Five Trails Home
Simplifying Home Building, Design, and Planning
ON THE BLOG
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How We Chose Natural Stone Countertops for Our Kitchen (Well, Almost)
When we started choosing natural stone countertops for our kitchen at Five Trails, I was fairly certain I knew what I wanted. Something beautiful and dramatic, a piece of stone that would feel like art in the middle of the room. I had visions of Patagonia quartzite, with its incredible movement and layers of color,…
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Six Million Views, One Empty House, and a Summer We Didn’t See Coming
Leaving our family home, accidentally going viral, and discovering that maybe we’re all a little more connected than we think. At approximately 11 p.m. on the night we moved out of our home of nearly 20 years, I posted a video to Instagram. I was exhausted. Physically, emotionally, all of it. We’d just finished moving…
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The Hardest Part of Moving Out of the Family Home Is the Space Between Homes
One of our kids is having a rough time. Nothing catastrophic, thankfully. Just normal life stuff, which sometimes feels plenty catastrophic when you’re the one living through it. We were talking last night, and somewhere in the conversation she said, “I just wish I could come home.” It stopped me cold because I knew exactly…
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What Makes a House Feel Like Home? It’s Probably Not What You Think.
What makes a house feel like home? It’s a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately. After leaving the home where we raised our family, I’ve realized that what makes a house feel like home has very little to do with square footage, finishes, or furniture. Those things certainly add beauty and personality, and…
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I Thought Five Trails Was About Building a House. Now I’ve Realized It’s About Something Much Bigger.
A couple of weeks ago, I posted a short video on TikTok that I almost didn’t share. There was no elaborate edit. No trending sound. No strategy. Just one final moment before we walked out of the home where we raised our family. The only real place our kids have called home and the longest…
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The Truth about Moving in Midlife: The Messy Middle Between Leaving and Arriving
There is a season of life that nobody talks about. It’s the phase after you’ve made the decision but before you’ve arrived. The phase where every day feels like you’re moving forward and falling apart at the same time. That’s where we are right now – moving in midlife. Three weeks from moving day. The…
OUR STORY
Five Trails Home began with a simple question: What should we do next?
With our three kids grown and beginning lives of their own, it was time to jump into our next act. A plan began to crystalize involving a move to Wisconsin and fed a need for wide open spaces. The search began.
Why We Chose to Build
Like many families, we started by looking for an existing home. We toured a few beautiful houses and a whole bunch of dilapidated farm properties. We were up for a huge challenge from the beginning and the realtors kept questioning the level of dilapidation we were actually willing to consider. But despite our vision for something more, we didn’t see enough. None of these places were ours.
A spark ignited. Could we build? Where would we build? And what would a home look like if it were designed completely around the life we want to happen inside it?
For our family, the answer became Five Trails Home.
The name reflects the five paths that start and end on our five Wisconsin acres—our family moving through life together, each person growing in their own direction, but always returning and rooted in the same place. The trails carved into the land made us fall in love with every inch as we walked the property on Valentines Day 2025. We walked off, wrote an offer and Five Trails was ours.
The question became, “Now what?” Let’s figure it out together!
Follow The JOurney
Five Trails Home
