[Music]
[Applause]
have you guys ever had an idea that was
so big you knew instantly it was gonna
change your life
it felt absolutely perfect all the way
down to your toes and you knew this
wasn’t just one answer to your problems
it was the answer all your friends
listened they’ve wrapped you in a big
hug then they smiled and said are you
nuts you can’t do that we’re all just a
little bit worried about you honey a few
years ago I had an idea exactly like
this it was huge it was life-changing
and everyone thought I was nuts my idea
was to build a house with my four kids
to actually build it with our own hands
now the catch is we’d never built
anything larger than a bookshelf but we
didn’t let that little detail slow us
down we figured we could just build the
whole thing by watching YouTube
tutorials I know what you’re thinking
your friends are right Cara that sounds
a little bit crazy
my kids were 17 year old hope 15 year
old drew 11 year old Jada and two year
old Roman a few teenagers and a toddler
but this didn’t feel like a radical move
to us not at the time it felt like the
most logical idea in the world like
exactly the thing that anyone in our
situation would do like a slightly
larger than usual IKEA project I mean I
get it now I understand all of the
people who looked at us like we had lost
our minds I understand my parents and
others same people trying to talk me out
of this but we weren’t coming from a
same situation for more than a decade we
had been stalked and terrorized by a man
with severe paranoid schizophrenia and
when I married this muscled up guy who I
thought would protect us he became
physically abusive my kids learn to push
their dressers in front of their doors
to survive the night they learn to run
and hide how to be
small and how to be broken they didn’t
know how to just relax and let their
guard down how to laugh or communicate
as a healthy family we had to spend
trudging down this path of mere survival
for too long and you know sometimes it
takes that radical move to change your
trajectory this big crazy idea that will
shift your momentum toward a better path
and this idea to build a house would
become just that and yeah we knew it
would be more difficult than a normal
family project we knew it would be
20-hour days of hard physical labor
but we weren’t a normal family we have
been through hell
imagine after a decade of abuse fear and
stalking of waking up to find symbols
drawn on your bedroom windows finding
your pets tortured and holding a man at
gunpoint until the police arrive imagine
there hasn’t been a single thing that
you and your kids can do to make your
life better just to make it safe and
then one morning I was driving the kids
to school being one of those real
overachiever moms I was warming
two-year-old Romans blueberry Pop Tart
over the heat mint and then I saw my
kids in the mirror there slumped
shoulders there haunted eyes and their
small small futures I decided right then
and there we were done with all these
failed little baby steps we were going
to do something big something so crazy
and massive it would forever change the
way we saw ourselves and what we were
capable of we also needed a safe
inexpensive place to live so when this
idea to build a house popped into my
head
you bet we jumped on that it was the
first spark of something bigger the
first hint that we could take physical
action to literally build ourselves a
better life so we woke up every day we
gave it everything
we had and then we gave it some more
there’s also a whole lot to be said for
hitting things really hard with a hammer
– for the power you feel when a saw
blade rips through a sheet of plywood
for how it feels to finally take action
unless of course you get in over your
head because as hard as it must be for
you to believe that as a computer
programmer and an author I didn’t
actually know how to build a house it’s
true I was clueless I mean I driven by
construction sites in my lifetime and
naturally I always thought exactly like
you guys are thinking right now but
that’s really not as hard as it looks
not for the first time I cut myself in
way over my head I seriously misjudged
what we were getting into the kids and I
had to actually Google how to set a
foundation block how to frame a wall how
to do plumbing how to run gas lines
without blowing yourself up we looked up
each one of these things on YouTube and
then we built it and we did this over
and over until we had an entire house
and if you think about it that is
exactly how every massive goal is ever
achieved you just make one big can’t go
back now decision and then follow it
with lots of smaller leaps that just
keep you moving forward I can remember
though the very first day I saw my four
kids standing out on this construction
site in front of this enormous pile of
1,500 concrete blocks next to this
mountain of two-by-fours and pipes and
nails they looked so incredibly small
standing there in worn-out old blue
jeans plastic bags on their feet inside
of their old tennis shoes because we
didn’t even own rubber boots their
little lips quivering in the winter cold
I was as scared in that moment as I have
ever been in my entire life who wouldn’t
be
I just armed my
teenagers with power saws nail guns and
a hammer drill but also because I knew
in that moment that every single day for
the rest of our lives from this one
forward would in some way be shaped by
our level of success on this crazy
project and what if we failed I had to
keep fighting back this idea that what
if instead of empowering my kids I just
set them up for the biggest failure of
their lives because I knew standing
there with bread bags inside my horn
tennis shoes
I knew we could fail exactly like every
person who heard about this project had
said we would my kids couldn’t take
another failure neither could I lucky
for us I made one risky move at the
beginning of this project that
guaranteed our success i sabotaged our
retreat by spending every last penny on
these piles of supplies to build this
house there was no way out the only way
forward was the puzzle it all together
into a house and we had exactly nine
months to do it are we default on the
construction loan I’d taken out to buy
these supplies the stakes were high
the pressure was high and we’d been so
low for so long sometimes I had a really
hard time measuring out especially in
the early stages when one of the first
things that I had to do was to somehow
bring water onto this construction site
now unfortunately my plumber was
absolutely terrified of looking our
water line down into the city main maybe
I should mention I was my plumber but
not only was that water main more than
250 feet from our foundation it was on
the other side of the street and the guy
down at the permit office had told me
rather sternly that if I collapsed the
street I would have to fix it now
becoming a street maker was even lower
on my list of career goals than becoming
a house builder so of course
I just kept putting it off proving that
my plumber was also a coward coward or
not we still had to build this entire
house in this very short nine-month
deadline which meant to build the entire
foundation of the house process for
which water happens to be essential the
kids and I had to hike down to the
neighbor’s pond carrying five-gallon
pails in December in January
we’d scoop up the water head back up and
dump it in a wheelbarrow where we hand
mix the mortar to set 1,500 concrete
blocks and build a foundation that’s
more than seven feet tall in the front
and yeah I said we hand mix that mortar
don’t even get me started on the state
of my electrician after we finally had
all of these concrete blocks backed up
and stuck together using pails of water
we still had to fill that entire
foundation with this powdered granite 26
dump truck loads that we moved by hand
with shovels so not only did we have a
woman a few teenagers and the toddler
building a house we were doing it kind
of like you would in a third-world
country there were my kids dragging
these concrete blocks across the mud
because they didn’t have the muscle yet
to lift them there they were hauling
bucket after bucket of water up from
this half frozen pond there they were
laughing at me for falling on my butt in
this muddy mess again but what do you
know there we all work together building
the impossible and after we had this
foundation finally finished and I
gathered the courage to hook that water
line down into the city main it was
actually no big deal went off without a
hitch countless times my kids and I
would crowd around some daunting new
project without a single clue between us
of how we were supposed to accomplish a
diagonal wall or maybe a staircase
landing so I would shout bring me a 2×6
I’ll make the first cut
when the one and only thing I knew for
certain was that this was not how you do
it but it was my job to keep the
momentum going to keep the confidence up
to fake it until I figured it out so
there I was moving a saw blade across a
board at a snail’s pace well I tried to
work out the next move in my head
hoping I would be one step closer to the
right move our confidence grew every
time it took less than six tries to get
something right
I passed my framing inspections and my
plumbing inspections we laid hardwood
and tile we painted trim sidewalks and
flower beds
I ran gas lines without blowing anyone
up I have lived in the house we built
for nine years
it’s a 3,500 square foot house with five
bedrooms three bathrooms and a
floor-to-ceiling library plus a
three-car garage an enormous shop in a
two-story treehouse and every single day
my kids wake up surrounded by this proof
that our minds and our bodies can do
incredible things we built this house
and we rebuilt our family today my kids
are plowing through life with fearless
determination there’s no sign of those
small broken kits
who knew too well how to hide my oldest
daughter hope runs her own business and
will soon star in her own television
show my son Drew moved up to Alaska
where he explored climbed ice walls and
other crazy things that sound awesome if
someone else’s kid is doing them
my daughter Jada moved into the Ozark
Mountains for a while and lived in a
tent through snow storms so she could
learn to build a straw bale house milk
goats and live sustainably the youngest
little Roman runs his own YouTube
channel makes swords in my backyard and
has the biggest most fearless plans for
his future my kids and I came out the
other side of trauma thinking the most
important thing we needed was this place
to live
if this story our story it was never
about a house it was this process of
building a house together that taught us
how I determined family can turn trauma
into power and fear into courage as
proof that we can all build ourselves a
life without limits thank you
[Applause]
you
[Applause]
have you guys ever had an idea that was
so big you knew instantly it was gonna
change your life
it felt absolutely perfect all the way
down to your toes and you knew this
wasn’t just one answer to your problems
it was the answer all your friends
listened they’ve wrapped you in a big
hug then they smiled and said are you
nuts you can’t do that we’re all just a
little bit worried about you honey a few
years ago I had an idea exactly like
this it was huge it was life-changing
and everyone thought I was nuts my idea
was to build a house with my four kids
to actually build it with our own hands
now the catch is we’d never built
anything larger than a bookshelf but we
didn’t let that little detail slow us
down we figured we could just build the
whole thing by watching YouTube
tutorials I know what you’re thinking
your friends are right Cara that sounds
a little bit crazy
my kids were 17 year old hope 15 year
old drew 11 year old Jada and two year
old Roman a few teenagers and a toddler
but this didn’t feel like a radical move
to us not at the time it felt like the
most logical idea in the world like
exactly the thing that anyone in our
situation would do like a slightly
larger than usual IKEA project I mean I
get it now I understand all of the
people who looked at us like we had lost
our minds I understand my parents and
others same people trying to talk me out
of this but we weren’t coming from a
same situation for more than a decade we
had been stalked and terrorized by a man
with severe paranoid schizophrenia and
when I married this muscled up guy who I
thought would protect us he became
physically abusive my kids learn to push
their dressers in front of their doors
to survive the night they learn to run
and hide how to be
small and how to be broken they didn’t
know how to just relax and let their
guard down how to laugh or communicate
as a healthy family we had to spend
trudging down this path of mere survival
for too long and you know sometimes it
takes that radical move to change your
trajectory this big crazy idea that will
shift your momentum toward a better path
and this idea to build a house would
become just that and yeah we knew it
would be more difficult than a normal
family project we knew it would be
20-hour days of hard physical labor
but we weren’t a normal family we have
been through hell
imagine after a decade of abuse fear and
stalking of waking up to find symbols
drawn on your bedroom windows finding
your pets tortured and holding a man at
gunpoint until the police arrive imagine
there hasn’t been a single thing that
you and your kids can do to make your
life better just to make it safe and
then one morning I was driving the kids
to school being one of those real
overachiever moms I was warming
two-year-old Romans blueberry Pop Tart
over the heat mint and then I saw my
kids in the mirror there slumped
shoulders there haunted eyes and their
small small futures I decided right then
and there we were done with all these
failed little baby steps we were going
to do something big something so crazy
and massive it would forever change the
way we saw ourselves and what we were
capable of we also needed a safe
inexpensive place to live so when this
idea to build a house popped into my
head
you bet we jumped on that it was the
first spark of something bigger the
first hint that we could take physical
action to literally build ourselves a
better life so we woke up every day we
gave it everything
we had and then we gave it some more
there’s also a whole lot to be said for
hitting things really hard with a hammer
– for the power you feel when a saw
blade rips through a sheet of plywood
for how it feels to finally take action
unless of course you get in over your
head because as hard as it must be for
you to believe that as a computer
programmer and an author I didn’t
actually know how to build a house it’s
true I was clueless I mean I driven by
construction sites in my lifetime and
naturally I always thought exactly like
you guys are thinking right now but
that’s really not as hard as it looks
not for the first time I cut myself in
way over my head I seriously misjudged
what we were getting into the kids and I
had to actually Google how to set a
foundation block how to frame a wall how
to do plumbing how to run gas lines
without blowing yourself up we looked up
each one of these things on YouTube and
then we built it and we did this over
and over until we had an entire house
and if you think about it that is
exactly how every massive goal is ever
achieved you just make one big can’t go
back now decision and then follow it
with lots of smaller leaps that just
keep you moving forward I can remember
though the very first day I saw my four
kids standing out on this construction
site in front of this enormous pile of
1,500 concrete blocks next to this
mountain of two-by-fours and pipes and
nails they looked so incredibly small
standing there in worn-out old blue
jeans plastic bags on their feet inside
of their old tennis shoes because we
didn’t even own rubber boots their
little lips quivering in the winter cold
I was as scared in that moment as I have
ever been in my entire life who wouldn’t
be
I just armed my
teenagers with power saws nail guns and
a hammer drill but also because I knew
in that moment that every single day for
the rest of our lives from this one
forward would in some way be shaped by
our level of success on this crazy
project and what if we failed I had to
keep fighting back this idea that what
if instead of empowering my kids I just
set them up for the biggest failure of
their lives because I knew standing
there with bread bags inside my horn
tennis shoes
I knew we could fail exactly like every
person who heard about this project had
said we would my kids couldn’t take
another failure neither could I lucky
for us I made one risky move at the
beginning of this project that
guaranteed our success i sabotaged our
retreat by spending every last penny on
these piles of supplies to build this
house there was no way out the only way
forward was the puzzle it all together
into a house and we had exactly nine
months to do it are we default on the
construction loan I’d taken out to buy
these supplies the stakes were high
the pressure was high and we’d been so
low for so long sometimes I had a really
hard time measuring out especially in
the early stages when one of the first
things that I had to do was to somehow
bring water onto this construction site
now unfortunately my plumber was
absolutely terrified of looking our
water line down into the city main maybe
I should mention I was my plumber but
not only was that water main more than
250 feet from our foundation it was on
the other side of the street and the guy
down at the permit office had told me
rather sternly that if I collapsed the
street I would have to fix it now
becoming a street maker was even lower
on my list of career goals than becoming
a house builder so of course
I just kept putting it off proving that
my plumber was also a coward coward or
not we still had to build this entire
house in this very short nine-month
deadline which meant to build the entire
foundation of the house process for
which water happens to be essential the
kids and I had to hike down to the
neighbor’s pond carrying five-gallon
pails in December in January
we’d scoop up the water head back up and
dump it in a wheelbarrow where we hand
mix the mortar to set 1,500 concrete
blocks and build a foundation that’s
more than seven feet tall in the front
and yeah I said we hand mix that mortar
don’t even get me started on the state
of my electrician after we finally had
all of these concrete blocks backed up
and stuck together using pails of water
we still had to fill that entire
foundation with this powdered granite 26
dump truck loads that we moved by hand
with shovels so not only did we have a
woman a few teenagers and the toddler
building a house we were doing it kind
of like you would in a third-world
country there were my kids dragging
these concrete blocks across the mud
because they didn’t have the muscle yet
to lift them there they were hauling
bucket after bucket of water up from
this half frozen pond there they were
laughing at me for falling on my butt in
this muddy mess again but what do you
know there we all work together building
the impossible and after we had this
foundation finally finished and I
gathered the courage to hook that water
line down into the city main it was
actually no big deal went off without a
hitch countless times my kids and I
would crowd around some daunting new
project without a single clue between us
of how we were supposed to accomplish a
diagonal wall or maybe a staircase
landing so I would shout bring me a 2×6
I’ll make the first cut
when the one and only thing I knew for
certain was that this was not how you do
it but it was my job to keep the
momentum going to keep the confidence up
to fake it until I figured it out so
there I was moving a saw blade across a
board at a snail’s pace well I tried to
work out the next move in my head
hoping I would be one step closer to the
right move our confidence grew every
time it took less than six tries to get
something right
I passed my framing inspections and my
plumbing inspections we laid hardwood
and tile we painted trim sidewalks and
flower beds
I ran gas lines without blowing anyone
up I have lived in the house we built
for nine years
it’s a 3,500 square foot house with five
bedrooms three bathrooms and a
floor-to-ceiling library plus a
three-car garage an enormous shop in a
two-story treehouse and every single day
my kids wake up surrounded by this proof
that our minds and our bodies can do
incredible things we built this house
and we rebuilt our family today my kids
are plowing through life with fearless
determination there’s no sign of those
small broken kits
who knew too well how to hide my oldest
daughter hope runs her own business and
will soon star in her own television
show my son Drew moved up to Alaska
where he explored climbed ice walls and
other crazy things that sound awesome if
someone else’s kid is doing them
my daughter Jada moved into the Ozark
Mountains for a while and lived in a
tent through snow storms so she could
learn to build a straw bale house milk
goats and live sustainably the youngest
little Roman runs his own YouTube
channel makes swords in my backyard and
has the biggest most fearless plans for
his future my kids and I came out the
other side of trauma thinking the most
important thing we needed was this place
to live
if this story our story it was never
about a house it was this process of
building a house together that taught us
how I determined family can turn trauma
into power and fear into courage as
proof that we can all build ourselves a
life without limits thank you
[Applause]
you
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