The Keybunch+Asian Paints: No Place Like Home

Small or big, luxurious or cosy – a home is home, and there is no place like it! What does home mean to me? As a decor blogger, it means style and passion, a mesh of well co-ordinated furniture and accessories, wall colours that are selected carefully to set off the explosion of other colours, and more!

I recently saw this video on the Asian Paints Facebook page. When I watched it, I identified so well with Meha – work, deadlines and funnily enough, a brief that she puts all she has into, only to realise that the answer is as simple as speaking the truth. Have you seen the video? Take a moment to watch it here.

A home’s canvas holds much more than decor and furniture. Like Meha realises, it embraces our memories, and shared experiences. My walls have pictures that warm my soul whenever I pause to look at them. My grandmother’s clock, an 1857 wind-up model still ticks and tocks perfectly, set off by a coffee cream wall. On the other side, a family altar stands tall and proud, a symbol of my past, and one that I still pray around with my kids.

Every part of my home tells a story – a coffee table that was one of our first buys, and couldn’t be thrown away because of the memories attached to it, got transformed into an upholstered stool, on which the fond reminisces of our early days are carefully woven together.

And that reminds me. I walk across to the carved corner shelf – and I glance over to my husband. He has a smile on his face, and I know the story of how it came to be in our possession is flashing in his mind as well. It has traveled to every home we have lived in, and holds within its carvings, special memories of the cities we have lived in!

In my kids’ room, a map table that I had carefully decoupaged together last year, has become ‘the’ place to hold my kids’ favourite things.

A home is where I dwell – where my life unfolds each morning and wraps up every night. Where my kids run around with sticky fingers, and my husband feels comfortable enough to read the newspaper on an old garden chair, while he sips his coffee every morning! It is where I can encourage messes to be created knowing that I will clean it up for my next blog photo shoot; knowing that the messy spot is my little one’s learning curve, and the mess under the dining table means that he can be himself at home! Realizing that messes are as important to homes as a sparkling, pristine look helps my family feel safe, secure and un-judged in that one place that they can be themselves – home!

Home is where the family is, where love dwells, and where we can be ourselves, stripped off the masks we put on in public. We owe it to ourselves to make this space happy, comfortable and secure. As I type this I recall a picture I clicked last year, of my son lounging on the couch, upside down. It is these moments that make my home special. It is the only place where we can all be ourselves, for there is #noplacelikehome 🙂

Home is where life happens,
Moments and milestones are cherished,
Sickness and wounds are healed
Birthdays are celebrated.
School day costumes are altered and finished
Projects are frantically completed.

Be you rich or poor,
It’s true that there is
#NOPLACELIKEHOME