Our Lexar Home Journey blog

About a month and a half ago my husband called me from work and dropped a bomb on me.
"Let's build a house".  Or maybe what he said was more like "You know how we had decided to stay in this house awhile longer, what if we just built a new house now instead?"

I was floored, to say the least.  First let me tell you why.

Our wonderful, cozy home!

We currently live in a double wide manufactured home on 20 acres.  It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bath home that we had placed out here in 1998.  In 1998 we had no kids and the house was plenty big enough for us.  Fast forward to 2011 when I'm pregnant with our 5th child.  We already had 2 girls sharing a room, and 2 boys sharing a room- and we were managing just fine.  Of course having a little extra space would be nice, but it wasn't necessary.  We always had the mind set that our little house kept us close as a family, so getting into a bigger house was a want, not a need.  But we thought we'd try selling our house anyway (the house and shop on our 20 acres), and build a house next door on a separate 20 acres that we already owned.  
So that's what we decided to do in 2011, we put our house on the market and waited, and waited, and waited.  We had a lot of interest, but no offers.  This wasn't the best time to sell, the housing market wasn't great, but we thought we would try anyway.  We had our house on the market for that entire spring and summer without any offers.  We dropped the price during that time, had a lot of interest but no offers.  I was pretty discouraged.  We took our house off the market at the end of summer.
The next spring we did it again, and the spring after that too.
For three years we had our house on the market during the spring and summer months.  No offers.
Yes, we have a manufactured home and you may think that was the problem, but I don't know about that.  It's a nice home, we've updated things inside, we've landscaped over the years, we have a spectacular view of Mt Adams, it's in a great school district, we have a huge shop as well, the list could go on.

So why wasn't it selling??
I truly believe now that it was not in God's plan for us.  He had other plans.

The last summer we had our house on the market, I actually didn't want to put it on the market.  I was tired of trying, and the more I thought about it the more I realized I did not want to move off the land we were on.  You have to understand that when we first bought our 40 acres there was absolutely nothing here.  Not one tree, not one bush, nothing.  Since we moved on the property we have worked our tails off getting trees, working on landscaping, etc. 

I love it here! 

Our amazing front yard with the beautiful Mt. view!

The yard is perfect and big, enough space for all our kids to run around it.  We have huge trees now, the trees we planted 15 years ago tower over us now, and over the house as well.  We have lots of green grass that was once just a field of alfalfa.  The kids have their play set, their trampoline, the huge shop that they can ride bikes and scooters in, we have an awesome drive way for bike riding and basketball.  If we were to move next door on the bare 20 acres we would have none of that.  No green grass, no yard, no trees, no shop, nothing.
So I wasn't excited to try and sell again, and luckily we didn't.  Another summer and no offers on our house, even with repeated drops in price.  
God knew!
Two years ago was the first year we didn't put our house on the market, for once I enjoyed my spring and summer, I wasn't stressed about keeping our house picture-perfect clean 24/7.  It was nice.
We came to terms with living in the house forever (or at least for quite awhile).
I was okay with what we had, actually I was thankful for what we had.
Oh sure it would've been nice to get into something bigger, now 3 boys were in one room, but we made it work.   We continued to do some updates in our house, we re-did our kitchen cabinets, we replaced carpeting, added laminate flooring, painted and redecorated.

We were happy.

Then my husband dropped the bomb.
I'm thinking to myself, "where is this coming from??"  I thought we had decided to stay where we're at?  We had some bigger projects on our list, and had made some decisions about getting our mortgage paid off within the next 8 years or so.  So why was he thinking about building a new home now?  But my husband had a different plan this time.
He wanted to build the house on the same 20 acres that we are on now instead of the 20 acres next to us.  We would still have the yard, the shop, everything.

We prayed.
We wanted to do what was right.

This is where we'll have the new home built, right where we park our cars,
directly in front of our current home and next to our shop.

This is the model Lexar home in Kennewick, WA.
The same house that we've chosen to build.

And now here we are, in the early stages of getting a Lexar home built.  And when I say early stages, I mean early stages.
But it's exciting, really exciting.
It's funny how plans can change when it's God's perfect timing.  Our timing wasn't right, but God's is always right.
He's always right!

My next post I'll explain what stage we're in (I tell you it's early), but I'll chronicle the stages which will be helpful to anyone else thinking about doing this same thing.

Summertime routine for your kids

Summertime means saying Goodbye to a routine for some.  Even in our home I allowed our routine to go by the wayside for the first few weeks of summer vacation.  But Alas- our routine is being reinstated, the reason??  Chaos, utter chaos rules and reigns in our home when there is a lack of routine.

One morning two weeks ago, after having my quiet time and feeling guilty for the chaos around the house lately, I decided to write out a summertime routine.  We followed (fairly closely) the routine for the day and guess what?  Less chaos!  I am now going to be following a routine for the rest of the summer.  I don't want to be so very strict to this routine that spontaneity is not allowed.  I do welcome some spontaneous changes if the day calls for it, but while at home I do plan on sticking with the following routine:

6:30am-   wake up in time to say goodbye to husband as he goes off to work
7:00am-   quiet time for prayer, Bible reading, and verse memorization
7:45am-   start breakfast for children (they love oatmeal with brown sugar and maple syrup)
8:00am-   wake up children, if not already awake
8:30am-   after breakfast, children to brush teeth, make beds and straighten rooms if needed, and get dressed
9:00am-   Bible time with children:  Bible story or passage, verse memorization, prayer request list (children to each pray for one prayer request)  At the end of this time remind children of house rules and consequences (for my young children when they are reminded daily they are more apt to follow the rules)
9:30am-   chore time for each child
10:00am-  Buddy time (I have 4 children, 2 boys and 2 girls, so each day they will have a different buddy, during this time they pick one or two board games and play together- I believe this helps them to learn to play nicely with each sibling and not to have favorites)
10:30am-  play outside if nice- riding bikes, playing on swing set, etc.  If it's raining or too cold to play outside then I have a bowl with a different activity on separate slips of paper, every 15-20 minutes we pick from the bowl and do a different activity.
11:30am-  quick clean-up if needed in the house, or clean up outside toys
12:00pm-  lunch, then clean up dishes and table, and brush teeth
12:30pm-  story time on couch, short storybooks for all the kids
1:00pm-   nap time for the two youngest, reading time for the two oldest (they are to read quietly from a chapter book)
1:30pm-  quiet time for the two oldest while the other two are napping

I'll stop there for now, it's a bit harder to stick to an afternoon/evening routine because my husband gets home around 3:30-4:00pm and we go with the flow when he's home.  He likes to let them ride their 4-wheelers/motorcycles, or they work around the house/farm with him, or just play outside.

So this routine is when we plan on being home for the day.  I do have things planned during the summer that will take us away from the house, and I'll talk about those fun outings later.

Do any other ladies follow a routine during the summer?  What works for your family, and what doesn't? 
I'm interested in hearing!