The Perfect Homemaker

I know your dirty little secret. You didn’t fool me. You can stop pretending right now.
I know you’re not the perfect homemaker.

I know you sometimes sweep the floors and just end up moving the dirt under the couch where nobody will see. I know when I came over last time you probably stuffed clutter in the closet and hoped the door would close. I know you leave shoes strewn around the floor and then you step on them in the dark and cry out in frustration.

You know how I found out your secret? Because it’s mine too.

I married a man who can be messy. And he married a girl who can be cluttered. Neither one of us are extreme neat freaks. Neither one of us are slobs. That means we get to take turns getting mad at the other one for whatever mess we find. He comes home from a business trip to my shoes strewn throughout every room of the house and it pushes his buttons, but when I ask him to please make the bed because it affects my entire perception of life, and he forgets, I can snap quickly.

Anyone with me?

I want so badly for my house to be clean all the time, and sometimes I have good phases. Things seem to stay naturally orderly and I’m on top of it, but as soon as life gets busy, it’s the first thing to go. We don’t even have kids yet, but when I haven’t had an evening at home in weeks (like right now), the kitchen table becomes a dumping ground for purses and papers and the living room floor looks like we are stock piling clothes for the next Y2K.

Jeremy & I are working on communicating better and establishing teamwork to keep the house orderly and organized, but in the mean time, God is teaching me a lesson.

I am not the perfect homemaker. 

I am currently reading “The Nesting Place” by Myquillin Smith of The Nester. Her mantra is It Doesn’t Have To Be Perfect To Be Beautiful. I have been so blessed and inspired by her journey to the realization that we can embrace imperfection.

So,  here is my encouragement to you today.

Your home doesn’t have to be perfect. And you are not the perfect homemaker.

So I hope you will open up your home to friends even when the floors haven’t been swept in a week. I hope you will stop apologizing when things aren’t exactly like you want them to be. I hope you will be encouraged that there is imperfection everywhere, and that is part of the beauty. Stop apologizing. You didn’t do anything wrong. 

But, also, do you have any tips for keeping things tidy when life is crazy busy? #help.