How much space do I actually need?

I was originally looking for patterns (just looking...), when I not only found paprika patterns (if you like sewing, look at the jasper jumper and the jade skirt, great stuff!) but also discovered that Lisa is sharing in her blog details and thoughts about her life. Not only did they spend time as travellers and had a proper look around Europe, they have settled in a yurt. Yes. A Yurt. How brilliant is that? (link) It's a super efficient 1 "room" house. I love it!


If you don't know what a yurt is -> here's the link to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yurt

Personally I don't think I would want to live in a yurt, although I greatly admire them. But we have been thinking about settling down for good in the past year, and of course you have to decide on where and how and how big and all that. Usually people seem to go for the biggest available. We don't want the biggest available because we really want to stay in that place until we are so old we can't remember how old we are, so it has to be big enough for four people now but also small enough for 2 old folks. No weird corners, steps, space for a wheelchair (you never know...). We did insist on one luxury: a garden. We are living in warm, nearly mediteranean climates, half of the year a garden will be a room of its own. It's great for children, evening meals in the sun, building a snowman and growing strawberries. I've lived for the past 16 years without a garden and I long for green and outside sitting. I admit, I wasn't missing it as a mid-twenty-year-old-student, but I'm getting older too! ;)

In my blogpost on our parental time I was writing about average house sizes and garden sizes in Germany. (45m2 per person house/flat size, 400m2 average garden size, 50% have a garden). But average is just a number, it doesn't mean anything really. What means something is what you are happy with. For us that means a 113m2 ground floor flat and 170m2 garden is absolute luxury.

So we will be moving into a sub-average sized flat, with a sub average-sized garden. In a village. But it has absolutely everything we need. I don't want to spend my life tidying up a huge house and keeping up a huge garden. And I don't want to cripple myself (and my family) with a huge mortgage that keeps me up in the night. If I want a vast view, I climb on a mountain. And while we are on the sub-average size item: I am just nearly 5'3" tall. That's also sub-average. But I prefer to call it travel-size. :)

On a side note, I would like to mention: I've not always thought like this. I grew up in a small town, but in a big house. With rooms that weren't used but for decoration. And stuff everywhere. EVERYWHERE! With a huge garden, huge like a football field. No joke. And as a child, I always thought, that's normal, that's what you've got to aspire to. That's sort of what I would be living in. Because that's normal. Of course, even if I could work 72 hours per day and my husband too, we wouldn't be able to afford a huge place like that ever. And although it's a lovely house and it's great to have so much space around you, I think to live in a big place like that wouldn't make me happy. I love simple, efficient ways as much as I like space. And I know that a smaller place with structure will make me happier than a huge house stuffed with furniture and stuff. Or a huge empty place. After all I can't  be everywhere at the same time. And I am not the kind of person that is walking around their own house in self-admiration. I don't do decorative space. I don't really do "decorative" much any more either. So I think, considering all the facts, it's absolutely ideal for us. :)