Drop-In Friends….

My house is a wreck today. No…seriously. Look at just my laundry room….

I’m under no illusions. It’s a wreck! And yes… on the far wall, that would be some paint that I put up a couple of years ago to see how I felt about painting the laundry room that color. I never wanted to do it because the laundry room stresses me out and I have to spend enough time in there as it is.

I’m showing you my laundry room though to show you what a friend of ours saw today when he came to look at putting in some shelves and more cabinetry. Ok…so I’d tidied up at least the stuff on the floor that was making it hard to walk, but it was still bad.

This friend that came, J, has a really amazing wife who I think is truly great. She apparently thinks I am more well put together than I actually am. It’s such a flattering thought that I’m tempted to keep it, but then I’d just be living with a lie, and that’s way worse than being honest about who I am…deficiency load and all.

So in order to make sure she knows how very un-put together I am typically, I texted her this picture. And this is just the laundry room. I’m not saying I live with a mess because I really don’t all the time, but I have 2 small children who can wreak some serious havoc on a room in about 5 minutes and sometimes it stays that way for the rest of the day. Whatever though…it’s real life.

A few years ago when we first bought this house, we were painting the cabinets in the kitchen…they were ugly glossy wood and so we painted them cream. It was a horribly tedious process that we eventually gave up on and paid someone to finish, but we got most of the way done. All of the cabinet doors had been removed for priming and I decided that we needed to have a party for Memorial Day….sans kitchen cabinet doors and all.

I don’t know how your cabinets are when you open them, but I have a few that are disasters waiting to happen…the tupperware cabinet in particular. All that business was in plain sight…and we had a party with about 50 people. I’ll never forget how many people commented “I can’t believe you don’t care that you don’t have cabinet doors on…I could never let it go enough to have a party with my house in disrepair.” I’m pretty sure they all meant it as a compliment, because they’re my friends and if they’d judge me for that…well, we probably wouldn’t be friends long anyhow truth be told.

So yesterday was kind of a mess around here. And 3 different friends stopped by for various reasons. One had about 20 minutes to kill before we had to pick up our kids from school (and we live behind the school,) one came over for an impromptu lunch when I invited them in the carline, and one dropped by to borrow my coffee urn for a party she was having….and I didn’t stress about my imperfect house. Would I prefer it look nice when friends come…yes. Would I avoid letting people come by just because it’s not perfect….NEVER.

When I throw a big party or a dinner party, I definitely straighten things up….everyone does, but in daily living, some of my favorite moments happen when friends just drop in for a visit out of the blue. I love it. I love having “drop-in friends” who text you when they’re in your neighborhood, or who are out walking and will come in for a cup of coffee, or who need to kill time before having to be somewhere, or will come hang out because they care more about time with people than they do about what everything around them looks like right then. Those are my favorite kinds of people.

I heard someone once say…

So that’s my mantra for visitors….I love the time with you way more than the time I spend endeavoring to achieve cleaning perfection. I want to enjoy my life and the people in it, and not “sweat the small stuff.” Noone ever dies and people stand up and talk about his or her capacity to keep a perfect home as much as they remember the way they loved others….and I hope that’s more what people would remember about me once I’m not around anymore too!

How about you? Where do you fall in the cleanliness versus friendliness question?

DON’T forget that all next week I’ll be hosting AMAZING giveaways each day!  Each one will only be open for 24 hours, so don’t miss out!  Check back every day for your chance to win really awesome stuff!  And I can’t wait to hear what you all think about the new look that Life for Dessert will be revealing then too!!!  WOOHOO!