how much????

[jacsan1451]

I watched Oprah the other day ( I think it was a repeat) and she had on Nate the designer. He made-over a womans apartment that was about 250 sq. feet! He did a wonderful job. Oprah also had other people who lived in very small spaces. The one thing that they all had in common was how happy they all were. The basic message from all these people was "how much stuff do you really need?" It really made me think. It is such a simple question but I don't think most people really think about it. It really made me look around my house and think. The last few days I have been getting rid of a lot of stuff. I don't miss any of it and either do the kids. I guess Oprah gave me one of those light bulb moments. Just wanted to know what everyone thought about this?

[DJ1972]

I saw that one too. We have 1200 square feet for 4 people and I am happy with it. My kids have to talk to us, there's nowhere to hide lol. Our best conversations are after everyone has gone to bed, our hall is so small we can all be in our own beds and still talk.

[tbs727]

It really makes me re-think getting a bigger house when we have kids. Seeing a family of three living in 300 sq. feet really changes one's perspective. We (just the 2 of us) live in about 1200 sq. feet and I can see us adding two more little ones in a house this size. We would just have to make ourselves more careful about what we keep and what we get rid of. I REALLY don't want a larger house to clean!

[Dancing Lotus]

I have 1900 at I could do with one less room. The "formal" is mostly empty anyways/ I got rid of a lot of stuff when we moved and I havent missed any of it. the more I get rid of the happier we seem to get.

[danni]

Dh, me and 5 kids live in 1100 sq ft. It can be crowded and it would be nice to have one more bedroom but I wouldn't want it to be alot bigger.

[YankeeMom]

That's what I've been trying to explain to dh. We are planning on building our own house in 5-8 years and I really would like to downsize. When we lived in an 1100sqft apartment, it was easy to keep clean we didn't have a lot of 'junk'. When we moved into a 2300sqft house, it was still relatively easy to keep clean and we didn't have a lot of stuff. Then we downsized to a 1400sqft apartment and it was kind of nice. We had to put a lot of stuff in storage, but it was sooo easy to keep things neat & organized.

Now we live in a house that's well over 3000sqft. Not included in that is 5 rooms in the attic, three rooms in the basement, plus a two stall garage, and one enclosed porch (and one open). We are packed to the gills with STUFF. I want to get rid of half of it and go back to a nice 2500sqft of living space.

[quiltergirl]

We live in a teeny tiny 1 BR (unsure of sq. footage). You do learn not to bring a lot of "stuff" in. I still have to do a serious cleaning/thow out session about once a year.

One thing I would really like to have though is a studio space. My art supplies take up the hall closet and part of my BR closet. And let's not talk about the unsold works under the bed. It would also be nice to not have to put everything away every time I decide to work on a project. Having a space to leave things out would be nice.