When I tell people that we purchased our home for just under $10,000 they immediately want to see it. So today I am letting you have a peek at what the living areas of our home look like; keeping it real style.

(this is a keeping it real post so hence the reason I didn’t move the upside down Christmas reindeer lawn ornament)

  My Keeping it Real House Tour

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I never want to be that blogger who makes it looks like she has is all together; because I  don’t. So today I am sharing what my home really looks like on a good day. I say a good day because my husband, the cleaning ninja of our family,  without knowing I was going to take these photos after I got home from a run surprised me by cleaning our home up while I was running with a friend.  So today’s tour will be a little neater than a normal day.

I want to mention 2 other things (besides an awesome husband)  that are helping my home stay a lot neater lately . One my 52 weeks to a simplified home, is making our  home easier and easier to pick up and make presentable. Two I am way past the toddler stage of life where everyone makes a mess and even if they do help clean it up they still make the mess again two minutes later, my kids are 12,14 and 19 and they help keep our home clean and keep it that way. Mom’s training your kids to help clean when they are little does pay off eventually trust me.

This is the view you would receive as you stepped onto to our front porch and headed to our front door. That wicker couch, yard sale, the cushion, clearance. The lounge chair, thrift store, the cushion clearance sale. The table, left behind by a previous owner of our last house. The welcome sign; something I won in my MOPS days.

Yes we believe in thrift around here. Even our home was a thrifty find costing just under ten thousand dollars. We spent forty thousand and two years  fixing it up from top to bottom to be just how we wanted it. I had so much fun doing the renovations, it truly drew my husband and I closer together.

This is the first room you will see as you walk in the front door. We call it our library. It can get cluttered really quick as we don’t have a coat closet nor a real defined area to put shoes and such. I make do with a big plastic tub for our coats (see the corner of it near the lamp) and  laundry baskets for shoes. Oh and that banana box you see, it is full of stuff for the thrift store but I just haven’t put it in my car yet; which breaks my own decluttering rules.

Off the library is the dining room. Yeah I really need to stain those china cabinets. I only bought them oh 7 years ago at an unfinished furniture store. That project has been on my to do list a long time. 🙂Off one end of our dining room is our galley kitchen. I loved being able to plan my kitchen from scratch. We bought stock cabinets and painted them white. I however am not happy with how the white paint has held up. If you look closely it has worn off near the handles on the cabinets, yet another thing to add to my to do list

Oh and my hubby in the picture is making me a breakfast of fried eggs and hash browns. YUM. I am very blessed to have him.

To the other end of the dinning room is our family room. Yes that is a safe on the ground it is a long story, but nothing is in it currently. The bean bag over in the corner is the dogs bed. Oh and those two baskets stacked up on top of each other is actually where we store all our socks. Yep, all 5 of us share socks. We all have the same sock size. Years ago I got tired of sorting socks, so I went out and bought 2 dozen black socks and 2 dozen white socks and now I just stuff them in those boxes for people to grab them as they need them. It works for us.

That makes up the living areas of our home. It isn’t large but it is big enough for our family of five; plus we own it 100% debt free and that makes it awesome. As a homemaker I work hard at making it a home. It took every thrifty trick I had to decorate it and stay within our budget. It takes all 5 of us working together to keep it clean.

I wanted to share with you just one more spot on the front porch. My favorite spot. If you lived near me and asked me to spill my homemaking secrets I would take you out front to sit on the swing porch a while and discuss what has worked form me and what hasn’t.  I would also want to hear what works for you too!

In this busy world though there isn’t enough time to sit on front porches, sip sweet tea and share wisdom with one another, so instead before you leave let me share some of my favorite books that have helped me with my homemaking skills over the years.

For cooking help nothing is better than the classic Better Homes and Garden 3 ring binder style Cook Book. It has all the instructions you need to cook great meals from scratch.

For time management I really like Don Aslett’s book How To Handle 1000 Things at Once. It was written in the 90’s but the wisdom in it is timeless.

If you feel like you are lost in the trenches of motherhood Say Goodbye To Survival Mode can help you find your way back to living a passion filled life.