from my Commonplace Book to yours...
a collection of quotes on H O M E ♥
May these words bless your soul and bring light to your heart.
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It may seem like a silly little old thing to think about putting the time into making mundane tasks beautiful. Things like thrifted wicker baskets instead of plastic. An old picket fence next to the clothesline with hopes of flowers next spring and the intentional placement of the clothesline so I can see the bees and the garden. Maybe it is silly because some may see it as yet another chore of the day. Yet, if you take the time to create a space you love with beauty, the daily tasks of the day just become enjoyable.
~ Rocky Hedge Farm ~
We have our own small square of life on this planet, and it's our choice to do with it what we will. We can bring order and beauty to that place we have been given. We can touch the people who come into our sphere of influence with love and care and comfort.
~ Claire Cloninger ~
The comfort and honesty of a good family supper should never be underestimated. You don't have to be in a fancy dining room, have the best fine dining etiquette, or feast on luxurious ingredients. You just need good food and good company.
~ Life at Number Ten ~
I firmly believe that it is homemaking that empowers all else. We all need home. Without it, we are both unmoored and rudderless.
~ Elizabeth Foss ~
Home. I always am apologizing for the shabbiness of my home, but I really love it, especially this kitchen. It's where I spend most of my time and it is located in the very center of the house. It's a natural spot for congregation and it can get loud, stuffy, and cramped pretty fast, but I tell myself there must be some level of comfort in it because people keep coming back to it. I hope when I'm dead everyone who has ever dropped into this kitchen remembers it fondly, as a happy place, if not sleek and clean.
~ Annie Hatke ~
Home matters and can be a source of joy and outlet for creativity, unlike any other. Whether yours is four walls, a bed, a desk, and a window, or a big house full of rooms and a kitchen and a garden in the yard. Simple or elaborate. Home, a place of comfort, of safety, of peace, of magic made up of little thoughtful details, of joy, a place to welcome in and to love, a place of memories cherished and order kept, a place where creativity can flourish, a place that looks and feels and smells and tastes like "me" and "you" and "our family", a place that's all yours in the big wide world.
~ Erin Morris ~
Nature forms a wonderful backdrop to domesticity. It's like an external room with ever-changing wallpaper, rugs and carpets that alter by the month, and lights that brighten and dim with the hour and the season. It's full of colors, textures, shapes, smells, patterns, designs and sheer cleverness. Nature provides space, pleasure, inspiration, solace, and life itself.
~ Jane Brocket ~
The girl with the simple clothing, the natural hair, the skin nourished from within. Nothing hidden, nothing pained. She's that girl, with the smile that finds her loved ones and the arms always outstretched. The girl with a heart for turning simple houses into soulful homes.
~ Mother in the Northern Lands ~
For those women...who bury themselves in books, who know the song by heart, whose kitchen is a sanctuary, the hearth a domain. Women who live in dreams and visions, forever striving, forever keeping it just within reach. Funny little Somebody, don't you ever forget how you made all the small things large.
~ Mother in the Northern Lands ~
Sacred spaces are those that ignite our passions and fan the flames of our creative fires. There are many tiny spaces of magic in this home that I would consider sacred in that they are a container for exploring my inner self and depth, and give reverence to the care and intention of the daily tasks of homemaking.
~ Whole Woven Home ~
Only in home life does a woman attain her best development, and that whether married or single, home-keeping hearts are best. Nothing on earth is so divine as a home. It is four walls and a roof, with windows to let the sunshine in, and a door to bar against the outer world, and to open to one's friends. It is a nest full of sweetness and peace. It is an asylum and a refuge and a shelter and a place of withdrawal from storm and tempest. It is a place of dignity and repose.
~ Margaret E. Sangster ~
Traveling is all very well if you can get home at night. I would be willing to go around the world if I came back in time to light the candles and set the table for supper.
~ Gladys Taber ~
Disorder in the society is the result of disorder in the family.
~ St. Elizabeth Ann Seton ~
When we traded homemaking for careers, we were implicitly promised economic independence and worldly influence. But a devil of a bargain it has turned out to be in terms of daily life. We gave up the aroma of warm bread rising, the measured pace of nurturing routines, the creative task of molding our families' tastes and zest for life; we received in exchange the minivan and the Lunchable.
~ Barbara Kingsolver ~
As the family goes, so goes the nation, and so goes the whole world in which we live.
~ St. John Paul II ~
What can you do to promote world peace? Go home and love your family.
~ St. Teresa of Calcutta ~
The ordinary arts we practice every day at home are of more importance to the soul than their simplicity might suggest.
~ Thomas Moore ~
Those dreamlike days of going nowhere and everywhere all at the same time. Adventures at home are so wildly wonderful, I hardly ever feel the need to leave.
~ Ivy and Tweed ~
Sometimes the best way to unfurl hope's banners over the war-torn landscape of life is to make a bed with a sweet expanse of clean sheets and set a table with candles and wine glasses and something green from the yard to which the fragrance of earth still clings. Everything matters. Especially the most ordinary things.
~ Lanier Ivester ~
Sometimes I daydream as I make my home. I'd like to think Louisa May might have tidied up and scrubbed the floor as I have, or Ma might have baked a few batches of bread that wasn't quite perfect as I've done or that Mrs. Tittlemouse might have had a little cabinet just like this...with dried chilies dancing merrily above a shelf of filled mason jars. The world may feel weird right now, but home is still what you make of it.
~ Jes the Pilgrim ~