OH LORD YOU'VE BEEN SO GOOD!!!

Oh my!! There is just so much to catch up on that I have no real idea where to start. I have been shouting all over the place since about 4:30 this afternoon and I have no idea when I'll stop. We are moving!!!!! The Lord has blessed us so much more than I even knew to ask Him to and it came as a huge surprise to me today but we have found a wonderful new home to move to and we get to move in less than 2 weeks!!!!

We have lived out here for nearly a year now and the entire time (except for the first 10 days) we have been living in a not so nice mobile home park with some very untrustworthy neighbors. The Lord has blessed us and protected us the whole time we've been here there were very few really bad issues and only once was there anything really horrible to fuss over or complain about but we really haven't been too happy here and have felt horribly confined. The kids haven't even really been able to play outside since there is quite a bit of drug related activity going on most of the time and several violent episodes have taken place just yards from my front door. We really didn't think we could afford to move though so we just tried to make the best of a bad situation and stay in prayer that the Lord would provide us with a way to get a better place to live.

Before we moved out here we nearly always (except for an excruciating year in Oklahoma City) lived in the country and had mostly four legged neighbors with a very limited vocabulary....think MOOOO. The culture shock of moving from that kind of environment to the place we live in now was enough to shake me up quite a bit. When you add to that the fact that rent is quite a bit higher here than what we were used to seeing and the income isn't it almost felt hopeless a few times, but we knew that the Lord would provide and He sure did!

The kids and I were driving around today looking at places to rent and getting more discouraged by the minute after seeing what was available in our price range. We put over a hundred miles on the Jeep today and burned more gas than what I wanted to but oh well, it was a pretty day to be outside so I just kept on driving. I ended up driving down a road that I had driven past several times already and then I saw it!! The perfect house for us right now. My heart beat probably tripled as soon as I saw it but I managed to stop the Jeep before jumping out and running to write down the number on the 'for rent' sign in the yard. When I got out of the Jeep all I could hear was the singing of frogs....no thumping stereos, no screaming neighbors, no car engines revving, no doors slamming, nothing but frogs. I just wanted to stand right there and listen to the frogs sing and not even go back to this tiny little trailer house with all the racket and neighbor noise.....but I did. I got in the Jeep and prayed all the way home, asking the Lord to please just give me a certain answer on that house today and that if it wasn't His will for us to have it that he would just give me peace that there was a better place waiting for us.....I also prayed that it be a very specific price and have several very specific features and that the Landlord would love dogs.

The challenge then was to work up the courage to actually call and talk to the landlord of this wonderful new utopia and see if there was any way at all that we could possibly ever afford to live in such peace and quiet. First I had to call a friend that I had seen earlier in my travels and make sure that my eyes weren't deceiving me and that it truly had been her I had seen out travelling in the wilds of the wooded road ways too......it was in fact my friend and as it happens her wonderful new home was provided today too!!! After frantically and quite loudly explaining to her what I was doing running round the countryside instead of hiding in my tiny home working on school with the kids I also explained that I was now beside myself with fear over calling the owner of the home I found. I was so afraid that there was no way we could afford the home or that the owner wouldn't allow pets that I was ready to resign myself to staying here rather than deal with the dissapointment of hearing someone else say that to me on the phone. My sweet friend rather sternly says...." NO, you can't have the house.....there now you've practiced so CALL already".....and I did.

When I first called the landlady definitely did NOT give me that price and as I was getting ready to thank her for her time and get off of the phone to go have a good cry over the perfect home being lost to me she says..."well, I don't owe a dime on that house and I may consider lowering the rent for the right family" and then launches into a really detailed conversation about the house during which she dropped the rent $50 a month. The landlady went on to describe every single one of the features that I had prayed for and THEN she asked me if I had pets......I took in a very long deep breath and quietly described my two dogs and indoor kitty. The lady on the phone just chuckled and went on to tell me all about her dog who she loves very much and would never consider denying a renter , especially one with children, the privledge of such a wonderful friend. Well, that was all sweet and wonderful and laa teee da, but I really didn't think my hubby would be too happy if I killed his budget on this house either so again I was trying to get off the phone and the landlady said something about it being family property and that her dad had built that house when she was young. For some reason that made me pause and blurt out "so you wouldn't consider selling it any time soon either?" I really didn't want to consider moving only to turn around and move again next year and when I told her that she said "hon, if you want that house after you take your husband to see it I'll let you rent it for ___) " She dropped the rent another $100, a total of $150 a month less than what she originally wanted for rent. THE EXACT AMOUNT I HAD ASKED THE LORD FOR IT TO BE!!!!!!

So how could I say no to the perfect house with everything we wanted for exactly what we can afford? I didn't and that's why we are moving in on the 3rd of March. AIN'T GOD GOOD!!