how long does it take...
...for a house to feel like a home?
posted by Jenna at 8:53 PM
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
About Me
- Name: Jenna
- Location: Jackson, New York, United States
Enjoy the story of a young writer living in Washington County with her fancy dogs, sheep, lots of chickens, fiber & meat rabbits, geese, ducks, turkeys, a hive and a garden. Expect to hear a lot about mountain music, the civil war, local food, and my friends along the way. It's a big time folks.
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61 Comments:
Takes a bit, but it comes soon enough. Take your time, Rome was not built in a day.
I could never have done all you doing right now. My wife and I started with the Garden in year one, then moved to the composting, wood stove and firewood harvesting in year two, laying hens in year three, and now meat animals in year four. We have messed up alot and learned alot along the way, but our little 1/2 acre (and some land borrowed from the neighbor farm in exchange for fertilizer) has really taken off :)
Its not the destination, its getting there.
你好勁呀! 感謝!!!............................................................
A house never feels like home until I dream myself there. It took about two years for my current house to appear in my dreams. :)
It took me about 6 months to feel at home here. Within a year it was already time to clean out the spare bedroom and have a garage sale.
I think you have to be there for a year and see all the seasons. And you have to meet some neighbors, for sure.
I've always found that as soon as I have my favorite things around me and the house becomes 'familiar'...enough that I can walk around in the dark without bumping into things and when I refer to it as 'home' instead of the 'house'...then it's become 'home'.
Maybe just spend a little more time inside making it 'familiar' will help. It not an instant bond with a home...it's a gradual process.
Just smile...it will claim you as 'owner' instead of tenant soon enough.
**Tami
as long as you r in boxes it will not feel like home
It does take a while, so be patient. It seemed like going through all of the seasons, especially my favorite, autumn, helped create that sense of home. I don't know if it was a matter of building memories within walls or what the magic formula was, but it definitely wasn't an immediate bond for me. It was a difficult transition period, not feeling at home in my own house, but it did gradually happen.
I've been through more moves than I care to remember, but you need to make some memories and have some good times in there in order for an empty shell to be filled and to feel like a home and not just a house. It does admittedly take some time, but it's worth it in the end. :)
When you start referring to it as your home, you know it's happened.
Home is where my internet is! I moved a few weeks ago and there was a bit of an overlap between the two leases, I slept wherever my internet connection was working.
On the other hand, I still have huge white walls staring at me as I'm waiting for a friend to come help me hang pictures. It doesn't feel very homey here without decorations. Once those go up, and I can find everything in the kitchen without thinking, I might call this place home.
For me, it's home as soon as I can walk in and put down stuff without thinking about where it needs to go. I've moved on average about every 2 years of my life so I get used to a new place quickly. When I finally get my own place I'm going to put down roots so deep they won't ever get me back out.
About 3 years or more, for me. Once I paint a few rooms, change out some light fixtures, add some window coverings and make it my own, it starts to feel like home. I think it takes quite awhile, especially if you were very attached to the place you lived before.
You've been running around outside since you bought the farm. I think once fall and winter come and you're forced to spend more time inside, it will start to feel like home. Try hanging some favorite photos or painting a room a color of your choice instead of constantly looking at the prior owner's colors (or lack of). Light some candles. Play your music INSIDE.
The day you hang a whole room with wallpaper. Works every time!
It's something that just happens one day.
You wake up one morning or get home one afternoon and discover that there really isn't anywhere else you'd rather be.
Or you go away for a weekend (or week) and you walk through the door and smeel your own scents and breathe your own air, and the familiarity of it makes you so glad to be back.
Moving to Alaska, it was almost instantaneous. A week or so and I just knew I "belonged" here.
Our current cabin (also in Alaska) was purchased a couple years afte we moved to AK.
I didn't realize it was "home" until I got home from a winter trip to Seattle, and felt "hugged" by my home.
And once the chickens got here...
Well, home is where the eggs are :)
Took a couple years for this place to feel permanent; now at eight years, I cannot see myself anywhere else!
I reckon it's different for everyone. For me I have to shelter from a few storms; plant, grow and harvest a few seasons; know that when I walk around in the dark I'm safe and won't walk into anything; feel good about the neighbours; know the exact location of sunrise in all seasons; recognise the local birds and the migratory ones; understand local systems and recognise local wildlife and flora; and when alone I sleep without waking all through the night.
The first place I bought didn't feel like home until after a year, when I finally had time to clean and organize the garage, and put together a workbench and hang up my tools. I stepped back to look at it, and immediately felt a sense of home. Weird, huh?
I think it happens in spurts ... you wake up one morning and before you open your eyes it feels like home ... and then you walk in the door and instinctively throw your keys where they belong ... and then you wake in the middle of the night and without turning on a light, you make your way to the bathroom ... and then one day you realize it's been home all along ...
When you find out, let me know. I know growing up it took a really hard winter for me to feel like I was at home; I can only guess that it was the 'nesting' that happens when you're snowbound for a few days.
I'm about to uproot myself and try starting all over again.
...one day you will wakeup with the feeling there is no place you would rather be.
I don't think you can put a time frame on it. You'll know - one day you'll feel something and that's the day you'll know you're home. But that said, if home is where the heart is, and your heart is definitely in it, I'd say you're already home! Having moved across the country twice, out to an island for a year, down south, and back up north many places never felt like home. Don't force it - it will come when the Universe deems it.
It will take as long as it takes you to make it yours. When you've painted walls, hung curtains of your choosing, put in your own scatter rugs, hung you're own pictures etc it will start to become home. Going through the seasons will make the whole place more familiar and homey and spending more time there will also help. It might be good to hole up there for a whole weekend if not now certainly when winter comes you'll do it. One day when you come home from work you'll feel
the peace of being "home" come over you.
You might find this book by Karen Kingston useful - its so wonderful :) Creating Sacred Space - space clearing and the art of feng shui. Her website is www.spaceclearing.com/
It took me a good several or 6 months before I started feeling at home, and that was moving into a house that felt like home the moment we took our first tour of it. There are still bits of time now and then when I feel out of place for a moment, but mostly it's home now and settled.
I moved into town after my first husband died and I did not feel at home for probably the first year. Every season is new and doesn't feel like it did at the old house, even if it is in the same region. It is hard to explain, but gradually a house becomes a home.
-Brenda
Jack said it right when he said: ...one day you will wakeup with the feeling there is no place you would rather be.
I have been in my current house for 10 years, and it still isn't 'home'. My 'home' will be the place I can see myself staying forever.
One of my young sons has decided that it's not really home until the house smells like brownies.....
when it comforts you
The second you take off your shoes inside!
For me this last time it was as soon as I walked in with the realtor. It just called out to me. It was strange. The house was all but falling apart and we could bounce on the flours. Even the inspector asked us if we were sure we wanted this money pit of a house. And we have sunk over $50,000. and lots of sweat and tears in the house. But I can honestly say it was love at first sight. I could actually see the finished product. And it needed lots of love. It had been abandoned for several years when we bought it. So this home is full of love now. It will come to you. All our other houses took awhile.
When you leave it for a holiday and wish you were home instead.
You may simply be feeling overwhelmed b/c you are trying to do it all right away... Jeremy's right... a little here, a little there and enjoy it.
Usually takes me 2 years (we move like gypsies). I know how you feel- we both moved about the same time, but you are trying to do so much for than I. Don't know about you, but I am WAY burned out, and just want to hang out at home all day alone, bake stuff, and give it to my neighbors. I need a little "community" right now.
I think it is when you get there, you close the door, exhale and then get a big smile on your face.
I've lived in my house nearly 30 years and it still feels like somebody else's. 'Home' is the house I grew up in, where my parents still live.
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It takes history for a house to become a home...
We knew the minute we pulled into the driveway with our realtor and then we walked inside and it was confirmed. It was named Heartstrings Homestead before we even moved in and continues to be a place we love with all our hearts!
I agree with other posters, everyone is different, so it is up to you how long it will take. I've been in my house now (this is my second house) for three years and it almost feels like home, but not quite.... I know in my heart that my first house was my real home (I was there for 17 years).
I have been where I am now since November last year & its only fairly recently I caught myself thinking heeey I think I have hit my stride at last! Theres still better places to be found for things,better ways of laying a room out, but its all feeling homey now. I find things rather than places homey as well so as long as I have some of my old things around me,well that keeps me humming a happy tune until the home feeling tugs x
GTM x
It took me 40 years to find it. I knew this house was "home" before we even sat down to write our offer. We see it as a 10 year project. Good bones and potential. So far we've saved the barn from falling in on our heads and the toilet from crashing down into the kitchen.
But every day I get a glimpse, a corner, a smell, a way the light plays across the floor, or the wind rushes up through the pasture that tells me "this, this is home."
I've been looking for it since I left my childhood homestead (in an old school house)
I've found that where ever I am is home. I never understood why I'm like that but I sometimes call hotels, or rentals home in conversations while we're staying there. Home to me is where ever my life has me. I suppose that's strange.
I agree a with Misha. You'll spend more time inside when it gets cold. When you're outside on a bitterly cold day and come inside and feel the warmth and are so happy to be in there - it starts to feel like your safe warm home, your sanctuary.
Jenna - your question certainly struck a chord with us, your readers. It is such a deep question and I have enjoyed reading the responses. In Jungian symbolism, a dream of a house, (as I understand it) is a representation of self. So, I think, at your young age, a house is a home in the fullness of time. Time. It will take time.
it took me a couple of years to feel like our house is home.During the summers when everyone is outdoors or gone all day it feels less like home.But once the weather cools and we are all at home for dinners the feeling returns.
My family is what makes our house home for me.What I am going to do when our boys leave for collage in a couple of years I don't know,rattle around I guess.
When we moved to our farm house I remember calling my sister and crying. I had wanted an old farm, but left my former home of over 20 years to live here with my new husband. She told me that soon it would feel like home. She was right. It took a little while and now I love it so. It is a dream beyond a dream. I think perhaps what your yearning for is "someone' to share it with.
It takes three cries.
Cry with sorrow, cry with frustration, cry with joy.
Not necessarily in that order, and you may hit a few of them a couple times before you get your first crack at another. It may take a few weeks, it may take a few years.
But once you have your three cries out of the way? You're home to stay.
I had a hard time feeling at home too. I think the reason was it was so much more than I thought I'd ever have that maybe I on some level didn't deserve it.
The first time you dig yourself out in spring and the last sprigs of your garden begin to sprout, when the sheep no longer ask you with their eyes when they can go back to the cabin, and when you can reliably drive the truck again because the ice is gone . . . it will feel like home.
A full larder
It doesn't take too long. The feeling sort of creeps in, a bit at a time. Its a great feeling you will have when one day you'll look back and see how far you have come.
The failures recede into the background...like those itty bitty watermelons...and they are successes too. It all depends on how we look at things. I admire your spunk while you are still young and able. Go for it, girl. Its all a matter of one step at a time.
I think I must write about my sick brother's success with his garden/watermelons. Yes, I just must. It gave me pride and what you are doing generates pride also.
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I agree with the 4 seasons thing. Once you've lived there for all four seasons, and you think "oh yeah, this is how I did this last winter", it will start to feel like home. When you are at work, and you are longing to not be there, but to be at your house...that's when it's home. When you crave to be 'home', it's home. But Jenna, I have a true feeling that once you spend your first autumn there, with the chilly nights and warm days...it will be your home.
For me, this time around, it's taken 2 1/2 yrs. Or so I thought. We moved to western WA from the Knoxville area. While our current location is "home enough" it isn't the home to our souls. Our hearts are still back east. I purchased your book and read the entire thing within days. Your chapter on music took me back "home" if only for a moment. I've reread the chapter a couple times and every time I feeli like I'm right there again.
For me, sometimes not until it's just about time to leave - or after I've already moved on! But I've never been a homeowner . . .
好熱鬧喔 大家踴躍的留言 讓部落格更有活力..................................................
人不能像動物一樣活著，而應該追求知識和美德................. ................................................
Perhaps, considering what you went through with your last place, it might take a little longer than it normally would. I think it will feel like home when it hits you that it is really and truly yours. That doesn't always happen right away but it will happen.
I'm here five years and still feel like I'm living in someone else's home. But, I don't like the town or the house, so it's all in my perspective. You might need to do something to make it your own. A special paint on one wall or something. My mom said she never felt at home until a certain painting was hung in the living room. We moved every 3 years as kids, so I figure she latched onto something she could easily do herself that said "home."
Hey Jenna,
I thought I'd chime in to let you know that this post inspired K & I to paint our apartment.
It had dark red walls with a depression blue accent wall and black trim.
Now it's white with primer and already feels better, more like home.
Thanks J. :) You never know what your blog will inspire.
these comments made me smile, over and over...
thank you
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