You may recall (if you’ve been following our story here), that last year, we sold our home of 17 years in Weddington (Charlotte South), North Carolina, to build a new life and a new home in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where peace, quiet, mountain fresh air, and serenity reside.

We purchased almost 3 acres in the Equestrian section of The Coves at Mountain River Club in Lenoir, NC. It is a beautiful 3200+ acre managed community, with everything we need – high speed internet, underground utilities, paved roads, mountain views to die for, a community garden, a large Lodge free for the use of residents and property owners, horse trails, hiking trails, creeks and rivers, waterfalls, kayaking, a nice pool, all gated community, horse stables, barns for the horses, events in the Lodge are going on every day from Yoga to Enthusiast groups, and more. It is NOT a retirement community, but it is where a lot of couples have chosen to retire or build a mountain retreat. We love it.

I seem to recall thinking during our move … “This apartment will be so much easier to keep clean than our big house that we sold last year.” Yeah. NOT! I’m tripping over my own feet here, and two people cannot move in our apartment kitchen. I cannot wait to be into our home in Lenoir, overlooking the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains! And, starting to build the house cannot come soon enough!

We made modifications to our house plans and the 3-car garage plan with the 2-bedroom apartment above that is semi-detached from the house and connected with a breezeway. The house will be 2085 square feet. The detached garage/apartment is 1353 square feet and will be located off the back of the house. The 2-car garage that is a side-load on our house will be my artist studio. I’m currently looking for “Screens” that I can pull down instead of the doors when the weather is nice. I don’t want a lot of bugs and bears wandering in while I’m painting! LOL.

The good news is our son, Matthew, and his beautiful wife, Danielle, have decided to move into the 2-bedroom garage apartment. Matthew and his Dad (my hubby, Bob), are both studying for their General Contractor’s license and have decided to start their own contracting business, doing residential building, remodeling, and landscaping work. Matthew has been working on his Master’s in History, but is currently taking a break to start this business with his Dad. Plus, Matthew *loves* working with his hands, and he has always enjoyed working with his dad doing landscaping and brickwork, building, and more.

Bob has a long line of builders and contractors in his family from Texas to Tennessee, and we are bringing a Vaughn over from Tennessee to build our wood-burning fireplace and do the stonework around the skirt of the house and detached garage, and also as a backsplash in the kitchen. The fireplace will also have beautiful stonework. These are photos that are my inspiration for the stonework.

All this planning and preparing has taken longer than we anticipated, but it is all coming together nicely, albeit slowly. We had the perc test done and passed, and next on the list is putting in the Well and Septic Field. Yes, this is very exciting!

I keep dreaming of the day I can wake up to birds singing, make a pot of coffee, and with my coffee cup in hand, shuffle out to my front porch in my jammies and robe, settle down in a comfortable rocking chair, and breathe in all the glory of God’s creation that surrounds me. It almost seems like an impossible dream. I just need to keep telling myself that the dream is getting closer every day.

Now that I and Bob are in our 60s, I can’t help but think that we are on the final trajectory of our life. So, that even if we are blessed enough to have another 20 or 30 years ahead of us, I hope they will be happy, healthy, and joyful. For us, family is everything – absolutely everything – and everything we have done and continue to do is with our adult children, their families, and our grandchildren in mind. We hope that this home in the mountains will be in the family for generations, bringing joy and laughter and too many wonderful memories to count.

As of today, we are putting the final touches on the changes to the garage/apartment plans, and getting everything ready to start our build. It’s definitely been a journey … so far!