Monday, October 16, 2017

#Microblog Mondays: Home Sweet Home

Every once in a while, we go looking at houses that catch our eye, because we can't quite decide what to do with ours. Most recently, last weekend (well, the weekend before this one) we went to see a house that seemed absolutely perfect from the listing -- it had ALL THE THINGS (a porch, a private looking backyard, a newer kitchen, a finished attic, a first floor laundry, three bedrooms, office space for both of us, and a kickass location where you could walk to a village and a library and shopping and a movie theater and also the canal path). It really looked amazing.

The key word is "looked." After we saw it in person, we could see all the things that were awful -- the backyard was private to the back but woefully open and viewable from the sides (and one neighbor was exceedingly creepy); the basement had two sump pumps and a water track; the kitchen was newer but in disrepair; the rooms were as small as our rooms; the closet space was nonexistent; the awesome giant garage addition was offset weird and the bonus room space was only accessible from the second floor bathroom window (!); the basement smelled as though it was saturated in cat piss; the porch was also in disrepair -- this was not a house that was loved.

We need a house that is loved. And, quite honestly, we love our house.

So why do we keep looking?

I always thought that if we ended our journey childfree, that I'd want to move. That I'd want a house that was free of counters that had seen injections, free of space that had seen mourning over losses, free of ever having had a nursery that we put together (and then tore down).

Except... we redid our kitchen, so the counters are new. We bought all new living furniture, so the couch that held me wailing is gone and replaced with more joyful upholstery. The nursery was transformed into my office, which is definitely one of my favorite places in the house -- not at all tainted by what it once was.

We made a big list after this last house coveting adventure, and decided that we can make a first floor laundry for this house, and we can try to get a 4-season sunroom/family room addition on the back. Our needs have changed since we last looked at an addition and we don't need to do a two-story jobbie. We love our neighborhood. We love our neighbors. We love our gardens and outdoor spaces. We love our kitchen, and living room, and offices, and bedroom... every time we look at another house we always end up feeling like our house is somehow better.

Because it is. And keeping it will give us greater financial flexibility -- buying a new house would be definitively more expensive than what we have now (and what we have now is 15 years down on a 30 year mortgage, and the possibility of paying the whole thing off sooner than later), and if we stay here we could have the flexibility to travel more (and do it up), to look into the possibility of a lake cottage or something down the line, and to have the glory of not overextended ourselves for a house that has more space than we ultimately need.

So is it because we want a change somehow? Are we putting our want for a new direction into the wrong place? It's possible. It's strange to have been in this place of striving for something that didn't come, and now to be like, "um, now what?"

It's nice though to realize that we don't have to move to find that fulfillment, that we can enjoy what we have and make it even better and then decide where we want to go from here, knowing that we have our home sweet home.

All decked out for the season, loving the fall light

Love our home! Heh heh heh
Want to read more #Microblog Mondays, maybe ones that are actually playing by the rules and are micro? Go here and enjoy!

20 comments:

  1. Honestly, your house sounds perfect. You’ve done so much to it and have kept it in well maintained. I get what you’re feeling about wanting a fresh start, but I also see all you’ve done and all that is on the horizon and think that you are making that fresh start in this space that is yours. Which is pretty awesome.

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    1. Thank you! We're sort of rethinking what we mean by "Fresh start." It's freeing to turn the house we have into the fresh start and reap the benefits from the financial stability we gain from staying here.

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  2. Shucks, your house is so pretty and so.....clean. I would totally keep it! But then I’m really really not into moving.

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    1. Oh yes, moving is the pits. I haven't done it with a whole houseload of stuff but that is a big deterrent too. And thank you -- we do love our house, and that was a moment after I did all the dusting and cleaned the windows, so it looks amazingly clean and clear! I am making an effort to keep things clear and clean. It's in our marriage vows -- I will work on pile management. :)

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  3. Okay, I can't get over the bathroom-window entrance thing. What?????!!!!!!

    Anyway, it sounds like you're in a good place. But it can be fun to look!

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    1. Right? It was SO WEIRD. You could never finish that space unless it was a loft with spiral stairs or something from inside the garage, and it made the bathroom SO DARK because that was the only window. It really spoke to power of good photographs, because everything we saw in the listing was there, just all the weird and off-putting things were carefully curated out.

      It is fun to look, for sure! But it's also fun to realize that we are in a good place where we can stay where we are and feel good about it being our space.

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  4. I smiled at the list of all the things you loved about your house. I remember feeling like I needed to change - I looked at apartments, and other options that wouldn't have been child-friendly. But I love our house, and now - over a decade later - it is perfect for the two of us. And we travel rather than make it perfect for others. Which makes our place even more perfect.

    So at least you're not feeling pressured to move. If you want to move in the future, it will be because you're moving towards something new and exciting, not from something that didn't deliver for you.

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    1. Oh, I love that so much -- moving towards something rather than running away. Yes, loving the house and finding the change in how we spend our time sounds so much better than moving just to get a fresh start and losing all the things we've done to this place that we love. The freedom to travel and enjoy the time we have with that financial piece really pushes things in the "stay put and adjust what we have" category!

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  5. It seems like you have two things going on here: feeling inner peace in your home and having bad memories tied to things. But it also seems that as you purge the old things or change old spaces into new that the peacefulness grows. The fact that you’ve looked at other places and still keep coming back to your home shows me that it’s where you’re meant to be. Once the practical and financial benefits are added in, it seems like a no brainer.

    Seriously though, I’m so happy that you and Bryce are at peace in your space. Our situation was a bit different in that we went through infertility in a rental. I swear that despair was seeping from those walls and since it was a rental we couldn’t even change the space with a new color. I couldn’t wait to get out. It seemed like the minute we had the keys to the house we bought that a huge weight lifted off of my shoulders.

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    1. Absolutely -- I like how you put that, that the purging leads to peacefulness. We actually made a list of things we learned from the house experience, since we do keep doing this and we do keep coming back to our hobbit home. :)

      Oh yes to leaving the rental behind and starting new and fresh somewhere where you can change change things and make them yours -- some lovely symbolism in the idea of going through infertility in a space that's transient and not truly yours, and then finding your home after.

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  6. I've always thought of your home as one of the coziest and most welcoming of all my bloggy friends. I always love seeing pix of your place. May it ever be a place of peace.

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    1. Awww, thanks so much! I do love the coziness of our home. I need to get my business together so I can have a get together at our home...we usually are cozy homebodies in it only! :) Definitely more and more a place of peace. Minus the concussions Bryce sustains from the low ceilings in the basement and upstairs in the dormers... ;-)

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  7. I think that loving your neighborhood and your neighbors is so key and it is part of the reason that we decided to renovate instead of moving somewhere else.

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    1. Yes! Absolutely. I love your renovation -- it came together so beautifully! There's always so many question marks when you move.

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  8. I love this plan! And your living room just looks so cozy!

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    1. Thank you so much! It is a cozy space for sure. Getting the new furniture has made a terrific difference, as has setting up my office upstairs in the room that was meant for something else. We are fortunate to have a space we love!

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  9. We bought our house with the idea that we'd move up to something bigger when we started our family... we wound up staying 26 years! There were a lot of sad reminders in that house but it was also in a great location & it was a good size for two people... it wasn't so small that we felt cramped but it wasn't so big that we we felt lost in it. Never say never, of course, but there's nothing wrong in staying put (especially the financial benefits!). If/when you find something worth moving for, you'll know it!

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    1. Oh yes, that sounds so familiar! We always felt like, "well, we'll outgrow this house when we have children." Then it turned into, "Well, with one child we could probably stay for a few years until they needed more space." But for two people? It's actually all the space we need, really. The financial benefits are definitely worth it. I also think about environmental impact -- we don't spend as much on heating and cooling and we're using existing space, so that's good too, right? We used to feel cramped here, but then was when there was space dedicated to someone who didn't exist. Now it's just fine. Which is both lovely and sad.

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  10. I love your home! And I've (obviously) never even been in it hahaha. But I very much enjoy all of the pictures you share. I think one of my favorite spaces is your office.

    I look forward to having a Home again. We did sell our house out in the suburbs 2.5 years ago. It was beautiful, but we bought it for our children. Since our family is going to be the two of us, we don't need 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, and 2 living rooms. Living there felt so... Empty. And depressing. Now we're in a rental in the heart of the city with less than half the square footage and we are much happier. However, we plan on moving out of state next summer and I look forward to seeing where we land.

    Sorry for rambling about my own situation... All that to say the importance of feeling good in your Home cannot be overstated! I am happy you are happy in yours. Home Sweet Home indeed :)

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  11. Entrance through a window? So weird. Your house is precious. It feels like after all this time and all the work, with wonderful neighbors to boot--more pros than cons.

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