New neighborhood, new neighbors

When we listed our home for sale in April 2012, we weren't sure how everything would play out. We just knew we would trust the Lord as He lead us, whether that was selling the home or staying a little longer in that home. The selling process was not an easy journey. The more we house hunted, both online and in person, the more excited we became for our next house. And, of course, with every house showing we cautiously, yet excitedly, wondered if "this was it." The longer the process went on, the more discouraged we became. So much so, that we even talked with our Realtor about taking our house off the market. She encouraged us to stick with it a little while longer and shortly after that, we went under contract and sold our home....with no new home on the horizon. It was an interesting, stretching time. My parents graciously opened their home to us while we continued to house hunt. We faithfully sought the Lord and His direction in leading us to our new home. It took several months of waiting, per His leading, but we eventually were lead to our new home. Well, new to us. :)

We had no idea, at the time, how very perfect this home is for our family but we see it more and more everyday. And while the neighborhood was one we longed to live in, we had no idea how wonderful the neighborhood would actually be for us, either. Being an older neighborhood, with many people being the original owners of their homes, there is a great sense of community here. People are genuinely interested in knowing you and your family and helping you anytime, in any way. We have learned that first hand.

Many of our neighbors came over to introduce themselves and welcome us to the neighborhood within the first few days and weeks we lived here. We had some unexpected drainage problems with our yard, requiring us to remove a whole row of landscaping in the front of our house. A whole row of Holly bushes...that had been there since 1975. You can imagine the depth and width of those roots. Robert had a good time pulling them out with a truck. Not without trouble, though. It took borrowing our neighbor's chains to pull those suckers out. But our neighbor so willingly offered his assistance to us. It was so kind and different from our last neighborhood. We're embarrassed to admit that after living in our last home for 5 years, we only knew the names of 3 of our neighbors. So sad. That's why we've been so encouraged by our neighbors involvement and interest in our family and vice versa.

Having a large yard now, our push mower didn't cut it...unless we had 6 or so hours to spend push mowing the yard. However, we had not yet purchased a riding lawn mower by the time our grass needed mowed! So, Robert decided to break the mowing down into different days and began mowing our front yard first. One of our neighbors saw him out there mowing, and after talking with Robert, gave us his extra riding lawn mower to borrow for the summer! So very kind and such a blessing to us!

We are so thankful to be in our home and this neighborhood. We're very much looking forward to this summer and being outside more, playing and enjoying the pool, and getting to know our neighbors more. Waiting on Him was so very worth the wait!