People often ask me if we’re settled yet, and I’m never sure how to respond. It depends on what you mean by “settled.”
Are all of your boxes unpacked? No. Only the most important ones are unpacked because we are still in a process of eliminating the things that we don’t need or that don’t fit in our house. Other boxes contain books and school supplies that will be placed on shelves we are currently building, and our Keeping Room is doing an admirable job of keeping things.
Are the rooms in your house set up? No. Again, all the important things are where they need to be, and our living room looks great, but we cannot set up everything until we have a place for them, and that place for many of them are the shelves we are currently building.
Do you feel at home? Are you emotionally settled? Yes. A resounding yes. Despite the mice, the snakes, the lack of shelves, and the things that need to be fixed or completed, we are very comfortable here. I haven’t looked at houses on-line for weeks, which is a big deal for me, because I’ve been checking the homes for sale in my county almost daily for the past year.
Now you may have noticed in three of the four paragraphs I’ve written of shelves, or a lack thereof. Not having much vertical wall space has its challenges, the most notable being no place to put bookshelves. I homeschool, and we have a lot of books. Not a crazy lot of books, but a fair amount, and we need to store them in places other than boxes. One night before we moved in I was looking on-line for pictures of A-frame houses, and I found one with shelves built between the beams of the house, and I knew that I no longer needed my bookcases, because my entire house could potentially be one huge bookcase. I dreamed, and Mark has been working hard to make the dream come true.
Our closet was the first to receive shelves, because we needed space to put things like shoes and change baskets, and because it was a good place to practice. Wow. With every new shelf that went in, I smiled a bit more. Instead of cramming my shoes into a drawer, they are now standing in a neat row on three shelves. Yay! We’ve a couple more to put in our closet, but we’ve moved on to other parts of the house for now.
Today we rid ourselves of all our children for a couple of hours and worked together on shelves for the boys’ room. Now instead of a floor cluttered with LEGO creations and other Very Important Items, the shelves above and beside the boys’ beds have become a canvas for their personality and creativity. Each boy has his Very Own Shelves to fill with treasures or trash as he sees fit. A tip for anyone who has children who share space: if it belongs to Everyone, No One takes care of it.
Next week we’ll finish the boys’ shelves, head into the girls’ room to give them some horizontal surfaces for their toys and treasures, and then we’ll start on the shelves for the school books and supplies. A friend asked where I would homeschool in this house, and the answer is in the Nooks and Crannies. My office is in one such nook, and two more are going to be built upstairs. Lots of weird angles to figure out, but it will be fabulous when it’s done.
Last we’ll put shelves in the living room and kitchen. I think I’m most excited about the kitchen. I envision an open pantry filling the one large slanted wall of my kitchen, and I’ve begun collecting interesting and beautiful bottles to keep things in. Functional and practical rather than model home is the look I’m after. Miracles never cease, and the fact I’m willing to leave appliances that I use every day on the counter means I’ve come a long way from when I first set up house 18+ years ago.
And yes, I’ll eventually take pictures.
I know reading about house stuff is a bit boing, but this blog is about me, and this is my life right now.
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