He has provided for us to live and serve Him. If all goes as planned, we will be able to do that. I want the party to first and foremost be a house dedication, giving our house to God and asking Him to bless us as we live there, to open up opportunities for us to make Him known. My 30th birthday is just a side note, an added bonus. :)
I seriously can't begin to express how wonderful God is, how amazingly He has worked out all the details for us to sell our house and buy a new one. I am so thankful He has, and continues to do so, though! Which is why I can sing the song at the top of my lungs, not caring if I am on pitch or not:
Hip, hip, hip hippopotamus
Hip, hip hooray!
God's fingerprints are everywhere
Just to show how much He cares!
Thank you for all your prayers for us in this process! We have appreciated every single one of them! We would actually really like for you to keep praying, as we are trying our hardest to not get all that excited until every single paper is signed, every i is dotted, every t is crossed, and the deal is absolutely, positively finalized! We will get one step closer to that happening this afternoon as we talk with the lender and sign papers regarding our new loan. Maybe we could all pray that interest rates will drop drastically in the next hour! :)
No, really, we just pray that God will keep working things out, all to the glory of His awesome name!
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