The Pruning: Our House...

In what felt like the blink of an eye, we lost our small group and found ourselves looking at every aspect of our life.  It's in those quiet moments, after the kids are asleep and Chris is out working, when I started to take stock.  So to speak.  

Rhys dropped his nap SECONDS after we converted his crib to a toddler bed.  Once he was no longer physically confined, he was done with the whole sleeping thing.  It's been a long six months since.  He really needs to sleep but he won't slow down long enough to do so.  I fought it for as long as I thought it necessary.  

And then I gave up.

It was time to move little people's toys to their rooms.  No reason to keep them out since NO ONE SLEEPS.  

Rhys got his tool bench, his chest full of randomness and some stuffed animals in his closet.  Aubrey Kate got her kitchen, baby crib, dolls and various art supplies.  At the same time, I cleaned out a good many baby toys and stuff the kids just don't play with.

Although, let's get real here and say KIDS DON'T PLAY WITH TOYS.

Initally, yes.  In the first four months, occasionally.  From then on, they're buried and forgotten about.

My kids have spent the last three days in their swimsuits chasing bad guys with a couple of white plastic hangers.  

Not a toy in sight.

After all that was done, I looked around the playroom and realized, wow, this is empty.  I moved a couple of chairs from our room in there just to fill it up.   We still have the cubbies and the book shelves but truthfully, those could move to a bedroom too.  Or be replaced with two simple bookcases in each kiddo's room.

Oh how that playroom has served us well.  It was once filled with tummy time play mats and a bouncy seat neither of my babies liked AT ALL.  Almost every space was taken up with that tool bench and kitchen and a Minnie Mouse chair the kids tended to fight over more often than sit in and a baby crib and a Mickey Mouse train that got left out in the rain once and would randomly start chew-chewing in the middle of the night.  

We have spent hours...HOURS...in that playroom.  I may or may not have fallen asleep on that floor while the children played.  May.  I'm not admitting to anything.  From the floor, I could still see the TV in the living room so when the weather was bad (or I just wanted to selfishly have on HGTV) I didn't have to leave the kids to keep up.  

And I could see the playroom from the kitchen.  Once I no longer had to hold Rhys with one hand and cook with the other, the kids could be in there playing flashcards or ballet class and I could watch while dinner was being prepped.  

My view from the kitchen into the playroom.

I could see all.  TV, playroom, and living room.  Such a great perspective.  Many a meal prepared as I watched them play.  Thanked my Father for loaning them to us.  And also, possibly, maybe hollered a few choice words of warning to break up those adorable sibling spats children tend to have.

Adorable. Sibling.  Spats.

All these moments and events and pasts needs swirled around in my head and heart.  Did we even need the playroom anymore?  It was almost empty now.  The kids still played in there some but really, it was just a stopping point now.  The space in between their rooms.  A wrestling ring for the nights Daddy was home.  But that's it.  

It could go.  I could let it go.  We did not need it.

Then I thought about the bonus room.  Our one room upstairs.  It only got used once a week and that was for small group.  If we didn't have small group, did we need the room?

Now granted, it was our guest room too.  And for that, it was used.  About every three or four months.  So we're talking three or four times a year.  Chris' parents stay up there when they're here and Chris and I stay up there when my parents are here.  If we let Chris' parents stay in our room, then it just gets used by us for sleeping.  And truly, Chris can sleep on the couch in the living room.  And, well, I can sleep on the air mattress just as well downstairs as I can upstairs.

Or, better yet, I can sleep in AK's bed while SHE sleeps on the floor in Rhys' room.  

Genius.

We have a ton of office furniture up there but Chris rarely works there.  He spent a month working at our kitchen table rearranging the high school musical.  Set up the keyboard, his computer and ear phones and went to work.  He doesn't need the big office furniture.  

And do we need the books out on the bookcase?  Can we even remember the last time we read one of those books?  

The file cabinet.  That has to stay.  

The scrapbook case needs to stay.  But it can find a new home.  And the oversized chair can go to the attic.

So in a matter of minutes, I'd managed to let go of another entire room in our house.  

Although, it is really nice.  It has served us well.  Gave my mom a room of her own while she helped us transition from a family of three to four.  Let's just all admit she probably saved my marriage.  She lived in that room for three months.  

Small group met up there for 18 months.  We did a whole lot of praying and discussing and sharing in that room.  If walls could talk.  

And Chris used it as an escape space when I needed a nap or some time to myself.  He'd take the kids up there to, well, DESTROY as much as possible.  Endless supplies of paper and game pieces and UNO cards and highlighters can keep little people busy for an hour or more.  The three of them would hide away, behind the closed door, and leave me to sleep or clean or cook in relative peace.  Or maybe play some 80's music turned up a little too loud.

Oh, bonus room, you have served us well.

But it's time to admit, we simply don't need you anymore.

Now a thought was forming.  A calling starting to take shape.  A realization accepted.

We do not need this house any longer.

Between the playroom and the bonus room, I'm guessing that's 600 square feet we don't regularly use.  

The rest of the house could be better laid out for our needs now.  We have a good deal of wasted space in our master bedroom but we sure could use a bigger closet.  

The dining room is too small to hold my end chairs but the kitchen has empty cabinets, and with some cleaning out of that, a good many empty cabinets.  

Plus, let's get real here and say all that counter space gets mostly used to hold JUNK.  Mail that doesn't get shredded/trashed/recycled/filed away.  Various art projects from school/kids' park/church.  Purses.  Keys.  Backpacks.  Everything that should get put away but doesn't in favor of, oh, well, everything and anything else.

A living space that is cramped and awkward.  With furniture on top of itself.  Very little in the way of cozy and more just weird.

So the more I thought, the more I analyzed, the more I realized, it's time.  Time to move.  

I was crazy nervous to suggest the idea to Chris.  We've moved quite a lot.  And never by choice.  But I did a good bit of research.  Looked at surrounding areas.  Compared property tax rates (which is how we fund schools in Texas since we don't have state income tax).  

And I could see no reason to stay and a whole lot of reasons to move.

Chris was on board.  In fact, he said he would have moved a year ago but I didn't want to hear of it.

You know, because I was holding on with a DEATH GRIP to stuff God was so clearly asking me to give up.  I'd been praying for God to fill our house.  Instead, He emptied it.  And in doing so, He removed my need for it from my heart.  

This house has been a blessing.  My babies grew here.  Aubrey Kate went from her crib to a big girl bed.  From an unsteady toddler to a twirling, prancing, dancing five year old here.  

Rhys came home from the hospital to his room.  A room Chris and I painstakingly painted when I as 952 weeks pregnant.  I pretty much rolled from spot to spot to get the grid on his wall just right.  And he's grown from a picky baby who would only sleep in the boppy sleeper to an active nearly three year old who barely sleeps at all.  

And our backyard.  The world's smallest backyard.  Well, it was just the right size for two little people and their toddler pool.  Because of the surrounding houses and our house's western facing position, the back patio was almost always shaded.  No need to have it covered, really.  And in the middle of the day, the tree did it's job to shade us instead of the houses around us.  Many an hour spent outside playing.  A true blessing.

But I can't see the backyard from inside the house.  Unless I parked myself next to the window in our bedroom.  There's no point in that.  I would like to see them from the kitchen.  You know.  A kitchen window over the sink overlooking the backyard.  That's the dream.  

For months, we prayed and talked about moving.  We never got a "No" but we got an emphatic "Yes" either.  My dad would say, "God gave you a brain." Which simply means, if something doesn't make sense, and God isn't giving you a decisive answer, make logical changes.  However, what we did receive were oh so many things encouraging us that this was the right time.  

Home values skyrocketing.  A crazy seller's market.  Houses in our own neighborhood selling in a matter of hours.  Houses better suited to our needs and our budget around us.  Kids who seemed excited with the idea of a new house.  And never a moment of regret about letting go of this house.

We're excited too.  Excited about getting out of those skyrocketing home values which have done an excellent job of raising our property taxes a significant amount over the past four years.  Excited about downsizing and reducing our expenses.  For sure excited about reducing our energy bills (deregulated energy = middle man = crazy expensive energy).  Excited about moving into a less expensive part of town where maybe, just maybe, there are some other stay at home mommas and kiddos (our current neighborhood is a ghost town during the week).

Does all that mean this has been easy?

Nope.

In fact, more than Chris, I have struggled with feelings of rejection and failure and missed opportunities.  Feelings of frustration and defeat and giving up.  Some mornings I wake up under such a spirit of defeat.  I spend my whole day either praying against it or, just being totally honest, letting it sit.  Like a heavy blanket, it'd cover me, making me feel sleepy and weak.  

Thankfully, I wake up the next day feeling better.  So far.  I know we are in God's will.  I know we are following exactly as He has lead us.  I know this process isn't fun.  

But I know, once this process is complete, there are blessings waiting.  More fruit for the harvest.  Healthy, full branches ready to serve Christ and the people He gives us to love.  

Those promises keep me focused.  Keep me showing up every day, ready to move forward. Keep me from letting that blanket of defeat settle and take root.  

And keep me filling up boxes with stuff we are keeping and the garage with stuff we aren't.  

As I say every time we move, WHY DO WE HAVE ALL THIS STUFF?

Can you hear God saying, "Child, I have no idea?"

(All photos credit to The Rhodes Team.  Bless them and their wide angle lenses.)