FARM & HOUSE TOUR - Our Homestead in the Forests of Norway

Hello and welcome to Skogli farm. That is what we decided to call this place because skog in Norwegian means forest and ly is something like a shelter or something that makes you feel protected and that is exactly what this place is going to be for us. A little shelter in the forest. We are pretty much in the middle of the wilderness here in the middle of a huge huge forest in Østlande in Norway and yeah also mountains in every direction and here we're just having a little home base shelter in the forest. We just bought this farm a few months ago and actually also just moved in so I thought today I could just give you a little tour of the property, show you the houses, show you how everything looks like and also share a bit about our plans, what we're going to do here because yeah obviously we just moved in. The only thing that we did so far is basically just a pretty big mess. Everything is really chaotic just to warn you already but of course that's not going to stay like that and I also thought it could be really nice to capture how it is right now and then maybe to look back at it in a few years and see how it has changed. And of course if you're interested in more details I will also upload an extended version of this farm tour in my community membership on YouTube and on Patreon so if you're interested in that feel very welcome to join us there. So yeah let's go I would say. So to give you a little overview maybe also in case you don't know us already my name is Lena. I'm a filmmaker and photographer and I'm living here together with my fiance Joachim who is an artist. He's a landscape painter and yeah we both mostly work from home. I do freelance jobs and YouTube obviously and we also run an online store together where we mostly sell Joachim's artworks and ship them all over the world. We also have two dogs Ivy and Alva both rescued from the streets of Romania. They're living here together with us and yeah mostly at this place the plan is just to build ourselves a little home here. Joachim really wants to have a garden and yeah I would really like to have horses again. Horses always have been a very big part of my life and yeah that is basically the plan for this place. We have two buildings, a barn and a living house with a little extra house attached. The farm has been built in 1930 roundabout and has about two hectares of land. A little bit less probably. I'm always a little bit confused with these measurements but it should be around about two hectares. One hectare is pasture and the other hectare is forest that has been mostly chopped down and yeah maybe you can also just start the tour on the field and then go down to the house to the barn and yeah I will then share a little bit about everything. Okay I have my camera assistant ready and I thought we can just start the tour here on the field. The field starts at the art studio and goes around our little forest here in the middle. The field we are going to use mostly for the horses. It is a little bit too small. I would have wished to have a little bit more land to be honest. If you have three or four horses they will eat this up in no time so I just hope that we can maybe rent an additional farm somewhere nearby. We just take what we get and are grateful for that and of course it's great that we even have the space and also this area around here you can see that the forest mostly has been chopped down already. Our property goes to the big trees there in the distance and then behind the barn down a little bit and yeah it's not such a big problem that this forest has been chopped down. It's actually quite good that it's already like this because we will need the space for the horses in any case so our plan is basically just to chop down all the small trees, leave the big ones of course and then yeah this all will be horse area eventually. So not much to show you here but this is kind of like the overview over the property so far. So I think we can go down to the yard now. So this is like the main farm yard. This is actually the original house that has been here when the farm has built and this house here is actually from the 1800s. It's an old log cabin and they brought it here afterwards I think in around 1980 or so they brought it here and attached it to the main house which I think is pretty cool. We will show you that later. I thought we can just go into the barn first before the sun is completely disappearing. So this is the old barn as you can see it's quite old but the previous owners actually started renovating which is very great. They built a new ground construction and secured the barn from falling into this direction. I think that is what happened. They kind of had to stop like in the middle of the renovations. You will also see that from inside but it's very great that this part is done. So here you come on this very nice little porch where you can sit and enjoy the sun. There are two entrances into the barn. I think we can just go inside here first if the door is opening today. It is. So this is like the main big room of the barn. It's a huge mess as you can see. We just thrown everything in here when we moved but this is actually going to be the future workshop because as you might know I do enjoy to build things from time to time and my plan is also to reuse and renovate a lot of the old furniture. Also some of the tables and the cupboards and so on. They also have already been here and I think they're quite nice so looking forward to see what you can do with it. From here you then go into the other half of the barn. This compartment here is probably the oldest part of this barn. Also a lot to do still. Also has this little room around this corner here. So while this is probably like I said the oldest part this is probably the newest part. As far as I understood it the plan actually also was to build in a stable here for horses which is also why we have these three compartments here for boxes. I'm not quite sure yet if I really want to build in a stable like boxes. Of course there are horses who do enjoy having their own box in the evening and just have some peace and quiet but in my experience if you have a herd that is in harmony they actually prefer to be together the whole time and also to choose when they want to go inside. So my idea is to use this as a kind of an open stable. So there's a door back there and just leave this door open and just use this whole space here for the horses where they can decide when they're going to go in and out. This is probably how we are going to do it in the future. It's not a priority at the moment. And here you have like a door outside. Oh no, all the snow came down from the roof. We can just squeeze ourselves through here. Careful of the microphone. Yes, easy peasy, no problem. But it's great to have this door here. Yeah, like I said we will probably then just leave it open for the horses. It's actually perfect so they can just access their area outside whenever they want to. And let's have a very nice view from here. Now we are behind the barn. This is where our beloved campervan is living. I'm actually very happy that it has now like a place under a roof. It feels very good and it fits perfectly. Just fits like it couldn't be any bigger. And I also love like this design with the windows. It just makes it feel so open and some of the windows are broken unfortunately. But the plan is definitely to just replace it and yeah keep this kind of look because I really like it. And yeah, here is our beautiful outdoor toilet. It's all right, we are quite used to that kind of lifestyle. Though the plan of course is to have a proper toilet in the house in the future. So this is only temporary. And yeah, here now we come to the woodshed. Piles already shrinking. But here we have all our firewood. All a little bit messy still. But always a good feeling to have a shed full of firewood. Yeah, here some of the windows are or the glass has just been broken. But it should be possible to cut hands on like old windows like this and just replace them. So this pretty much has been the barn from inside. And I thought we can now just go around the house a little bit where the future garden is going to be. This is actually the driveway from where you come to the farm. Our property also goes around that corner as well. But it's all just, yeah, kind of messy forest area. We'll have to see what we're going to do about that part. And here is where the field ends. We started the tour up there. And yeah, pretty much there where the porch ends all the way down there is going to be the future garden. So yeah, we will see. Well, that's mainly Joachim's project. I'm not a very big gardener. I think there already also has been a garden before. Maybe I can blend in some images how it looked without the snow. Because there are some like juniper bushes and like this kind of half dead apple tree. I think that's what this is. And yeah, it's really perfect. So this all will be garden. Maybe we will place a little greenhouse down there as well. Looking forward to see how that's going to be. And yeah, now let's go inside the house. So this is where you come in to the main house. Obviously, there once has been like an entryway. I don't know how you call it. Something built in front. We're pretty much just going to rebuild this. I think that's also going to be one of the first projects in the spring. Because yeah, now you can see all the snow just ends up in front of the door and it's almost impossible to go inside and out. We don't use this door at the moment because we all live in Joachim's art studio so far. We are still renovating in this house at the moment. But yeah, that's of course going to be, like I said, one of the first projects in the spring also to protect the door a little bit from the weather and from the snow and everything. So yeah, let's just see if we even get in here. Just have to squeeze ourselves in there as well. Oh my god, I think there's definitely some improvements can be done here. Yeah, then you come into the hallway which is a very big mess. Mostly where we store all our tools at the moment and a washing machine. We actually got hands on a washing machine. It's a used one. I hope it will work. And a lot of garbage. Yeah, as I said, we're still renovating in here and this is just how it looks at the moment. But I thought we can maybe go upstairs first and then go into the living area in the kitchen and from there into the other house. The house is quite small. So upstairs we have two bigger rooms and two very, very, very small rooms which are here. As you can see here, we also have some storage space. I cannot open that right now which is very great. We lack a little bit of storage space in this house. So this is very great and I also I just love like things like this. And yeah, here we have actually one of my favorite places in the house. It's so incredibly cozy. This is our current guest chamber at the moment. And yeah, from here you then go into two rooms. This is going to be our future bedroom. Also with the most beautiful view I would say. I think also the sun goes up from that direction so you actually have morning sun in here. And yeah, it's a very beautiful room. One thing that we already did is sanding the floors. You maybe have seen that in the first renovation videos. So that's pretty much the only thing that we did here except from throwing a lot of things away. There has been a really big cupboard here. We have just been moving everything out and then sanding the floors. And yeah, the next step is just going to be painting the walls and painting the floor. And then we can also finally move in here and sleep here which is going to be very, very nice I think. Here we have a little room as well. A mess currently but this is going to be where we have our clothing in the future. I really have to say that I love these old little details like these doors and these light switches. I think it's very beautiful when you can see these traces of the past in the house. This is the next big room that we have upstairs. If you have seen my first renovation video then you know that this has been the room with the green floor. Yeah, this is actually going to be my future office and creative space. Very much looking forward to that. It has been quite a time ago that I really had like my own space. Here you can also look outside the field. Maybe future horses grazing on the field. I don't know. It's like everything is still full of sanding dust. Probably will take some years until we really get rid of that. Okay, then from here you come into the main living area. This is going to be the kitchen which then goes directly over to the living area. I really love that it's so open especially with such a small house. I think it's so important how the rooms are organized. It doesn't really make this house feel small. It feels like a lot of space. I really like this place. It's also very light in here. A lot of sunlight in general. This house just has like this very light feeling to it and I really love that. Here we have sanded the floors as well as you can see and we're just about to rearrange the kitchen a little bit. This is the kitchen that already has been here when we moved in and we pretty much plan to just leave it as it is. Probably just replace this working like this kitchen bench, kitchen plank. I don't know how it's called and maybe buy a new sink. Maybe also paint it eventually. We're not so sure about that yet. Here you can also see our beautiful little oven that we found secondhand. I think we paid like 20 dollars for it from a grandma on a farm in this area. I really love it. I think it fits perfectly in this house. From the kitchen you then come into our very very small bathroom that is here. We have a little shower and a little sink. It's very small. I don't know if you can even see that on the camera how small it is. I can stand here but if you're a little bit taller than me, you always have to be careful not to bump your head. But it's good. It's very nice for now. We lived without a shower for a very long time so it's really nice to at least have a shower, have running water. We are very grateful for that though of course in the long run the plan is to build a little bit of a bigger bathroom. The idea for now is to just extend like the bathroom that we're already having and just make a wall into the kitchen here. Remove this wall so that we have a little bit of a bigger space in the bathroom where we can also have a toilet and a bathtub which I think Joachim very much agrees to have a bathtub. So this is kind of the idea for now but we will have to see for now. It also works like this. Then from there you come into the living room. As you can see we have sanded down the wooden beams as well as the floors and yeah here we pretty much just have to paint the walls, paint the floors and then we're ready to move in here. Here has been a window before because this is where the house ended but as you have seen from outside they built in this hallway, this glass hallway to the other house which is actually also my favorite part of this whole farm I have to say. So here you come into the hallway. Maybe I can blend in some images how it looked before we made such a big mess here. At the moment we're not heating this place so this is just where everything kind of ends up where we don't know where to put it. So it's a big mess but I hope you can see why I love this place so much because yeah you have like the view over the whole farm. We cannot really go outside there right now because all the snow has been coming down from the roof here as well but it's going to be so beautiful I think in the summer. All the doors can just be open and you can sit here on the porch or when it's raining you can also sit inside here so my idea is actually to build a very cozy area where the sofa is right now behind there so you can just sit there and watch the horses, watch the dogs outside and enjoy the sun in the evening and yeah I think it's going to be very cozy and lots of plants and yeah I think it's going to be a very beautiful space. It's not right now but I hope you can see the vision that I'm having here and from here you then enter the artist's realm. Right now more dog, dog and living space are two wonderful, wonderful dogs. Baby and Alba. Yes, sit, sit. So this is actually where we currently live because as you have seen the house is still, we're still renovating there but in the future this is going to be Joachim's art studio. It's a very beautiful house as well, just fits perfectly to be creative in here and to create lots of magical worlds. But right now we all live here, we sleep up on the loft there and this is our kitchen and living room at the moment so yeah it's all right but we definitely also look forward to have a bigger space soon. There actually also are two small rooms here. This is where we pack all the packages or I'm packing all the packages to be fair. So this is the packing room, also much room for improvement but for now it works very well. So yeah here is where all the art gets packed and sent out all over to the world. Pretty much the same on this side as well. I'm not going to show you that just very quickly because this is just a very, very big mess. It's just where we store everything that we don't know where to put at the moment but yeah I think this is also going to be just storage space for the shop probably and yeah. The blue pug. Okay I hope you enjoyed this tour. Yeah and of course if you're interested in how everything is going to continue I feel very welcome to subscribe to this channel. I will definitely keep you posted and keep sharing about the process of the renovations and yeah all the different plans that I have now also shared with you. For now we will just focus on the inside of the house that we can move into the main house. That's like the next big priority and after that we will just see what what comes our way. How we will continue also with the horses. We really want to be ready before they move in. So yeah I think it's going to be an exciting year and I am very much looking forward to keep sharing it with you and yeah thank you so much for being here and I will then see you in the next renovation video where we will probably start painting finally in the main house.