It's Alright to Be Little Bitty: Living in Small Spaces

There are a lot of things in life that are relative.  The size of your home is one of them.  In a previous post I mentioned some advice given by an interior decorator at a MOPS meeting.  She said that your home is like your wedding ring.  There will always be someone with a bigger, nicer one than yours, and there will always be someone with a smaller, cheaper one than yours.  It is just a fact of life, and the sooner you can find contentment with exactly what you have, the happier you will be.  That said, I realize that some might read this post and shake their heads a bit, but I'm going to write it anyway.  

We live in a little bitty rental house right now.  When we moved last summer, we not only added a person to our family, but we also decreased our square footage.  Currently, our little family of four and our 65 pound energetic dog are living in approximately 800 square feet.  (There's the part where my NYC friends laugh because that probably sounds like a lot of space to you!)  

I won't necessarily say that our house is too small, because we are definitely making it work.  Somehow the home managed to carve out three tiny bedrooms, so having a small space for each of us seems to help the feel of things.  We also have a garage and attic for storage and a large back yard.  Upon moving in, we promptly put the majority of our seasonal, sentimental, decorative, and otherwise non-essential items in the attic and garage.  I haven't done a whole lot of decorating in this place, partially because we will probably only live here for about a year and partially because the place is so small that there are only so many places to put things!  

If everything is in its place and the children are both asleep, all is well, but anyone who has ever been around a small child knows that a wee one can spin a tornado of stuff through a house in no time flat.  It is in those moments when I literally cannot walk through my home without stepping on something, or when a new item comes into the house and there is literally no where to put it, that I begin to struggle with frustration and contentment.  

There are quite a few perks to our little bitty space.  I can clean it in no time.  I can hear my children (or notice their silence, which is always concerning!) in any room of the house and usually guess what they are up to and whether or not I am needed.  The rent is super affordable.  Jonathan has a two minute commute.  I have a better idea of what things are essential in my home (I'm sure I will be doing a massive purge when we move again and go through all of those things that have been in storage!).  I know I will miss this simple time in our lives.   

But the biggest blessing of this little bitty home?  God has been revealing how much I have idolized the idea of a pretty home in a pretty neighborhood with pretty things.  In this Pinterest-crazed world, it is easy for my standard of normalcy to get nudged upward bit by bit, ever so subtly.  Contentment is conversely shoved downward and suddenly my expectations are distorted so beyond reality that I can hardly see straight.  Those entitlements and the grumblings of my heart against unmet expectations are sin, straight up, and they say that what God has provided for me in his grace is not good enough, big enough, pretty enough, cushy enough for my needs.  Yuck.  

Lord willing, we will someday buy a bigger home with space for two growing boys and their rowdy dog.  But God has been pressing on my heart that if I can't be content in this little space with his abundant blessings then I will not be content anywhere.  The choice to be content, and to go beyond contentment to gratitude and praise, can often be an hourly struggle for me.  But I am so thankful for the gut check brought by our time in this little house, and for a God who reveals the ugly areas of our hearts that we have failed to surrender, changing us through his power for his glory.   

I have a few practical tips that I have learned from living in a small space and downsizing our belongings by almost half.  I'll write a follow-up post on that soon, and will try to take some pictures to go along with it.