Making Your Home Your Home

I’ve lived in three apartments, one condo, one cabin, and six houses. During that period, I experienced a variety of furnishings and interiors. Different color schemes, themes, layouts, and traffic flows. Each seemed to go with our lifestyle or age. For example, in the beginning, avocado green and harvest yellow appliances were all the rage. bright foil-covered wallpaper and Formica countertops were huge. So went followed the decorator trends like everyone else. In later years, our taste changed and we toned down our interiors. We also learned about quality versus price, comfort versus style, and fad versus typical design. It was an education course of action.

I have pictures of every house I ever owned. It’s a rude awakening to relive the

past experiences and try to understand our mindsets during certain eras. Or make

that, errors. The outlandish wallpapers that were a pain to put up and seam, were

just one example. I can nevertheless visualize an orange shag rug. We had scoop chairs that

were amazingly uncomfortable and plastic beads for a window treatment. Slowly, we

evolved back to a civilized world. The sad part was that we made all these poor

decisions out of free will. We got to choose anything and everything we wanted,

and, unfortunately, did.

But we were influenced by: (a) television shows, (b) decorator magazines, (c)

salespeople, (d) friend’s and family’s homes, (e) form homes which we loved to

tour, and (f) our own taste in color, style, and fact. This holds true for most

everyone to this day. But it doesn’t have to be so. To prove it, you should see what

we’ve done in our present home. We designed it to strictly suit our needs. Notice I

said ‘our’ needs. That method, we didn’t consider anyone else. It’s custom designed

around our lifestyle.

Here are some examples. We don’t encourage overnight company and, consequently,

don’t have a ‘spare’ bedroom. We eat at a large, substantial quartz kitchen counter. It also

serves as a workspace and where we read the morning paper. We don’t own a

kitchen table, because we don’t need one. Instead, our eat-in kitchen serves as our

office area. It contains his and her desks for our home-based web business, ‘The

Nurse’s Choice,’ including computers, fax machine, copier and other office

equipment. A reclining chair and couch confront the glass doors so we can look out

toward the back yard and our mountain view. The former formal dining room, is a

combination game area with a chess set and gaming table and music room, There, I

play the keyboard, harmonica, bongos, and guitar. The living room has just a couch

and widescreen television in an entertainment center. In the ‘country’ corner, is our

imitation mountain fir tree, large hand-carved, wooden bear and logs. At

Christmastime, the tree lights up.

The rest of the house is also designed to fill our needs. The second bedroom

serves as a gym with exercise equipment and a large walk-in, custom-designed,

closet with built-ins for my wife’s clothes. The master bedroom has another

widescreen television so we can watch movies in bed. There I have my closet, also

with custom built-ins. The third bedroom is a hobby room for craft projects and has

a single sofa. The closet is also custom-built for our travel gear as we are gone a

lot.

We chose all the bath and kitchen cabinet woods and colors. All the floors are tile

with a few area rugs because we hate wall-to-wall carpeting that holds dirt and

dust. Every wall is painted in a color because we dislike white walls. All the lighting

was designed and installed to enhance and provide what was needed for each space.

I have my own wants and tiled the garage floor, to keep it easier to clean and

insect-free. There, I have a custom workbench, storage cabinet, and custom

lighting. Everything is stored off the floor and I already have a phone.

The back and front yard is low-maintenance with a minimum of plants and trees.

It’s on a drip system, grass-free with river rock, and a block wall fence that never

needs painting. All of these things were our choice. We ignored what is traditional

and opted for personal function. It’s a great house and suits us to a ‘T.’ In the

beginning, we got a few comments from visitors but they understand this is our

home and our design. We don’t need or intend to please anyone else.

And that is the assumption. Make a house your own. It doesn’t have to meet anyone

else’s agenda or standards. Make the choices that you have to live with, not the

other relatives. If they were making the mortgage payments, then I could

understand. You’re the one that spends the time and it’s your money. Invest in

yourself and lifestyle and you’ll be better off But remember, it’s your castle and

treat it that way. And so, if you need to install an alligator-filled moat…