What Makes Your House A Home?

"Think of the inside of your house as your soul and the outside architecture as something like your bone structure, your genetic inheritance...Our true home is inside each of us, and it is your love of life that transforms your house into your home."

 - Alexandra Stoddard

Your house may be your home...but the question I ask here today is...does your house FEEL like your home?

Yes, I realize, that is a loaded question.

Think back to a time when you were living somewhere that FELT like home. What was is about the place that made is so?

Was it the house itself?

Was it its contents?

Was it the other people who lived there with you?

I generally relate feelings of home to feelings of COMFORT.

How do YOU define comfort?

As some of you may know, I am a Certified Home Stager (although I have never really done this for a living!). Here is a post I did a while back that show several before and after shots of rooms I staged.

Imagine yourself in each "before" space and notice how you feel. Then imagine your self in the co-ordinating "after" space and notice any shift in feeling. Notice any difference?

Here is the post: If You Stage It, They Will Come.

There are a few things that are conjured up in my mind when I think of comfort when speaking about what HOME means to me 

1. Coziness. I want my home to feel cozy. When I walk through the front door I want to feel a sense of being embraced by the walls...kind of like the safely of a cocoon...a feeling of belonging.

I want one of these.
Badly.

2. A sense of calm. I want to feel my stresses of the day fall as I cross the threshold. I want to feel relaxed and at peace.

Ahhhhhhh

3. Surrounded by beauty. And beauty can mean very different things to different people. When I look around my home I want to see things that bring me a sense that this is MY home. I want my home to be a reflection of ME.

So purdy!

4. Order. As I mentioned in a past post, A Cluttered Home is a Cluttered Mind. When we are in a home that is full of scattered "stuff", our mind becomes bogged down by the dis-order. Hardly the grounds for a relaxing, calming, beautiful, orderly home.

This just makes me want to get out my label maker!

5. Love. I want to feel love when I am at home. I want to feel as if my home loves me...as well as the people I live with. Love is a two way street when it makes one feel good.

My loves.

When I review the above list, I realize that my home has some work to do...or rather, I have some work to do on my house in order to make it truly feel like my ideal home.

I often walk in the front door and feel overwhelmed. Piles of clutter, toys, papers and what-have-you stresses me out.

I don't feel the sense of calm I crave.

There is certainly some beauty to my home, but it still does not totally feel like ME. Now, part of this has to do with the fact that I hardly live alone. What means "beauty" to me, does not necessarily mean beauty to my husband and three sons.

Beauty to me...may not be the same as...

...beauty to one of my boys!

Finding a balance here involves a lot of compromise and give and take. I have yet to find that perfect (or good enough) solution...but that's OK. With three young boys running about, one has to surrender a certain amount of what one finds ideal in order to accommodate the realities of their family.

Messy? Yes. Fun? Definitely!
Well worth the clean up!!!
(And homemade brownies ALWAYS make a house feel more like a home!)

The same goes for order. I am not a drill sergeant, nor do I want to become one all in the name of perfect order. Again...some surrender is...well...in order, if you will.

A "locker" system I concocted (with my husband's help!) - one for each of our boys.
Their photos are above their own "locker" in case they - or I - forget!
I'm trying!!!!

As for love...well...I love the people I live with. Not to say they are perfect - no one is. But they are my family and Lord knows I am no personification of perfection myself.

No comments from the "Peanut Gallery" please! LOL

But if you don't, perhaps it is time to re-evaluate your situation.

Do you have roommates that suck the energy out of you?

Has your relationship run its course?

Only you can answer these questions, but if these people make your house feel more like a prison than a home...well...maybe you need to take some action.

Well...I didn't mean a LITERAL prison...but you know what I mean.

Now this is my list and my feelings. Your list may be entirely different. 

Start by making your own list of things that make you feel "at home".

Here is me making mine.
Notice my small waist.

And then...take a little action.

And then, maybe...just maybe...one day, you will find that your house whisper to you...

"Welcome home".

Smiles,

Lora