Living My Legacy 4~Making My House a Home

Living My Legacy ~4~Making my house a home by making it a place of “Comfort”

This is the next in my series on Living My Legacy which started with a mere Trip to the Grocery Store! I strongly believe that all of us are living our legacy each and every day. Dosen’t matter if I like it or not, the way I live today is how I’ll be remembered when I’m gone. I’m determined to live my legacy with intention. If you want past posts you can scroll to the very bottom of this page click on the category: All Things Legacy.

Today I’m talking about making your home a place of: Comfort. I love that word. It conjures up warm and restful images. A soft fluffy bed. A roaring fire with a cushy chair snuggled up next to the hearth. Fuzzy slippers. The way your house smells when a roast has been in the oven all day and you’re starved.

I believe that to be remembered for making my house a home (for my family and friends) it needs to be a place where they can find comfort. Now this is just plain fun!

Setting the stage for comfort in my home means surrounding my family with things we love. I had such fun decorating the kid’s rooms when they were growing up. I tried to let their rooms be an expression of who they were as individuals. It didn’t take long before they caught on and started filling their rooms with their artwork or posters they loved. One thing I can grin about, NOW, is what our son, Timothy did …in middle-school he started stapling copies of detention letters to the walls of his closet. By the time I noticed them I kid you not half the closet was full of them. By the end of the year the walls were covered. I’m pretty sure he made several copies of each one and honestly it wasn’t all that amusing at the time. Anyhoo, I can still picture his playful, mischievous grin when I found him out…

I hate to bring this up but comfort also involves a semblance of order. Who can be comfortable in a room that looks like the laundry fairy exploded everywhere? I’m a big fan of even the littlest kiddos having chores to do. Not everyone is naturally neat, but even the messiest can learn how much more peaceful a picked-up home feels.

I home schooled my little ones for several years and one of my goals during that time was that they would learn how to “run the house”. Each one of them, including Timothy can clean any room as good as I can. They all started doing their own laundry somewhere around middle-school. And they learned a little bit about cooking by making a menu for dinner and then doing the grocery shopping and all the cooking for that meal. We had lots of pizza, hotdogs and tacos on their cooking nights but it was fun. Now, they’re all out on their own and have the responsibility of creating an atmosphere of comfort in their own homes, I pray I’ve given them the tools to do that.

Comfort foods…as I’ve said so often, family dinners were important to us when the kids were little. Nothing is more comforting than spending a long day out and coming home to a warmly lit home and smelling something yumalicious in the oven. I didn’t do big and fancy, but I did plan ahead. Most evenings I made a ritual out of preparing dinner and eating together. I put on music in the kitchen while I cooked. Whoever was home with me helped set the table. The TV was never on and sometimes dinnertime only lasted 20 minutes, but it was something we counted on day in and day out.

I have to say a little about providing comfort when someone’s sick. My mom was so good at this and I tried to carry on this ritual. Making sure the bedroom was straight and bringing trays of snacks and drinks. A little nurturing when someone’s not feeling well goes a long way.

Comfort also comes in the form of a listening ear or a sympathetic word. Family and or friends sometimes just need a soft place to land. Do you always have to use your “teacher’s” voice and give advice when someone comes to you with a problem? (I have this issue, big time. I want to FIX things…) Sometimes,those close to you just need you to show your softer side.Just need you to be quiet and give them a listening ear and a shoulder to cry on.

Now it’s your turn, can you think of something from childhood (or adulthood) that makes you feel the scrumptious feeling of comfort?Praying for you today Peeps, that you are living the legacy you want to leave.