What might have been ...

We spent a lot of time last fall building a house.  It was supposed to be ready to by December 2012.  It's probably ready now, but unfortunately, we were not able to sell the house we currently live in.  Fortunately, we were building on a contingency, so we didn't lose any money by backing out of the new house, but we were sad.  The kids were sad.  I felt like we had wasted a lot of time and money putting our current home on the market and showing it about 30 times to still be in the exact same spot we started out in.

 

Here is the model home.  Our home was to be the same floor plan, but a different elevation (exterior).

 

 

Here is our lot.  We loved that it backed up to wooded common space.

 

My sister and I spent a couple of hours one Saturday morning picking out flooring, cabinets, counters, etc.  I'm thankful she is an interior designer.

 

 

The kids loved driving by the house to check its progress.

 

 

Praying over our lot.

 

I stopped by one day and saw them laying the foundation.

 

 

 

Foundation is finished.

 

 

Framing.

 

 

Almost to drywall.

 

Here are the kids in their rooms.

 

Almost finished.  This is what the house looked like when we backed out. 

 

My prayer through this entire process was for God's will to be done.  If he didn't want us in this new house, make that clear.  If he wanted us to stay put, make that clear.  And I think he did.  Our house didn't sell.  We got tired and frustrated having it on the market for almost 6 months and all the work associated with keeping it clean (while still living here with 3 small kids).  We didn't want to give our house away.  We re-evaluated and decided to stay put for now. 

 

 

I have no doubt that we are exactly were God wants us to be, but I'm still a little sad to think about what might have been.  It would have been nice to be in a new, bigger house.  It would have been nice for all of the kids to have their own room and a guest room.  It would have been nice to have hardwood floors, a bigger closet and a 3-car garage.  (I realize that these are all first-world problems).  But, it's even nicer to know that we are seeking God's will and are exactly where he wants us right now. 

 

And even though we didn't get the house, I wanted to document the process here since it was such a major part of our lived for the last half of 2012.