Hello. My name is Samantha and I have an addiction.
I’m addicted to Pinterest.
Guys, have you been on this site? You have, right? Oh man. The things you can do with stuff you thought you were going to throw away! Or the stuff you found on the curb! I love it all, and take turns being engrossed in my favorite sections – humor, kids, etc. Christmas this year is going to be intense – the recipes, the crafts, the presents, the decorations! Oh my!
But my current addiction, the section I can’t stop ogling and drooling over, the section that I spend hours plotting how I can have it all…is the home section.
The kitchens, the backyards, the kid’s room, the libraries, all of it. I WANT IT ALL. And it’s so very fun to look and pin things and think, ah, when we own a house (which is actually the name of my ‘home board,’ but I digress) then…THEN I can have all of this.
Then, my kitchen will be enormous with so much storage space and so many counter tops! Then I will have, at the very least, a reading corner with a big cushy seat next to a window with space for all my books. Then, we will have a shower that my husband does not have to hunch to fit under! Then. Then we will have it all. It’s very exciting.
But then a daughter needs me, and I have to get back to the real world, and the real house we rent right now, with the too small kitchen, the horrible storage space, and the lack of back yard, and I get frustrated. Frustrated with the now.
Because when is then? WHEN will we own a house? Caleb wants to buy a house the next place we are stationed. I’m hesitant. Because we can’t guarantee being able to sell the house when we move again, and I don’t want to be a landlord. I have too many friends who have dealt with crappy renters who ruin the house far beyond what the security deposit will cover. Houses with walls missing, with carpet shredded, with bugs, stains, permanent damage. Not doing it.
Although, that might actually be better than the friends who have dealt with paying for two houses because they can’t even find renters. That is a lot of extra, unnecessary stress that I do not want.
Still…I want to own a house. I want a place where I can paint the walls, and change the carpet, and demolish the stupid ugly cabinets. (Can you tell how I feel about my current kitchen??)
I have actually gotten (irrationally, I fully admit) jealous when friends talk about their houses. Especially when they complain about home ownership. Granted, paying to fix the broken heater or a flooded basement sounds miserable, but still. I want to own a house.
I think it’s so bad right now because my friends keep having babies and I keep seeing the cute things they are doing to the nurseries. I always assumed when I had a baby, I’d paint the nursery. But we can’t paint here. So…both girls’ rooms are white. I hate white walls.
Thankfully, this set of landlords doesn’t mind nail holes (though I’m pretty sure we’d hang even if they did…no way can I do white walls AND nothing hanging on them. I’d go insane!) so we have plenty of stuff hanging in every room. That helps. But every time I go in to Madelyn’s plain white nursery, or Cailin’s stark white room, I am reminded that this is not my house.
Caleb and I play this game called “If We Owned the Zoo.” Every house, we take turns deciding what we’d change if we owned the house. I won’t even start with the list for this house. Let’s just say it’s as long as Madelyn. I’ve gotten so excited about owning a home, we do it at friend’s houses, vacation homes, places we pass on the street. Caleb isn’t as excited about it as I am, but he’s a patient man so he plays along.
I suppose the bright side is that when we do finally settle down – whenever that is – I will know exactly what I want in my forever home.
You can find it all on my Pinterest board. (@mimi320)
(You can follow Military Spouse Magazine on Pinterest @MilSpouseMag)