You may be surprised when you find out the answer to this question! It's not having a dear hubby or children. It's not canning, sewing, decorating cookies..or other nostalgic past times. And amazingly enough, it's not even interior decorating as important as that is.
Cherl Mendelson, author of Home Comforts, says
"In fact, too much attention to the looks of a home can backfire if it creates a stage-set feeling instead of the authenticity of a genuinely homey place."
(Sheesh...I guess I can quit worrying about that now!) Surprisingly, she also says, "I know from experience that you cannot make a home by imitating the household chores and crafts of the past era. Ironically, people are led into the error of 'playing house' instead of keeping house by a genuine desire for a home and its comforts.
Nostalgia means, literally, "home-sickness".
So are you ready to hear her answer for the secret to making a house really feel like a home? I can tell you right now...you may not like her answer!! (I like it though! Tee-hee!)
HOUSE CLEANING!!! Imagine that!
Here's what Cheryl has to say about it... "What really does work to increase the feeling of having a home and its comforts....is housekeeping! Housekeeping creates cleanliness, order, regularity, beauty, the conditions for health and safety, and a good place to do and feel all the things you wish and need to do and feel in your home. Whether you live alone, or with a spouse, parents, and ten children, it is your housekeeping that makes your home alive, that turns it into a small society in its own right, a vital place with its own ways and rhythms, the place where you can be more yourself than you can be anywhere else."
Having moved 23 TIMES! (Count 'em!), I think I can safely claim to be an expert on this particular topic! Truly, it is as you LIVE in your home that it BECOMES your home. It is in the process of cleaning, washing, cooking, shopping, dusting and going through all the other normal routines of home life, that a brand new house, begins to finally feel like home. For us, it takes about a month to feel like we really belong and aren't just living in a hotel.
You want to know another strange thing? I've noticed that it is the driving back and forth from the new house, to the new post office, bank, grocery store, library and church, and back again that finally ingrains in our brains that the building we are now living is our home and not just a house.
Coming home is your major restorative in life!
Housekeeping...is the source of most of the good things things that make a place homelike--fresh sheets, good meals, airy, clean, orderly rooms, and so forth.
1920’s Reproduction Quilt…made by meOther good things include fresh flowers, good books, half finished projects to work on in spare moments...It is a cliché, but true, that a room that looks lived in looks more homey. This implies not that you should be less neat but that you should actually live in the rooms!
Faked signs of life make the room feel desolate and lonely. Signs of real life make the room feel comforting and warm.
We will talk more about decorating and other fun things...but it is important that we keep in mind that cleaning is important...and not secondary to the beauty of our homes. I love the fact that FlyLady calls the Monday Morning Routine a "Home Blessing". Cleaning is a way to bless not only your home, but everyone in it!
Now that you are ALL inspired...Here's my "Home Blessing" list...
Weekly Home Blessing Hour
Just 10 minutes each so you can spend the rest of the time de-cluttering or deep cleaning your zone for the week!
Here's our deep cleaning plan for this week. We are in Zone 4: The Master Bedroom!
Week 4 - Master Bedrooom and bathroom
O Launder: Wash area rugs, curtains, (shower curtain if necessary), Bedspread, mattress pad, and dust ruffle (turn mattress)
O Floors: Vacuum, sweep, scrub and/ or wax floors
O Scrub toilet, shower door, tub (use Bathroom cleaner for water deposits and scum)
O Dust high and low, (ceiling fans, floorboards,) cobwebs, polish furniture and wood
O Clean windows, mirrors, switchplates, walls and doors, medicine cabinet, dresser tops (409/ Windex)
Habit for This Week...Let's Spend 30 Minutes a Day DeCluttering our Master Bedroom!!
What do you believe makes a house feel truly homey?
Happy Homemaking!
Donna
Check back tomorrow for our Menu Plan and Recipes....
8 comments
Good Morning, Donna!
First of all, I can't believe that you have moved 23 times! That must be a record! Second, I LOVE your quilt! What a wonderful job you did. I totally agree that having a clean house makes a home...and makes us feel so good! Thanks for sharing this wonderful post.
Blessings,
Laura
our house looks definitely lived in with the toys, arty stuff and guitars everywhere..we are all happy so thats what makes a home to me not a place where you are sitting on the edge of the sofa and having to take your shoes off when entering the home..one of my pet hates! Oh and thanks for reminding me that i need to declutter my bedroom shelves
Donna ~ I want to thank you for visiting my "little space" and the sweet comments that you so graciously shared. I have browsed through much of your blog and I have enjoyed it very much! I love the book "Home Comforts" and all that Cheryl Mendelson shares. You have added so many homekeeping ideas...that will help make our home a blessing to ourselves and to others. Sweet pleasures and simple blessings as you tend to your home. Hugs ~ Teri
Donna, I had to do a double take on that 2nd picture. The stairwell looks identical to the beach house in Galveston doesn't it! great post!!
oh Donna, i don't know what to say about my home right now. I have to take a rain check. Though we keep it clean i still find it messy. But then again i cannot crib much as i don't have to time to set things right nor even the time to crib ;)
I thought I didn't like the cleaning thing, but if you're saying "Clean, but a few toys on the floor where the kids are always playing and some books here and there and a half finished crochet project left on a shelf" then I'm OK.
Most of the time.
Do muddy paw prints from the dogs count toward "lived in?" Probably not...
Hi Honey,
You're exactly right about our home being a place to be re-energized. It makes all the difference in the world to have a clean (certainly doesn't have to be perfect), orderly place to come home to as a way of resting from the typically too busy world we live in. Thank you so much for the years of commitment you have made to try to keep our home an oasis!
I love you,
Tim
Thanks for this post. We are moving to a new house in CS this summer (after a loooooooong home sale and renting two years) - and I'm excited to settle in and REALLY make a home. I'm also amazed at 23 moves - you really are an expert!!!
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