Living With Less

One thing living half-moved in to a house has taught me is that I CAN live with less.  One area I have noticed this so far is linens.  How many towels, washcloths, blankets, sheets and pillowcases does a couple actually need?  Not as many as we have, obviously, because several of our towels are still out in our garage wrapped around framed photographs and have been for almost 2 months now.  And still we manage to dry ourselves off every day after our showers.  Most of our blankets we never use--not even in winter.  Why do we have so many?  And I don't even know where the rest of our pillowcases are.  I know we have a couple dozen, mostly mine, but I only know where about 8 of them are!  We'll need even less when this pregnancy is over and I don't pad myself on all sides with pillows every night.

Clothes is another area I've noticed I can live with less in, although partly that's because I don't really care how I look right now.  What 9-months-pregnant woman does?  What is fascinating, though, is that I am way more apt to throw my clothes in the hamper when they start smelling...less than prime...than I was when I had so many shirts to choose from.  I think it's because I realize I have fewer options once things do get dirty.  With my other clothes, I was like, "Oh, this probably needs a wash.  Oh well.  I have 2 dozen other shirts to choose from."  And I'd throw the shirt back into the drawer.  And now when the clothes are IN the hamper, I'm of course more likely to get the laundry done, because, good grief, I only have 3 shirts left!  So it's been very interesting seeing how having less in general affects how I live day to day.  It's a good change.  I hope I can hang onto it and use it to motivate me to thin out my non-maternity clothes.

I can do a similar thinning out of the baby stuff I've received.  I know they dirty things up a lot more, but I really like this extra motivation to do the laundry when something is dirty and I want to incorporate it into every area of life.  I got so many crib sheets for my shower that I think I can at least start there.

I can't wait to apply this to other places.  Maybe there is hope for someone like me after all. :)

-Stephanie

2013-2014: Year of New Things

The last year or so has meant a lot of new things for us.

Back in November 2012, I lost my job as a Saturday flower delivery driver thanks to new management at the shop I worked at.  I decided it was a good time to pursue floral design at other shops.  In January 2013, I offered myself as extra holiday help at a shop down the road from our apartment and let them know I was interested in a part-time job in design in general.  They hired me for Valentine's Day and Mother's Day, and after that hired me on part-time as a designer and driver.  The first 6 months were hard as I tried to learn everything and become a better designer, and Christmas was utterly exhausting--my first 46 hour work week!  But by 2014 I was feeling really comfortable there and incredibly overwhelmed with gratitude for a good job and good coworkers and good hours.  It has been such a blessing and answer to prayer in so many ways.

Come June, though, I will be leaving, at least temporarily, to start a new phase of life: motherhood.

Stephen and I took a giant leap of faith and went off birth control back in September.  We were still in a dingy, dirty two-bedroom apartment that was, for all intents and purposes, a 1-bedroom apartment with a storage room that could absolutely not be a baby room unless something major changed.

But the Lord had His say, and we got pregnant in October, with a baby boy.  So we began another crazy journey: house-hunting for the first time in our lives.  Our budget was ridiculously small, but we were bound and determined to find a new home for this baby to live.  We searched the furthest ends of the suburbs around here for an affordable house that was also functional and safe.  There were some possibilities, and we even made an offer on one house, but the owners countered our offer and in the short time we had to decide what to do, we came to the agreement that it just was not right.

Completely discouraged by the hunt, we stopped house hunting for a while and pursued other, better apartments.  In the meantime, trying to be prepared for the worst, we bought a storage unit to move in all of our stuff from the second bedroom.  It was amazing the freedom that afforded--our apartment would have been finally livable!

But the Lord had better plans.  In March, Stephen's grandma came to us and offered up a suggestion for consideration.  She had a large house with a large master bedroom in it that could be turned into an apartment suitable to her with the installation of a kitchenette.  She would live there and we could have the rest of the house.

She left it open for us to decide, but the decision seemed pretty clear.  This felt right.  So after some talking about how it might work, we gave Grandma the go-ahead to begin constructing her back bedroom into an apartment.

Well, our lease at the apartment ended before everything could be perfected and ready, but we scooped out a place for our bed and Grandma's bed and started working together on readying the house.  It is still rather chaotic, but we all make slow progress on getting settled every day.  The baby at this point still does not have a room, but he does have a cradle in our room to stay in for the first few months, which would have been the plan anyway.

I absolutely love Grandma's neighborhood that we live in.  It is exactly the kind of neighborhood a family can feel comfortable in.  We have way, way more than we were ever hoping for while we were exploring other options.  God is truly amazing and we are truly blessed, and our little boy will be, too.