Crystal Miler
Home Comforts and Orderliness
Crystal Miler
Lately I have been reading several excellent books. But the one book that stands
out as the most encouraging to me is the book
Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House
In the book she deals with routines and housekeeping schedules, food (no
recipes, rather it is the discussion on home cooking, serving meals, the kitchen
culture, shopping, etc..) laundry with descriptions of different fibers used and
there care, washing, drying, stains. She covers cleaning the home with topics on
household cleaners, how to clean various surfaces such as tile, stone, no-wax
floors and more. Plus issues on home safety and even has chapters that deal with
legal issues, insurance, keeping records and the storing of keepsake papers and
photos. The book has over 800 pages that are full of helpful information. If you
want a good grasp on homemaking and all it entails then this is a book I highly
encourage you to look into.
Keeping Order
As I started reading this book I was greatly encouraged and motivated by some of
her first chapters on neatness and orderliness. In my home there are currently 7
of us here and by the end of the day we can all accumulate a lot of clutter that
is just lying around the house disrupting a good deal of order. My husband
pointed out that if each person left 5 items in the wrong place or did not deal
with those items properly that would be 35 things out and about on any given day
and after 3 days there could be over 100 items out of place if things were not
dealt with. And 5 items in a day does not seem like a lot. There are shoes,
jackets and sweaters, pens and paper, books, the newspaper, a coffee cup, toys
and so on.
Cheryl had an excellent example of this chaos in life outside the home and then
draws a superb parallel of this to life inside the home. She calls it the broken
window theory. Here is a quote from her book:
“This theory says a neighborhood causes people who are predisposed to antisocial
conduct to feel more inclined to commit various crimes and misdemeanors. If
there is one broken window and it isn’t fixed, this suggests to malefactors that
no one is in charge – that there therefore it is safe to write graffiti on the
walls, litter, and break other windows.”
She goes on to explain how this applies to the home and I will show how it
happens in my home. Let say I begin the day with a clear dining room table or
other flat surface (top of the piano, my built in hutch, etc..). I lay the
magazine I am reading down on the table when I am done with it. Then someone
else comes in and removes their sweater and sets it on the table. Then the kids
leave their finished cups of water and maybe a few toys on the table. And so the
day goes. By the end of the day the table is covered again. This creates a lot
of clutter and makes the whole room seem out of order.
So what is the solution? Make new habits. First
there is an awareness of the problem, and then there can be a plan. With my own
family I have started emphasizing the need to take care of our things by putting
them in their proper place right away. Rather than waiting for a specific time
of the day to start picking up the house I want to instill the new habit in my
children and myself to stop and deal with that item properly to begin with. If
you have established places for items such as a basket to hold the magazines,
hooks for sweaters, used dishes in the sink or dishwasher, and so on then it
becomes a matter of follow through and teaching that to my children.
In my own experience I can say that there is nothing that makes a home feel more
comfortable than to be neat and orderly. However, Cheryl does point out and I do
agree that there will be times when a current project can and should be left
out. I leave sewing out on the table if I am in the process of working on a
project, I let the children leave the board game out or the Lego’s that they are
currently playing with so they can take a lunch break and then resume the play
time or setting my book down to answer the phone or get a cup of tea, puzzles
that may be currently worked on are left out on a table.
I think the bottom line for what I want to see in my own family is an
understanding of the importance of making new habits. When these new habits are
instilled it will go along way in helping to create and keep a nicely
comfortable home.
It is not always easy to teach a child (or myself) new habits. It takes patients
and time. There is a fine line between nagging frustration and teaching. To
avoid becoming frustrated and nagging (which is so grating on the nerves of
everyone in a home) I start by letting my children know what the new
expectations are and then gently but most importantly I consistently remind them
until it becomes a new habit, which may take time! This is where patients are
needed. However I do not try and change my husband’s habits. I am not his mother
and that is not my job. I love him and in love I will do what I need to do to
create a warm and comfortable home for him!
If you are interested in reading more on the book Home Comforts or would like to
purchase your own copy you can find them very reasonably priced through
Amazon.com.
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