How big was your house growing up?

[Evoman]

I grew up in a tiny 2 and a half bedroom house (that room couldnt even fit a double bed) with only 1 bathroom. Contrast that with my sisters house she just bought. She has two kids (twins) and no plans to have more kids. Their house has 5 rooms, and 3 bathrooms. She claims she "needs" all this space, because the kids deserve their own rooms.

WTF? We group up in a tiny home, and we all came out alright. Oh sure, there were a lot of sibling fights, but no more than you usually see. Nobody NEEDS their own bathroom. Little kids don't NEED their own rooms. By the time they NEED their own space, they should move out of the damn house. Am I the only one that sees this NEED to have so much space is out of control?

[ananda]

1. sort of

I think your house growing up was a bit too small, but I agree that your sister's house is obscene.

[Karenca]

2. I grew up in very cramped quarters

and it truly sucked.

When I became a parent,
I tried to give my family more needed privacy
than I had as a child.

[Evoman]

6. It builds character

Goddammit :p

[Karenca]

9. Depends on the situation-----

It can also rob you of your dignity.

Every family is different.

[AirmensMom]

3. When Dad was in Vietnam,

we lived in a 2-bedroom house. Mom had her own room, two sisters had the other room. Two of us slept in the hallway in homemade bunks. My brother slept in a homemade bunk that dropped down from the ceiling in the utility room.

We're all a little nuts, but not because of the 2-bedroom house.

Our girls shared a room until the first one was in high school (maybe her 2nd year). They never complained about it.

[B Calm]

63. I grew up in a two story, 3 bedroom, coal heated 1920s house in

the 1950s. My brother and I shared a bedroom upstairs. During the winter we woke up shivering, during the summer it was so hot we would throw sleeping bags on the roof and sleep under the stars.

[zanne]

4. I know what you mean, Evoman

I was one of five kids, living in a two-bedroom house with one small bathroom. But we never felt cramped. I guess you're only poor if other people tell you you are. The new houses I've seen are enormous. My niece just bought a house with five bedrooms and a ground floor that her two year-old gets lost in. She has two kids with no plans for more. I think it's a little crazy, but it seems like every generation needs more and more "house".

[pooja]

5. its nice to have space, but really if you do have siblings, having

to share a room not only sucks, but it prepares you for the day when you have to share 1 bed with another person.

Houses don't really need to be bigger, just less junk needs to be made and bought to go in it.

[bryant69]

7. 4 Bedrooms 2 Baths.

When I was 15 or so an addon got built.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[TomInTib]

8. I have lived in a log cabin and I have lived in 7,000 sq ft.

Didn't make any difference.

We always ended up on the porch or hanging around the kitchen together.

I have also lived on 13,000 acres. Is that too much room four four people?

[Skidmore]

32. 13,000 acres. Tom, you almost had your own township.

[zanne]

50. Nothing will ever replace the kitchen table.

That's where everybody winds up.

[Blue Belle]

76. Absolutely....

The kitchen table is the gathering spot at my parents house too. Partly because that's where all the food gets prepared and the tea is had afterwards, partly because the noise of Dad's TV drives us out of the front room... but that's the place where everyone hangs out.

[sweetheart]

57. it makes a difference only

(politically speaking), if the event is inside a different national
border, as then your speaking is transpiring in actions that a coherent
government can actually interpret, and then you become a conspirator,
for sharing with your insane government, the wish that *your* own
stupid government in washington that has completely lost the plot
would somehow take acid and turn ON.

And we pass a thousand borders in a thousand experiences and all
experience leads to desire for more experience... it is unending,
and in buddhism, a karmic compulsion, perhaps, not personal, but
sociological, pathological to the narrative of social survival as a
modernist metanarrative.

It only makes a difference if other contexts are in-place as well. If it
really worked for all of us, then we'd all be rich, buy the government ourselves
and then dine in fine restaurants toasting each other's health. It is like
we are all the characters in the stephen king book "it" and we are setting
out to kill what we did not kill before, what has been the bane of every
civil life on the planet, and will be throughout time if we cannot...

you are a fortunate son indeed, honourable sir..

[TomInTib]

78. And now I live in a cottage on a bluff.

overlooking San Francisco Bay.

In a town of 5,000 that I rarely leave.

'Tis the gift to be simple
'tis the gift to be free
'tis the gift to come down
where you want to be

And when you find yourself
in the place, just right
you will dwell in the place
of Love and Light

[calico1]

10. My father owned 1/2 of a duplex.

Each one had 3 apartments. We lived in the middle one. There were 4 bedrooms and one bathroom. In those days (1960'a) not too many people had more than one bathroom even with big families. There were 5 of us kids.

[Mandate My Ass]

11. I grew up in the same house you did

A tiny rowhouse with bedrooms smaller than most walk-in closets nowadays. The closets were so small the hangers had to be hung diagonally. Four of us came out OK, or at least, semi-OK. Add parents to that and you have six. :crazy:

It was entirely luck that the two girls and two boys could share a room each.

My parents bought that house in 1960 IIRC for about $5,000. They're there alone. Now that the neighborhood has gentrified, it has gone from being a rowhome to a "townhome" and a neighbor with only two tiny bedrooms sold theirs a month or so ago for $275,000.

[napi21]

12. I grew up in a 1 br 1 bath, lr & kitchen two family OLD house.

It had a coal furnace, an old side arm water heater, and a shower in the basement that had a dirt floor.

When I was 9, my aunt and her family bought a house and moved out of the upstairs of that rental house and my parents then rented the whole house. I can't tell you how big the hosue was, but it was built in 1884, and it was a tall skinney structure with a basement that had a dirt floor and an attic.

We didn't have a lot of money, but things like going out for dinner, and shopping as a passtime just weren't done back then. I can't ever remember thinking I was poor either!

[SmokingJacket]

13. A bunch of different places...

A two bedroom apartment, a two bedroom duplex, then a crumbling old farmhouse with five bedrooms but no central heat! :scared:

Kids don't "deserve" their own rooms, but they appreciate them when they get to be adolescents. I'm glad my family moved into a bigger house when I got to be a teenager -- I had some room to think (and make out with boys ;) ). And two bathrooms are nice so that someone can take a bath and not get barged in on by someone needing some major toilet time.

But it's disingenuous for people to claim they "need" all this space.

What I find really gross is how many people have closets the size of entire Japanese apartments.

[Ezlivin]

14. 2 Bed 1 Bath CBS construction, about 1100 square feet.

This was it back in 1951. It's still there with my parents living in it, but I-275 is only a block away.



My own home is twice the size and that is small here in the D/FW area where 7,500 square foot homes are common.

[cynatnite]

15. It's the need for more crap

Look at how much crap people have in their homes, garages, attics and sheds. Most of it just sits and collects dust.

I will say this...as kids get older and become teens, they do need their own rooms, IMO. I'm big on privacy and I want my kids to have it as teenagers.

[Deb]

16. 2 parents, 8 kids in a 3 bedroom, 1 bath house

Of course the walk-in closet made another "bedroom". A huge yard, gardens, barns, streams and ponds made up for the lack of interior space. Tell your Sister good luck with the cleaning chores.

[Rosemary2205]

17. We had dirt floors (no kidding)

Until I was 13 we lived in a 2 room shack behind a gas station. We had no electric, a well and an outhouse. When I was 13 my Mom was pregnant with #5 and we moved into a 3 room apartment overtop a jewelry store with electric and indoor plumbing.

I have a 3 bedroom/ 2 bath 1100 sq ft ranch with an attached 1 car garage just south of Atlanta (the wrong side of the tracks). I think it's a mansion. I have 3 kids, my Mom, and the husband and I. Mom and daughter share a room and the 2 boys share a room. My neighborhood is quiet, safe and full of families in similar houses - although most have turned the garage into a family room.

All of my siblings live in similar fashion. Even the "rich" one with a good job and no kids, who kindly sends me money to help take care of our Mom.

[Arkansas Granny]

29. My family lived in a one room log cabin with dirt floor when I was

very small, but I was so young I don't remember it. We moved to the house where I remember growing up when I was about 3 years old and I lived there until I married. It was just two rooms for a few years, until my dad added two more rooms.

[MoseyWalker]

47. Congratulations

on taking care of your mom and family.

When I was growing up, mom had her room, the 3 girls had one, and my brother and I shared one. Dad was always overseas in the service. We all slept on military cots for most of my growing up years. I got my older brothers clothes when he was done with them.

I never felt deprived of anything. I have kept my frugal ways over the years. My son drives a much better vehicle than I do (though I get much better mileage - so there), and has to have current fashions, games, but I consider myself lucky. He doesn't really ask for much.

I've always been easily pleased, and I think it has served me well through this life so far.

Off to finally watch V for Vendetta on my big screen tv - well, ya gotta give yourself presents every once in a great while, right? I love watching movies on the big screen. My living room is dark as a theater. But, I digress.

[Rosemary2205]

68. RE: Big screen TV

I teach a class to teens every morning before school and we use videos often as part of the class. 15 kids peering at my little 13" TV from the 1970's and the sound knob that keeps needing fixed .........

So last Christmas I decided it's time to get my husband a new TV and cable. 29" - more than twice the size of the old one. I told the teenagers we were getting a "big screen TV".

I can't even tell you how disappointed they were when they came back to class after the break and informed me my fancy new 29" with a remote IS NOT A BIG SCREEN TV DARNIT!!

:) :)

[saracat]

18. Well, I am an only child and 3 bedrooms and four full baths and a

studio apartment over the garage.However we had a summer home that had three bedrooms and 1 bath. Waiting in line didn't kill anyone and sometimes we had as many as 20 people vacationing with us. It was the family gathering place.People even slept in the attic and screened porch! But you are right. Think of the mini mansions.They are obscene!

[dogday]

19. AF Base housing till I was 17 years old

Standard box house with 3 bedrooms 2 baths.... always had CA/CH.. Can't complain at all....

[flvegan]

20. 2 parents, 2 kids, 1 Great Dane in a 2/1

There was a third "bedroom" that was a well done conversion of some porch space. There was no closet in my room. The view was beautiful (it was right on the ocean). It' might have been 900-1000 square feet of heated space.

[karlrschneider]

21. Decent middle class, 3 bed 2 bath, 2500 sq feet

Pretty much an Ozzie & Harriet type but not 2 story. Now live in similar but smaller house, nothing
fancy - we don't much care beyond shelter with enough space to keep our junk. The best part (for us) is it's away from the madding crowd, on a nice lake. :-)
8 miles to the closest traffic light.

[mitchtv]

22. a two BR apartment

Mom, Dad, 5 kids and the dog. Didn't have my own bed, much less a bedroom, till sisters started marrying and leaving. They used to move me after I fell asleep to another room. Bathroom time was tight

[cali]

23. This is kind of embarassing

I grew up in a big rambling house. I lived on the third floor with two of my sisters. We each had a br, there was the childrens'library, one bath, a spare br. and a funny little room off the landing. On the second floor my parents had a br and a library, and my 2 brothers each had a room. There were 3 extra bedrooms, servant's rooms, but we didn't have any servants. On the first floor there was a living room, playroom, den, sunroom, dining room and kitchen and an informal dining room. It was a great place for hide and seek, and the basement was so big we used to rollerskate in it.

[Rosemary2205]

34. Well don't be embarrassed!

Good heavens, be happy for what you had (and have). One thing about all of us, dirt floors or grand ballrooms, we all survived and grew up to contribute something to this common world we live in! :)

[LiberalHeart]

69. I was embarrassed and cringing till you showed up...

If you counted *every* room in our house (including the rooms real estate folks don't count), there were 23. Not all were used for everyday living, though -- for example, two were for storage: a wine cellar and another room for storing canned goods. In the attic, which was huge, there was a cabin-like house which was actually a cedar closet but big enough to put furniture in. I used it as a play house. It even had windows, but they looked out into the attic, not the outdoors.

In addition to housing our family, the home also held two businesses: my father's office, his secretary's office, and a doctor's office (a doctor built the house). The doctor's office alone had 7 rooms and an outside entrance on one side of the house.

One room was something we called the sleeping porch. It had big windows on three sides of it. It wasn't heated; was used only in the summer. And there was a maid's quarters, but like you, we had no servants.

I know exactly what you mean about having a good place to play hide 'n seek. Our house was great for that. And there was a large cage-like wooden structure where clothes landed when they were tossed down the clothes shoot. It was up off the floor, so I had to climb up a ways to get into it. I used to like to hang out in there when it wasn't filled with dirty clothes. It felt sorta like a tree house. I also used to climb out one of the attic windows and sit on the gable roof that slanted down from it. I liked the view, and so did my dog, which I took out there with me. I'm sure if my parents ever knew I did that, they would have keeled over then and there. But it was a big house where noise didn't travel, so they seldom knew what I was up to -- and never would have heard me way up in the attic.

I used to believe there was a hidden room or stairway or something in the house and I spent a good deal of time trying to find it. Of course, there was no such thing. Just wishful thinking.

The house was so large, all five of us living there could go through big chunks of the day and not see each other. I think that's why I fell in love with solitude -- a life-long love. I have almost no memories of having seen my sisters in the house, which is probably beyond weird seeing as how I was the baby and I was born in that house and lived there till I was 17, went off to college, and got my own place.

Mom still lives there, for the past 15 years alone.

The house was built in the '20s and is wanting for bathrooms. There's only one full bath and two half baths. But other features make up for what it's lacking: fireplaces, hardwood floors, balconies, sun porches, large rooms with interesting details. It was a wonderful place to grow up.

[Poiuyt]

80. I now live in the big old Victorian house that I grew up in

3 stories, 12 rooms, 5 bedrooms. It is definitely more than I need, but this is home for me. The house has been in my family for over 50 years. I know every little scratch on the woodwork, and every squeak in the floorboards. I moved back here two years ago, and there hasn't been a day go by that I haven't said, "God, I love this place!" I just hope the tax man will let me keep it.

[htuttle]

24. 3 Bdrm, 1 bath -- an old, old farmhouse

I have a brother and sister, so all the bedrooms were in use (I shared a room with my brother).

The insulation was non-existent, and it had an old oil-fired steam radiator system for heat that had been converted from a coal furnace. We wore a lot of sweaters in the winter.

[rubberducky]

25. WW11 bungalow

In a neighborhood of the same. HOW ON EARTH did we suvive and thrive without mcmansions?? Most homes had kids, so always had someone to play with. Had the old cyclone fenced back yard, but it was always filled with kids. Organized sports??? Wedid not need `em. We had the street or local park or school to play in. Oh, yeah, when I was a teen we could actually afford, with a $5 fill-up, to spend our evenings cruising with a great many friends. Stop off at a local drive-in for a movie or snacks. Oh, yes, it was such sweet times!!

[Blue Belle]

77. I miss being able to fill my car with the change I found on the floor...

and in the console. :(

[Blue_In_AK]

26. Three bedrooms,

not real big. My two brothers shared a room, I had my own room (being the only girl) and my folks had theirs. We lived a couple of different places, but we generally had a living room, a family room, and a couple of bathrooms. When I was really young (birth to seven), we had a farm house in southern Ohio, three bedrooms, living room, dining room and kitchen, but no indoor plumbing, a pump in the kitchen sink and an outhouse in the back.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

27. 10,000 Square Feet

We had a maid, a butler, and a nanny all just for me.

Just kidding

800 square foot home for mom, dad, and me.

[Arkansas Granny]

28. I grew up in a two bedroom house. Shared a bedroom with my

sister and brother. Then we had to give up a corner of our bedroom for the bathroom when we moved the plumbing inside. There were always plans to add more rooms to the house, but it was never possible. I didn't realize how poor we were growing up until I married and moved away.

[Skidmore]

30. We had a house of similar size.

My parents had one bedroom and we managed to farm out 8 kids between the other bedrooms by stacking us all in bunkbeds--girls in one, boys in the other. An eat-in kitchen which doubled as a laundry room on laundry day. Just push the old wringer-washer out of the pantry corner and fill it with water. We had an outdoor privy until I was about 13. We took baths in a galvanized tub filled by my mother who heated the water on the old gas cooking stove. We took baths in shifts, 3 kids in the tub until we go too big. That old tub did double duty on laundry day as the rinse tub. No dryer. Hung clothes up on a line outside, even in the dead of winter. Jeans used to come off the line freeze dried and as stiff as boards. Nothing as much fun as hanging wet clothes in the winter. Place first was heated with a wood burner until dad bought a coal burner. The stove was also in the kitchen and the heat for the upstairs bedrooms was the radiant heat coming from the chimney. Eventually, this was replaced by an oil space heater. Whatever mode of heat we had, it meant lugging the fuel into the house.

Dirt poor and very few toys, no shoes in the summer so we could all have new shoes for school. One ragged bike to share. We lived in the trees in summer--they were our swings and monkey bars. We were fine as adults, give or take a couple of us. People don't understand that they can survive on a lot less.

[Gormy Cuss]

39. Frozen pants --- definitely the best reason for owning a dryer.

Hauling in frozen clothes from the line was not my favorite chore. We were more urbanized and our clothesline was strung between two buildings at the second story level. It was a long, heavy line with a pulley and in winter the first step to doing laundry was to clear the line of ice.

I remember the communal baths for the little one too, although ours was in an indoor tub. For the older kids, the tub water was shared by several kids in succession. Only teens got fresh tub water and it wasn't an every day even. We took 'sponge baths. most days.

Hanging out clothes and our tub routine were usual in my area so we didn't feel deprived. It was just normal.

[Gormy Cuss]

31. Under 1200 SF, one bath, and as many as 9 people living in it.

Two bathrooms would have been nice, but otherwise it never felt cramped. We had less stuff and kids spent most of their waking hours outside. I shared a bedroom until I was 11. We had many bedrooms but none were very big. Two twin beds and two dressers filled the space. My parents' room was no bigger. I would live that way now if that were the standard size house. None of my siblings are big house people.

Some people equate space with comfort, some of us don't. When the question is need, rather than want, very few of us live in as little space as we need.

[ncrainbowgrrl]

33. grew up in a 2 br apartment.

Granted it was a relatively large one in NYC.

[AnnInLa]

35. Daughter, hubby and granddaughter

bought one of those McMansions in Marietta, GA. It is gross. How can 3 people need that much space? When I was visiting last month, I found my answer: they have so much STUFF, they have to have a 3-story house. Made me think of George Carlin and his rant about STUFF. Altho my granddaughter is just a little girl and doesn't drive, they also have 3 vehicles. One vehicle is just for going up into the mountains, or to go fishing. Altho I find it a total waste of the earth's resources, and a displacement of much habitat (where and how they live), I hold my tongue, but it's harrrrd werrk. Son-in-law is die-hard repuke who is always grousing about paying taxes for people who don't work as hard as he does. Daughter is uninvolved Dem who votes that way because I tell her to. LOL

[TahitiNut]

36. Post-WW2 1.5 story frame 'Bungalow' - 900 sq' - 2 bed, 1bath, no garage

They arose like weeds in southeast Michigan. Center entrance w/ unfinished upper half story. Somewhat like this one ...

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

37. various: Trailer, small house, car, a garage.

We moved around a lot, sometimes homeless, mostly lived in small rental houses.

[moc]

38. 2400 sf, 4br/2ba, 7 kids. My husband grew up in a 1200sf rowhouse

with 3 (tiny) bedrooms and 1 bath for 8 people (sometimes 9 when his grandfather was living with them).

Our idea of what we "need" has become truly warped, imo. My husband and I have ~3000sf, 4br/2.5ba and two kids, and folks think our house is small. My sister-in-law has ~6000sf, 5br, 4.5ba for 2 adults and 2 kids. We were at their house recently and I felt we were living in different time zones. It was too big.

[grilled onions]

40. Two bedroom;one bath(eventually)

No one thought much of roughing it back then. Of course we didn't seem to need space for when you didn't own much you didn't need to store much. Kids did not own tv's,computers didn't exist. Neither did video game consoles,huge screen tv's and any number of bric a brac that is considered necessities today. Oddly enough people used to have company sleep over yet managed with no spare bedrooms,no extra bathrooms and meals were always cooked at home. There was no drive thrus back then. What they consider basic today would have been considered high end back in the fifties in our area.

[Karenina]

41. The first house I remember

seemed quite large to me. As the eldest child I had my own room, there was room for a piano in the parlor and domestic quarters upstairs. It was only when I returned decades later that I realized how small the space actually was. We lived in the physicians' housing of a state institution surrounded by fields and forests. We kids spent most of our time as an international band of brats roving the countryside.

Daddy and I indulged in oil paints on our enclosed porch, our works were properly framed and hung in the parlor; the site of many house concerts.

On this point I have to line up behind Jolly Prince Charles in believing that humans require a certain amount of "private space." It needn't be very much, but in its absence, creativity is stifled.

[lectrobyte]

42. 1950-era ranch, 3 BR, 1 BA, 1000 sq ft

[NewJeffCT]

43. Same with me

And, I was born in the mid 60s.

My parents still live in that same house, though in the late 80s, they added some room onto the house when remodeling the kitchen and it is now like 1,200 square feet and has 2 small bathrooms instead of just 1 small one.

[TahitiNut]

46. I live in that now.

:dunce:

[marions ghost]

44. 3 bedrooms, one bath

inner city vertical box. We were city urchins. The places we kids went to sometimes my mother would have been horrified at. With 4 kids, there was no "family room," den or rec room or whatever. There was no eat-in kitchen. We actually lived in the LR and DR. DR even had an old upright piano crammed into it. There was also a very cool high attic, great for escaping to when it wasn't too hot. Yard was postage stamp....played on the sidewalks and in neighbors yards. There was a screened porch, but the street noise and grime made it less than idyllic. All the houses were different, and there were large apartment buildings sandwiched between. All sorts of different kinds of neighbors. To this day I appreciate diversity. We survived.

[CottonBear]

45. 5BR, 4 1/2 bath, 3 car garage + carport, 3 stories, about 8,000 SF.

Mom sold the house and moved into something smaller since all of us kids are grown and she's a widow, it was too much house for one person.

We had a big 3 BR, 2 bath lake house too. I miss the lake house. We had a great dock and several boats.

edit: I live in a very small house now! It is small but it is all mine! :)

[wicket]

48. We lived in a 2 room schoolhouse from the 1850s

Pretty crowded with my parents and my brother & sister. We built a house in the late 80s and they've been there ever since.

[One_Life_To_Give]

49. Track House circa 1958

The typical 40x24 ranch track house. 3 bedroom, 1 bath

[cobalt1999]

51. 3 bedroom 1 bath

with 5 boys and mom & dad.

We have a 3/2 now but my daughters have to room together. I don't think they should get their own rooms. IMHO, you may fight, but you'll have to learn to get along if you share the room.

[sendero]

52. Me, my 3 siblings,

and my parents in a house that's about the size of my living room now. I don't know how we did it :)

[SammyWinstonJack]

53. Well lets see. There were six of us total. A very small tract house

with 3 bdr/1ba on a postage size lot. My dad who is an excellent carpenter, added on a master suite with a bath and he also added on a front living room, that we kids were never allowed to be in. Four kids, 3 girls/one boy sharing a single bath wasn't much fun. :rofl: But we managed. Later after the two oldest moved out, my parents moved to the high desert in Calif. We moved to a one room brick house? with no inside plumbing (out houses suck!). He later added on a second room, but even then, my brother and I slept in a 1950's travel trailer. but before he added a bathroom, we all took baths in a large wash tub which was separated by a folding screen,in the added room, with water heated on the stove. Talk about embarrassing! And this was in the late 60's. My brother and I laugh about it now, but back then we absolutely hated it! And we weren't poor. My parents just chose to live in a remote area of the high desert, where most houses were weekend homestead cabins.

[Suziq]

54. I Grew Up In Brooklyn . . . .

over a candy store on a busy street. It had two bedrooms, one bath. My sister, brother and I shared a room until I was almost 13. I finally got my own room when we moved around the corner to a three bedroom apartment in a two-family house. My brother-in-law's parents owned the house. That's where he met my sister.

[Nay]

55. 850 SF concrete block house in FL. 3 br, 1 bath.

Mom, Dad, me and my brother. Even today, as I go in that house, it seems perfectly fine and spacious, well laid out. I wish I could pick it up and plunk it down on some acreage where I live now.

[VOX]

56. About 1200 sq. ft.; 3 tiny bedrooms and one bath...

And by many relative standards, that's not bad. But for a family of four, you certainly kept bumping into one another (often literally).

In fact, every time I went back there as an adult to visit my mom, I was always amazed to see how small the place was, and had a hard time imagining how we all packed in there without a lot of bickering.

[QuestionAll...]

58. small house and even a smaller outhouse.

have some extended repugish relatives now with 6 bathrooms, for 2 assholes.

I feel fortunate that I don't feel needy. One real flush bathroom is quite enough for me.

[LWolf]

59. A long series of 1 and 2 br apts. in run-down neighborhoods.

I first lived in a house when I was 12; a 3 bedroom, 1 bath "ranch" house with concrete floors. The bedrooms measured 10 X 8. That lasted a year.

Then I lived in someone's basement while my mom scrambled to find new digs.

I next lived in a 2+1 rental in a working-class neighborhood. For a year.

Then in a barn converted to a house; 2+1.

Then, when that house was going to be torn down for development a year later, in a 2+1 cottage with plumbing problems. That's where I lived when I graduated from high school.

At the age of 46, I now live in the first place I've ever lived with more than one bathroom. Of course, the fact that the tub is broken, the shower so small I can't bend over to reach my feet in the 2nd bathroom doesn't matter. I've hit the big time in this rundown old trailer; the biggest place I've ever lived, and 2 bathrooms to boot!

I need the space. First of all, I have 5,000 books. They didn't fit well in my last little "cottage." Secondly, I've joined forces with my adult son, since he's become a single parent. I like having my own end of the house further away from them.

[politicat]

60. Base housing, trailers, bunked with a grandparent... a little everything.

My great-grandparent's house has 12 rooms (7 can be bedrooms, though one's the farm office and one was set up as a classroom for my grandmother and her brothers) and one bathroom, a coal burner in the basement and a secondary gas system. The house on the south side of the road had four bedrooms, five public rooms and one bathroom (it now has two, but the family that now owns it put the second one in.) We had an outhouse on the north side until 1980. Both of the farm houses were originally built in the 19th century and added on to over the last century; both houses started as 4 rooms (Parlor, 2 bedrooms and a kitchen.) The big house usually had 7 to 14 people living there at a time, until the late 80's when we stopped raising things that needed farm-hands year round.

The first house I remember was base housing, and it was pretty scary. The second one had two bedrooms and a big "playroom" that I now realize was not a very safe place for anyone, let alone a child. But it was cheap.

I usually had my own room growing up because I was eldest and needed the study space; sometimes I had my own bathroom, sometimes I didn't. Depended on the configuration of the house. But we lived in 24 houses in 16 years, so they kind of all blend together.

Some of them were huge, but luggage allowances meant we didn't have a lot of stuff.

[tammywammy]

61. 4 bedroom, 2-1/2 baths

2 car attached garage. When I was in middle school my parents built a second detached 2-car garage for our boat.

There was my parents and three kids. By the time I was 8, though I was the only child living at home (both of my brothers had turned 18 by then and joined the military).

[union_maid]

62. We lived in three places

When I was really, really little we lived in a one bedroom apartment. That was my parents, me and my grandmother had moved in with us by the time of my earliest memory. I shared the bedroom with her. Then we switched rent-controlled apartments with my childless by choice aunt and uncle. That was 10 rooms, mostly big. We gained my father's uncle, though, so when my sister came along we shared a room even though the place was huge. Then we moved out to the suburbs to an eight room, 4 bed, 1 1/2 bathroom house. My sister and I still shared a room because our grandmother and great uncle were still with us. Actually, I really hated sharing a room. I don't think it destroyed us or anything, but I would have given a lot for my own room.

Now we live in a two family, which is filled to overflowing with us, our kids, grandkids and my sister. My mother was her until she died earlier this year. We're cramped, but in this economic climate, we're grateful to be here.

*edited to make correction - father's uncle, not husband's uncle. No husband when I was 11.

[stevedeshazer]

64. 700 square feet heated only by a wood stove

My pop was a WW II vet. In about 1950 he bought a "defense house", a house left over from the shipbuilding era of WW II to temporarily house the tens of thousands of shipyard workers here in Portland OR and Vancouver, WA.

After he married my mom, he had the house trucked to property he bought from his dad. It was at the end of a dirt road, the kind that is two ruts with a big hump in the middle overgrown with weeds. I lived in that house until I was 14.

When I was three, Pop got some neighbors to help him build a barn out of lumber sawed on site by a saw hooked to a power take-off run by an Allis-Chalmers A-40 tractor. Needless to say, this was impressive to a little kid, and I still remember it nearly five decades later.

Today, my wife and I live in a solid old house (built in 1924) in a very progressive city that is <1600 sq. ft. It's like a palace to us.

The McMansions of today are a joke and a huge waste of resources.

However, I don't agree that kids should have to move out. My son lives here, and I've invited my elderly mom to live with us when she no longer can make it on her own. Extended family is the norm in human history. I find it strange that so many folks today reject that notion.

[sweetheart]

65. it was as big as benburch's house

and since i can no longer ask him how big that was, i'm at a loss.

In his house was a billion rooms, in a million dimensions of existance,
like the temple of atlantis, or some egyptian mystery school underground
with pools of reflecting azure in omniscient prescience of the downfall of mankind,
fallen petals of a white rose...

[B Calm]

66. I miss him too...

[sweetheart]

67. waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

:cry: :hug: :cry:

[kath]

81. what happened to benburch?

[kineneb]

70. maybe 1000 sq ft

when I was very small, I lived in my parents' single wide trailer. Then when they divorced, I moved across the driveway into my grandparents' late 1930's house. The house was tiny, but we lived on 3/4 of an acre, with lots of fruit trees, a big garden and a big lawn.

Originally, it was a 4-room large cottage with an outhouse in the back yard. They built an addition with a bathroom, laundry space and "guest" bedroom. Alas, it was badly damaged by a fire and had to be torn down and rebuilt. My parents rent it out now.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

71. I Say God Bless Your Sister. If She Can Afford It, She Can Buy However

big a house she wants. I don't care if it had 20 room and 10 bathrooms to be honest with ya. God bless her and congrats to your sister on her new home!

[Cleita]

72. There were about four homes that I grew up in.

All of them were from two to three bedrooms with one bath. Since I was an only child, they weren't cramped. They had nice big yards too, something the new homes of today don't have. That always makes me feel cramped. However, I could live in a tent as long as I have a nice big yard with trees and gardens.

[Missy Vixen]

73. Three bedrooms, one bath, 1200 sq ft

Our house now? Three bedrooms, two and a half baths, 2148 square feet for two of us and three uncivilized felines.

Julie

[MissB]

74. Ours was pretty sizeable

Not quite 3000 sq feet. All three of us kids had our own bedroom. It wasn't fancy, but it wasn't cramped by any means.

I have a smaller home (2300 sq feet). My kids share a room because I prefer to have a guest room available. Smaller house = less to clean. Less stuff = less stuff to clean.

[Blue Belle]

75. I grew up in a small house...

Our house was 3 bedrooms, and one bath. My sister and I shared a room, and the boys had the loft upstairs (and when I say loft, I mean converted attic space). My parents raised 7 kids in that house... and yes, they probably could have used anoher bathroom, but I don't remember ever NEEDING more space.

I agree... this need for McMansions is out of control.

[yorkiemommie1]

79. 3 bd 1 ba

4 kids.

then we moved to a new 3bd 1 3/4 ba. there would have been enough room if my parents hadn't been packrats, something i try to avoid being at all costs.