candle holder

A peek into Samantha's home

 

Another Nesting & Nurturing guest post—for your reading and viewing pleasure!

Today my guest is Samantha Martin-Evans, photographer and mama behind the blog eleven of hearts.


candleholder

"Offerings" candleholder from an old church

where Sam spent her childhood

 

Samantha, what does home mean to you?

It's impossible for me to define what home means to me today without drawing upon memories of my childhood home. In remembering what it felt like when I was a child, a few words leap to mind: safety, shelter, happiness, comfort. And the same holds true today, but the word "shelter" in particular strikes a chord: Shelter, as in a roof over our heads, but also in the Dylan sense of a haven "from the storm" of life (not that daily life is dark and dreary, by any means, but more a whirlwind of activity, of to and fro, of hustle and bustle).

Home is a shelter that grants us a place to incubate, to be nurtured, to grow, and to thrive.

The word "home" carries with it so much hope and promise; it's full of potential. Here is a list of things that spell home to me.

  • floral wallpaper on the walls
  • afternoon tea with milk and sugar
  • dogwood and forsythia seemingly forever in bloom
  • large, worn cushions on the floor
  • going for hikes out the back door
  • rainboots and pink cheeks
  • family dinners by candlelight
  • warm featherbeds, flannel sheets
  • Sunday chores
  • rain coming in through the screen
  • Fleetwood Mac on the record player
  • living room furniture pushed aside to make room for dancing
  • jumping in a pile of just-raked leaves
  • sprinkler on the lawn
  • chocolate-chip cookies in the oven
  • reading by flashlight, under a blanket
  • movie night with popcorn, all the lights out
  • fireflies blinking
  • camping out in the backyard
  • bathtime with bubbles
  • unfinished jigsaw puzzle or Rummikub on the card table
  • tire swing in the frontyard
  • kick-the-can with the neighborhood kids played until past dark (a mom's voice calling for her kids to come in)
  • the music from the ice-cream truck as it turns onto our street
  • the sound of someone cooking in the kitchen: closing cabinets; laying a stirring spoon on the stove
  • visitors' hats and coats on the hat rack
  • early to bed, early to rise

This is the home of my past, of my present, and, hopefully, of my future.

 

About Samantha Martin-Evans:

woman

Samantha Martin-Evans





















Sam is a mama, a photographer, a volunteer community mediator, and a caregiver to her mentally ill older brother. She and her 7-year-old son Julian live in a sunny little cottage in San Francisco with their dog, Penny, and cat, Winter. You can see more from her on her blog eleven of hearts or on her Flickr.

Thank you, Sam. I love your vision of home. It is so nice... Check back next week for more stories and photographs from the home lives of real moms.


+++ What about you? What's on your list of things that spell home?


Previous Nesting & Nurturing guest posts: