In early 2019, the itch to move began. Our entire married life was peppered with packing up and relocating every 1–2 years for Cory’s medical training and work. So it wasn’t a shock when, after living in our current neighborhood for three whole years (a record!), we felt the familiar urge for change, to build our custom home.

The hard part? This was the best neighborhood we’d ever lived in! Beautiful homes, gorgeous landscaping, and kind people. But even so, trying to do life as a family of eight with a glorified closet for a laundry room, a laughably small pantry (shoe-closet-sized, truly), and a kitchen that my parents literally laughed at… wasn’t sustainable. There was square footage, yes—but the layout wasn’t made for a big family or for the lifestyle we needed. That’s when we started seriously thinking about building a custom home.

So, there we were… just uncomfortably itching away. Cory had dreamed of designing a home since before we met in college—he was 22, I was 19—and that dream was starting to make more and more sense. Meanwhile, I wanted a move-in ready place. Something already built. Something easy. The idea of building a custom home felt overwhelming. Waiting a year (or more)? No thanks.

We started casually scrolling Zillow… as one does… and I fell in love with a home. The kind of love that makes you text screenshots to your best friend with excessive exclamation points. But we were just a few hours too late with our offer.

Fast forward: more scrolling, more dismissals, and then the idea of buying land entered the picture. We found a beautiful lot near the mouth of a canyon—a corner lot in a stunning neighborhood. It had been sitting on the market for months, which felt suspiciously like fate. It was flat (huge bonus for building a custom home), and our backyard “neigh”-bors would be horses for the foreseeable future. YES. The price? Not cheap, but reasonable—and looking back, buying land in 2019 before the market went banana-pants was basically a miracle.

And then… COVID hit. Just like that, any concrete house plans were tabled as the world pressed pause. We doubted, debated, and even got quotes to remodel our existing home—but ultimately realized that would be a short-term fix. Deep down, we knew we’d always wonder: What if we had just gone for it? So, in a moment of clarity (and adulting), we fully embraced our custom home journey.

I documented it all on Instagram—every little step of the way. That’s when Stonebrook Home was born. I didn’t tell anyone I’d created the account (literally, no one), but I didn’t make it private either. Slowly, people started finding it. Turns out, I loved sharing our home design inspiration, our progress, and all the behind-the-scenes of this wild but rewarding process.

Stonebrook comes by its name from our choice of exterior material and the location of our build. While Instagram has been fantastic for documenting our journey through building our custom home, sharing my design ideas, and my home details and design that inspires me—along with the best deals I find online for our home and family—I have found that my Instagram captions are essentially NOVELS. Hence, the need for this blog.

I’ve loved every phase of designing a home from the ground up. Every. Single. One. From the architect sketches to choosing cabinet pulls to stalking tile samples like it was my part-time job—building a custom home has been one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life.

And listen—remember how I was so firmly on Team “Buy an Existing Home”? Well. Let’s just say I’ve eaten a hearty serving of humble pie. Having a home that reflects us—truly us—has been better than I could’ve imagined.

So thank you for being here and following along on our custom home journey. I’ll be sharing more about our home design inspiration, favorite finds for everyday living, styling ideas, and other lovely things I’m loving for home + life.