Interestingly, the other nine include: death, divorce / separation, major illness, job changes, imprisonment, marriage, financial troubles, retirement, and transitioning to adulthood.
So the (abridged version) story of our new home begins back around 18 months ago, and goes a little something like this:
February 2019: We decide to start house hunting for something bigger than a semi, with a little more space for the kids.
March 2019: We find a house we have peace about, with a back garden large enough to play cricket in, and put in an offer - but there is an existing offer on the house.
April 2019: The offer ahead of ours falls though, and our offer goes through pending the sale of our house.
April, May and June 2019: We nearly sell out house a couple of times, but the offers don't work out, and we don't feel entirely at peace about everything.
June 2019: We withdraw our offer, and take our house off the market. We are so ok with this decision, we literally don't give it any thought again until...
March 2020: We are hounded by an agent who wants to sell our house. We tell her we haven't been thinking about selling, but she insists on coming to visit, and does so the next day, with a buyer - and an immediate offer.
Also March 2020: We decide to check out some houses, just in case, knowing we are under no pressure to sell if we don't find something we want to buy.
Also March 2020: We find a house - wait for it - in the same road as the previous house! We put in a ridiculous offer, and again, there is an offer in ahead of ours.
Also March 2020: The country goes into lockdown.
April 2020: The offer ahead of ours falls through, and our offer is accepted.
April, May and June 2020: Due to lockdown things are slow, and no one really knows where anything is al. We are still ok with everything as we figure that all of this has pretty much fallen into our lap.
June 2020: We get a call on Monday, June 29 regarding our buyers who, due to giving notice on their place in April when the sale was contracted, have no place to move to. On Friday, July 3 we agree to a moving arrangement with our seller. The Monday we agree to a movement arrangement with our buyer. From that day, for four days straight we move - In the middle of Level 3 Lockdown. With three kids. Without any boxes (we couldn't get any under Corona conditions). At the same time this winter's biggest back-to-back storms blow into the Cape.
We made it in just as the first drops began to fall.
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| Moving out of our first family home |
It's funny (not really), because moving house is just one of a couple Top 10 Most Stressful Events we are living through at the moment. Most of it (increased anxiety around death, physical separation, major illness, a type of imprisonment, and job changes) comes courtesy of Corona, but then we also a toddler with a broken collar bone, a new school year starting in August, and it's now public knowledge that 95% of Virgin Active South Africa's employees have been temporarily laid off (hibernating, they call it), so we have become a single-income family...
We have battled recently about pressure of being a "poster child" for the faith. We have been reminded that God knows, and is in, our reality, and so it's ok to be upset, tired, and genuine. Even Jesus, as He prayed in Gethsemane before His capture, felt that God was silent. BUT whole fast onto this Hope about where we are right now - not just physically where we are living, but also where we are in life. The sequence of events that led us here is so bizarre that there isn't any way we could have orchestrated any of this ourselves. That means that God, who is sovereign, and wants only good things for us, will continue to provide for what we need - what He has ordered for us.
ps. A couple days after that storm, when the sun came back out, the kids stepped out into their long await yard to play. As will we after this storm, I'm sure x
💖💖💖💖Going to pop in soon!
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