The last five months have been a whirlwind, putting our house on the market and searching for a house in Ohio, finding out I was pregnant after loss, seeing our sweet baby grow, and moving to Ohio and renovating our new home. It has been full of life, that’s for sure!
God has been so good to us and through the last few months, we have seen Him work so many amazing things for our benefit. So let me take you back a few months to share and for me to document everything that has happened.
This last year God began stirring my heart. Well actually I guess it began a coupe years back when I felt like God was telling me to leave my teaching career and stay home with my daughter. I had never ever wanted to be a stay at home mom, but I missed our sweet little girl everyday and when I returned after maternity leave, I knew something had shifted in my heart. I printed out the year leave paperwork and had decided I would pray on taking a year leave from teaching. I went back and forth so many times on the decision until finally a meeting with my principal and me handing the paperwork in, confirmed God speaking. I had such a wave of peace that came over me when I handed her the paperwork and I knew i was doing the right thing.
It’s funny because now that I’m sitting in my new living room in Ohio, I can see how that very moment completely changed the trajectory of our lives forever. You see, every time I thought of moving from our current location, the location I had grown to love and see as my home and the one I had worked so hard to build a reputation in, fear gripped me. I was nervous and fearful of having to start over and I was nervous there wouldn’t be a teaching opportunities or playing opportunities for me. Anytime Dave ( my husband) would bring up the thought of moving to Ohio to be closer to his family, I would freak out and share thoughts like “what would I ever do… I don’t want to bag groceries.” Looking back on my obedience to leave teaching or at least for the year, God freed me from thinking I had to have a teaching job, which therefore gave me the opportunity to actually begin thinking of living somewhere new and took away the biggest fear for moving.
Because I wasn’t teaching in the fall of 2022, my husband, Peyton and I were able to visit family in Ohio for a couple weeks. It was during that time that I began to see how our lives could be if we were here. God was working already behind the scenes. I began telling my family that we were going to be moving probably within that next summer. As the spring came, we began making the final arrangements to put our home on the market and began dreaming of what Ohio might be like, to be closer to family and especially after finding out we were pregnant again after losing a baby earlier that spring. As we packed and looked for homes, we prayed for God to lead us to the right home, for him to open doors and opportunities, and provide friendships.
We put our home on the market the beginning of June and within a couple days we had an offer. Praise the Lord! We knew we wanted to move during the summer months before it got too cold here in Ohio and seeing how quickly our house was snatched up was definitely confirmation for us. God allowed us to get the perfect house about 10 minutes away from my MIL and 15 mins away from my brother in laws family. The crazy part— we never actually saw the house in person until a couple days before we signed paperwork. The house was super cute but had smaller bedrooms than our last house, only 1 full size bathroom and the smallest closets, but the charm and the possibilities made up for it! Plus- with me staying home and interests rates higher than when we purchased our last home in 2020, we were looking for a home that would fit our growing family without breaking the bank.
And when I say God is good, I mean it! He cares about the smallest details. I mentioned above that we prayed for opportunities and for friendships- well- the same day we signed our paperwork I made a friend. The day we were supposed to sign paperwork kept changing and it ended up getting pushed back a couple days. Even though we were annoyed and frustrated that our dates kept changing, we made the most of the extra couple days we had and went to the beach (lake earie) and took in some new sites. We ended up signing for our new house on our 10 year wedding anniversary, which was actually really cool and a date we won’t forget. But here’s the really cool thing… the day we signed there was a farmers market in our little town and we decided to visit. We were meeting up with some family and heard that there would be free hotdogs and ice cream, so naturally we had to go. While in line for ice cream, we were chatting with a couple of people and mentioned we had just signed paperwork for our new home and mentioned the street we were living on. A girl with 3 little kiddos of her own in line ahead of us, heard our conversation, turned around and said she was one of our neighbors. And just like that, I had made a new friend.
But seriously, if we would have signed on the original date, we never would have gone to the farmers market and we wouldn’t have met my neighbor so early on. Danielle, the girl i met, has been such a blessing to me over the last couple months.
And if that weren’t enough to show God’s hand in our move, Dave had a friend he grew up with that began messaging us back in January of 2021, after having a couple dreams about us. She mentioned “seeing us back in Ohio, helping with worship and the youth program at her church and that I was pregnant and glowing.” That January I found out I was pregnant with Peyton and while we weren’t quite ready to leave springfield yet, God was already setting everything up for us to begin thinking about moving closer to family. Like What?! Seriously, how cool! And here we are expecting baby girl number 2 in Feb 2024 after experiencing a miscarriage earlier this year.
When we moved we stayed with my MIL and step FIL for about a month as we renovated our new home. We primed and painted all the walls and doors, swapped out light fixtures, and replaced all the door knobs and locks. Can’t wait to share pictures of the before and what we’ve done so far with you all 🙂
https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cv0cvYluY4k/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
Check out my video I shared with my instagram after a women’s conference at our new church 🙂
https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cx1SXVTvy84/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
Love & Light Always, Erin ❤️
