New Year Resolutions

I've made the usual list of New Year Resolutions- learn Spanish, drink more water, eat less bread....cut and pasted I think from the year before, and maybe the year before that! I'm getting there though. Hola! tea counts for water and I try to eat only the bread I make.

Should we be looking at interior trends or interior resolutions?  It has been said recently with falling house prices that a house should not be looked at merely as an investment but as a home.  That may not sound like rocket science, but actually there are many houses I go to that have no homely feel but are trying to recreate some bland showhome impression.
 I always cite the case of 15 years ago, large detached new house built in wealthy area where the buyers bought the showhome complete with all furniture, curtains etc.  I was invited to visit some 6 months later and the dining table was laid out showhome style complete with plastic bread.  The photographs of unknown people used to dress the side tables were still in place.
Then there is a now dear friend of mine who has furnished her home with bargains and auction items, handdowns and throwaways.  I only commented about a lamp shade.  Everything else was comfortable and you felt a warmth when you walked into her home.
I also remember the awful bathroom we had growing up in an apartment in New York, and shame to say that the cowboy tilers who did my own bathroom make me recall that scene daily.

Given we are only around for max maybe 100 years, why don't we create more of an impression? No one will remember us for having the latest Next dining set, the Marks and Spencer sofa or that light in the B&Q advert.
We will remember the good, the bad and the ugly- but never the bland.
A good interior creates an environment in which people can flourish.

1. Keep it tidy- find a home for everything- shelves, storage boxes, just don't leave it lying around
2. If colour blind, ask a friend to help. Pink and peach are not the same colours, neither are green and grey.
3.If you are going to wallpaper get a decorator. Nothing worse than seeing joins
4. If you are being brave with colour stick to Farrow and Ball or Little Greene Paint- good solid colours
5.Everyone who buys a new carpet has an old one going spare, chat to shops.

6.Frame those family photographs
7.Have fun, I love this mural
8.Sort out the bathroom, not talking hygiene, just make it more interesting
9 Did I mention clutter?
10. Just be you and your person, and let your house be your home.