Making the move from ‘downsized’ to ‘right-sized’
“You’re moving from the Happy Yellow House?!” The emails stream in daily with variations of the same question, all bearing a “how-could-you?” tone. People I barely know stop me at church to ask, “Why?” It’s a valid question. I love that house. It rescued me. How could I walk away?
You deserve an explanation, especially those of you who have been riding shotgun with me as I moved from Colorado to Florida seven years ago, left a beautiful home and a failing marriage, became a renter bouncing through a half-dozen places that I staged and briefly called home, then met DC, who stabilized me like the anchor on the Queen Mary. We fell in love and together bought the Happy Yellow House.
I also fell in love with it. That’s where DC proposed, in the kitchen on the day we closed, and where we started our happily-ever-after married life together — at which point, all of you breathed a sigh of relief that the fairy tale ended happily, and I had finally settled down.
And now two short years later, I up and move! What happened? The short answer is: We undershot it. The Happy Yellow House was ideal for two empty nesters or a small family. We eagerly moved in, then this happened: Our family grew.
DC and I did not plan for the fact that our combined family of five grown children, sprawling across four states from Florida to California, would multiply and come back. Now each has a significant other, and the two married ones have had the audacity to create more humans.
Now, they all want to visit, sometimes all at once, and stay awhile. Frankly, I wanted a home that would be the gathering place for all of that. In March, I sold my old home in Colorado, bringing in real estate income that made a little more house a possibility.
We made some discoveries after living together. You don’t know what it’s like to live with someone until you do that. Much as DC and I love our together time, we have separate interests that need space and walls. I need a room to write, preferably not the same one he’s using to watch the Steelers game. He needs room to play his electric guitar.
So that is why last spring we cautiously started looking at houses that had a little more elbow room and a little more yard, in the same wonderful neighborhood as the Happy Yellow House and in our price range. Then, one afternoon in late July, DC came home with eyes like candle flames. He’d been to see a house, also yellow, just around the corner. “It checks all the boxes,” he said.
The Happier Yellow House offered more bedrooms, a bigger kitchen, an office for me, a man cave for DC, and a yard for our dogs, Peapod and Pippin the Puddinhead. Because it needed a makeover — updated flooring, wall color, window coverings, light fixtures, all areas I can tackle — its price fell within our means.
And here we are. I know what you’re thinking: “Isn’t she the one who wrote the book ‘Downsizing the Family Home’?” That is also a valid question, so let me say for the record, I am not all about living smaller. I am about living better. I don’t advocate for downsizing. I advocate for right-sizing, for having exactly as much house as you need, and no more.
Downsizing stuff and downsizing space are not the same. Downsizing means living lighter, not necessarily smaller. It’s about constantly pruning and weeding your belongings, as if tending a garden to make room for new growth. Location is important, but fit is more important.
As households expand or contract through marriage or divorce, kids coming or going, what you need in a home changes. Don’t force your life to fit your home. Instead, if you can swing it, find a home that fits your life. Do not buy more house than you can afford to furnish. I have been there. It’s torture. Big under-decorated houses seem sad. Better to have a small house that you can turn into a jewel box.
Do not be a storage facility for your children or parents. If your kids have moved out, and you still have the vestiges of their youth, put them aside. Have the kids go through the stuff next them they visit, or over Skype, and choose to take or toss the contents. Similarly, those who have aging or deceased parents are not responsible for being the family museum. Evolve.