Here is our Farm House Story...How God gave me the desires of my heart!
Since I can remember I always wanted to live on a farm. I loved the whole idea of it. The animals, the gardens, the beautiful old barns, the hard yet fulfilling work. Especially the old farm houses!! I always thought that old houses had something that new houses did not. They have a story, character that can only come with time. The craftsmanship is unparalleled to that of houses being built by the hundreds and look exactly the same as the one next to it!
Some of my favorite memories as a kid growing up are those times that I spent at my Grandpa Cables farm in Kentucky with his horses, pigs, goats and chickens. Or the time we would visit cousins in Virgina and their neighboring dairy farms! I loved walking knee deep in cow manure barefoot as a kid!
I always knew, since I was about 12 years old, exactly what I wanted for my life! I wanted to marry a wonderful man that drove a sweet truck, be a homemaker, take care of some animals, grow amazing food, and eventually have children. All of this on a really cool farm!
I knew that my life was not my own. It belonged to the Lord. What I wanted more than any of those things was to have the Lord's will in my life. The life He had for me was so much better than anything I could provide for myself.
I began to pray for God's will in my life and that He would give me the desires of my heart.
My mom always told us how she prayed for a little house in the country and God gave her just that. A LITTLE house in the country. With 5 people in the house and only one bathroom...need I say more! But it worked, we made do! I love that little house! Mom always told me to pray for a big house!
When I was about 12 years old I began to pray for a Big, Old, Farm House with an old barn and a little land for my own. I had it pictured in my mind. I believe in praying specifically. God wants to know what we want to be blessed with. He wants to bless us. I also began to pray for a husband. I was specific about that as well! All the while praying for God's will.
Well, my life went on, it went by fast looking back at it. I met the man of my dreams with his sweet truck and two years later we were engaged to be married! He had his own excavating business and had some equipment as well. We had no idea where we were going to live. We couldn't just rent an apartment and park the backhoe and dump truck on the curb! We needed some space of our own. I'm still praying at this point...we though about building a house. We just didn't know what we were going to do and the wedding was less than 3 months away. I obviously believe in short engagements.
We both lived at home and would make a million trips back and forth between our houses. Sometimes 4 and 5 trips a day. There was this house that we would pass and I always thought it was cute but never gave it much thought. One day I was driving by and noticed a for sell sign in the yard. I took the number down and thought I would call on it just to be curious. We could never afford it!!
The lady that answered the call was the daughter-in-law of the lady who lived there. The older woman had lived there for 30 years and raised her family there. Her husband had died 3 years earlier and she had put the farm up for sale then. It had been for sell for 3 years!!! What! your kidding??!
It originally was 16 acres but they were separating it into 11 acres of farm field and 5 acres with the house and wonderful big red barn. How much I asked??! Seriously...no joke??!! We were looking at it the next day!
It was exactly what I had always prayed for! I fell in love with it!!
My lover signed the closing papers for the house on the evening before our wedding. He was late to our wedding rehearsal because of it. That was the only reason he could get away with being late!!
The day we got back from our honeymoon we moved in and tore up the living room carpet! The next day we painted the dark paneling in the living room.
And so it began...the life long challenge of an old house!!! If you have an old house you know what I mean!!
My husband often reminds me that I should have prayed for a NEW big farm house!! Then I remind him of that special thing that our old farm house has!!
The Lord is good! He is faithful! He answers prayers!
He has given me the desires of my heart!!
"Delight thyself also in the LORD: and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. "
Psalm 37:4
Here are some pictures of our humble abode! They are taken during the winter months so they are a little dreary. It's amazing what summer time and flowers can do for the looks of a place! I'll get updated ones come spring.
