The Four Parts of Our Home I’ve Come Around To

I officially missed celebrating our fourth home-iversary in early June, but that doesn’t mean that I haven’t been reflecting on the gift that our home has been to our family lately. You know I’m all for working on our home, making it function for our family, and establishing it as a space of peace for anyone who walks in the door to enjoy. I love having a project and pouring my efforts into making our home better and better with each passing year. But in saying all that, when focussing on the potential our spaces have, it’s too easy to dwell on the flaws of what exists. There are certainly areas of our home that I haven’t been able to get my hands on yet that have irritated me over the years. Heck, I’ve even felt embarrassed by them if I’m being truthful. But dwelling in those thoughts prevent me from realizing how much I have to be grateful for. I am so blessed to own a home I truly love. A home that brings safety and comfort to my growing family. A home that has hosted friends and family. A home that is our own.

In the spirit of gratefulness, I wanted share the parts of our home that I have come around to. These are areas that I’ve always loathed, but have recently been able to recognize the beauty in. Sure, they’re areas I would still love to change, but with a simple shift in attitude, I’ve been able to find the good in them. They have served us well, and for that, they’re blessings.

The Kitchen Floors

Have you ever seen our kitchen floors? There’s a chance you haven’t, since they’ve always been a sore spot in my eyes. They’re a vinyl sheet flooring made to look like tiles and, boy, are they ever colourful. There is a lot going on with them - swirling tones of beige, brown, and green, mixed with actual divets made to look like they’re worn in and aged. They sure are something.

But the other day I realized that they’ve actually kind of grown on me. First of all, the colours are at least consistent with the tones I like to use throughout our home, so they certainly don’t look out of place. But most importantly, they have been ideal for our current lifestyle. Our oldest daughter has grown up from a five week old baby to a thriving four year old around these floors and they’ve certainly bore the brunt. When she was learning how to eat (and deciding what she didn’t want to eat), these floors saw lots of crumbs and spills. When she helps me cook, I don’t sweat the wear and tear they bear as she drags her stool across them to reach different parts of the counter. Heck, she even once cracked open a bottle of my nail polish on these floors and guess what? You wouldn’t know it. When we welcome friends into our home and I don’t have time to run the vacuum, I definitely don’t sweat it. These floors may be a little crazy, but they sure do disguise a lot of messes and they make clean up a breeze.

One day I’d love to have something different, but for now, in this season, these vinyl sheet floors are actually pretty perfect.

The Separated Layout

I’ll admit that the way our home is laid out has never actually bothered me, but when we first purchased it, the idea of “open concept” was definitely more in vogue. Our home has a fantastic flow, but it certainly isn’t open. The living room and dining room are the closest thing to it, but otherwise, each room exists as it’s own.

I love having distinct spaces. In a practical sense, when I’m running my mixer in the kitchen, I’m not worried that it will be too loud for someone reading in the living room. In a visual sense, I love that there are distinct areas to draw the line when it comes to paint and decorating, which has allowed me to be more creative with styling our home and experimenting with projects. I tried a batten feature in the kitchen and had a clear and natural stopping point. It’s been fun to push myself to design a home that strives to feel cohesive, but still allows for some individuality between rooms. And of course, I love sneaking off to a quiet corner every now and then when I need a moment - another bonus with a separated layout.

I know not everyone loves this type of layout, but I’m thankful for mine. I think it helps that our home is fairly small, so everything still feels connected and no one ever feels too far away.

Our Unfinished Basement

I can’t believe I’m going to post a picture of our basement on the internet, but alas, here we are. Our basement is pretty well unfinished. It’s not awful, but we certainly don’t consider it a space we want to spend much time in. But with that being said, I’ve grown to really appreciate this weird space and here’s why.

This is the only space in our house that I (currently) truly do not care about. Throw a bunch of random workout equipment in the corner? Sure. Store our extra stuff down here? Sure. Make a mess in the workshop? Sure. Keeping a reasonably orderly home really matters to me, so it’s nice to have one space that I can just truly let go of. We do try to clean it up every now and then and Curt does a decent job of keeping it vacuumed and tidied. But if a couple of months pass without us doing a single thing, it’s no sweat off my back.

Along that line, even though it’s unfinished, Curt will occasionally bring our oldest daughter down to the basement while he uses the treadmill or while I’m cooking dinner. She doesn’t have a single care about what it looks like and loves playing with random seasonal decorations she can find or simply runs back and forth between the walls to burn off some energy. It’s nothing to look at, but has been a useful space in this season of life with little kids, for sure.

We’ve dreamed of finishing it, but for now it is what it is and it has served a purpose. I’m grateful for it nonetheless.

Mabel’s Bathtub

The final item on this list is the only bathtub in our house, and let me tell you, she is not pretty. Mabel’s bathtub sits in the bathroom we consider primarily hers and it’s outfitted with one of those plastic bath fitters. When we moved in it had an attached sliding glass door as well, but we were able to remove that and hang a shower curtain rod instead, which in itself made a significant improvement. But even so, this bathtub is nothing special.

It’s saving grace is that it’s the only tub in our house and I just happen to be one of those bath people. I love baths. I spent so much time in this tub when I was postpartum with Mabel, using it as my sliver of alone time in those demanding early days. Then again, I spent so much time in this tub when I was pregnant with Franny, using it to soothe my uncomfortable growing body. Most significantly though is that this bathtub has been used nearly every single night to bathe my babies. I don’t think a single space in our home has seen so much use other than our beds. It has been part of bedtime routines since the day we moved in and has been splashed on and jumped in and filled and drained over and over again.

I hate the way this tub looks, but there are so many precious memories attached to this silly little tub that I can’t help but feel a fondness for it. It’s perfectly imperfect and I appreciate that I don’t have to obsess over how immaculate it is or how well it’s cared for. One day it will be different, but for these little years, it’s holding out strong and I kind of love it.

I’ll finish this post by writing a sincere note of thanks to our home in honour of the four beautiful years we have been here. It’s seen a lot of change, but there is definitely more love waiting to be poured into these walls. It has served us faithfully and I’m grateful for it all - the good, the bad, and the ugly. I’ll always love you, little Reesor house.