When Does Home Feel Like Home?

I realized the other day that we've been in our house almost six and a half years now, which is completely crazy to me.  We started hunting when we knew that we needed to be in a particular location for a job, and after a couple months of searching, we settled on our house.  We picked it because it had a good floor plan, even though it was a wallpaper- and popcorn-ceiling nightmare.  We knew that we could make something of it even though it wasn't perfect and even though it was on a semi-busy street, which wasn't ideal, but everything else that wasn't a dump was out of our price range.

And so for three years we chipped away at the wallpaper and the odd features of the house (there were so many useless doors in here!) and made it our own.  We crafted a cozy space for our family and have transformed so many aspects of the structure itself on our meager budget and pretty much only the two of us working on it.  There is literally no surface that we have not altered in some way.

And yet, almost four years after we finished the major renovations, I still don't know if this feels like home, as crazy as that sounds.  You always hear people talking about their "forever home" - the perfect one that they loved instantly and that they were going to spend the rest of their life in.  I don't have that overwhelming feeling about this place, though I couldn't tell you exactly why.  It's a lovely house and we are so so lucky to live here that I feel like an ass even thinking it, but I do sometimes wonder if this is where we'll stay or if there is one of those forever home for us.  Is it in this house?  In this town?  Some other place or other state?  How do you know if it's "the one"?

Sometimes I think it may just be a restless feeling of needing a new project and the excitement of starting something new.  I love starting something new and running through all the fresh possibilities - finding the place with the perfect space to entertain, the perfect space to work, the perfect space to relax.  I enjoyed going through and freshening up the house room by room - maybe I just want to renovate another one.  I could have my own show on TLC - "RenoMom"!  In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy where I'm at, though I would love to get off the busy road.