City Girl Moves to the Country: One Year Ago this week...

One year ago this week, while volunteering at Hope Springs Institute, I had a series of fortunate events that changed my life profoundly.

I met Carma Crothers, a realtor with Wilson Realty and now a very dear friend. She showed me 3 properties. One was a darling pink cottage style house with a white picket fence affectionately known by the locals as "The Barbie House". While cute and charming inside and out, it didn't really speak to me. (See photos)

Next Carma showed me a home on a cul-de-sac that was brand new and maybe 4 other houses on the street but there were 17 lots total, very close together and no trees. Again, it just didn't have the feel of what I wanted.

I told Carma that I would go home and draft up a list of things that I would like in a home as I had no real conscious thought of moving here, yet from my first visit to Hope Springs I felt like I had come home. She called me later that afternoon and asked me how I felt about log cabin homes because she had one to show me.

I met her the next morning where she showed me the most beautiful home (only 5 years old) on 20 acres of land. The 20 acres is mostly natural forest with a huge ravine, two streams, waterfall and about 3 acres of pasture land with a very small patch of grass.

Walking around the cabin, hearing the birds sing, breathing the clean air, seeing how tucked away it is off the road, I knew this was what I wanted and we had not even see the inside yet.

The previous owners had the inside decorated simply and beautifully. And I had fallen in love. I slept on it that night and when I woke up the next morning in my dream I was unpacking and putting things away in the cabin. I took that as a sign that I was ready to commit to buying it and still felt great about my decision so I met Carma, we wrote up the offer and it was accepted.

I stayed on a couple more days then drove back to Washington DC to get my condo on the market and sold. It sold within a week of me listing it with Jeff Wu and closed 30 days later. If you live in the DC area, especially Northern VA, I highly recommend Jeff. He was outstanding, thorough, helpful, and communicative through the entire process.

After closing on my DC condo I drove to OH and a few days later closed on my new home. The previous owners are a wonderful couple and have since built another house just around the corner which is closer to their barns where their beautiful and beloved horses are. They needed extra time to pack up and move so I moved in near the end of September. My furniture and belongings arrived a few days later (everything had been in storage in VA) and I got into the business of unpacking, settling in, starting my new life and my new business.

And here is my new home...