Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Tip of the Week - Living in REALITY!

So often we look at homes in the magazines and see how perfect they are and wish that our homes could look like that.

Everything is in it's place and perfect... I don't know about you, but I don't live in that world. I live in reality where I have an 18 month old daughter, a newborn, and a husband who works from home.

My husband is in the process of finishing part of our basement so that he can have a private office down there. If you remember pictures of my office from before, it is way out in the open and isn't practical for him to work in with my girls always being so loud.... SO, he has turned our bedroom into his office! What does this mean for me... I don't get ready until 1:00 in the afternoon because my daughter is to noisy to be in there while he is on the phone and she is always where I am.

More of my reality....
This is how my coffee table looks in a perfect world....
This is how it looks in my reality. I finally I had to move everything off because my daughter thought it was fun to climb up on it, sit on the books, and dig her fingernails into the candles!
Here she is climbing on the baskets under my console table.... She usually pushes the baskets off and puts all of her toys on the shelves.
Here are her DVDs stacked up on the console table because she gets inside the baskets and tries to pull the DVDs out of the their cases and breaks them.
Here she pushes all of the buttons on the equipment........
and here are her toys on the floor, (along with my husbands weights).

I took these pictures all within 30 seconds and she ran from place to place to place... this is our life everyday!
And we can't forget all of the newborn items that come with having a baby...... (notice the measuring cup on the floor, Brooklyn loves to get into all of my drawers and pull out my cooking items.

This is my reality everyday! I try to keep my house as clean as possible, and at night, I make sure that it is clean and I can feel good about it. But everyday, my house has toys on the floors and pillows in piles.... and you know what, I wouldn't change it for the world.
This house is lived in, which means it is loved in! It may not be perfect for a magazine cover, but it is perfect for me and my lifestyle. I have kids and that is shown in my house, you don't question that when you come in, and that is OK!

I hope that you guys don't look at your house and wish that you could change all of these things about it. Make it the best that you can for the situation and lifestyle you have and be happy with it. That is sometimes easier said than done, I know.

You may not have toddlers like I do, or even have kids. Maybe you have pets or a family member in a wheelchair. These are all things that shape our home and how it is lived in. Design it to what works with your lifestyle and what is perfect for you.... Don't compare it to what others have, they don't have your life and circumstances!

BE HAPPY! :)

4 comments:

  1. Great post!It's nice to be reminded that even an interior designer's house does not look perfect at all times.

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  2. Great post! I sometimes gaze with longing at the neatness of the rooms in blogland and wonder how in the world they stay so nice. I have a very lived in house - what with my boys, dil and critters running around, I cannot keep much of anything on my coffee table and there are always furbaby toys scattered everywhere. Pretty soon there will be newborn paraphernalia in our house too.

    Love your honesty!

    ~ Tracy

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  3. I love your site. I know the reality bit. I wish everything could look picture perfect, but unless our house is on the market it's not functional. I finally took the DVD's out of their cases and into a 25 disk cd case. Takes up the width of 3-4 DVD's and is pretty much impossible for my boys to break. It looks pretty good to. I had some old ones on hand
    (now that we just do everything MP3). I have one with all the kids movies, and one with my favorites. The cases are just in a box in the garage.

    I have a design site/blog that I'm still working on. I'll send you a link when it's done.

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  4. Thanks Lindsi I needed to read that today. The other day I made the comment to my husband that I could not stand the pigsty we were living in and his response was, I don't think it looks like a pigsty I think it looks lived in, and I liked that and appreciated that he did not expect perfect!
    It made me stop and realize that he is right a lived in home is the best kind of home to have.

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