I may be getting a wood cookstove!! Though that might seem like something not to be very excited about, or something that you would actually not want at all, it has very special meaning to me.

The story behind it...

A few months ago we were able (due to the Lord's provision) to purchase "The Family Farm" which has been in my family for almost 100 years. I grew up here, it was my grandparents farm, and my great-grandparents before them. We have lived here as a family for over 9 years with it being my, now deceased, grandparents estate, but now it is OURS!! A dream come true...

We currently live in a singlewide trailer that my grandparents bought a few years before my papaw passed away...smack in the middle of 22 acres.

My husband and I are planning to build our own home...ourselves. We are basically debt free, and are trying to live out that philosophy. We want to build this home as we can, and do most of the work ourselves.

The house we plan to build will be *rustic*...I like to think of it being rustic in the charming sense instead of in the primitive sense. We don't plan to have brick or vinyl siding, but wood...remember wood?? We also want wood floors...not the pre-fab stuff that really doesn't look like wood but the kind reminiscent of an old country store. Oh, and I don't want sheetrock/drywall...I want WOOD walls. Wood, wood everywhere wood....

I have watched my husband sit in *his chair* many evenings with a clipboard and graph paper, lovingly planning this house for our family. He will draw designs of floor plans, and landscaping...even plans of how the wood on the walls will form a pattern to make it architectuarlly interesting.

We've talked about what kind of tin we want on our roof, the different kinds of wood we could use in each room, and the layout  of the home.

We bought this wonderful book titled "Cabin". It's just full of pictures of different types of cabins, and we call it our "wish book"...it reminds us of the feelings we had as children when we would look at the Sears Wish Book near Christmas time. Dreaming that some of it might be ours, but keeping in mind that most of it probably wouldn't...and having a hard time with the waiting to see which of it we would end up being able to enjoy.

The pictures were absolutely beautiful to us. So many different ways to build a cabin, and so many different stories surrounding the owners of the cabins pictured. A lot of them were very inspirational to us...

We decided that we wanted our home to be able to still function normally if we were to ever find ourselves without power. So we began to make plans, concerning our home, to make it possible...and that's where the wood cookstove came into the picture. This would make it possible for us to live normally without power. We could heat water for baths...cook and bake...and it would make my kitchen nice and warm in the cold weather.

I never thought that my husband would be trying to find me one though. He's the sort to just want a written list (or the help of a very attentive 14yo boy) to help him decide what to buy for me. That, in itself, makes it very special to me.

But also, I consider it an "act of faith"...a symbol of my husband's faith in God's ability to help us see this happen.

Someitmes we become discouraged and cannot imagine how we are ever going to be able to build this "dream cabin home" with one income, 3 children currently, and seeking to adopt more. It seems totally impossible to do it without going into debt...or at least that it would take us working into old age to see it happen. But we know that God is the God of the impossible...and just as He made the way for us to own the land free and clear, He can make a way for us to have the finances to build this home in time for our children to be able to enjoy it.