I’m not going to lie; it feels a little odd writing this blog. It feels surreal because for over two years, I wondered if we could ever reach this destination and because I am not an expert in home reno or design. But here it goes!
New Look for Our Humble Home
The pictures speak for themselves but this transformation was HUGE! I feel like our house is unrecognizable to it’s previous self. As you can see from the photos, we weren’t too adventurous and went with the white farmhouse look. 🙈Even though this style has become quite popular and we aren’t the first in our neighborhood to use it, we went with it anyway. We love it but also hope the classic white with black trim will age well over time.
Even though Hardiplank/fiber cement siding is beautiful and very popular right now (not to mention expensive) we wanted something with little to no maintenance. Many of our neighbors have painted and resided their homes themselves, but I am 1000% thankful and pleased with our decision to pay an expert to do this project for us!
One change that completely transforms the look of our house was replacing the arched window in our dining room. It leaked, would need regular maintenance, and dated our house. We prayed and prayed about whether to fix the window or replace it and really felt like God said it was up to us/He was with us. I’m the cheapest woman alive, so I felt silly making an already pricey project even more expensive, but I AM SO GLAD WE DID THIS!
So, we didn’t do this project ourselves, we aren’t experts, and we didn’t even have an original design for the exterior renovation. So, why write a blog post about siding? Well, our God is BIG and this project was over two years in the making!
Our God is BIG
We purchased this house (our first home) in July 2018. We were confident this was the house God wanted us to buy even though the inspection left me feeling nervous about this purchase.
We knew nothing about homeownership or how to take care of a house. We just knew our house had some problems (WAY more than what came back on the inspection/what we knew of) and we had no idea how we were going to afford some of the issues that popped up. We knew we needed a minimum of 9 new casement windows and our siding needed some help. The price of residing a house seemed impossible, but we saved enough money to replace 9 windows, with hopes of residing within the year. Later I kicked myself for the purchase because our HVAC system kicked the bucket two weeks after the windows were installed. If you’ve followed along for a while, you know the HVAC dying seemed to be the tipping point causing an avalanche of expensive repairs (both auto and home-related) that continued for over 6 months. We finally got everything repaired and paid off (oh and had our first baby in June 2019) by December 2019.
In the early days of January 2020, Christian and I sat down and prayed together about the upcoming year. God didn’t give us a heads up about all that was to come (nationally and globally), but He did give us visions of our home taken care of inside and out. New paint, new light fixtures, and NEW SIDING. I was a little disappointed because I really wanted 2020 to be the year we completely paid off our student loans and saving for siding seemed like an impossible task. But God made a way that while we were saving for new siding, our student loans didn’t accure any interest for several months! Thank you, Jesus! Who could have foreseen that?!
So, in 2020 we took on a big project ourselves to save money (read more on that here) and saved and saved and saved for new siding. And by the grace of God, we did it! We had our order made and finalized in October and the house resided in January 2021. God made what felt impossible, possible.
God is all-knowing and sees the unseen, so while I was wishing we were paying off student loans, God knew about all the holes in our house, rotten wood, and missing insulation that was making our home cold. He knew one day in September I would hear someone “knocking” on the side of our house to find a woodpecker literally pecking a hole through our siding. He knew how much it would bless and overwhelm my heart to see our house slowly but surely be loved, cared for, and brought back to life after what appeared to be a lifetime of cut corners and cheap fixes. I’ve shared before how restoring something broken stirs in my soul and makes me feel alive because that is what God has done for us, (read more on that here) and our house being restored is no exception.
So, all of this to say, I am honored and humbled God would move the mountains He did for us and our home. Even though my ideas and project lists are endless, I am still so happy with how far we’ve come. God is good and faithful to His promises and we are so, so grateful.
“So is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” -Isaiah 55:11 NIV