Welcome to our humble abode...

It's now been 3 1/2 years since we moved to Charlotte. It's so hard to believe. The older I get, the faster time seems to be soaring.

To share just a little bit of our story...it was September 2006, our house in Wilson was not on the market and one day our phone rang. It was a couple who had seen our home 6 months prior when it was on the market. They said "would you still be interested in selling your home?" We really didn't want to at that time, but wondered if the Lord had something else in store. Little did we know He did...Charlotte!

It was just a week after we signed the papers that Scott was made aware of the opening here at Calvary Church. The Lord was at work and we knew we had to pursue what was ahead. We sold our home and the Lord made available a home for us to rent until we decided what we were going to do. To say the rental home left "a little to be desired" was an understatement. But we were VERY thankful to have a place to call "home".

Well, you know the end of the story: God did call us here to Charlotte. During our hunt for a house, we must have looked at 50 homes one weekend. This was during the time that homes were selling in two weeks or less. When Scott and I came back to purchase a home in April '07, all those homes had been sold. We had one day to look and find something and I was determined not to rent again. I wanted a real home for our family. There were so many changes going on in our life (after uprooting our kids from the place we called home for 17 years) that I wanted some normalcy.

God led us (or I "think" He did) to the place we now call home. We looked at our new home for all of 10 minutes and said "deal"...it had 4 bedrooms and a playroom. We must have had blinders on the day we looked at it. Trust me, I won't bore you with all the details. All we did the first two years is work and work on this house. And I don't mean just decorating it...I mean working! Things falling apart, air conditioning not working, ceilings falling in...you name it, we fixed it. I can laugh about it now.

But God has done a work in my heart. He has taught me another area of being truly content..and that is in my home. My "home sweet home". And I can honestly say that is exactly how I feel about it now. Thankful we have a roof over our heads, thankful we have a small mortgage, thankful that we have made so many wonderful memories in this home with our family, and thankful that we have turned it in to "our home"...a place where you can stop by anytime to visit (and have coffee with me :)

Believe me, it's all been the Lord. Over these past 3 years, I have griped, complained, cried, and been angry....all at the same time! God has so taught me that my joy is not in "things". My joy is in Him - and I have ALOT to be joyful about.

I wanted to share some pictures from our "transformation" over the years :)

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Wonderful Labor Day weekend....

It was our second annual Labor Day weekend with our friends from Wilson. Once again, we had a great time. We went to the mountains. The weather was absolutely perfect! We walked up lots of hills, ate, talked and laughed alot, and relaxed....lots of relaxing!

It's always great catching up with great friends. 17 years we spent in Wilson, so there are tons of memories. Thankfully, even after being here 3 1/2 years, I've been able to get together with them usually every 3-4 months.

We arrived home Sunday afternoon to having all our children here for dinner. That sure is a rare occasion. I fixed their favorite dinner, we played games and then went to the Knights baseball game with Brad and Lindsay. There were fireworks that night, so that was an added bonus.

It was a perfect weekend!

Shantia, Heather, Amy and me (we missed you, Stacy!!!) me with my man!!!!!
Eating....again :)
my blessings!

Brad and Lindsay with "Homer"
The hilarious thing about the above picture is that "Homer" was off-duty and not anxious to take any further pictures for the evening. Well, that didn't stop Lindsay and Brad. They followed him around and waited for him to come out of his dressing room. They stood posed and waiting (if you look closely, you can see him closing the door and ready to walk ;)