Life By Kristen

A Decade of Home Ownership

Today marks ten years of owning my home!

So much of life has changed in these 10 years: when I bought the house, I was young and in love, about to get engaged, and ready to start my life with someone. 10 years later, I have a significant other who has truly showed me the meaning of partnership and love, and we’re about to embark on a new chapter of our life together and expand our family. In a decade of living the house has seen a lot of life go through it and as the saying goes “if only the walls could talk.”

This image is taken from Google Streetview which apparently made its way through our neighborhood sometime last summer because the hosta plants on the front left are gone now ( in an effort to get rid of some invasive weeds, we killed them which is saying a lot for a hearty plant like hostas). The evergreen that I bought 10 years ago to cover up my gas meter on the front of my house grew pretty close to the house and rather tall so Q lopped off the top of it this past fall. It’s always funny to me to look at progression of trees and shrubs in pictures over the years to see how quickly things grow that you look at every day, but don’t ever really see their growth. That little evergreen was one of the first purchases for the house with my then-fiance/now ex-husband from Lowe’s (funny how we remember little details like that too!)

And of course, in 10 years, there have been numerous frustrations (a fire in the lot next door where we feared we would lost our house), lots of painting (fences, ceilings, walls), and various upgrades, but for the most part our little house has remained the same, a happy place for me during both the rough and happy moments of life. It’s not perfect- it’s 1930s bungalow style layout is limited with one tiny bathroom and 2 bedrooms, it’s close to the main road and can be loud, and we don’t love living in the town I grew up in as much as I used to (though to be fair, I never thought I’d stay, but things happen in life and you go with it).

It’ll always be the place where I learned who I was and took a stand for my own life in getting a divorce. It’s the place where Q told me he loved me for the first time, and where we’ll bring our little boy home to in June. It’s not our forever home, but it’ll always be my first house and a huge part of my life.