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Making a house into a home.

A house is not a home unless it lives and breathes and sleeps
and creaks and groans and laughs just like you. There are many
forms of housing all over the world, ranging from an igloo to a
tree house to a flat to a mansion, but the essential ingredient
is care and love. If you imbue your dwelling with these, it will
literally glow. It is obvious when you walk into a house whether

these qualities are there. Who hasn't at some stage in their lives
entered a house where nobody cares and there's mess and junk and
dirt and filth everywhere, as though the occupants merely exist in
the space around them. I remember working in Botswana, Southern
Africa in 1995, and there was a decent looking house over the other
side of the street, but when you looked inside and into the backyard
it was a rubbish dump and those inside slept round it. You have
to feel good about your dwelling and also proud of it and by
making a house into a home you are projecting a part of you
into the structure. This is what I try to do; to turn houses
into homes.( and I've lived in a few into homes. )

Firstly, thoroughly clean it and then keep it clean. It is a great
feeling to vacuum a floor and see it smile back at you as if to
say," thank you" and much as you might like those daddy long leg
spiders, their webs make your house look old and musty. If you have
nice benches and sink in your kitchen and bathroom they look so
much better clean. My father brought us up in a sprawling, ranch
style, wooden, white house, on a farm, and he would rub back the
exterior boards every six years or so and go round and repaint
all thirty squares of it till it shone.

Once your house is clean comes the fun, as you put your personality
into it. My wife and I have a large, split level, (three levels)
modern ,1980s home and we are artists, writers and designers .
We have many nice middle eastern rugs on the wooden floors and
our art work decorates the walls. My wife has a better eye than
me for arrangement, and I am constantly amazed how she can see
and move something ever so subtly and it brings a whole area to
life.

Outside the house is very important too, and the way your garden
is kept can literally add thousands of dollars to the value if
you sell. Not only that, landscaping and making gardens is fun
and creative. For instance a lovers seat somewhere, preferably
made out of chunky wood is great. The arrangement of flowers in
your planting, the making of paths and borders and even a garden
swing for a bit of fun. Rocks are

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