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It all seemed like a dream to Elizabeth Edwards.
From the time she was picked up at the house she rents on Morgan Street, to when was driven around Middletown in a limousine with the windows covered to keep her destination a secret, until the Middletown fire truck pulled away, revealing her new home and finally when she walked through the home at 2352 N. Verity Parkway.
“You know how when you have one of those dreams, and it’s so good that you hope you never wake up,” she said. “Then you wake up and realize it wasn’t real.”
There was nothing fake about Sunday night.
Edwards, 28, a single mother with two special needs sons, 10 and 5, was presented an “Extreme Makeover” gift from Berachah Baptist Church and the Middletown community.
When she toured her home for the first time, she felt like she was walking through a Homearama home.
“It was like, ‘Look at that. That’s neat. That looks perfect there,’” Edwards said. “Then it hit me. It was no dream. I wasn’t waking up. It’s absolutely mine.”
When Edwards, her sons, Logan and Leeland and extended family, pulled in front of her new home around 7 p.m. Sunday, her escort, a Middletown Division of Fire truck, blocked her view. When she saw the McDonald’s sign across the street, she knew she was on Verity.
Nothing could prepare her for what she saw when the truck pulled away as more than 100 people, mostly volunteers wearing green Berachah T-shirts — with the words, “To love is to serve,” on the back — chanted: “Move that engine! Move that engine!”
In the matter of a few seconds, following more than 72 hours of rehabilitation to the home, Edwards said her life, and the lives of her sons, the “loves of my life,” changed forever. She was handed the keys to the home. She went from renter to homeowner in the blink of an eye.
“It’s too much,” she said after walking through the home, tears streaming down her face. “This is way more than I ever could have imagined.”
The city of Middletown gave the home that was destined to be demolished, and through a $12,000 grant from the Middletown Community Foundation, thousands of dollars in offerings from church members, donations from area businesses, and hundreds — if those thousands — of man hours, the home was renovated, from the second floor to the basement, complete with two wheelchair ramps and a handicapped accessible addition to the home with a bedroom and bathroom designed for Leeland, who has congenital muscular dystrophy.
From Thursday to Sunday night, volunteers worked around the clock on the house. One volunteer described it as “organized chaos” because while there was little instruction, everyone seemed to know what to do. People were working on the roof and the basement — and everywhere in between — simultaneously.
Doug Adkins, director of community revitalization for the city, praised the work of the church and its army of volunteers.
“To make this a better community, it starts with one home at a time, one family at a time, one neighborhood at a time and one fabulous congregation,” Adkins said.
Later, he said, the home, because of its disrepair, had no commercial use. Now, he said, it has become “a good house to have in Middletown.”
The Rev. Lamar Ferrell, pastor at Berachah, thanked the volunteers and church members and said he was “truly grateful” for their continued support as they finished the eighth “Extreme Makeover.”
“God has given us another opportunity to serve,” he told the crowd.
The Rev. Clark Helvey pastor of outreach and missions at Berachah, added: “This is what community is.”
Later, Ferrell, his shirt soaking wet with sweat, said the home that was slated for demolition now has life, a beating heart.
“This is more than a home, it’s a place where dreams can come true,” he said. “God loves to make dreams possible.”
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