The first week of December we moved into our new homestead. It is located in a rural area near Eatonville, WA (south of Tacoma, west of Mt. Rainier). The property is 5-acres; flat, usable, fully fenced, about 1/3 moderately forested, and 2/3 overgrown meadow-ish. The house is 40 years old, structurally well built, with several additions/remodels, about 2400 square feet. There are two outbuildings: a large three-car detached garage (about 1200 square feet) right next to the house, and a one-story 1800 square foot barn, about 40 yards east of the house.

It was a long road getting here, as discussed in my previous posts Buying Our Homestead: The Saga (9/20/13),  We’re Trying to Buy a Homestead! (5/2/13), and Goals For 2013. Long story summarized: We wrote a contract on a short sale house January 2013, it went back and forth and up and down between the bank (Bank of America) and lender and finally closed in November (after almost falling apart multiple times).

We immediately undertook a relatively large remodeling project involving the bedrooms and what was to become Sarah’s office (our ‘Phase 1’ remodel, we’ve defined four phases that will be done over the next few years). At that time we also bought another dog (for a total of three), four goats, and eleven young hens. We moved my 19 y/o son, Ryan, out to the property to provide security and care for the animals.

Sarah and I moved out here the first week of December. Since that time we’ve finished most of our Phase 1; recently completing painting, hard wood flooring, trim work, and replacing many of the lighting fixtures. We did most of the work ourselves, with the help of skilled friends (thank you!) — though we did contract drywall. Ryan has been invaluable, and the girls help every time they are out here (they live about 15 miles away with their mother).

In addition to the house we’ve worked a lot in the garage (two of three cars can now be parked inside), and some in the barn. We’ve completed a lot around the property: cleaning up, securing the fence, and clearing areas out. We’re beginning to get it ready for the summer gardening season. We also added six barn cats.

We’re very happy with our place! Sarah gave me a big hug, Christmas day, and said she knew this was hard — and at times would be a pain in the ass — but she was very glad we were doing it, and loved that we were creating our own home together.