I have a real treat for y’all…. one of my “in real life” friends Vicki is my very last guest post on home. Vicki & I went to UT together our freshman year. She moved back to Florida a mere 10 months after I met her, but 9 years later I still consider her one of my very best friends. We’ve kept in touch over the years and followed each others lives over the interwebs. Vicki’s blog, Crowning Victoria, is full of the awesome. She’s a spunky vegetarian, fantastic aunt and a BRIDE TO BE.

Vicki’s post makes me so excited about the day I can play pretend and give Madison a doll house of her very own. It is such a wonderful story about the simple imagination of a child and how you can carry that imagination with you through your enter life. I hope you love it as much as I did.

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You know what’s exciting about guest blogging for Joanna?  Knowing that I’m a non-mommy blogger on a mommy blog!  Well, that and helping out a friend.  I’m honored that Joey would think I know what I’m talking about and have enough faith in my post.  But she’s good like that, I don’t need to tell her awesome readers about that! (Plus, it’s nice to take a break from all this wedding planning.  I will be so happy when The Big Day comes for many reasons!)

I spent the last two weeks out in Texas with my sister and her family helping out with my newest niece Madelyne.  She’s adorable, as is my three year old niece Eleanor.  But let me tell you, that was some strong birth control.  Mike and I are getting married in a year and I’m sure this will last me until then!

But while out in Texas, spending the longest amount of time with my sister since she moved out and went to college (oh lord, am I dating myself here?) I experienced a very sweet event:  playing dollhouse.

In the late 70′s my dad built my sister the most beautiful dollhouse, down to the wooden shingles covering the entire outside.  There are six different rooms, each hand decorated by my dad and sister.  It has miniature electrical lighting, teeny patterns in the vinyl flooring, and even a toilet. My sister played for hours with that house, making furniture out of spools of thread and whatnots around the house.  She loved every inch of that house, and my dad felt proud that she loved it.

Fast forward a couple years and we have little Vicki enamored with the same house.  Of course my dad built me my own dollhouse and we shared the same experience of decorating all the little rooms.  I treasured those trips to the flea market and the dollhouse booth.  It was an amazing world filled with tiny treasures.  But I secretly coveted my sister’s dollhouse.  The details were more intricate. The fact that it belonged to my sister made it more enticing.  When in the garage with her dollhouse I transported to a different world and played for hours.
Sure I loved my dollhouse, but hers was special.

You can imagine my excitement when I walked into my sister’s new house and found the same dollhouse in the guest bedroom.  I sat on the floor the first night and almost cried sweet tears of nostalgia.  It felt comforting opening the same door I used to push little doll people through, imaging their life, pretending how they lived, manipulating their world.  Now some of the original people are gone, but the frame is still the same.  The lights fail to work and the wallpaper is peeling off and missing in spots, but I can see it just the same in my mind.
But Eleanor sees the same world I once did.  She sees the possibilities and expansive play universe before her.  The dolls play just the same as they did for me, and for my sister.  She loves that house, as I did, as my sister did.  The wonder of children is amazing.

The lights may not work and the wallpaper dingy, but through a child’s eyes all is perfect.

As many of the wonderful guest bloggers said, home is what you make of it, what you choose to fill it, and who’s in it.

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