No More Pink Carpet....Our Unexpected House Makeover!!

We were nineteen years old when we built our little house. It was 1995. Mauve, burgundy, hunter green, and country blue were all the rage. So was flower border And, soon, faux finishes. I had them all in my tiny house.

This is my living room and kitchen. Pink carpet, floral border, faux finishes. Super cool in the 1990's...but not so much in 2011.

                                            
                                          Tim playing guitar in our purple faux finish bedroom.
                                          You can't see it, but floral border lined the walls of this room, too.
                                          Sigh...

                                           This was my kitchen a couple Christmases ago...

My mother helped me decorate and there were so many touches of her throughout my house. Over the years, I have wondered what I would choose for my house now, if I could redecorate. Would I know what I like? I've often said that a house reflects the personality of a woman. What is precious to her, what she loves, her very essence. It was evident as I walked through Dinah's house in the waning hours of her life. And, as I reflected on my mother's passing, noticing all the nuances of her she left behind.

I used to tell Betsy, "If I die before you, please make sure that people know that my house doesn't reflect who I am. This is not my personality."

Betsy replied, "I would say that your house does reflect who you are. It reflects the life of a woman who cared more about loving and spending time with her family and serving in ministry than decorating her home. It does reflect what's important to you."

She was right. Although, I've known for quite some time that I've been neglecting the "making my home a haven" part of being a wife and mother. That all came to an abrupt halt when The Great Gerken Flood 2011 came upon us.

Suddenly, I cared about all that had been neglected and ignored for years. After three weeks of cleaning up the debris left from the flood, tearing up carpet, sorting through sentimental items, cleaning windows and light fixtures, sweeping away dust, painting our house from top to bottom, choosing flooring and wall colors in record time (nothing like decorating your entire house on the spur of the moment when you weren't planning on it!), and living on floors that looked like this:

Welcome home, Gerken family...here's our brand new house. Still tiny, still full of love, still a work in progress...but with a whole new look!

Master bedroom

My beloved curtains...love looking at these every morning...just cannot believe this is my house.

                                                                          Our bathroom

The kitchen...hardwood floors...once just a faraway dream barely whispered in the depths of my heart.

Our front room...no more pink carpet!

James and Timothy have new carpet and fresh walls in their rooms, too...although not pictured here.

Never in my life have I felt more like "daddy's little girl"...those times when God blesses you with something that you don't necessarily need...something special, just for you. I have spent the last few weeks standing in awe of God and His ways...ways that are certainly not our ways. I wasn't sure what He was doing at first, allowing our washer to flood the house, stripping me to the core, revealing all the ways I've fallen short of caring for my home, stretching us further by filling our days with hard work that seemed unending when Tim is already working more hours than any man should, forcing me to face boxes of items that represented my mother's life...ripping off the band aid, making decisions about home decor, painting alongside friends and family, working together, blessing us beyond words, crying everyday...tears of gratefulness, humility, sorrow, joy, nostalgia, and awe. Not that new floors and a fresh coat of paint are necessary or overly valuable from an eternal perspective...but this experience has been about so much more for us.

God is good...

Always, He is good. In the flooding, in the mess, in the breaking down...in the healing, in the cleansing, and in the rebuilding. He doeth all things well.

Mom and Dinah would be so proud. ;)