Approximately 50 members of the community — including representatives from the Charlotte County Partnership and the Farmville Area Habitat for Humanity — welcomed the Boyd-Wilmouth family to their new home Saturday.

The family of six received the first home in the county kick-started by the Farmville-based Habitat for Humanity.

Before the ribbon cutting, Alanna Rivera, the volunteer coordinator and office manager with Habitat, spoke about her experience working with the Boyd-Wilmouth family. She the Boyd-Wilmouth family was the first she had worked with through the process of their application to the home dedication.

Rivera said the process of working with each member of the family and renovating the home was both rewarding and emotional. The night before the dedication, Rivera said she and the family corresponded on Facebook because neither of them could sleep due to excitement.

Rivera said the family became like an extension of her own during the process, and noted how gratifying it was for she and members of several communities to work together.

“It just goes to show how full your heart can be giving to someone else, and seeing them walk through their journey, and being a part of that with them,” Rivera said. “(It shows) how you can be blessed just being a blessing to someone else.”

The Boyd-Wilmouth family also spoke during the dedication. Jermaine Boyd thanked everyone who helped with the process.

“When I filled out the application, I never knew that this would be us,” Boyd said. “From where we were to now, it’s amazing.” 

Rivera said the family lived in Drakes Branch in a run-down trailer that she said “could fit inside” of their new home.

Rivera said once the family’s application was accepted, they began renovating the existing ranch house in Charlotte Court House in March and worked almost continually until Saturday.

She noted that the family’s four kids attend Eureka Elementary School, and will now be closer to the school.

The Rev. Justin Hicks, chair of the Charlotte County Partnership, offered a short message and dedicated the family’s home.

Jermaine said he was blown away by the number of people who supported his family during the renovation process and came for the dedication.

He noted he reunited with teachers he had as a child whom he hadn’t seen in years.

“(It’s) all due to God,” Boyd said of the home.

Hicks said the partnership could not have anticipated what it has been able to offer people in the area, most notably the home for the Boyd-Wilmouth family.

The Charlotte County Partnership began working with Habitat months ago as a way to offer exterior home repairs to people in and around Charlotte County through a program called “A Brush with Kindness.”

Hicks said when given the opportunity to help renovate the home in Charlotte Court House, partnership members were all in.

“We jumped at a chance to give someone a home,” Hicks said.