Considering moving to Kauai, to work-trade on on farm...

[coleina]

I need some REAL advice since I can't talk to friends or family, all are biased...

My husband and I have a 8 month old girl.  We live in (cheap) Idaho, just moved into a lil place here a few months ago.  We both hate winter.  He just got laid off from landscaping and will be getting unemployment.  I am currently a SAHM, looking for some WAH with Lionbridge or similar.  His family is here.  We both are passionate about learning to grow food and live simply and have a rough go of it living like everyone else we know...

Enter an opportunity dropped in our laps to work off rent/food in a one bedroom cottage on Kauai (we've been there and loved it, also we lived on Oahu and Big Island before) on a 3 acre farm and B&B.  20hrs each a week.  We'd have to sell everything here, seriously everything (much of which we just purchased to fill this lil place) and find someone to take over our lease.  Not to mention dropping the bomb on family that once again, we are moving away.  We've done work trade before (in Hawaii and Alaska) pre-baby... with unemployment we have more than enough to get by, if I got some WAH we'd even be able to save since we wouldn't be paying for housing or food.  This is the kind of life we prefer to live, but .  However, it is obviously a more serious undertaking now that we are a family.  

So... would you do it?  Have you done something similar?  Am I crazy to consider?  Or crazy to hesitate?  I am pretty sure our minds have been made up, but I could really use some non-biased outside perspective.  Any advice?  

Edited by coleina - 10/3/12 at 11:18am

[amberskyfire]

I live on the BI. Personally, I wouldn't do it with such a small child because it would be difficult to wear them in the sun all day every day, even with a hat and once she's walking, you have to constantly watch to make sure she doesn't eat anything because of the slugs, but those are just my hangups. The WORST part of living here for us is my kids not seeing our family regularly. They don't even get to see them once a year. I have so much guilt over that, not just keeping my kids from seeing their grandparents, but essentially keeping their grandparents from seeing them. It breaks my heart. It's something I never thought about before we moved here and had kids. I wish we could spend Christmases with our families and I wish their grandparents could stop by and watch them sometimes or visit or just know them and watch them grow up.

I don't want to discourage you at all. I mean, we moved out here and we're dealing with it. I just wanted to warn you how much it would break your heart. It's much different when you have children. If you know you want to come out, do it! But know that first. Now that I'm here, I love it and could never move back. I wish I had never heard of Hawaii in the first place sometimes. :)