Leaving NC to go to Washington State

I had lived in NC for four years it had become home to me. I had made many friends and had a church family. I had made it my home so leaving to go to a whole other place was hard. My friends were struggling with the decision for us to go. Luke felt that God wanted us to look after a ranch in Washington State. In fact it was close to the Canadian border. Osoyoos is the town that borders the American border. I love that area both in the American and Canadian side. The ranch was 3,000 feet up from sea level. We had a double wide log home to live in which sat at the edge of the property and it had the most amazing views. The property the guy owned was massive 2600 acres. He was a man who had lots of money and lived in Seattle. This was his holiday home. It was a huge 4,000 square foot home. Our job was to look after the property and when he came to clean it. We lived rent free but when he came he demanded a lot and Luke was at his beck and call. The other problem with that was he treated us horribly. We were the hired help and he had high standards.

His home was lovely and the property as well. We walked out daily and discovered cool things antiques on the property. It was so peaceful up there and Liberty our golden loved running in the fields. She loved that ranch. The sunsets were glorious and we became fast friends with Emily and Dave who lived next door to us. I loved them and their children. They had a farm so I got to see kittens, puppies, lambs been born, bottle feeding lambs. I’ve day Luke and I happen to go down and check in one of the sheep. Good thing we did she was having a tough labour and we helped her fine birth and Luke had to help deliver a Lamb that got stuck. We named that Lamb Grace. There were horses and cows. I hung down at Emily’s as much as I could. Luke built them a covered porch for their log home. Emily used to tease me that I was a city girl.

We found a cute little church in the town of Okanogan County. We made fast friends there as well and that church was amazing. I will make another post about it. It deserves its own post. I love the countryside around there. We made friends with Kathy and her family and we often went to visit them. Kathy and I became fast friends. Every week we’d go to the library and get coffee and hang out. She was an amazing cook. I loved her family so much. The winter time was great. We tobogganed down the driveway of the ranch. The snow was dry so it was easy to drive in. I loved the winter time. The ranch was about 45 minutes away from the main road so it was very isolating. I’m so glad I had Liberty. She was my saving grace. I missed my family so much. I chatted with them every week but my nephew was born while we were gone. I didn’t drive so I relied on Luke to drive me everywhere. I was lonely and I started eating as a comfort. Even though I had made friends. I wanted to go home and visit my family.

I started to feel depression sink in. I talked to Luke about it and he always said this is where God wants us to be. How can you argue with that. I always heard that. It made me cringe. I just went inward. We lived there 10 months and then we were asked to leave no notice he had found another person. We had done a really good job but he didn’t want us anymore. We had not budgeted for Rent. In the US they want first months and last months rent and we could not come up with that much money. We could not find a place and it April so it was still cool out at night. We had nowhere to live. That is such a horrible feeling. All those feelings just came rushing back to me….. Even though we always moved lots I always had a roof over my head. Now we were homeless all of a sudden.