FINDING CONTENTMENT

For the most part I think Murph and I are pretty great together, we are polar opposites on lots of things, but that seems to work in our favor. This week we about lost our minds together, no seriously we did.

One of Murph and my hobbies is perusing Iowa Realty's app on the Ipad. We look at houses, get ideas for our dream house, laugh at terrible paint jobs and tiny yards and respond harshly to the realtor comments on the property ... it's a good time. This week though, we fell in love. I will say we fall in love with a house a month and usually we forget about it ... not this house. This house checked all of our boxes, and I mean all of them, ok it was only a 2 car garage, but it didn't matter.

• Walk-Out Ranch
• Over an acre in size
• Mature trees
• Large deck
• 3,000 sq feet +
• 4 bedrooms +
• Room to grow a family
• Room to improve it and make it ours
• Good condition, liveable for now
• Located in a neighborhood in the country

It even had some great bonuses:

• Pond
• Basketball hoop 
• Room for an art studio in the basement
• Room for a man cave in the basement
• In a small school district but easy access to interstate
• I could have multiple dogs here

I could go on and on, I mean just look at her:

So what was the harm to just go do a drive by? Well the harm is that you fall even more in love! We drove out of town about 10 miles and I swear to you we found a slice of heaven, in fact I think the mailbox already had our names on it. There were deer lying peacefully in people's yards, it was quiet, we couldn't see into the neighbor's windows and did you see that POND that would be in our YARD ^ oy vey. We got really excited, I found a video tour online and lo and behold it was even more magnificent than the photos showed! We crunched numbers, we talked logistics, I looked into school ratings and then we got REAL.

Yes, this is exactly where we want to "be", it's where we truly see ourselves going ... one day. But soon we were canceling cable, tearing down and remodeling a kitchen, finishing 1/2 of a basement, asking ourselves what heating 4,000 sq. feet costs, looking at the cost of a riding lawn mower and an invisible fence and it was clear we weren't moving here ANY time soon.

I looked at Murph from our couch and said, "we are home, we are blessed to be in this house, we can live here for a VERY long time, we need to find contentment". While websites like Pinterest and blogs provide endless inspiration I find myself soon thinking that they are the standard. Parties must be fully decorated with calligraphy, dinners become 4 course meals, and soon we are talk ourselves in to homes that we could technically afford, but not truly enjoy. It's a scary place to be. 

This year my focus has been on less. Less makeup, less clothing, less stuff, less stress, less spending, less hustle and bustle, and it has been hard but very rewarding. I am slowing down, I am spending more time being content and doing the things that matter to me and Murph the most. We are prioritizing and attacking problems together and while we would LOVE that house in the country, we know now isn't the time, and that we have more than we ever need right here on Hawthorn Drive.

So we decided to delete the apps, and I vowed to quit stalking the ARL website for a second dog, because yes, even our mutt WillyDog is enough. When the time is right I know we will leave this house, we will find our slice of heaven with woods in the back yard but in the meantime we will remember this life is more than enough, this place in time is more than enough, and we are so blessed to walk down this road together.