Making my house a HOME.

 Since being married, I have always had a hard time with decorating my own house.  It's not that I don't care about it.  I really do.  I love walking into other people's houses and see what they choose to display, how they display it.  It is magical to me.  How people can take the things that they love and it can turn an empty space into something that evokes such feeling.  Such warmth.

 I always feel inspired when I go Sister in Laws house, she has such a talent for creativity.  I also love how Courtney decorates her house.  Aunt Helen's house is like visual candy, every where I look there is something inspiring, uplifting and that has some sort of story behind it.  Looking around her house is like looking into Marcus family history, something that I am now a part of too.

 Whenever I am in places like these, I drink it all up.  I so appreciate their ability to "Do" when I feel like it comes as such a challenge to me.  To do my all house in one go would be costly, for sure, but it also feels like such an overwhelming task to accomplish.  I really feel like I have mastered the art of house cleaning and in thinking about that I realized something.  I didn't figure out all my systems in a day.  I also don't do all my house cleaning in a day.  I do a little here, or a little there spread throughout the whole week.  I also do some bigger projects a couple of times a week, it is a system and it works for me.

I need to apply that same principle with how I decorate my home.  I need to think about it, what things I like, what things I love.  Don't just buy something to fill a space.  I kinda of have to keep it in my mind a lot.  Then when I come across something that I love, that speaks to me or makes me happy then I need to get it.  My house needs to be full of things that will uplift me.  I have a silk screen thing in my room that I adore.  I got it for free from a friend of a friend who is an artist, every time I look at it it makes me happy.

A LONG while ago I discovered that a good family friend of ours had been married recently to this lovely, wonderful girl.  I kept up on her blog, she just graduated as an Art Major from BYU and saw that she has an etsy shop.  I checked it out HERE and fell in love with how amazingly she captured a person into charcoal.  I loved it.  I thought instantly that this is something I want in my home.  Some charcoal portraits of my girls.  When I was checking it out, while we still lived in WA, she was having a sale at her etsy shop and I jumped on it and commissioned her to make some charcoals of my girls.

I placed the order but had her hold off on making them until we were in CA so I wouldn't have to worry about losing them in the move before I could have them framed.  I was so excited when they came.  So excited to see how she chose to capture my girls.  I was blown away by the results.  My girls' little spirits and personalities are represented in these.  I have them in my living room and every time I look at them I smile, I just LOVE them.

It will probably be very slow and steady, it will probably take me a lifetime to figure out how to master, but I will learn this skill.  I will make my house into a home.  Not that our lives should be about possessions, that they are the only things that matter, but I want my house to be a reflection of me and my family.  I want it to feel inspiring like how I feel inspired when I go into those houses of those I admire.  One silkscreen and one charcoal portrait at a time I will do it.

If getting  portrait is something you have ever thought about, please go see Brittany's shop and check it out.  I promise you won't be disappointed.  I hope she doesn't mind my flagrant bragging for her, I guess I better send her an email about this, huh?