Why the guest room isn’t becoming a nursery

Since announcing that I’m pregnant with baby #3 I’ve been asked a few times if the guest room is going to become a nursery. The short answer is “no”….the long answer is the rest of this post :)

To be honest, I’m not going to prep for this baby at all. It’s not getting a nursery and I’m not altering the boy’s room. We’re just going to put this kid in a crib in our room and call it a day.

Why? Because I don’t think we’re going to be in this house long enough for it to really matter.

Most of you know that about a year ago my husband quit his job to attend a police academy. This spring he got a job…but it’s not in our area. And while it’s a commutable distance, it’s not something we want to be doing long-term. No one wants to spend a few extra hours a day in the car if you don’t have to. So, we’re on the hunt for a new home. We’ve actually been looking for about six months, but now we’re starting to get serious.

We have a good idea of what we want, and the three most important things we are looking for is location, price, and acreage (or more so, privacy). The actual house is less important than all those factors, because we are willing to take a nice house if it’s what we want, or do light or even major remodeling for the right price. We started off (early this year) only looking at pre-existing homes (on at least five acres) and haven’t had much luck. Then we began including raw land in our search and have started walking properties on the weekends. The longer we search the more excited we get about the idea of building. And now – even though we haven’t bought any land – we are really excited about starting from scratch and it would take a darn near perfect house to convince us not to. We know exactly what we want, it’s the same kind of house we have wanted since we were first married…a barn home. Trust me that you will hear plenty more on this subject…we have inspiration photos tucked away, floor plans sketched up, builders we are planning to talk to. The fun is just beginning.

rustic homes

Source 1, 2, 3, 4
 

So what does this all mean for the blog? For now it doesn’t mean much. You may remember that Adam and I live debt free and buy everything with cash. The exception to or cash rule is homes (and land). We would love to pay cash upfront for those things, but we don’t have piles of money hanging around and it just isn’t feasible. Our plan is to find a piece of land, finance it, and completely pay it off before selling our house and starting the building process. In the price range we are looking paying it off will take about a year and a half, and during that time we will keep plugging away at this house and finishing up things for selling.

So THAT is why you won’t be seeing any baby prep on the blog. Well, that and the fact that this is the third kid (although #1 and #2 didn’t get all that much prep either). Adam and I are throughly enjoying dreaming about our future (hopefully forever) home, we are both on realtor.com multiple times a day, texting each other houses and picking them apart. Heck, we even do this when we’re not house (or land) hunting. As soon as we buy a piece of land I’ll let you know…for now we’re just finishing up projects and trying to sock away some money!

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17 Comments

  1. How exciting!!! I really admire the two of you, such good financial plans and at such a young age. If only more young couples would realize what you can all live without there would be way less debt in this world. Make sure you look for land where the rocks don’t multiply when your back is turned, lol!! Looking forward to hearing more :)

    1. Thank you, thats so sweet of you to say! As for the rocks, I don’t think we can escape them. We’ve gotten smarter though, and the plan for the future property would be to throw all the trees we clear into the chipper (instead of burning them) and cover the rocks with a thick layer of mulch (instead of trying to pull them all up).

  2. that is soooooo exciting!!!! and if you want to borrow some of my piles of money so you can pay for the house with cash, let me know. ;) right.

    1. Yes, that would be great! I know your piles of money are so vast that borrowing probably won’t be necessary, as it would be your pleasure to simply gift me a couple hundred grand.

  3. I wondered sometimes about your plan to move eventually since you were doing so much work there!
    Also, have you heard of newlywoodwards.com? It is a new blog I found a few weeks ago, and they have been remodeling the upper floor of their barn to be an apartment (to live in while they build a house on the land). It sounds like something you’d find interesting:)

    1. Yeah, we bought this home as a starter home with the plan to fix it up and sell it. We have done a lot of work though, (and it’s taken longer than I thought it would) and it will be hard to say goodbye. I’m excited about the future though!

      I’ve heard of Newly Woodwards and have actually met Kim in real life, but haven’t ever read her blog. It sounds right up my alley though so I’ll have to check it out. Thanks!

  4. I am as excited as if it was me house/land hunting!! I think now I’d be disappointed if you guys ended up with a super nice and already built/ upgraded home, haha. The audiences are expecting a chunk of land and a homebuilding journey alongside you :-))) We voted, Ashley, and it is unanimous, haha. On a serious note, good luck and don’t forget to slow down and just enjoy this wonderful exciting chapter-opening time!

    1. I think I would be disappointed with an already built and upgraded home too. Sometimes I think it would be nice to give in a house that isn’t a giant to-do list, but when it comes down to it I love the to-do list and putting my own touch on everything. Adam and I will sit on the computer at night and look at homes on the MLS…he’ll pull one up, I’ll look at it and say “no, it’s too nice”. He says I’m the only woman alive that turns down beautiful homes because they’re too beautiful ;)

      I’m excited to (hopefully) build and share the process with y’all!

  5. Ashely I love your blog! I have been going through your archives so I noticed that even from your first posts you called this home your not forever home. I hope you find exactly what you want! The hill country is gorgeous and at least you don’t have to water rocks :-)

    I love that timber house #3, bestill my heart!

    I hope you don’t mind, I plan on using lots of your DIY ideas in our little home, as many as my husband will let me get away with :-)

    1. Thats true about the rocks, haha! Though maybe if they did need watering I could kill them just like I do the grass.

      And I of course don’t mind if you use my ideas, that’s what they’re there for!

  6. Built a house once, and although it’s wasn’t my forever home, it was a fantastic experience and SO much fun! Good luck to all of you!

  7. A barn home, wow, wow!! I’m excited to follow along on this adventure. I love barns and other types of buildings repurposed as homes. Out of the four inspiration pics, number one is my favorite. It’s amazing how quickly a person’s life can change direction, hey? Your road has taken some huge turns lately!

    1. Number one is beautiful, right? Most of my favorite’s come from a website called Heritage Barns, they take the timber from old barns and build new homes out of it, they are gorgeous. Also, they are crazy expensive and we won’t be using them (except for inspiration!).

      Our road has taken some big turns lately, I’m excited about them. Before we bought this house we were military and life was one huge turn after another…we haven’t had one in a while. I’m ready :)

  8. We built what we thought would be our retirement house about 10 years ago. It was such a fun experience. Unfortunately God had other plans for us, so now we are remodeling yet another house. That’s fun too.

    I really like house #2 with its wide verandas looking down to the river.

  9. I love reading your website! Found it again when I was looking for a table painting tutorial. And got lost in it for an HOUR!!! LOL

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