The Move...

Rich and I have finally done what we have talked about for the past 11 years. We bought our first home. What a blessing it has been. We had all kinds of things we were hoping for, and honestly, for a while, I was not sure that we were going to be able to buy a house. What with the financial restrictions we put on ourselves ( the bank would have loaned us far more than we felt comfortable with). Living in New England comes with a price, especially when close to major metropolitan areas, but God has blessed us abundantly.

On July 16Th, we moved to our little homestead. It's a 4 bedroom 1 1/2 bathroom house on 1.57 acres of land, agricultural land. Rich and I are thrilled with being able to expand our tiny garden. We are looking at getting apple trees, raspberry bushes, strawberry plants, high blueberry bushes rhubarb and more. Some of the bonuses we have found since moving is that we have a walnut tree, that we will be able to harvest, or at least try to harvest. We also have some blackberry bushes on the perimeter of the property.

It has been so exciting and exhilarating to spend time outside with the kids, working on our land. The people who sold us the land had planted some tomato and pepper plants. We had told them that they were more than welcome to the fruit, since they planted them. ( They live across the street) I also had told them, that I really didn't have the time or energy this year to work in the garden. I've been trying to get the inside of the house settled and ready for the upcoming home school year. ( as a side note, I now have a home school room that I'm thrilled about.) Anyway, I felt so bad at how awful the garden looked that I took the kids into the garden and we did some weeding. It took a lot less than I expected to restore some order, and it was so fun to do with the kids.

Some of the highlights of the past week:

1. Introducing the kids to caterpillars and to the joys of those furry little creatures. Naomi was much bolder than Simeon, but preferred holding the caterpillar only if she had a garden glove on. She did however enjoy petting it. Simeon on the other hand, wouldn't try holding it without a glove and barely managed to pet it. Ah, the beauty of caterpillars.

2. Picking blackberries from our own bushes. Blackberries are just coming into season here. I noticed yesterday evening that there were a few berries that were ready to pick. In all, we probably picked about 10 berries, but Naomi LOVED it! Simeon doesn't like blackberries, and Rich doesn't really care for them. It was so funny and exciting to hear Naomi say that she wanted to go blackberry picking today.

3. Understanding a little more about what God does and why. I've been researching how to care for the lone apple tree and the blackberry bushes we have on our property. I have been reading a ton about pruning. It's interesting to me,that in order to get more fruit and better quality fruit, one has to prune the tree/bush. Lately, God has been prompting me to give something up, and well I have been a little resistant, without really knowing why, its just not something I've wanted to give up. Yet, here I am realizing, that He wants to prune that area, so that I can be more productive and efficient. Never thought I'd learn more about Jesus by buying a house, but I have and I'm just so thankful for His grace amidst the chaos and ordinariness of my days.