It's happening again...3 years in and I'm getting itchy feet.
No I'm not about to trade Jon in for a newer model (who has the energy for that, these days?!) ... it's my house that I'm getting bored with!
I don't know what it is about me and homes...but I definitely seem to get a 3 year itch!
It's always the same story, I found our "dream house"...we move in, I'm in love with it for about a year...then slowly I start getting bored with it. And by the 3 year mark, I want out! A fresh start, fresh space to work with.
This has happened pretty much ever since I moved out of my family home...infact this is the 5th home I've lived in over the past 10 years. Jon insists that I have gypsy blood, and maybe he's right!
When we moved into this house, I was convinced it was PERFECT for us....it's a stones throw from several beaches, we can see the sea from our back windows, it has TONS of storage space with a huge cellar and a big garage as well as a loft and tons of cupboard space inside too (something that's really important for us as we hoard a lot of stuff!), and the rooms are a decent size...there's even an outside back yard area from the kids to play in and I loved the bay windows and the palm tree in our front yard too.
But things change...when we moved to this house we had one small toddler.
Now, with 3 children living here, it feels like we've outgrown the house...and there are things I really want in a home that we just don't have here.
So what would my dream home for our family look like?
Here are my must-haves:
1) A proper back garden
The one we have now is fine, yes it's artificial grass but to be honest that suits me fine as its easy to keep clean, it doesn't require any upkeep whatsoever (no mowing! And no need to own a pricey and difficult to store lawn mower!) and it's nice for the kids to play in too...it doesn't get muddy and water logged, it doesn't tend to attract as many bugs as real grass either.
But the only problem is that the garden isn't on the same ground level as the house. We have to walk down a flight of stairs to get to it, and I want somewhere that I can just open the doors and let the kids go outside to play without me having to carry them up and down...somewhere I can sit inside with a cup of tea and watch them play as they get older. We can't do that here.
2) An extra bedroom
Right now we have 3 bedrooms, meaning that Tyne & Noah are sharing. We may decide to have a fourth baby one day, and I'm just not sure how that would work here. Although the owners achieved it apparently as their own 4 children grew up here...but in an ideal world, I'd like a fourth bedroom!
3) Great natural light!
Any blogger will tell you how important this is! Right now our palm tree obscures the light in our living room, so the only light room in the house is our bedroom...and even that isn't perfect!
I'd love our next house to have big windows letting in tons of natural light.
4) A conservatory
My sister and my mom both have conservatories which they use as playrooms and this would be IDEAL for us. We used to use our back room as a playspace for the boys and a space to keep all of those large gaudy toys that grandparents have a tendency to buy, but once the boys got older we decided we needed to have a dining table - so now the back room is a dining room and our playroom/toy storage space is gone! We really could use a house with a room spare, or one with a kitchen large enough for a dining table at least.
5) A better sea view
Yes I know I'm being spoiled, any sea view is fantastic and we're lucky to have one...but I want to be closer to the sea...I want to be able to see it from the living room windows, not just the back windows!
6) A dedicated parking space
Although we have a garage, it's an awkward position and we can't get our car into it so we just use it for storage - instead we have to park on the street which isn't always possible as the neighbours park there too, so our next house needs to have a drive or a garage we can actually park in!
Maybe I'm asking too much, I'd be very surprised if we managed to find anything that ticked off all these boxes at once...but you never know, right?! I'll be keeping my eyes focused on the rentals section of our local paper...whether Jon likes it or not! ;)
What would your dream home look like? I'd love to hear from you!
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