Building and Bewildered

So overwhelmed!

We are in a crazy spot in life. The Lord seems to be leading us to a blessed place of building a new house that will accommodate our homeschooling lifestyle more easily. And for that, we are so grateful. 

Here are some "progress" pics, although we haven't actually started yet. 

This is shot from a mostly center point at the very front of the lot.  One large Red Oak stands on this lot, and there will be great pains taken to preserve it.  There is also a pond (they call it a "lake", but it's a VERY small "lake") at the back of the property.  It's a triangular shaped lot, with the larger "base" of the triangle at the front of the property.

It's really hard to see, but Jmk staked out approximately where the house will go, and he and the kids are standing at those four corners.  

But what is overwhelming me right now is the selling process.  We have a house now, and we gotta sell it!  We're preparing the house now to put it on the market - and there seems to be so, SO much to do. Praise God, it's nothing important. The roof is new. The HVAC system is new. We don't have any major repairs that need to be made. But, it's the STUFF. 

So. Much. Stuff. We have to move a lot of Stuff out of the house just so potential buyers can better see the space and the layout. We've had to move tons of school things into storage, because most people can't understand the homeschooling lifestyle. They don't really "get" the fact that this nice, open dining room really can't be a dining room. We need bookshelves and toy boxes and places for posters and globes. 

So, our school is all packed into a storage room, keeping only the very basic basics here, so that the dining room can be a dining room again.  We have stored toys upon toys and some extra furniture and just a whole bunch of STUFF.  Stuff, quite frankly, that we can obviously live without since we seem to be still living and breathing with it all sitting in a storage room.  

WHY do we keep so much stuff in our homes?  It's really unsettling to me.  A dear church sister reminded me recently that we're just "pilgrims and sojourners"; we really don't need to be quite so tied to this life and the STUFF that's in it.  But, I know that when we make the move into the new house, Lord willing, I'll start opening boxes and bags and putting things away and I'll give in to the unwieldy sentimentality and will KEEP all that stuff that I have lived just fine without for months.  No matter how many times I tell myself that I won't do it, I will.

::exhale::  Maybe.  

Maybe I'll come to a place of reason by then.  Maybe I'll realize that while my kids appreciate seeing my old pom-poms from high school (and actually had fun playing with them), do they really care about that old laquered jewelry box that I don't actually use anymore but reminds me of my "growing up" days?  No.  They don't.  And they shouldn't.  It doesn't relate to anything specific, it has no monetary value, and it doesn't evoke any memories for them.  It doesn't even evoke specific memories for me.  It's just from a time period.  Well, by george, there are plenty of things I've stuffed in the storage room that can remind me of that time period.  I don't need ALL of them.  And I don't need to take all of them, put them on the floor of my closet again, and never see them until I'm searching for a wayward flip-flop.  Seriously.  Come on. 

I'm just unsettled right now.  Our wonderful home doesn't feel as much like our home right now, because we're having to look at it through a potential buyer's eyes, which is a necessary part of being in real estate.  But, it's unsettling to have that "not really yours" feeling about the place where you live, even though it IS yours.  I wonder how the kids are dealing with it?  Surely they aren't able to take any weird feelings they may be feeling and actually put a name to them.  So, are they just ignoring it?  Or do they feel the weirdness too?

Selling a house is tough, and we haven't even actually listed it yet!  And, knowing that we are so overburdened with so much STUFF sitting in a storage room gives me a different, but equally weird, unsettled feeling.  Why so much? What is it about our lifestyle or choices or manner of living that draws us to the need to to accumulate things?  Not all of us have that urge; some of us are more bitten by this frustrating bug.

Well, I'll just have to Scarlett O'Hara these thoughts for now.  I'll go ahead and get some supper started and let it go.  Until I take the next load of stuff to the storage room.  And, then, I'll get that icko feeling again.  The Lord is working on me, I suspect.  At least, I pray that He is.  I certainly do not want to be left alone without His lessons!

For those reading who may know of someone looking for a house, we have a website set up for early lookers before we actually officially put it on the market.  The website is our current street address (dot) blogspot (dot) com.  We would gratefully accept any and all help to sell this home!