We bought a house!

Yep, our first house. It's in a cute neighborhood with a park and in a great area. It's has 3 beds and 2 baths, a finished basement, and decent sized backyard with a mature tree that I would love to hang a swing from. The best part is our mortgage will be less than our rent. We are so excited to move into it. We close on it in 2 weeks.

We started looking in September.. well when I say that we started looking, I really mean we looked online (since Jason is still in Germany) and we picked a handful that we really liked, got pre-approved, found a great realtor, and spent one day looking at those favorite homes of ours. We fell in love with this certain one online and I prayed and hoped that it would be the one, and when I saw it in person, it just confirmed that. It was just the kids and me and the realtor that did the house hunting. I sent Jason pictures of each of them and we put an offer in our our favorite and it was accepted the next day!

We had a major obstacle though-- our bank was being difficult with us and decided NOT to give us the loan afterall once they found out that Jason has less than a year left in the military. They didn't like that. So they said sorry and withdrew our contract. I was heartbroken.. not only could we not get that house, but we could not get ANY house until Jason gets out of the military in a YEAR AND gets a stable job. So I thought to myself there had to be another option. I called 5 or 6 other lenders and they all said the same thing. Then I found one, thank GOD, who was willing to work with us and they weren't that strict. I mean come ON. We have good credit, have money saved up, have a stable income, and the house is so inexpensive! So what's the deal? Anyway, we are just glad that our current lender is working with our situation.

Besides that little(or BIG) hiccup, we got all the different inspections rolling; termite, radon, and general house inspection, and the appraisal, signed papers for this and that every week it seems, had to relay to Jason to get this memo and that memo signed and scan it back. It was a lot, but we were seriously BLESSED with a fantastic realtor who really looked out for us since Jason couldn't be here. And turns out he used to be a pastor! Crazy huh. I told him Jason is going to be one, too. So now, everything is approved and good to go and we are just waiting for our closing date, which is nearing. The kids are excited to have a backyard to play in and a basement to run around in.

Jason is going to be coming home for Christmas to help me move all our stuff and get the house set up. Whew! Big weight off my shoulders. We'll be able to spend Christmas in our first house as a family. Can't get much better than that.

Thanks, friends, for continuing to pray for our family to be together permanently. We are still working on that. So far nothing is solid enough to say.