Small homes....how do you make it work?

[blessedx5]

I know there are lots of families who live in small homes. While ours isn't super small it feels it sometimes. We are a family of 5... have 1400 sq ft home....3 bedrooms, NO dining room, only a eat in kitchen, LR, bathrooms. No basement, NO bonus room, NO garage.....no extra room for storage so I have everything stuck here and there.

 

Curious what size home you have, family size and things you do to make it work without feeling so cramped and cluttered?

 

Debbie

[Sasharowan]

1380 sq. ft. with 6 of us. We have a dining room, living room, kitchen, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths. Things we have done: Shelves along the tops of walls. Turned coat closet into shelves for games, puzzles, crafts, etc. pruned toys (need to do that again). built floor to ceiling shelves with built in desks on dining room walls. Each child has a desk to keep their school stuff in and where they can work. We also have wooden tv trays that they can use to work in bedrooms or living room if they choose. bunk beds for kids. Store Christmas stuff at Grandma's. Took all DVD's and CD's out of cases and put them into notebooks. Stuff things into every available corner.

[Scuff]

We have 860 sq ft, but with a basement we probably have the same space as you. No garage, no closets, but in the bedrooms. It takes a lot of creativity and a lot of decluttering, but we make it work.

 

Keep only what you love or need, little else. In the kitchen this means we only have so many dishes and extras. Things have to earn their place through actual use. Which means I gave away my kitchenaid mixer :( But I only have so much counter space and it was too heavy to move around. I found that I only used it a few times a year and could get away with using a regular hand mixer. Ikea has nifty hooks that go on a bar by the stove. So I hang up all my utensils. And I have a small bucket on the counter for things that can't hang. This frees up drawer space and I LOVE having everything right there when I cook.

 

To free up bedroom space I put the girls' dresser and closet in the untility/laundry room. That may not work without a basement, though. And cutting down on keepsakes is huge. We each have one tote in the storage room and that's all you get. It has to fit in there.

 

Maybe others will have good ideas for you, too. We really utilize our basement. And I rearrange and declutter a lot to make it work. You have to be creative. And use your vertical space. Shelves are great. And think about what you really, truely need to have in your house. The plus side is that having a small house keeps you clean. I think with a bigger house it would have been easy for DH and I to have created a much bigger mess to dig out of. A good book that helped me come up with ideas is "Organizing for your Brain-Type". It's not necessarily for small spaces, but it does get the juice flowing.

[Rebecca VA]

I would love to live in a smaller house. Ours is average-sized (two floors and a finished-off basement), but it feels huge to me. When we moved here ten years ago, I felt that I would never be able to buy enough furniture to fill it up. It wore me out just to clean it.

 

Ten years on, I still dislike having this much space. We have rooms that never get used. We have *stuff* that we never use and have actually forgotten that we even have, but we keep it around because we have room for it and it would be wasteful to get rid of it. It's still not fun to clean all these rooms.

 

I would trade a well-laid out small house for a larger house any day! The grass isn't always greener on the other side!

[TammyinTN]

We are a family of 4 plus a dog in 1080 sq feet apartment. The only way to make this work is to stay on top of the clutter that comes in. Everyday we clean up before evening and this makes it manageable. We have two storage rooms in the attic that we store our decorations and clothes when we swap seasons. That really helps. Basically I'm always purging stuff we don't need.

[Nicole M]

There are four of us in 1200 square feet. I turned our 8 x 13 "dining room" into a school room. My oldest son has a desk that opens up and has shelves above to store all his school supplies. Under the window, I have one of those long dining room cupboards (buffet? credenza?) where I store science and art supplies and paper. In this tiny room I also have large bookshelves, a round table where my youngest and I do our work, and other small pieces of furniture.

 

I turned the living room into a dining room. The piano is in there as well, and you enter that room from the front door. A little awkward, but it is more spacious than the real dining room. We have a 13 x 13 addition that has a couch and we call it the library -- it adjoins the school room.

 

Until we built a garage, I was miserable. My husband is a pack rat, and I could not take the toys (everywhere), beer making supplies (under my bed!), photography equipment (in the linen closet).... I was overwhelmed. It is amazing how much better I feel since we've removed a lot of stuff from the house. I realize you don't have a garage, but if one is in your future, you will see a difference, if you are not able to pare down to the essentials (as I was not, before the garage).

 

A previous poster had good suggestions. I would say, though, that the most significant thing for me was removing all that was not necessary. It's not just that I chucked carp into the garage, but I also sent the menfolk on annual camping trips and during that time I would take load after load of stuff to the goodwill. It required constant vigilance, managing the flow of stuff into and out of the house.

[Carrie12345]

Family of 6, 2 dogs, 2 cats, 1200sf, give or take, no basement, attic, garage, etc. And it's all an open floor plan, so there are no quiet spaces.

 

We're working on putting shelves everywhere. Our couch divides our living room into two sections. Behind it, there's a small bookshelf and desks for the girls. We plan to put more shelves on the wall. Our staircase landing has shelves on it about 8' high. Our foyer/dining room/other school area has a side table that holds our main school books, binders and printers.

 

Our kitchen is insanely tiny. We use the tops of cabinets and the top of the fridge for storage. All of our art supplies, extra cooking and serving equipment, extra school supplies, book overflow, food stock, our chest freezer, heavy coats, skating and hockey equipment and miscellaneous other stuff clogs up our 5x12 loft, where we also keep the dog crates.

 

Our laundry "room" is in a closet, so thank goodness for the stackable Duet!

 

No matter what we've done these past 4 years, it NEVER feels less cluttered, chaotic or noisey. I suppose the fact that it's bright and airy makes it better than it could be, but we always feel like we're right on top of each other.

 

I throw the kids outside as often as possible (we're fortunate to have over an acre of woods on our property), but we get about 6 months of winter, so it only works for half the year.

 

If we don't get a bigger house soon, I WILL go insane.

[PinkInTheBlue]

We spent 4 years in about 1000sq ft with 4 of us. Then there were 5 of us in 1300sq ft for 5 years. The way we've handled it was to move into about 3200sq ft a few weeks ago. LOL I'm so glad not to have to squish anymore. That's what you do...squish. ;)

[Laura Corin]

We have a fair sized house now (four bedrooms for four) but four of us lived in around 700 square feet in Hong Kong. It wasn't pleasant and we could not have done it without having somewhere else to store a lot of stuff - not junk, but things like photo albums.

 

Laura

[Mandy in TN]

We moved several years ago, but our previous home was 1000sqft with 3 tiny bedrooms and one bathroom.

 

I kept the schoolbooks in crates in the boys' rooms. Every night everything having anything to do with school left the living area. Then I vacuumed the living area- every night. Nothing was left in the living area. Not a single scrap of paper was left sitting out. Even if I hardly had a single sqft of open space in the other rooms, just having this one little space clutter free saved my sanity. It was a tiny space, but I could close the doors to the other rooms and sit facing away from the kitchen area.:001_smile:

 

HTH-

Mandy

[Kathleen in VA]

There are 7 of us in 1000 sf. We do have a garage which is where my w/d, freezer and lots of bookshelves are, but I do not think of it as living space. We have had several copperheads out there :svengo:so it really is more of a shed than a room. I have 3 boys sharing a 10x12 room and 2 girls sharing an 8x9 room. They are squished. We have no dining room - only an eat-in kitchen. We also have a piano and dd16 who practices several hours each day - AACCKK!! There isn't any place to go and that piano is LOUD. Thankfully, she plays well.:)

 

There are times when I want to scream, cry, kick something, or just go back to bed because the smallness of my house makes me so crazy (especially during certain times of the month). BUT... I just keep telling myself that they will all be gone some day and then I'll wish they were all here again.:D Also, when it comes to trials, a small house has to be one of the easiest to cope with.

 

First, be sure to take advantage of all vertical space. The children's rooms have shelves up the walls over their beds, the hallways are lined with shelves, all the closets have extra shelving to the ceiling, and there are plastic storage boxes under every bed. We have two sets of bunkbeds and one loft bed.

 

Like others have said, be vigilant about clutter. Think long and hard before you buy anything and consider where it will go if you do buy it. Purge daily. When relatives ask what to buy for gifts suggest consumable items.

 

I rarely sew or do any kind of craft that takes longer than a few hours because there is no place to leave projects out. I realize that there are seasons to my life and now just isn't the time for projects.

 

I also keep extra clothes (hand-me-downs and out-of-season stuff) in those large plastic tubs with lids down in my crawl space. That's where I keep all seasonal items.

 

A year or so ago my husband bought a large shed for the back yard so that eased up some of the tool/garden clutter. If I have a get together of any kind I haul stuff out there for temporary storage just to open up the space a bit.

 

It's a never-ending fight to keep stuff out and peace and harmony in. I try to console myself with the blessings of a small house. I always know where my children are. We all spend our evenings together in the LR - it's the only place to stretch out a little. My carbon footprint just has to be smaller so I'm doing my part there. And it is the perfect retirement home - no stairs - and I can vacuum the whole house without having to change plugs.

[Georgiana Daniels]

It's really encouraging to see we aren't the only family in a small space (1000 sq ft/5 people.) Sometimes I think we're the only ones!

 

We throw away everything--and I do mean everything--that we don't use. The only exception to this is my husband, who has an unnatural attachment to his old pants.

 

We've started to utilize the hallway with the small bookcases you can put together yourself from Walmart, and crates on top. That takes care of kid books and games. Also have their dresser in the hallway.

 

The only thing that makes me really want to go insane is the neighbors, who have an affinity for loud junky trucks and love to start them over and over and over again.

[OnTheBrink]

625 sq ft, 2 people.

 

I throw things out, a LOT.

 

I also use cabinets for things. I have one for crafting and office supplies; my tv is in an armoire, I have a cubby for school stuff. I put up commercial shelving in my kitchen for canned good storage, stuff is under beds. DD has a captain's bed with drawers, shelving units and cubbies in her room for storage.

 

I also have a basement, but it's not being used correctly right now. It's more of a dumpster at this point.

[MariannNOVA]

We were in almost 6000 sq feet three years ago. The home we bought last year is probably 2000 sq feet - maybe - no garage, but a great lower level, however 75% of the lower level is now blocked off due to the recent water damage, and the kitchen is a wreck due to the water damage.

 

 

Our classroom is thankfully unaffected. We adapted by purging, purging, purging! And, I stopped shopping, shopping, shopping. I can't take this stuff with me to Heaven so I've decided to get rid of it -- DH has finally joined me on board with the 'throw it away' approach.

 

And, things do double-duty -- we got rid of the formal dining room, took down a wall and have a large eat in kitchen. No formal china, really nice dishes and nice table linens for 'special.' We bought a super nice table and chairs to replace the huge dining room set that we did have. It involved a lot of re-thinking, but it is doable. and, NO CLUTTER. things look more spacious if there is NOT alot of stuff around.:001_smile:

[AngelaNYC]

We have about 750 sq. ft. for the 5 of us. We live in a 2-family house in NYC.

 

There are 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, a living room, dining room, and kitchen.

 

We made the living room into 2 more bedrooms (using 2 standing armoires and a bookcase as the room divider), and now use the dining room as the "everything room". It has a large couch, large TV, dining table/chairs, and big china cabinet for all the homeschool books and supplies (I got rid of the good china and put all the meaningful tchotchkes on the top shelf). I felt the kids needed their own space. (There's nothing wrong with kids sharing a room, imo. But for us it was a constant hassle. This new arrangement works for us.)

 

I moved our standing pantry closet out into the hallway at the top of the stairs. We also have hooks on the wall out there for winter coats and umbrellas. We got rid of all the 1970s dropped ceilings, painted the whole apartment in a light neutral tone, and ripped out all the carpet (there were nice wood floors under there) so it feels bigger in here. We hung a nice pot rack in the kitchen and put a small ceiling fan in there. Our small bathroom is now all white (used to be dark blue - ick).

 

I'm all about practicality and function - I just wish I knew how to decorate :glare:

 

We also have a nice sized basement for the washer/dryer and lots of storage. We have a backyard (concrete, great for basketball, biking, skating, :tongue_smilie:) - our garage is back there, too. Since I street-park my car (minivan is too long for garage :blushing:) I can store outside stuff in the garage. We also have a front patio with small garden.

 

So, even though our actual living space is tiny, it feels bigger with all the storage space and usable outside areas.

Edited October 7, 2009 by Abkjw01

[BikeBookBread]

In the big picture, our home is not small: 1700 sf. However, compared to our friends' homes, it is smallish.

 

We LOVE it. It keeps us light on our feet. If we buy something new, something old (or two things even!) have to go OUT of the house...toys, clothes, books, whatever...

[Marsha]

We have 1300 square feet and we are building a room that is 275 square feet.

There are 9 of us.

I keep the house de-cluttered.

[kalanamak]

I also sent the menfolk on annual camping trips and during that time I would take load after load of stuff to the goodwill.

 

:iagree: My menfolk should be at Crater Lake today or tomorrow.:)

[petepie2]

We have 1150 sq ft for 5 people (soon to be 6). While I don't feel we're falling over each other, we do make use of every corner. We have 3 bedrooms and one and a half baths. The closets are teeny tiny. Storage is pretty much in the attic and under beds. Right now I think things are manageable because our kids are young. The only times toys are bought are at Christmas and birthdays, and even then we're selective due to the space issues. For example, there won't be a train set because we have no place to put it. The kids have fun and tend to get creative with what they do have. (Really, instead of getting "stuff" for gifts, I wish we could just go to the beach or the mountains for a few days!) Also, I don't buy things for myself that I would like to have if I don't have a place to put them. I would like a bread maker, but it's not going to happen because I don't have room for one. I don't have a huge wardrobe because the closet isn't big enough to store it. But in the end, I find that we just don't need all the things that we would like to have. So, we're happy. If we had a bigger house, I would probably buy more and then reach a point where there was no more room for more stuff. Plus I would have more to clean. Ugh.

[JenAL]

We have about 3400 sq ft for our family of 6. Four bedrooms, 2.5 baths, living room, dining room, kitchen with breakfast area (kitchen & living room are open to each other). We also have an oversized garage & two bonus rooms upstairs. When we built this house I really believed we'd use every inch of it. We don't. We are currently trying to sell & downsize. As a previous poster said, the grass isn't always greener on the other side. It's so hard to keep this house clean & it frustrates me knowing we pay to heat & cool at least 1000 sq ft of space we don't use!

[greensummervillian]

We have about 1400 sq. ft for 4 people plus my husband built a shed for tools, bikes, and the lawnmower. We don't have a garage or basement either. The size is OK for just the four of us, but when you start adding guests and visitors it gets small very fast. I would gladly add a few hundred square feet.

[Erica in PA]

I know there are lots of families who live in small homes. While ours isn't super small it feels it sometimes. We are a family of 5... have 1400 sq ft home....3 bedrooms, NO dining room, only a eat in kitchen, LR, bathrooms. No basement, NO bonus room, NO garage.....no extra room for storage so I have everything stuck here and there.

 

Curious what size home you have, family size and things you do to make it work without feeling so cramped and cluttered?

 

Debbie

 

We have a 1200 sq. ft. apartment, and are a family of five. I think the only real help is to only keep stuff that you either truly need, or really, really LOVE. We have a yard sale every year, and it's amazing that we always have more stuff to sell, even as much as we've pared things down. We rely heavily on our closets for storage. Our living room closet is devoted to holiday decorations; hall closet to bikes and outdoor toys; and each of our bedroom closets is packed with stuff. Under the bed storage is huge for us as well.

 

I could more be organized than I am, and make it work even better, especially in the bedroom closets. But overall, I think we're doing pretty well for a family of five in an apartment. The only thing I'm concerned about is that as the kids get bigger, our apartment feels smaller and smaller. Right now they're 13, 9, and 7, and I would really, really like to be in a larger space before my 9 year old hits his teens, if at all possible.

[lionfamily1999]

We try to keep the kids in motion at all times. That way the clutter doesn't collapse on top of them. Lol, really though... our house IS cluttered all around the edges. We keep the working areas tidy and neat and try to hide the clutter in cabinets and closets, but it's there lurking and biding its time until it can finally break down the doors and pour all over some unsuspecting guest.

 

Our house is a few hundred square feet smaller than yours, though. So it's a bit tighter here ;)

[stripe]

I put the kids in the smallest room, and use the biggest bedroom to do activities in. My reasoning is that at their age, they only are in their room when they're asleep.

 

I also recently painted.

 

I'm working on getting rid of things. No "collections" of doodads. High bookshelves. Donating unwanted books to the library and unwanted clothes etc to charities or interested acquaintances. Coming to terms with being satisfied. Finding storage solutions that work. And thinking about having something because I want it, not just hanging on to things. Trying to get family members to believe me that I really don't want any! more! junk!

 

I really loathe giant houses, so I am trying to make this work.

[LibraryLover]

We're in 1200 sq ft, but we do have a barn for seasonal storage, and a small cottage where the my oldest sleeps when he is home from school.

 

We streamlined like crazy. We have small furniture from Ikea. My 15 yr old is in a room the size of a small walk- in closet. He has an Ikea armoire for his clothing, as there is no closet. The girls share a small room, and the 10 yr old has an Ikea loft bed (which was still too long, so dh took a buzz saw to the metal & wood and lopped off 4 inches) , so she can store her stuffies under. She uses it as a play & reading space.

 

But of course, there is always stuff. You can't get rid of everything, esp when you're hsing. I have a giant cabinet in my kitchen for art supplies and such. I also have a microscope on the kitchen counter. ;) Whatever, you know? I try not to worry.

Edited October 7, 2009 by LibraryLover

[SheWillFly]

I know there are lots of families who live in small homes. While ours isn't super small it feels it sometimes. We are a family of 5... have 1400 sq ft home....3 bedrooms, NO dining room, only a eat in kitchen, LR, bathrooms. No basement, NO bonus room, NO garage.....no extra room for storage so I have everything stuck here and there.

 

Curious what size home you have, family size and things you do to make it work without feeling so cramped and cluttered?

 

Debbie

We are a same sized family as you in a same size house with a similar situation. We have storage units in the closets, a bookshelf in the landing of the hall, storage under our bench at the kitchen table, and a place for everything. If it doesn't have a place it gets assigned one or it doesn't live here long. We do have a dining room but our kitchen isn't really eat-in sized.

[lulubelle]

We have 1100 sq. ft. - our house is a mess and cluttered and homeschooling is the priority. Would love a bigger house, but I think I would still be cluttered. It's just me, not my house!

[Annie Laurie]

We have about 3400 sq ft for our family of 6. Four bedrooms, 2.5 baths, living room, dining room, kitchen with breakfast area (kitchen & living room are open to each other). We also have an oversized garage & two bonus rooms upstairs. When we built this house I really believed we'd use every inch of it. We don't. We are currently trying to sell & downsize. As a previous poster said, the grass isn't always greener on the other side. It's so hard to keep this house clean & it frustrates me knowing we pay to heat & cool at least 1000 sq ft of space we don't use!

 

I agree.

Edited October 7, 2009 by Annie Laurie

[Just Another Jen]

We are moving on Friday- We're moving out of a 4 bed 2 1/2 bath 2800 sq ft home with a full finiished basement.

 

All 8 of us are moving into a 3 bedroom, 1 bath, no basement 1300 sqft home. As I pack I can see just how much stuff we don't use or need. Check my blog for updates to see how we organize and fit stuff in. I'm just so excited we're finally downsizing and eliminating my dh looong commute- that I just know we'll fit whatever is important to us.

[Reya]

We have about 3400 sq ft for our family of 6. Four bedrooms, 2.5 baths, living room, dining room, kitchen with breakfast area (kitchen & living room are open to each other). We also have an oversized garage & two bonus rooms upstairs. When we built this house I really believed we'd use every inch of it. We don't. We are currently trying to sell & downsize. As a previous poster said, the grass isn't always greener on the other side. It's so hard to keep this house clean & it frustrates me knowing we pay to heat & cool at least 1000 sq ft of space we don't use!

 

We have 4 people in 3200 sqft, and we use every single inch. Seriously. It's far from packed, but it's all used every single day. In fact, I just went through our basement storage--3x12' is the total storage in this house, other than the entry closet--and culled like a madwoman to get DD's outgrown clothes to fit. (I did discover that I could squeeze past the oil tank and there's a tiny extra storage space under the half fight of stairs down to the basement...)

 

In fact, we're planning a 260 sqft addition, as the kitchen area is 6'x7' with a 1' deep broom closet (that I turned into a pantry) and the fridge across an aisle. It's agony to cook with only 2.5' of counter space.

[Nestof3]

1,100 sq ft for 5 of us. 3 bedrooms (all small) and 1 bathroom.

 

The regular size coat closet is our pantry. The other skinny one in the hallway stores coats (we don't need many as our climate is mild) and the vacuum.

 

The linen closet is really a game closet with plastic drawer units for toiletries and a few extra towels.

 

We limit extras. Few extra towels. Only the young boys have extra sheets because I wash, dry and make a bed in the same day.

 

Off-season clothes are stored in Rubbermaid containers in the garage. We do have a detached garage and a gardening shed (both built be dh).

 

Half our family room is the boys' play area, and this is lined with bookshelves.

 

Our kitchen is an eat-in one; we have no dining room. Our office also holds current homeschooling stuff and my scrapbooking supplies. One wall in our kitchen holds my rubber stamp collection.

 

We use the kitchen table for school, crafting and eating.

 

I am very organized, and I insist on everything being put in its home when not in use. That helps a lot. I am also always getting rid of things, especially kitchen stuff. I limit things like cookbooks too. I find I'm always going to www.allrecipes.com instead. I am vigilant about paper clutter and have quite a system for storing important papers, coupons, etc and a great bill system.

 

The main drawback is that our entertaining is limited. I sometimes wish the boys had more space and that they could be at the other end of a very long house. ;)

 

The positives are it's easy to clean and cheap to heat/cool. We can turn the heat off, be gone all day in the winter, come home, and in 10 minutes, the house is warm again. I can also freeze us out in the summer without bankrupting us.

 

It's also paid for, so that encourages us to stay here. ;)

 

Oh, and I love the gardening we've done, and I'd have a hard time leaving that.

 

PS -- When I go to bed, the house is restored and ready for a new day. This is very important to me.

Edited October 8, 2009 by nestof3