Good Friday

In our home, Good Friday is a time for reflection

image from here

and a time for enjoying home-made hot cross buns...

hello 2013: one word

Maxabella invited us to give a one word focus for 2013.  I've been giving it a bit of thought and I realised that for me, 2013 will be all about

home

because after our three month away adventure, it's nice to be home

because I have a least another 6 months of maternity leave left and will be spending much time at home

because we want to focus on de-cluttering, cleaning up, unpacking, throwing out and making our home a more usable space for our life

because we want to spruce up our front garden

because home and family are intertwined

because I want to work on feeling content with our home

because home is where our family relationships are built and strengthened

and because ultimately my hope lies in a future home, a new home - one with no pain, no tears and no death 

What's your one word 2013 focus?

image from here

home?

i really do have an awful lot to say. there are so many things to share with you - stories of our wedding and honeymoon and of visiting family and of wedding receptions. of packing my life into boxes and suitcases, and then trying to unpack and settle into a new house, a new area of melbourne, a new married life. there are stories and pictures and tales a mile long. but for now, with this dodgy borrowed internet and a brief snatch of time, the things i want to say are different. 

see, i've been thinking a lot recently about how you make a house a home... for me, this has been harder than i would have expected. harder than i ever remember it being. i've moved lots of times, but never before struggled to feel at home. 

when we first moved in here, i thought it would be about having your stuff, familiar things, unpacked and put away. things you've had for years out and in use. but i am realising that it is deeper than that. each box we've unpacked and put away, for me, hasn't made this house feel any more like ours. 
 
then i was thinking it would be about living in the space. but we've been here 5 weeks now, and although it does feel more like home. it still doesn't feel like ours. i still don't quite feel comfortable in this space. i feel a bit like i am all elbows and knees and my clothes are too big and i'm wearing somebody else's shoes. i feel a bit like we're living in the in between. 

so yesterday i tried a different tack - i got outside and stuck my fingers in the dirt and planted this:

a rosemary bush. a solid thing. and maybe as it settles in and puts its roots down, we too will spread our roots deeply here and feel at home.

what about you? what makes you feel at home?