Spread Love Events

It’s moving day.  We don’t often blog about our personal life, but our parents have recently sold and are moving from our family home today. This is an exciting time and an emotional one. Our home was no ordinary house.

My parents bought the house when my Mom was just 29 years old and the garden (she hosts tours) was more of an overgrown bamboo forest. Over the years they thoughtfully transformed that house into a home. Looking back it’s easy to see where our DIY and resourceful nature came from.

We recently got our whole family together to share stories and be together one last time in the house and Rebecca Chalmers of Bee Chalmers Photography joined us to capture the memory. Here are a few our of favourite photos.

Images by Bee Chalmers Photography

 

Lessons I learned growing up in that old house:

Choose carefully. My parents built a home over 37 years, each door nob, light fixture and piece of furniture was thoughtfully selected. They didn’t try to fill the house in one weekend of shopping and every piece and detail has a story to tell.

Learn to paint. As my mom always says, the best way to give a room a “lift” is a can of paint. Often seen in her painting overalls, she painted every room in that house at least three times.

Trends come and go, style is forever. Mom and Dad’s house was full of treasures, some passed down all the way from our grandparents. Classic pieces never go out of “style.”

DIY – learn to do it yourself and don’t be afraid if the outcome is a little different that the online tutorial (so long as it’s not electrical) – it’s just more you.

Perfect is overrated. Character and imperfections make homes, and life, interesting.

Stock your cupboards with gourmet food to feed a crowd and fill your home with family and friends. The best memories in our house were shared with others.

And finally, it is the memories you make and can take anywhere you go that matter most.

 

Here’s to new traditions, fond memories, and building our own homes wherever we go!