if I had to narrow down to one reason why we chose to flip our life upside down and live in as small of a house as we possibly could...building the barn of our dreams would be a top contender.
well, honestly, on our first date, after a couple of Long Island iced teas, Bob and I decided that we'd like to live on a lake one day...so that would probably be the actual reason to our current situation. but the barn of our dreams is immediately after that.
after moving + downsizing in to our home in April 2023, it took a bit for me to find the motivation and energy necessary to design and build a barn. I was mentally and physically exhausted from the move and emotionally worn down from navigating life transitions in every single one of my relationships. but once I started working at a local family farm it poured all the inspiration and motivation I needed. the barn started consuming my brain and I knew we were back on track.
the biggest struggle in designing the barn of our dreams
one of the biggest struggles in designing the barn of our dreams is getting to something that feels good to both me and Bob...who have two very different ways of looking at things. Bob is the numbers, realistic side, based in facts and focused on practical, here and now elements with little ability to visualize. no surprise, I'm all into the aesthetics, idealistic, pick and choose what facts and numbers I like, I love planning for the future and can visualize pretty well.
turns out, 10+ years of being together, we're [still] learning a lot about how to communicate our wants with having as little arguments as possible. it's interesting but I guess zero arguments would be boring ??
we've been 'communicating' on the overall size, layout, location of where the barn will be built on our property and deciding which 'wants' can wait to be added in the future. I went deep into Pinterest barn world for images and chatted with my dad who's had a couple of barns built. we also toured a handful of barns built by our builder and I think we've narrowed it down.
here's some inspo barns that each have certain elements that had me drooling...
prepping for the barn of our dreams
while my excitement comes from designing and planning and dreaming, Bob didn't get really excited about things until he started clearing the property of where the barn might go. of course he didn't do it alone, forrest was there to help...
our planned spot for the barn and driveway looking at the property from the road and Bob's hard work of clearing the field to get a better sense of size and location.
forrest helping...
narrowed in on the barn of our dreams
we're looking at building a 40' x 80' barn with 16' ceilings and radiant heat floors. overhead doors, probably on each end of the 80' length. we want to have a lean-to on the right side for a covered patio and then part of that lean-to will be enclosed for a future temperature controlled hangout.
now that these basic decision are narrowed down we get to do all of the fun things like getting an address so that we can have a driveway installed to have electricity and water installed and to have our builder get back to the barn. it seems like it might be happening!!
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