"Through skillful and godly Wisdom is a house, a life, a home, a family built,
and by understanding it is established on a sound and good foundation.
And by knowledge shall its chambers of every area be filled
with all precious and pleasant riches."
(Proverbs 24:3-4)
As someone has said, "Thoughts are things," and the atmosphere of every home
depends on the kind of thoughts each member of that home is thinking.
I spent an afternoon a short time ago with a friend in her new home.
The house was beautiful and well-furnished with new furniture, but it seemed
bare and empty to me. I wondered why this was until I remembered my experience
with my new home. I could not make the living room seem homelike. I would
move the chairs here and there and change the pictures on the wall, but,
something was lacking. Nothing seemed to change the feeling of coldness
and vacancy that displeased me whenever I entered the room.
Then, as I stood in the middle of the room one day wondering what I could
possibly do to improve it, it came to me that all that was needed was for
someone to live in it and furnish it with everyday pleasant thoughts of
friendship and cheerfulness and hospitality.
We all know there is a spirit in every home, a sort of composite spirit
composed of the thoughts and feelings of the members of the family as a
composite photograph is formed of the features of different individuals.
The spirit meets us at the door as we enter the home. Sometimes it is
a friendly, hospitable spirit, and sometimes it is cold and forbidding.
If the members of a home are ill-tempered and quarrelsome, how quickly
you feel it when you enter the house. You may not know just what is wrong,
but you wish to make your visit short. If they are kindly, generous, good-
tempered people, you will have a feeling of warmth and welcome that
will make you wish to stay. Sometimes you feel that you must be
very prim and dignified, and at another place you feel a rollicking
good humor and readiness to laugh and be merry.
Poverty or riches, old style housekeeping or modern conveniences
do not affect your feelings. It is the characters and personalities
of the persons who live there.
Each individual has a share in making this atmosphere of the home
what it is, but the mother can mold it more to her wishes.
I read a piece of poetry several years ago that was supposed to be
a man speaking of his wife, and this was the refrain of the little story:
"I love my wife because she laughs,
Because she laughs and doesn't care."
I'm sure that would have been a delightful home to visit, for a good laugh
overcomes more difficulties and dissipates more dark clouds than any
other one thing. And this woman was the embodied spirit of
cheerfulness and good temper.
Let's be cheerful! We have no more right to steal the brightness out
of the day for our own family than we have to steal the purse of a stranger.
Let us be careful that our homes are furnished with pleasant and happy
thoughts as we are that the rugs are the right color and texture and
the furniture comfortable and beautiful!
"How To Furnish A Home"
(November 1917)
Laura Ingalls Wilder
(1867-1957)
Prolific American writer and pioneer girl
Author of the "Little House" series of books.
Essay taken from the book,
Little House In The Ozarks
A Laura Ingalls Wilder Sampler
The Rediscovered Writings
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Edited by Stephen W. Hines
(1991)
Guideposts Edition
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