our house feels like it's shrinking.
it's not, obviously. it's the same 3BR 2 1/2 bath 3 bay detached garage we bought 12 years ago. but with three kids, it's incredible how a seemingly roomy house quickly feels tight.
we're not in the market to purchase a new bigger house. we don't have the funds and with 5 years left on our mortgage and the housing market sucky at the moment, it would be foolish to move. and i LOVE my home. but it doesn't stop me from dreaming about a new house, someday.
we bought our home, back in 1998, 6 months before our wedding. we wanted a house before we got married, so we weren't scurrying for a new home. our requirements were - at least 3 bedrooms, at least 2 baths, a garage, and preferably in norry/sunbury. we saw a lot of homes during that spring and summer. some homes needed a lot of fixing up. while we expected some minor maintenance, we didn't want any heavy duty restoration. some homes were out of our price range. some houses were just plain wrong.
we found our little farm style home in the middle of the summer. the realtor went to my church. the house, which had been on the market for nearly a year, was stuffy from being shut up. the living and dining rooms were nice sized, and there were 3 bedrooms. the house had 2 and a half bathrooms, well, one full bath, a 3/4 bath and a half bath. there was a side porch, closed in years ago, off the kitchen. the garage was huge - 3 bays, with a large basement. it was detached from the house. outside there was a raised garden and fruit trees. the house had an unfinished cellar and a nice sized attic. what sold me was the stained glass wood-mode cupboards in the kitchen. the home was old - it had old wallpaper and chandeliers, but nothing that couldn't be replaced or repainted/papered over. the house was in the right price range, the right town...it was perfect! we placed a bid and it was accepted. we later learned that someone else had placed a bid the same time, but it was less than ours.
we got our keys that september and spent the fall and winter months removing wallpaper, stripping paint from baseboards, replacing fixtures and making the house our home. hubby moved into the house a month before we got married; a week before the wedding i brought my furniture and belongings and after a beautiful wedding and a blissful honeymoon we settled into our nest.
we picked this house with children in mind, and 4 years later the boy took up residence in the sunny shelf room. i loved his nursery, and while i was pregnant with him i would sit in the glider, folding up tiny clothes and putting them in my old dresser drawers, hanging up pictures. some days i would just sit there, my hands folded over my growing bump, and take in the lemonade yellow walls, the baby snoopy bedding, the book shelves full of books and toys that i couldn't wait to share with our new little one.
all too quickly the boy grew up, we dismantled the crib and changing table and my bed from childhood moved into their places. more books crowded the shelves, baskets of toys around.
one presidents day weekend hubby and i moved the furniture out of our bedroom and he ripped up the old shag carpeting and sanded, stained and polyurethaned the floors. the floors looked like molten honey and were beautiful. later that summer, we moved furniture from the living to dining room and back again as we stripped those floors, baseboards and window frames and finished them as well. our 80+ year old home now looked authentically its age and we loved it.
6 months after finishing those floors we learned we were having twins. while we had an extra bedroom - i grew up with a guest bedroom and always wanted one in my home - it would be for not just one but two kids! after some reshuffling, the boy moved over t0 the spare room - we repainted it and he chose batman bedding - and we returned the nursery back to it's original space. when the twins were 8 months old, we added another crib, and i lost my "perfect" nursery.
somehow my neat homey house became tight. now rattles, blocks and a big ol' exercircle fight for space with the boy's wii junk and million little action figures. my dining room table, which once was bare except for a table scarf and a bowl on top, is now covered with the boy's markers and drawing books, knitting crap, a moby and a baby bjorn and other junk that has accumulated there. and i don't even want to talk about the kitchen, with breakfast bar full of containers of baby food and formula, bottles and sippy cups, the table blanketed with miscellaneous clutter, the counters crowded with bowls of snack foods, pill baskets and appliances. i recently cleaned out my junk food drawer (originally a bread drawer). there were snacks in there older than the boy. scary.
every month the newspaper publishes a real estate guide and i entertain myself looking over the listings. for one thing, half doubles now cost what our house did 12 years ago! a house and even a rancher half the size of our home is easily twice what our house cost. and for the price of a house that has the 3+BR 2+baths plus family room (or is it great room?) and 2 car garage, i would have to go back to work. at about 3 times the salary of my best paying job. and hubby would have to be head of the IU. who the hell can afford these homes anyway? no wonder the housing market sucks!
but while i dream about a bigger home, with an extra bedroom, a large kitchen and more closets (my house was built when closets were taxed as rooms, hence why it only has one real closet) i am grateful for what i have. i am grateful that our mortgage is more than half paid off and in 5 years we will own it free and clear. i am grateful that while the house feels small to me, it is huge compared to what most people in the world have for their own home. it shouldn't even matter what kind of house we have - it's whose inside that counts. and what matters to me is my family - they are my home.
it's not, obviously. it's the same 3BR 2 1/2 bath 3 bay detached garage we bought 12 years ago. but with three kids, it's incredible how a seemingly roomy house quickly feels tight.
we're not in the market to purchase a new bigger house. we don't have the funds and with 5 years left on our mortgage and the housing market sucky at the moment, it would be foolish to move. and i LOVE my home. but it doesn't stop me from dreaming about a new house, someday.
we bought our home, back in 1998, 6 months before our wedding. we wanted a house before we got married, so we weren't scurrying for a new home. our requirements were - at least 3 bedrooms, at least 2 baths, a garage, and preferably in norry/sunbury. we saw a lot of homes during that spring and summer. some homes needed a lot of fixing up. while we expected some minor maintenance, we didn't want any heavy duty restoration. some homes were out of our price range. some houses were just plain wrong.
we found our little farm style home in the middle of the summer. the realtor went to my church. the house, which had been on the market for nearly a year, was stuffy from being shut up. the living and dining rooms were nice sized, and there were 3 bedrooms. the house had 2 and a half bathrooms, well, one full bath, a 3/4 bath and a half bath. there was a side porch, closed in years ago, off the kitchen. the garage was huge - 3 bays, with a large basement. it was detached from the house. outside there was a raised garden and fruit trees. the house had an unfinished cellar and a nice sized attic. what sold me was the stained glass wood-mode cupboards in the kitchen. the home was old - it had old wallpaper and chandeliers, but nothing that couldn't be replaced or repainted/papered over. the house was in the right price range, the right town...it was perfect! we placed a bid and it was accepted. we later learned that someone else had placed a bid the same time, but it was less than ours.
we got our keys that september and spent the fall and winter months removing wallpaper, stripping paint from baseboards, replacing fixtures and making the house our home. hubby moved into the house a month before we got married; a week before the wedding i brought my furniture and belongings and after a beautiful wedding and a blissful honeymoon we settled into our nest.
we picked this house with children in mind, and 4 years later the boy took up residence in the sunny shelf room. i loved his nursery, and while i was pregnant with him i would sit in the glider, folding up tiny clothes and putting them in my old dresser drawers, hanging up pictures. some days i would just sit there, my hands folded over my growing bump, and take in the lemonade yellow walls, the baby snoopy bedding, the book shelves full of books and toys that i couldn't wait to share with our new little one.
all too quickly the boy grew up, we dismantled the crib and changing table and my bed from childhood moved into their places. more books crowded the shelves, baskets of toys around.
one presidents day weekend hubby and i moved the furniture out of our bedroom and he ripped up the old shag carpeting and sanded, stained and polyurethaned the floors. the floors looked like molten honey and were beautiful. later that summer, we moved furniture from the living to dining room and back again as we stripped those floors, baseboards and window frames and finished them as well. our 80+ year old home now looked authentically its age and we loved it.
6 months after finishing those floors we learned we were having twins. while we had an extra bedroom - i grew up with a guest bedroom and always wanted one in my home - it would be for not just one but two kids! after some reshuffling, the boy moved over t0 the spare room - we repainted it and he chose batman bedding - and we returned the nursery back to it's original space. when the twins were 8 months old, we added another crib, and i lost my "perfect" nursery.
somehow my neat homey house became tight. now rattles, blocks and a big ol' exercircle fight for space with the boy's wii junk and million little action figures. my dining room table, which once was bare except for a table scarf and a bowl on top, is now covered with the boy's markers and drawing books, knitting crap, a moby and a baby bjorn and other junk that has accumulated there. and i don't even want to talk about the kitchen, with breakfast bar full of containers of baby food and formula, bottles and sippy cups, the table blanketed with miscellaneous clutter, the counters crowded with bowls of snack foods, pill baskets and appliances. i recently cleaned out my junk food drawer (originally a bread drawer). there were snacks in there older than the boy. scary.
every month the newspaper publishes a real estate guide and i entertain myself looking over the listings. for one thing, half doubles now cost what our house did 12 years ago! a house and even a rancher half the size of our home is easily twice what our house cost. and for the price of a house that has the 3+BR 2+baths plus family room (or is it great room?) and 2 car garage, i would have to go back to work. at about 3 times the salary of my best paying job. and hubby would have to be head of the IU. who the hell can afford these homes anyway? no wonder the housing market sucks!
but while i dream about a bigger home, with an extra bedroom, a large kitchen and more closets (my house was built when closets were taxed as rooms, hence why it only has one real closet) i am grateful for what i have. i am grateful that our mortgage is more than half paid off and in 5 years we will own it free and clear. i am grateful that while the house feels small to me, it is huge compared to what most people in the world have for their own home. it shouldn't even matter what kind of house we have - it's whose inside that counts. and what matters to me is my family - they are my home.
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