Domestic Day - Making a House a Home: Something Living in Every Room

I once read, somewhere in a list of home-making tips (likely linked from Pinterest), that one ought to put something living in every room. Being a lover of plants and animals, I fully supported this idea. Now that we have our own place I have begun to implement this idea, and I must say, if you are looking for ways to make your place more homey and alive, add plants!

My hubby seemed rather skeptical when I informed him of my intentions. He also has a passion for plants, but he prefers ones that bear fruit and vegetables. House plants don't generally fall under that category and as such didn't seem as useful. However, after I had finished my work he agreed they added a nice homey touch and later commented on the added advantage of how they made the rooms smell good as well. (Bonus! Hubby approval ^_^)

This activity is really a quick and easy thing to do, and took me only one afternoon to complete. After going through the house and taking note of locations that looked like they needed sprucing up, I went to the local Italian nursery to procure my plants. The plant nursery was recommended to me by our landlords, who advised me let the woman know who had sent me. I then appropriately name dropped and coincidentally I was given several plants for free! (Yay for connections!) I returned home and proceeded to get good and dirty planting.

Above are pictures of some of the creatures I encountered while planting. Upon seeing them, I took the opportunity to practice one of my new hobbies: photography. I've been attempting to improve the quality and style of the photos I capture, and this here may be the most captured lady bug ever! I took numerous shots in various settings and angles, finally settling on showing you this one. (Thank you again for the camera Uncle Tom! We use it almost daily.)

Our landlords are very involved with their yard and garden, and have been more than supportive with our endeavors at gardening. For this project, they offered me planter boxes they no longer use. (Hooray for saving money!)

While we were house hunting here in Italy, I noticed that nearly all of the windows here have very large windowsills, due to the fact that the custom is to have wooden window shutters and they need space to fold up when opened. The house we selected is no exception and every room has large window sills with plenty of space to put plants. This thrilled me, as I had always wanted to live somewhere where I could have a window box of flowers. A dear friend of mine once made me a lovely window box that I got much joy out of, however I was unable to bring it with us overseas, and realizing that our new house had the ability to home flowers/plants in EVERY window was very exciting.



     Here are some of my finished results! What do you think?

I have little pansies on the window sills in the nursery. The tiny colorful flowers seemed suiting to the room.

The window sills in our bedroom.

This is my favorite window in our house! I like the unique triangular shape and design of the bars on the other side. My favorite window happens to be in my hobby room. ^_^ My hobby room is really about the size of a walk in closet... and currently stores the boxes we've partially unpacked... but it will be great someday soon!

A partial view of the window from the outside. These plants are supposed to grow long tendrils and flowering vines. I thought they would look pretty overflowing from the window, and the representation of life escaping through the bars and the fragile, whimsical petals against the cold, hard stone wall make for a good contrast too good to pass up.

Our current table center piece. I may look for some natural pebbles to put in the square vase. The small vase is actually a glass salt/pepper shaker.

The plants have definitely added a homey touch and some life through their vibrant colors, smell, and movement when a breeze blows through the house. This project was a very good idea indeed.The only potential downside to the majority of the plants I chose is that they are only good for a year or season. But I guess that means I will get to redecorate with new varieties next year!

Pslam 103:15-17

 "Our days on earth are like grass;
    like wildflowers, we bloom and die.
¹⁶ The wind blows, and we are gone—
    as though we had never been here.
¹⁷ But the love of the Lord remains forever
    with those who fear him."