In search of a Simpler Life. Our Journey from the City to The Country.

If you haven't heard we have moved. Not down the road but to the country in NW Arkansas. We fixed up our home, sold it and moved to a home on 20 acres. Now we are fixing up our new home and building a plumbing company for my husband. Once we decided to move so many people would ask me why????

Well if you live in the city you may know, traffic is terrible, people are always in a rush and the city life is not where we wanted to spend the rest of our lives. We wanted to show our kids that their is more to life than always rushing around. Slowing down was something that we craved. Slowing down to us meant having more time with each other. Less outside expectations on our family time and more independence of our time.
We want our children to have integrity, work hard and treat people with respect with out wanting something in return. Yes, these are all things that you can teach your children in the city, but as a child of the city I myself know that it is very easy to get distracted by the "Bright Lights". This was the start of a big mind shift for both myself and my husband. My quilting business was taking off and Eddie had a great job with wonderful co-workers. I loved our house, but I was not fond of the area. So why the change? Inside my wonderful home I began to feel like I was going in circles. In so many ways, laundry, homeschooling, dinner, quilting......... My passion for all of these things had began to fade.
It took us almost two years once we changed our outlook, vision or view on life to be at the point we are at right now. During those 2 years we got chickens, began gardening, and started on the journey of homeschooling our boys. Reflection of our life helped us make these great decisions to help us to slow down. Truthfully since our move I have worked harder than I have ever worked. As my dad would  say "Work is a Blessing" This work has been done with my mom, my husband and our kids and I love that we can all be a part of making this house our home.

So how it all began.
One weekend we decided to drive up to the
Ozarks and look around to just take a peek and see if it was somewhere that we would like to live.

We drove through Oklahoma to take a look at a home but it was not in any condition for living. We looked on and every house we looked at was either too expensive, too run down or we could not find it, phone reception was patchy. That night we had a hard time finding a hotel. We drove into Fayetteville for the night and that there was a special volleyball tournament in town and every place that we found was booked up. Finally we found a hotel that had a room available. When I went in to get us a room, I spoke to the girl at the front desk and explained to her that we were looking for a home kind of far out and in the country. She suggested to take a look at Decatur. As soon as we got to our room I looked up Decatur on Zillow and found a house that was perfect. Great price, a bit of a fixer upper and on 20 acres. The next morning we packed up and drove to Decatur. We followed our GPS(which shockingly worked all the way to the house) and turned down a road which did not look like a road. We drove a long way down this road and even thought that we might be lost. Finally at the end of the road was a valley and right in the middle of this valley was the home.


We looked all around and surprisingly the back door was unlocked.....

1st side Living Area

1st Side Bedrooms both looked like this

2nd Side Kitchen

1st side Kitchen

1st side Fireplace

It was perfect, it was almost like this house was meant for us. It was just what we were looking for and needed. There were 2 living areas which was great because my mom was going to be moving with us. Which meant 2 kitchens, 4 bathrooms, 2 living rooms and 4 bedrooms and for my sewing studio a huge 2 car garage.

2 Car Garage/Sewing Studio

It was in need of some updates and looking back we had no idea how many updates. From what I hear with every renovation there is always more work than you first thought.

We drove home right away and got to work on our home. This also took us twice as long to complete but it was well worth it. We also had to tell our family that we were moving. This was easy with some family members they understood what we were doing . Other family members did not accept our move as well as others, it took them some time to come around.  I had a feeling that it would take some family members to actually see our new home to be able to see our insight, dream, vision or pie in the sky:)
My husband, Eddie and I had a dream and soon my Mom had our same dream. We took a ton of pictures and shared them with everyone and most of all we shared them with ourselves. I put them on our TV as a screen saver, they were the backgrounds on our phones. Anytime we got discouraged or had 2nd thoughts that this move was not what God had planned out for us, we would go to the pictures. The pictures were like our North Star, our Beacon of Light, a Glimmer of what could be......
One thing to point out is that every time we had doubt in our move. We would pray and put our future into Gods hands. We would release all control and by the next day the situation would change, change in a way that showed us that we were headed in the right direction. This doubt came and went many times through out our move. One of our biggest worries was that someone else would buy our home that we had so many hopes and dreams for. In our "TV Sreensaver dream time" we would plan how to fix it up, who would live in what room and how many cabins would we build on the land. With all of these dreams the idea of not getting our home was almost downright devastating.

Now to the revamp of our old home. We painted, caulked, trimmed, updated fixtures and down sized. The book that helped me downsize was The Life Changing Art of Tidying Up I perfer Audible Books. So as I cleared my clutter I listened to my new found way of looking at my junk. Does it bring joy? If you have read the book you know what I am talking about if not you should get the book. We all have crap we need to part with.

Fresh Paint and New Fixtures

I think we were on the market for 3 months or so.
Then....We had a buyer, maybe. They went back and forth with us on wheeling and dealing (which I HATE) We had to tell them NO over and over again. Finally they got the hint after our realtor set them straight. Once this part was complete we were able to pick up our Uhauls, sign the papers and begin the final packing. Or so we thought....

Out of nowhere a call came that the buyers of the buyers were having trouble with their paperwork and we had to wait. We had to make due for 3 nights and 4 days unsure if the sale was going through. Also our Uhauls were packed with all of our belongings. We made due. The best part of the delay was that a dear neighbor of ours threw us a going away party and all of our sweet neighbors came to celebrate our new journey. Here are a few pics of us in the waiting.

Dog Crate TV Stand

All Packed up and nowhere to go

Fortunately U haul was completely understanding.

At last we got the word and it was time to Sign and Go. We packed the last of our stuff, which took way longer than I had thought and left our Old Home around 4 pm Eeeekkk. Sorry Hubby 😕. The drive to our new home was only four and a half hours. That is if you have no stops and drove straight there. Here was our moving caravan setup. My husband was driving a 27 foot U haul and pulling a large covered trailer. In the front was my husband, our eldest son and our Large Black Hound dog. On my end I was driving our Titan Truck with the back packed full pulling an open bed large trailer packed to the brim. On the inside front seat was Myself, My Mom and a crate with my little dog Ruby. In the Back seat our youngest son, Wyatt with a dog gate next to him (so the dogs would not try to jump over him on gas and potty breaks) at his feet there was a small crate with my moms cat. On the other side of that gate were 3 large dogs all laying together. This setup I had worried about for weeks going back and forth on where my youngest Son should be, what dogs should go where. In the end it was no big deal and they all did well together.

We said goodbye to our old home and life. 

Then we moved on to our new Adventure.

Sometimes saying goodbye to a home that we had lived in for over 10 years is not as easy as I thought. I loved our old home we had our 2 sons while we lived there. My boys grew up there, this home was all they had ever known of a home. To me it felt the same.😢 I had grown up so much in this home. It had brought me up from a young self involved girl/woman and through the years in this house I have grown into a Mother, a better more caring Wife, and Daughter. Lets not forget I became a Quilter in this home. I went from not even knowing how to use my sewing machine to becoming a Bad-ass Longarm Quilter.

And in this move not only would I be in a new home that needs work. I would also have to be without my Sewing Room for at least 4 to 6 months. Quilting is my stress reliever, my favorite pastime, my best friend and one of my great LOVE's. So saying good bye to our old home also meant saying "I'll see ya later" to my Quilting Dream.

My Sweet Ruby Do saying "Goodbye old Home"

20 Acres with a spring at the bottom of the hill

Wyatt did not want to move at all until he saw this house and the land.
Then once he saw it he was ready to start packing.

This is our Journey.

I hope if you are going though a similar change that these words bring you comfort.

The thing I have learned is to lower my expectations of myself and those around me. I like to have it all done yesterday and those expectations are ingredients for disappointment, always.

Take Care and Lots of Love

April

One of my favorite YouTube channels to watch during this time of change is Esther Emery's Chanel.

This can be perfectly explained by Esther Emery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pPRvcSP9W0