In our home we have constant expressions of ourselves and those who we live with. If you live alone, with a mate, or with your husband and your children we are in competition with each other. We all search for spaces in this confined home to be our own person. Fighting for this space can be difficult because sharing is not a natural part of who we are.

* First there has to be a realization the mother and father have been there first. They have the priority. What they surround themselves with is expressing who they are. There furniture is chosen to meet their needs.

* Bringing two people together from two different families can be a challenge in itself. Sometimes the things that come have deep meaning to the one while the other has similar responses to their treasures. Making it all fit in is challenging.

* Furniture is a powerful emotional response to who we are. We grew up in a home that your family did things a certain way. Regardless of what it looked like, this is a part of who you are. Someone trying to change you can be detrimental.

* Mothers have a way of instilling life in us by the fact of who she is. Mothers are looked at as the warming center of the home. Sons want their wife to be like their mother. Daughters want to do or not do what their mother did.

* With sons they bring treasures of their mother and want the wife to embrace them. Daughters will cherish what mother shared with her and she will want her husband to recognize the importance of her mother. Conflict arises if jealousy becomes a part of the perspective.

* A lamp that you had in your childhood that was there when you grew up. A table that stood for memories of your childhood home. Dishes mother had, tools that father had, handed down from generation to generation.

As you set up housekeeping, if you are doing it for yourself than all your decision are yours and do not have to be shared by anyone. If you are setting up a home for you and your family, what we want does not always the say so. We have to respect each others feeling about the things that are important to them.