Annie: October 5, 2021 we had a counseling appointment where it just became obvious that we needed to go ahead a buy a house. It was a bigger realization to me than Matt, but it came from such a simple question…”so if the work-from-office gets pushed out further, would you just stay in the apartment?” That wouldn’t move my plans, dreams, goals ahead–I had to let go of what’s familiar to get to the next chapter.
Matt was able to track down an out-of-town realtor to help us start looking. The realtor sent us pages and pages of listings in several areas, but I narrowed it down to 3 homes in one area. We did a before-church video tour of the homes on October 17th and decided that we wanted to make an offer on one of them. The house had an offer deadline of the 19th, so we thought we’d have some time to mull it over. The realtor found out that the sellers were planning to take an earlier offer, so we scrambled to toss our hat into the ring by noon on the 18th and only about 20 minutes after submitting the offer we were called by our realtor with the greeting, “Congratulations!” So, in another leap-of-faith moment, we bought a house we’d never stepped foot into.
We were able to close quickly and made our first load trip, including the dog on November 15th. We did the 3 flights of stairs a bajillion times to load the apartment into a giant moving truck and then left just before noon. The day was stormy, rainy, gusty, gross–all the signs that this was a bad idea. But as I followed behind Matt, who drove the moving truck, I frequently saw rainbows created from the spray kicked up by the tires and was reminded that we’re not going it alone or outside God’s promises. It turned sunny and clear a little less than an hour from arrival.
When we got to the house the power was out because of the earlier storms. We unloaded the truck hurriedly with the waning daylight. A smoke detector started to chirp and it started to get pretty cold in the house. We dropped off the rental truck, and sought out a grocery store with power (and bought a flashlight, some dinner items and a 9V battery) and came back to the house to unpack by candle light (somehow they came in the first load!). We bundled up for bed expecting a cold night when the power came on around 9:30. Sigh of relief after a very long day!
We drove back to the apartment the next day with the dog and packed up load number two from a storage unit, had a pig-pile slumber party with the pets (used couch cushions and random blankets) on the apartment living room floor and on the 17th (a gorgeous sunny day) I drove all the house-pets in my car while Matt drove a moving truck again. Crossing the interstate bridge first, I called back to Matt letting him know that he’d be in for a treat if he was in the right-most lane–our Mount Hood in full snowy glory with a river full of sailboats in the foreground! That’s right, we’ve moved to Washington. Renton to be precise.
I hurried ahead of Matt so that I could make it in time to meet my horse who had also boarded transport that morning. Apparently, Faith was the “emotional support animal” for the other horse being transported and such a good girl! She is loved at her new barn by the people and other horses. Faith has taken a particular liking to the 5 miniature horses and seems to attract all manner of fauna, it’s kinda like Snow White & the Seven Dwarves.
We’re making good progress on setting up house here and finding that the house is even better than we imagined–it’s going to be perfect for my speech therapy practice when I get my Washington speech-language pathologist license (probably in January). Although I’ve felt discouraged at times or anxious to get my practice going, I’m thankful that I can trust in God’s timing.
Matt & Annie - Journey 