2021 Life & Plans

❤We moved this spring back to our old house and sold the little house we homesteaded at. 

The amount of projects we completed has been intense to say the least. 

Painted the entire house minus the bathroom. The bathroom will be gutted next year and completely redesigned & renovated. We refinished the original hardwood floors in two rooms. We still need to get carpet for the living room.

The screen porch had to be completely repaired. New screens, flooring, paint, screen door, and blinds. The deck needed repainted too. The front porch still needs finished: paint and railings and we are adding a second set of steps next to the driveway. 

We put up 320 ft of 6 ft privacy fence. Bought a large shed for a home gym & workshop space. The shed needs some finishing done and we need electric ran to it. 

I'm planning to set up one room as a home library/ hobby space for myself. I'm planning cabinets below and bookshelves to the ceiling on one wall. This is one of the rooms that has refinished hardwood floors and it should be absolutely gorgeous when it is finished. For now, I'm chilling in here typing this up surrounded by boxes of books, home decor we haven't hung, and crafty things that don't quite have homes yet.

We are buying a hot tub from my in laws so that's a whole project getting it set up and electric which will be done at the same time as the shed. 

Insecurities About Being A Homemaker

I have really been struggling lately with being a homemaker vs. working outside the home.

I get email updates regularly for new job listings. I read through them meticulously wondering if perhaps one of these jobs might be the right one for me. But mostly the jobs that speak to me require more experience and/or education than I possess. I'm left feeling inadequate and just kind of worthless. Almost like I'm taking things too personally?

However, at the same time I've been trying to focus on being more productive at home. Getting more things done, saving money, being more available and less distracted. I believe that a stay at home mother is supposed to be an asset to her family. I haven't felt like I've been doing this job very well to be honest. I feel like more of a burden than an asset and I spent a good chunk of time crying about it a couple days ago.

If I don't have the skills or education for a job outside the home to be able to contribute financially to my family I have to do this homemaker job well. And if I don't then I've failed monumentally.

But in this I've got to let go a little bit. I've got to accept that this is my decision, that I want to be a homemaker and I want to do it well. Because I don't know that I've taken this job seriously now that my kids have been getting older and I know I've taken this opportunity for granted on many levels.

It is also hard to feel like I'm in the right place. I don't know any other women who are "career homemakers".... if that makes sense, I'm not even sure that's even a term close to what I mean. But I battle feeling like I'm not doing enough because I see so many women working and I know I shouldn't compare but I do. And I admire them so much! I think that they are amazing.

Maybe I feel guilty because I'm not a very good homemaker. But in my mind maybe I'm delusional about what that actually means. I feel like if I'm not good at this job, I really should have a job. And maybe like parenting I'm always going to feel a bit insecure and that doesn't necessarily mean I'm doing an awful job, it could just mean that I want to strive to always improve and get better at it. 

I wonder if other women struggle with these feelings.

Our Little House On The Prairie

I guess you could say I've been dealing with some restless energy. I tend to go all in when there is an idea or a possibility. I want to explore it completely and learn everything that I can.

In most cases this is wasted energy because nothing comes of it.

But at least I am informed completely and that might make it easier to cast aside the crazy ideas from the good ones.

What am I talking about?

Well our house is small. We need more space and we don't know how to get the most for our money.

At first I had wanted to expand the laundry room out from the back of the house, and include enough space to make it a sufficient mud room and alternate entry with a good size storage closet and also put a bedroom out there as well.
We've also been thinking from the other end of the house to the right of the fireplace would be a good doorway down to a mud room that leads to a garage and then put a loft above with a couple bedrooms. Hell, maybe we need both additions for this house realistically.


But realistically, we don't have the money up front for it, and we also don't have enough equity in the house to borrow from the bank.
Perhaps if we found a way to fund one renovation... we could have the equity to build the other one. It is so damn expensive and we also want to expand our farming endeavors. We need a proper barn especially if we're getting goats and rabbits in the spring like we are planning.


We discussed the option of selling and buying a bigger piece of land and building on it... but it just doesn't feel like the right choice. That would have to be painfully expensive for one thing. And I really like our neighbors here.


Having more property is something that we intend to do in the future. It is an incredible investment to make. It could be property for our children to build houses one day, it could be something that is kept in the family for generations. Who knows.


But that's what has been on my mind.
Here's a general idea of our floor plan. My bathroom is different. There is  a fireplace and built in bookshelves/cabinets on the far wall in the Family Room. The dining room has our most used entry door in it.