Creating Your Joyful Home: Inspiration to Make a Home Planning Journal

If you are planning a home makeover or remodeling project, here are some ideas to help you.

Inspiration to make a home planning journal from "Joy to the Home Planner:"

"Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context -- a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan." - Eliel Saarinen (Finnish Architect)

Declaration of Intent

Form your unique design plan encompassing your entire home, from the first glimpse, all the way throughout your home, and to the far reaches of the back patio, garden, or yard.

Think about the feelings you want to bring about: joy, peace, comfort, and contentment. Add in ease, simplicity, and economy. Start with your feelings and the emotions you want to bring about for yourself and those you share your home with.

Write down your ideas. Start with your desired emotion and expand until you create your personal design goal. Something like this:

"I desire peace. I want my home to sing in perfect harmony with the universe. I need to encourage nature's music of bird songs and plan a birdbath."

"I want natural warmth. I want the sun to shine in! No heavy window coverings will block out natural daylight. Ethereal light will be encouraged with soft, sheer window dressings for privacy."

"I feel like relaxing. I desire a padded rocking chair on my back porch with a table nearby for iced tea."

"We want joyful rooms to play together in. Only necessary furnishings will take up valuable play space."

When you first think of how you want to feel in a space, then you can choose the decorating details that will bring about your emotional well-being. I want everyone to feel welcome to my home, so I planted yellow and white flowers. I want my friends to feel refreshed when they park their car, so I planted shade trees. I want all who come to the front door to feel happy, so I painted my door a joyful shade of red.

Enjoy writing your desired feelings and playing with this concept!

Joy to you!

(c) Copyright 2004, Jeanette J. Fisher. All rights reserved.

Professor Jeanette Fisher, author of Doghouse to Dollhouse for Dollars, Joy to the Home, and other books teaches Real Estate Investing and Design Psychology. For more articles, tips, reports, newsletters, and sales flyer template, see http://www.doghousetodollhouse fordollars.com/pages/5/index.htm

In The News:


Jakarta Post

Space Shuttle Crew Home Improvement Project
KTNV Las Vegas, NV - 23 hours ago
The space shuttle endeavour and its seven astronauts are making their way back to earth. The shuttle undocked from the international space station Friday ...
Video: Raw Video: Shuttle Endeavour Lands in Calif. AssociatedPress
Space shuttle Endeavor returns home College News
Space Shuttle Endeavour forced to make westcoast landing WCBD
ChattahBox - Pittsburgh Post Gazetteall 4,726 news articles

Despite drop in oil, Americans seal up for winter
Reuters - 20 hours ago
Across the northern United States, contractors, home improvement retailers and nonprofit groups report that such weatherization efforts continue apace, ...

Home improvement contracts regulated
Daily American Online, PA - Nov 29, 2008
The bill will regulate written home improvement contracts and require contractors doing more than $5000 of work annually to be registered in the state. ...

Secondhand home improvement stores stock big savings
Trading Markets (press release), CA - Nov 30, 2008
The store is Stardust Building Supplies, a nonprofit organization that sells donated home improvement items at up to 80 percent off retail prices. ...

CNET News

The iPhone 2.2 software update, a hands-on report
CNET News, CA - 7 hours ago
... from last to first in a circular fashion), and a bigger improvement, I think. It makes the first Home screen distinctly more convenient than the others, ...

Senior Citizens Beware of Lame Home Improvement Companies
Floral Park Dispatch, NY - Nov 28, 2008
Over the past year, at least three local senior citizens have been taken advantage of by an out-of-town home improvement contractor for tens of thousands of ...

Foreclosures: Hardest hit blocks are in Tolleson
Arizona Republic, AZ - 15 hours ago
On a recent morning, a crew from a home-improvement store put down new carpet in a house that had been vandalized after it fell into foreclosure. ...

Lady Rams will continue to work toward improvement
Mt. Vernon Register-News, IL - 5 hours ago
This will also be the team’s sixth straight game away from home, with the team’s first home game scheduled for Thursday. “It’sa huge challenge, ...

Beaver County Times

New law will require contractors to be licensed by state
Beaver County Times, PA - Nov 29, 2008
Contractor John Matthews of Matthews Home Improvement, Baden, called the new legislation “a double-edged sword.” He said he liked the idea of insurance ...

Home improvement sometimes best left to pros
Sun-Sentinel.com, FL - Nov 28, 2008
Their column has been in syndication for 20 years, and they have written 20 home improvement books. Each week the Hamiltons will compare the cost of a ...
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