About Mercer County, WV

I spent Saturday with two of my sisters attending the Mt. Jackson Baptist Church Mother, Daughter, Sister, Friend Luncheon at the Concord University. Concord University is located in Athens, West Virginia in Mercer County. Nestled in the beautiful mountains of southern West Virginia and known as the Four Seasons Country!

The room was full of women on this warm and beautiful day. The luncheon was planned and hosted by Phyllis Rice.

Phyllis Rice Deanna Bartlett & Brenda Beckner

After the welcome and opening prayer, attendees were served a delicious lunch and listened to a special song by Brenda Beckner "I Want to be Mary for a While".

The guest speaker was Deanna Bartlett from Anderson, SC. She spoke from the "Believing God" Bible study discussing five points to claiming your identity in Christ.

1. God is who He says He is.
2. God can do what He says He can do.
3. I am who God says I am.
4. I can do all things through Christ.
5. God's Word is Alive and Active in me.

Ms. Bartlett read a quote from Beth Moore, "I don't think the biggest threat to our Christianity is humanism or the host of world religions. Our biggest threat is cut and paste Christianity. If man places his faith in a God he has recreated in his own image, has he placed his faith in God at all?"

When Ms. Bartlett started talking she said that "when the Lord teaches you something, teach it to others." And, that is exactly what she did today.

All the women present had a great afternoon and heard about how faith and prayer will help in our daily lives. I was so glad my sister invited me to this wonderful fellowship with mothers, daughters, sisters and friends.

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If I can assist you in any way with your real estate needs in Lewisburg, WV, Greenbrier County, or the surrounding areas, please feel free to contact me by phone at (304) 520-2133, email, or visit my website.

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Winterplace Ski Resort is extending its ski and snowboarding season to Sunday, March 30.

Winterplace President Terry Pfeiffer said the resort set a record for snowmaking this season and there still is plenty of snow for skiing, boarding and tubing.

The resort will be open for skiing and snowboarding from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, March 24, through Sunday, March 30. Tubing will be open from 1 to 5 p.m. weekdays and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the weekend.

For more information, call (800) 607-7669 or go to www.winterplace.com

One of the easiest places to get to to enjoy ski and snowboarding in Southern West Virginia.

For more information click on the link below......

http://www.keithsshaver.com/bin/web/real_estate?acnt=AR247998&ZKEY=&action=ACTIVATE_FRAMES&button=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.winterplace.com%2F&linkout_sourcepage=LOCAL_INFO&tm=&linkout=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.winterplace.com%2F

It was 1952, I was five years old, and moving into our new house located in Bluewell, WV…. My parents and 11 children. My parents had this home built and mom made some design changes to the rooms. The rooms were very large, and just right for our family. There was a large eat-in kitchen, dining room, living room and two bedrooms on the first level. One was my parent’s bedroom and the other bedroom was for the oldest sibling…..usually the oldest girl got that bedroom.

The upstairs had two bedrooms, with a bath between the two rooms. The rooms were so big; mom had two double beds in each room. On each side of the house there was a large attic. One attic was turned into a bedroom. There were still six girls and three boys living at home. (My brother Danny joined the military and Betty got married.) I can remember at times there were two (somestime three) girls in one bed. It was truly fun. We would laugh and giggle until Mom would call upstairs for us to be quiet and go to sleep.

Hardwood floors were throughout the house. I remember on Saturdays we all helped clean house. The most fun was when mom would clean and wax the hardwood floors. With our socks on, we would dance around on the waxed floors and pull each other with old towels; while one of my brothers would use the buffing machine. Thus, putting a great shine on the floors.

I remember the day we moved into the new house, the new television arrived before our furniture and mom said we could watch TV, but we had to sit on newspaper because she didn’t want us to track up her beautiful new hardwood floors.

Mother died in 1967, Dad followed later in 1999. We sold the house in 2008, after my brother got too sick and had to go into a nursing home.

Today, the house is back on the market. It is sad when I think of my childhood home, both happy and sad memories, without a loving family to run the halls creating new memories.

This house, that was my childhood home, located on a hill overlooking Bluewell, was mother's pride and joy, will always hold a special place in my heart, as will the memories.

No, No, I don't mean monetary, I mean wealth as in:

My loving husband, Claude. He is the most caring and compassionate person I know. Last night while I was working on my Active Rain blog -- setting up my outside blog, commenting on blog posts, learning new techniques, installing new links, or writing posts, he was in the kitchen preparing our dinner. Having Claude in my life, gives me a wealth of happiness.

My family - Both my parents are deceased. My brother, Donald, recently passed away leaving a whole in my heart. I feel very blessed to still have 9 siblings; 6 sisters and three brothers. The youngest is 57 years of age, and the oldest being 75. When my sisters and brothers visit, we always reminisce about our parents and our childhood. Growing up, I always wondered what it would be like to be the only child. I suspect that we all wanted to be an only child at one time or another. But, I was truly blessed to have a big wonderful family...AH... to be so wealthy.

Pictured here is my Mother 38, and Dad was 41, with 9 children; the 2 youngest, Linda and Avis, were not born yet. Mother had lost one child. I am sitting on my Dad's lap.

My health - If you don't have good health, what good is money? Eat healthy, exercise regularly, keep your mind active (i.e., post and comment on Active Rain) and you will have a wealth of good health. I am so thankful for my good health.

My friends - Since my husband and I moved to Lewisburg, WV, in 2007, I've met so many wonderful people that turned out to become good friends. Since my retirement, many of our friends from Northern Virginia have visited us; and love this quaint historical town. As a new agent in this town, the real estate agents I work with are so supportive and helpful. It has been said, if you can count the number of your friends on your hands, you are indeed wealthy. So, again I say, "I am wealthy"!

My faithful companion, Zeke - a chocolate lab, has become a part of my extended family. He is so adorable with the best personality. In fact, better than some humans I know. Zeke gives unconditional love. No matter how I feel when I get up in the morning or come home from work, he is always there to greet me with all the "hugs and kisses"....in dog language that is "licking and jumping".

I am so wealthy to have Zeke!

But, above all, MY FAITH in God. My parents had great faith, and growing up, had instilled in us about the love of God, and about having faith. Without my faith I could not get through every day of life, especially those days of suffering and stress, and those times of complexity and challenge. I truly am wealthy because God lives within me!

My husband, family, health, friends, faith in God and my faithful companion, Zeke (who is the chocolate icing of my life) is all the wealth a person needs to have a full and complete life.

I AM INDEED A WEALTHY PERSON!

Well it seems my prediction of a real estate recovery early in 2009 is so far true. That's the main reason I haven't blogged in a few days, (I've been busy). The Mercer Tazewell Multiple Listing Service is up 50% in residential sales for the month of January compared to last January. Overall sales are up about $800,000 dollars this month from last year. What was interesting also was our median sold prices and average sold prices are both up. Our average sold price went up 30% from January of last year to January of this year, although comparing the entire year of 2008 to 2007 the average price rose only about 1%. Median sold price went up 60% from January to January, and if you compare the median sold price of January 2009 to the entire year of January 2008 it is up 9.6%.

A prospective customer of mine was discussing a piece of property that he was interested and I mentioned how the market had picked up in Princeton, WV Real Estate, and he proceeded to tell me how horrible it was everywhere. Well the numbers speak for themselves as a market we are up, as an office business is up, and I have been busy writing offers every week so far this year. I hope 2009 stays like January all year and it will be a good year.

P.S. Here's a few more numbers if the first part didn't bore you to tears. Residential property sales are up $1,118,349 from January of 2008 to January of 2009, and number of homes sold is up over 18%.