Experiments in Dishes

Guys (and gals), it's happened. The unthinkable. The how-am-I-going-to-get-through-the-week disaster. When I told my daughter (she's almost 5), she said, "OH NO! Mom. That's NO good!"

Yup. Our dishwasher broke.

[Oh, yes. God bless us and our first world problems of earth-shattering proportions. Oh, the agony. Oh, the drama.]

But seriously. Who's gonna do the dishes? Cuz you know I got other stuff going on... work... trim my nails... laundry... facebook... work (did I mention work?)... spending two hours every night begging my children to PLEASE JUST GO TO SLEEP...

When it broke, I immediately jumped in my mind to replacement. Call the appliance store! How soon can they get a delivery here? What color should we get? Do they have a model that also cleans the mess under the table? Do we have enough paper plates to make it through this ordeal?!

Sure, our dishwasher is old. And loud. And not very pretty. But I reminded myself that I probably really truly should look into fixing it. Maybe get another year out of it (or a few?). Clean it up. Make the best of it. And maybe save a few hundred bucks in the process.

Without a doubt, it's nice to have new things. Somehow, it just feels good. Fewer worries. Better efficiency. But also it's a status thing. Like, "Hey, look at me - I can just run out and drop a pretty penny on this luxury appliance at random, just because, even when I don't need to. I have money, and stuff. Pretty stuff. I have arrived."

If I really had my way, I'd have a dishwasher (sure - a nice, new one), and just enough dishes to fit in it. So I could take them out when we need to eat, and put them right back in to get washed. "Unloading the Dishwasher" would be a chore of the past!

Not too long ago, we did try an experiment with our dishes. There's a facet of the tiny house community that goes for the one person, one dish lifestyle. One cup, one bowl, one plate, one fork. It's simple, and small. It sounds like a perfect structure for tiny house living.

John (that's my husband) and I decided to give it a go. There are four of us, so we kept four of each item in the cabinet, boxed up the rest and put it in the basement during our one week trial period.

At first, it was great! The clutter in our kitchen almost disappeared immediately. There were no dirty dishes overflowing the sink, the cabinets were neat and tidy and everything had some space around it. Minimalism in action!

And then it was lunch time. But, because we only had four plates, and we used those four plates for breakfast, we now had nothing to eat off of. Now you might not know this, but when a 4 year old and a 2 year old want to eat, they don't fully understand the meaning of the word "wait" or  "I can't right now" or "just give me one more minute..." My kids are good eaters. And they were not about to let the lack of a plate keep them from the agonizing, "MOMMY! is lunch ready YET?!" <repeat> cry.

So we stopped making lunch to do the dishes.

And, by day 2, we decided that we would rather deal with a little clutter and a few more plates to throw in the dishwasher (back in the good ol' days when it was working!) so we could have a little bit more time and attention to give to our kids.

And though I'm sure there are lots of podcasts, blogposts, twitter feeds and facebook messages dedicated to the energy and bodywork and enlightenment and deep connection with your own food source and other positive soul-cleansing you can attain from taking the time to hand-wash each and every one of your own dishes, truly NO ONE in this house was going to miss scrubbing plates, bowls and cups three or four times a day.

The box came up from the basement, and the dirty dishes now pile up. Experiment complete.

The two reasons why I need a dishwasher

As for our dishwasher, I am swallowing my pride. Last night I pulled out the racks, gathered up some tools, looked up some repair videos, ordered a part, and after two hours of work, $12.99 and waiting for the FedEx truck to show up, it should be back in business.

I did allow myself one miniature luxury: paying extra for 2-day shipping!

Because sometimes a mom just needs a break.

"Our Evil Plan to Steal Photons from the Sun"

May 26, 2016 was a monumental day in my life. Not my birthday. Not my kids' birthdays. Not my anniversary. It was the day we flipped the switch to turn on our brand spankin' new solar panels! My husband calls it [cue Dr. Evil cackle], "Our evil plan to steal photons from the sun"! I call it free green energy for the rest of our lives.

Apex Solar installing our solar panels in May 2016

The whole process was so easy, I seriously can't believe we didn't do it sooner.

I must thank environmentalist Bill McKibben, because it was his talk at Keene Central School last fall that really reminded me that I MUST do something to slow down climate change. And, thanks to our friends Jan and Megan Wellford who shared their experience going solar, and gave us the connection to Apex Solar - a company I can highly recommend.

The Details

From start to finish, our project took about 6 months. It would have taken 6 weeks, but just as Apex was about to schedule our install, the ground froze late last December and that meant we had to wait until the spring.

Apex was absolutely great to work with. Our salesman (John) was knowledgeable and personable. Our project manager (Oren) was on top of the entire process. Our installers were also super nice and really, really good at what they do! The only hiccup we faced in the entire process was one machine that broke down while digging the trench between the panels and our electric box. We had to wait a day for a part to come in.

The Install

For our ground-mount system, the racks went up in half a day, the panels (we have 24!) took a day and the trench took another day (not including the breakdown). Pretty good for full energy independence!

Except for snow removal, our system takes care of itself. I'll report back on this as time goes on if we have any issues. I've talked to a number of friends (and friends of friends) and I have only heard of one couple who had to replace an inverter - but it was over 10 years old, and beyond its expected lifespan.

[Edit: Last night our inverter was not giving a reading. I called Apex, and a tech (Mike) swung by the house today to take a look. By the time he got here, everything was working fine again and Mike determined it was probably due to a brief grid power outage. It turns out they check our system productivity and functioning from the office every day! No worries there.]

So what does it look like? A beautiful piece of industrial artwork

We are set up with 24 panels in a (mostly) unused portion of our driveway which will produce an estimated 7,000 kwH of power every year. Sweet mother of god, that's a huge system, right?! Yeah, it kinda is! Because we planned a few changes in the near future - electric heat and a clothes dryer - it's sized at 109% of our expected usage These are two luxuries we've decided to go with after much discussion. (More on those changes to come.)

With such a sizable system, we have created a new landmark in the Town of Keene! Need to find our house? Look for the solar panels!

Grid Tie

Being grid tied has its advantages:

• we sell to our electric company any excess power we produce.
• if you've ever looked at getting a mortgage on an off-grid home, you probably know that most banks won't finance you. In the off chance that we ever want to sell our home, being grid tied can give our buyer more options. For the time being. I hope someday banks see the value in investing in off-grid homes.

and disadvantages:

• we still have to pay a monthly fee to the utility company to have an electric meter. I only wish NYSEG uses our $15/month to invest in green energy! 
• when grid power goes out, our power goes out. 

That last bit is kind of a bummer, but we hope to one day mitigate that disadvantage by installing a Tesla home battery, the coolest new thing out there in energy conservation.

The Dough

I was always worried that we could never afford to go solar. I had always heard of the thousands of dollars it costs and it always sounded beyond my reach. But here's how I found out it was something we could afford to do:

• Our monthly utility bill would not increase. Instead of paying the utility company, we pay off our loan.
• The value of our property goes up by about the cost of the system, so we recoup the full system cost even if we sell our home tomorrow. 
• Our down payment was only $1,000.
• Between the grants offered to us and the Federal and State tax credits we will receive, our system will be at least 50-60% paid for! Right now the grants offered to us through NYSERDA were double what they had been in previous years, and it's there as long as funds remain available. Lucky us! 

When I ran the numbers, from every aspect, it always came out that a solar installation was something we couldn't afford NOT to do! 

AND... The Best Part

Apex Solar did ALL the paperwork! (Now you know how much I love paperwork!)

The Bottom Line

Without hesitation, and at the risk of sounding like a radio commercial, I implore you: If you have $1,000 and a house, GO SOLAR!

And tell Apex Solar I say, "Thank you!".

P.S. If you decide to go solar with Apex and want to support the LSLS blog, please mention my name! 

What v. Who

It's 8 o'clock Friday night. Kids are in bed, and I'm ready to reeeeelax. Couch. Netflix. Snacks. Tea. You know, that kinda thing.

Wait, is that the baby crying?

I quietly ascend the stairs, hoping with each step that my trip is in vain and sleep will come without my assistance.

Not to be. My daughter sees my shadow as a sign to start talking.

"Mom, I thought my hands were dead."

"What? You thought your hands were what?" I think she said, "dead". I have no idea what to do with her three-year-old thoughts sometimes.

"I thought my hands were dead."

"Did you wake up your brother?" I try to ask without judgment, though I have my suspicions based on the fact that he was fully passed out when my husband and I left the sleeping loft only minutes before.

The Children (Photo by Donna O'Mara)

"Yes,"

"Why were you out of bed?"

"I WASn't, Mom!" As one of our friends calls it, a threenager.

"Well, how did you wake him up?" I'm more curious now than anything.

"Probably by clapping."

"Clapping? Why were you clapping?" Again, trying to keep my tone calm and bedtime-like.

"I thought my hands were dead so I was clapping them together."

Oh, my love. My sweet, sweet, darling girl. Your hands are definitely not dead.

"Ok. Your hands aren't dead. But if you're ever worried and you need to check, just shake them like this, instead of clapping." I shake my hands frantically in the dark air like I am trying to get a stuck booger off them and I don't care where it lands.

I hope she can see me. Then again, maybe she could just close her eyes and go to sleep...

I pick up the baby, whose cries have escalated since I came into the room and didn't pick him up within microseconds.

And, within microseconds, he is calm and resting again. I nurse him, and while he's eating the sounds machine turns off. That means it's been 46 minutes since I started putting them to sleep.

That used to drive me NUTS. If bedtime took a minute longer than I thought it should, my ire was up and  almost inconsolable. I had stuff to do, and things to attend to.

This is why I spent the last few years discarding a lot of the What in my life, so I had more time and space and energy for the Who.

The lack of What in my life means we live in this small house, and we don't have thick doors on big rooms for our own purlieus where babies can sleep in peace from the interesting drowsy thoughts of their big sisters. It means I can't watch Netflix when the baby is still awake. This is the truth of a small house.

But now, sitting on the edge of my daughter's bed, I take the opportunity to clasp my daughter's hand, to watch the baby's sweet little sleepy face, to rest for a moment instead of rushing off to whatever it was I used to rush off to. It was so important, I can't even remember what it used to be.

They both fall asleep, hard. There's even a little bit of snoring. I lay him down and cover her up. Sweet peace, at last! 

I slip downstairs thankful for the shift in my life that brought me less stuff, smaller house, and more connected to my (amazing) family.

And, Netflix. 

It's Not About Stuff Anymore

So... our 21 days is up! Do you want to know what happened - what really happened?

[Ok, good. I was hoping that you would be okay with knowing the real story, and not some made-up, fancy blogpost aimed at getting attention.]

Because, nothing. Nothing happened.

Well, not much.

I mean, yeah, we found that we didn't need a bunch of stuff that we'd stored in the basement. And we found a few things that we did need: the baby's swing, some shoes, paperwork. We haven't gotten rid of all the other stuff, even though our 21 days is up. Though I do have plans to do another yard sale soon.

But I honestly thought this would be a revelatory experience, with more freedom springing up in our lives like fresh bamboo sprouts in a Japanese forest. But really, it was just living our same ol' life, with less stuff.

So I'm starting to get to the place where this whole small house living experiment is not about the stuff anymore. It's not about the house, or the size of our house, or the amount of stuff we have or don't have anymore, or the number of things we have gotten rid of or anything like that. It's starting to be about something much more personal and sensitive and maybe even private.

Because, the whole point of my husband and I choosing to live this way - giving up our belongings, our personal space, our comfortably full-sized home and our comfort zone - has been to enjoy life more. To live better. To be independent. To experience life more fully and feel alive.

And, even after all we've done to get to this place, I don't always feel too much different than I did when I had a full closet of clothes and overstuffed bookshelves.

So I realize that now is the time that I have to start working on - not my stuff, but - me. I've shaken off some of the weights that kept me living with stress and work. And now there's a lot I need to do internally, to address my thoughts, my beliefs, my habits and my behaviors that hold me back and keep me stuck in a place where I'm stressed and dangerously burdened.

I'm reading Everything That Remains by The Minimalists, and tonight I'm struck by something else Joshua writes. It's not heady, but it has my brain in a tizzy. In chapter 8, he writes that, after an intense process of downsizing his belongings, leaving his corporate job, ditching technology and simplifying his life, he gave up his goals.

As soon as I read that, my brain went, "What?!" because I.
Am.
A.
Task.
Oriented.
Person.

This is how I live. It's how I measure myself. It's how I know I'm successful. It's how I got through school. It's how I finish my work every day. It's how I know I'm having a good day. It's PART of me.

I make lists. Even if it's not on paper, it's in my head: what I want to accomplish for the day, for the morning, for the weekend.

I like numbers. I studied math. I like their reliability. I like to quantify things. I like to compare. If 75% of my list is done, I feel much better about myself than I would if only 50% is done.

But it doesn't bring me any real contentment. If anything, it's momentary, and it lasts only long enough for me to make a new list of things to do or tasks to accomplish the next day. There's never any achieving, there's only doing.

So thanks, Joshua. Thanks a lot. Because I have no idea how to do this. I don't have any idea how I could give up this thing, this way of being, that feels so fundamentally part of myself that I don't even know if I have an identity without it. I don't know to function without goals. I've always constantly asked myself what I want to be, where I want to go, what I want to do, this year, next year, the next five years. It's just what I do.

But I realize it's getting in the way. It keeps me from relaxing and having fun with my family, the thing I keep wanting SO very, very goodly. It keeps me from getting on the floor and building blocks with my daughter. It keeps me from tickling my son's tiny big feet. It keeps me from sitting on the deck with my husband staring into the night sky. I might still be doing those things, but I'm not really there. My mind is elsewhere, thinking about the other things I need to accomplish. Even when those things are dishes. Or paperwork. Or web design. Or blogging. Or whatever.

I don't know where this is going to take me. I don't know how much of this journey I'll be able to share. I only know that I have to try and go there.

I think I am going to have to be quite diligent about this. I mean, I think I actually need to focus my attention on this. In comparison, getting rid of our stuff seemed easy. We were moving to a smaller house, so things just had to go; it was a simple matter of volume. It was like trimming my fingernails: it had to get done, and it was a relief.

But changing the way I think about my own life, and how I function in it, and how I define my success, is surgery.

Keep me in your thoughts, and please share your thoughts, especially if you are also reading Everything That Remains (as I would highly recommend you do and I don't get paid by anyone to say that). You can email me privately here.

Until I'm able to write again, peace and love. Enjoy the life you have!

The (Un)Packing Party

I posted recently (okay - today, actually) about how we rented out our house on airbnb.com for the first time last week, and I thought I might share a little more about what happened when we did.

Sorry, I'm a little excited about this!

Actually, two happenings converged together in the past week to bring me to this place.

The first: airbnb. So our house is small (as you know) and it has only one closet (as you know) and we still have a lot of stuff (as you know). In order to make our house rentable, we basically spent a day doing some last-minute fixing up (like, I painted the ceiling that's been calling my name for 6 months, and John put up the trim around the bathroom window that needed finishing).

Then we spent another day taking all our personal belongings and shoving them (yes, almost literally shoving) into the basement. All the things that would scream out "THIS HOUSE BELONGS TO SOMEONE ELSE! Someone with KIDS! Someone with PAPERWORK! Someone with TOO MUCH STUFF!" to someone trying to spend a nice, relaxing vacation in the Adirondack park.

When we left, I looked around and thought (or did I say it aloud?), "This is exactly what I'd like our house to look like."

Sigh.

Because I thought that only someone else would get to experience that freedom.

But this brings me to the second happening: a few days later, I'm reading Everything That Remains by Joshua Millburn one night when everyone decided to hit the hay earlier than me. I'm reading about Ryan Nicodemus and his extreme introduction to minimalism. He called it a Packing Party (on page 85, to be exact).

It involved packing every. Single. One of his belongings into moving boxes and stuffing them into one room of his home. Covering his furniture, his tv. As if he was moving. But instead of moving, he had 21 days during which he could take out of the boxes only those things which he truly needed. At the end of 21 days, he had to either sell, donate or trash whatever remained.

Wow! That's a heck of a way to move into minimalism.

So it's late, and my brain is processing this stuff I'm reading, and suddenly I realize: that's US! WE are going to have an (Un)Packing Party.

We already did the hard work - moving all our stuff sitting around, collecting dust, driving me nuts. It's already in the basement (our version of Ryan's moving boxes). And why just bring all of it back upstairs and clutter up our beautiful small house the moment we get back from a relaxing vacation? No, no, I am not going back there!

So I am going to celebrate every time we unpack only the things that we need. Then, I'm going to celebrate even more when we get rid of all the stuff we have that we don't need. The stuff we didn't even know we didn't need because it just kept sitting there.

Our 21 days starts today.

Join me on our journey and find out what we really need - and what we don't!

Don't Forget the Why

So I was just about to write a nice little post last week about our car downsizing experiment, and how we decided to keep two cars, and all the reasons why – where we live (rural, mountainous, with no solid public transportation, far away from THE grocery store) and how we live (running a business, with two small children), etc. We were sorting out what kind of car to buy to replace my little putt-putt. Then we drove back to the Hudson Valley to visit family. And, lo and behold, our other car died, on the day we were supposed to drive home.

It’s been six weeks now. Two (old) cars down, one (new-ish) car up. The one-car experiment continues.

What’s been on my mind lately, though, is more about why we downsize, rather than how or how much.

Because I see (especially in the tiny house movement and the minimalist movement) a push towards decluttering as some strange anti-American Dream competition, where numbering one’s possessions and obsessive downsizing have overpowered the whole purpose behind the origins of the movement. The place that Things once held is now just replaced by the-getting-rid-of-Things.

I work with data, numbers, and statistics on a Monday through Friday basis in my job in data governance. I see how taking a count – a real, numeric, quantitative count – of one’s belongings could be helpful, to set before you everything you have as one lump sum total. It could force you to see each thing individually as you give it a cardinal number. I haven’t done it yet, so I’m only surmising.

What I don’t understand or see value in is the competition (with oneself or with others) to get that number down. Is there a perfect number of Things that we’re all trying to obtain? (If there is, can someone please share?!) If I have 83 possessions, am I happier than my friend who was 87? Or if I have 207 possessions now, am I any better off than I was when I had 208?

And I can attest to the fact that decluttering feels GOOD. Really good. It literally lightens your burdens in life to get rid of things you don’t need. But I see folks for whom decluttering is their new hoarding. It fills their void. It becomes just another addiction to distract from what really is important.

But what IS important? What does freedom from Things mean?

I’m in the middle of reading Everything That Remains by The Minimalists  Joshua Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus. (P.S. I think this is a great read, no matter where on the minimalist continuum you are.) Millburn writes, “Ultimately, the purpose of embracing minimalism has to do with the benefits we each experience once we’re on the other side of decluttering. Hence, removing the clutter is not the end result; it is merely the first step…. It is possible to get rid of everything you own and still be utterly miserable.”

And: “When I got rid of the majority of my possessions, I was forced to confront my darker side, compelled to ask questions I wasn’t prepared for: When did I give so much meaning to material possessions? What is truly important in life? … Who is the person I want to become? How will I define my own success?”

These are the tougher questions that everyone on a downsizing journey runs into eventually and has to answer. For themselves.

I’ll tell you one of my answers.

This week, I’m writing from a beautiful big house in coastal Maine. We rented it on airbnb.com on a last-minute whim, sharing a vacation week with my in-laws. Because I work remotely, I can work from anywhere, so I figured why not work from coastal Maine?*

We also thought, why leave an empty house behind? So we took the leap, ran around and made some last-minute fixes, and rented out our home on airbnb. (My fingers are crossed for a good first review!)

This is one of our goals, something that has value in our lives: to be mobile, unattached to mortgage/responsibility/Things, ready and able to travel and see the world around us. It’s not like we don’t want roots. It’s more like we want to be like seaweed, with strong roots in the ocean floor below us but the ability to wander around with the waves. Because we chose a small mortgage and we live in an area where people vacation frequently, we can rent our house for a few days, cover our mortgage, and travel somewhere new without going into debt for the experience. 

This is what having fewer things, and small house living, is giving me.

For now.

Life is fluid, right? It’s good to check back in now and again because what I’m doing right now might not work for me, for my family, in five years. Or two years. Or whenever. I try to stay sensitive to the shifts in our lives and revisit what we want and how to get there as necessary.  

If you’re on a path of downsizing or sorting out what things you want to own that add value to your life, keep the end goal in mind: to add value, as you define it. 

Even if you define it from a porch swing on a summer night in Maine. 

*Though, through a series of poor circumstances, I ended up taking the week off. My husband had a (thankfully) brief hospital visit at the beginning of the week and we weren’t even sure we’d be able to make the trip. But it was his birthday, and he wanted to be by the coast (isn’t the ocean relaxing?) and I wanted him to be happy, and he said he felt up to it, so we cautiously set off from our home 6 (or was it 10?) hours away. Basically, I looked for every hospital in between there and here just in case something went wrong. Seriously, I don’t make this stuff up. Anyone with or married to someone with Crohn’s Disease probably understands. There’s some type of balance we have to strike between being safe (like, at home in a comfortable place, or near a hospital) and living life (like, going on this trip!). 

Parenting in a Small Space

[You can also find my guest blog post of this article on Hudson Valley Parent Magazine, an amazing parenting publication in print and online. I'll be writing an article for the June print issue, so be sure to pick it up!]

We used to be "normal". You know, a 1200 square foot, 2-bedroom apartment in a city, with closets and things sitting in them that we didn't use. For a family of three, this seemed just about right.

Then we started off on an adventure.

When we first called the seller to inquire about the small house we now own, he warned us: "This isn't really a full-time living space. It's pretty small for two people, but - perfect for a vacation home!" (Little did he know, we were actually a family of three!) But we liked it, so we bought it anyway.

Our daughter was about 10 months old when we closed. No way could we even think about fitting her stuff, our stuff, and ourselves into this place! It was okay, though. We weren't going to live here. We would rent it out, share it with family and friends, and enjoy our own vacations here once in awhile.

Then, thanks to a friend's post on Facebook, I stumbled across the tiny house movement. I found cute story-book houses and blog posts telling the chronicles of brave souls giving away their possessions and living with less, all to live in infinitesimally small spaces. Maybe it would be possible for us...

But the one thing I didn't find much about were families living in tiny and small houses. Individuals, absolutely. Couples, sure. But with kids? Not so much. We decided to move here full time, and I just figured that we'd have to figure it out on our own.

Since then, I've found a number of notable families that have shared their experience living small. The numbers are growing of families diving into small house living. There are definite joys: less to clean, less to buy, less to pay for, smaller mortgages and utility bills. But parenting in a small space comes with some challenges too.

Wait - parenting is always a challenge and a joy (and, sometimes, both simultaneously)! For us, we're making it happen in a small house with an open floor plan, where just about everything gets shared, all the time. Living space? Shared. Play space? Shared. Sleeping space? Shared.

Headaches? Sometimes, they're shared, too!

Discipline
Probably the hardest part of living in a small space is handling a two year old's temper tantrum. She needs a break, and I need a break, but we can't get away from each other!

We understand the power of going outside. The fresh air, the change of scenery, the temperature change, all provide a good opportunity to take a breath. During an outburst, it calms us down. But we live in the mountains, so this is not always a viable solution. When it's 10 below or raining (both of which happen frequently!), we make a point to look out the window and find something outside to focus on: a bird, the weather, the wind, a leaf.

Independence
Since we're constantly sharing space, I find it sometimes difficult to impart healthy separation to my daughter. She is always in my sight and I'm always in hers.

On the other hand, my daughter plays where I can see her, and we always get to be a part of each other's lives. When she squeals over a re-discovered book she hasn't read in months, I'm right there to share in her joy. When I'm working on a project, she gets involved. When she's about to draw on the wall with a marker, I know. In reality, her independence is stronger because I'm not worried about her getting into trouble in another room. She can explore with freedom.

I've always been a very independent person. Having a child was a huge shift for me, and I really do need my down time to recharge. So when living in a small space gets too much for me, I ask for help. My husband is great about responding to my needs, and he'll take her out so I can breath. Even a few minutes is sometimes enough.

Sleeping
Yes, we sleep in the same space: we have a sleeping loft, where one side is hers and the other is ours. Until we bought this house, I never considered that there might be any way of living other than each kid having their own bedroom, with a door, and toys and books, and a closet full of clothes, and space. When my daughter was an infant, I remember feeling so very relieved when we finally moved her to her own bedroom in our last house. Freedom! And it was great, at the time.

Now, I treasure the fact that I can hear her breathing when I wake up in the night. In the morning, I see her sleepy eyes and her amazing little smile first thing. I'm literally right there if she needs anything.

Believe it or not, she still has enough space to practice her dance moves on the carpet before she hops into bed for the night.

Privacy
This seems to keep coming up in my conversations with friends and family: Where do you go to be alone? The truth is, nowhere. I can try the bathroom, but any parent knows no toddler is going to let that happen!

Where do you have private conversations? We wait until bedtime, or go outside. Or, we spell things. It makes a two minute conversation last ten, but right now it works. I've heard pig latin works well too, and we might have until middle school before she figures that out!

Where will your kids get private space? Honestly, I'm not sure. My daughter has a reading nook with her books and a miniature rocking chair of her very own. She loves to hang out there, and it seems to make her happy. And there's no way on earth that I can fit in that rocking chair, so that space is all hers!

If one of us really needs to escape the shared environment, our sleeping loft provides some private space during the daytime Sleeping lofts: for more than just naps!

For now, our kids are small (one is two and a half, the other in utero) so living in a small space works for us. We know that, as our kids grow up and start playing in the school band, they'll probably need more space. And so will we!

We'll cross that bridge - and buy that house - when we come to it.

Financial Dieting

In my last post, I briefly mentioned my desire to get out of debt. To me, living small means more than just living in a small house. It also means spending small. And that runs in my genes! The women in my family have made this our family motto: Numquam pretium persolvere - "Never pay full price"!

When I would come home from a shopping trip, my husband John and I used to play this game (okay, I used to make him play this game!). I would hold up the item, and John had to guess how much I paid. A sweater in April with a red clearance tag? "$15?" "Nope!" "$8?" "Nope! $6.95!" (After awhile, he got smart and started seriously underbidding, like $2 for anything... but we all know that's not how you play the game!)

I also get seriously excited when I see our accounts making money. Last year we switched our investments and retirement savings from a "big box" company to a small, family-run investment advisory in Goshen, NY (10-15 Associates - whom I highly recommend). I had no idea just how much more we could be growing our assets with a good advisor! And my experience is you don't have to have a ton of capital to start, but you do have to start.

My point is, I'm passionate about being financially free.

I think I'm on my way. Our old house - also, my biggest debt - is on the market. We didn't plan to get out of debt this way, but... well, here we are! (You can read more about that shift in my last blog post.)

I'm not an economist or a financial advisor by any means, but I see financial freedom as a balance between saving more and spending less. To me, it's like losing weight. There are lots of ways to do it, but it basically comes down to either exercising more or eating less. And I'm ready to lose some financial weight!

Before I expound upon some highly developed financial plan that's probably already out there, let me point you to this blog post I found that hit close to home for me, with practical methods in just a few words. Check out The Minimalists post on Financial Freedom. I love a lot of the things these dudes have to share, and there's nothing like a little inspiration on a Tuesday night (or anytime)!

And when you're done reading, let me know what you think. What works for you? What doesn't? What tools have you used to increase your financial independence? What's the most money you ever saved on something: in a day or a week or a lifetime? What weighs you down? And, most importantly, what lifts you up?

Thanks for reading, and may we all find more financial freedom this week.

Tiny

If you still haven't seen it yet, please please please take an hour and watch the movie TINY: A Story About Living Small.

You don't have to be downsizing or living small or tiny to benefit from (or enjoy!) this movie. (Oh yeah, plus the music is great and the scenery gorgeous!) Maybe your heart won't jump as much as mine did, but I found the ideas in this movie remind me to be thoughtful about my life, how I live it and what I surround myself with.

Where did we go wrong? When did we start believing in entitlement and greed over reasonable living and using our excess to take care of one another? What are the ideas behind why we have 4,000 square foot houses in our country and big lawns that we don't use and lots and lots of stuff we don't need or even enjoy? Maybe if we can get back to that moment in history when our values shifted, we can start to repair the damage that's been done to our society by us hording our overabundance.

Fine, those are my big questions. But ideology aside - what's important right here, right now, for me (and, I argue, for you too) is how do I live my life differently? How do I use what I have (not just my possessions but my time, my strengths, my energy) to benefit others? How do I make my life bigger than just me? How do I raise my kids to live like this (and better) too?

I don't have all the answers. I have some ideas for myself. We've given away probably a third of our belongings (and more to come, hopefully!). We've tried to be resourceful in how we build - reusing and repurposing materials wherever we can. We've tried our best to open our home to others to come enjoy the beauty of the mountains and the fresh air of the Adirondacks. We want our home to reflect the peace and awe of the natural lands around us and be a respite from busy lives for friends, family and others. It's our house, but we didn't buy it just for us.

But I know there's more. There are other ways and better ways to do this living small thing!

I'd love to hear ways you have come up with to live small, whether for you that means physically downsizing your belongings or your home, or living with less or sharing more, or ways you've developed that keep you from expanding unnecessarily. I encourage you to share one thing you did today that helped you live small.

Maybe you'll be inspired while watching Tiny!