Our Home Tour | 2021

I made a master list of all the projects I wanted to try to tackle in this coming year around our home. By the time I had finished, I realized that I basically wanted to re-do our entire house. Can you relate? It’s easy to get caught up in the visions and dreams for what we envision our space becoming, but when we focus too much on the one day, we lose sight of how much progress we have already made today.

Living the day to day in our space gives us a bit of tunnel vision. We get so used to our surroundings that we forget our space hasn’t always felt like this. A few times a friend has house-sat our home while we were away and when we return I always notice the subtleties of someone else living in our space – the curtains may be drawn slightly differently or our pillows may be arranged in a new way. It is always so refreshing to me – like I can see our home through a fresh set of eyes. 

Making this home tour video was much the same for me and I’m glad I did it. I could see our home through other people’s eyes and it gave me a new appreciation for how far we have already come. When I look around my home, all I see is projects I want to tackle. “This is our kitchen, but it needs this and this and this”. I’ve always struggled with letting people into the process – I always want the nice, neat, tidy finished product because the messy middle feels too vulnerable. 

I heard an interesting quote the other day that stopped me in my tracks. It was something along the lines of – our home, and our willingness to let people in to see it, is often a reflection of our hearts and our willingness to let people in to know it. It felt like a funny comparison, but when I really thought about it, it stung a little. I know that I struggle with being vulnerable in my relationships and I also know that I struggle with letting people see the messy middle of my home. I want it to be perfectly presentable and if it’s not, my instinct is to apologize, justify, or explain where I want to take it. I think I do the same thing with my heart. I usually only share the state of it once I feel like I have it under control, an issue solved, or a direction I’m heading. I don’t like exposing the messy middle.

But if we don’t, then we will never see the progress. 

I hope you enjoy watching our 2021 home tour. I’m embracing progress over perfection and already can’t wait to see where we are by this point next year. I am grateful for my home – a place that is my comfort and my peace, a memory box for our family, and a place to welcome friends. My hope is that maybe the more I open my house, the more my heart will open too.