About Hospitality

Note: This is the first of a series. Please check out the other posts in the series. There will be more coming too!

I've mentioned here before that I aim to be hospitable. I wish we had more people come for the night, but truth be told, Elise was our first houseguest other than my or Joel's mom when they babysit for us. I was so excited to put my guestroom to use for someone who would be staying with us! I hope we have the opportunity to have Elise again, and other in our home as well.







I found this great article from Simple Mom, that I think has great, easy pointers to make your guest feel at home. I had a lot of them in mind when Elise came last weekend.







Our guest room is a modge-podge of furniture, and the walls are lime green with color crayon accents, as it was our oldest daughter's room when we first moved here. We put the two girls together several months back, and made a guest room.







I am borrowing some pictures from Elise's blog to show you the things I did to try to make her feel special during her visit.

We have a chalkboard in our kitchen that we use for homeschool, and I wrote a simple welcome message for her. I have also used this to write congratulation messages for showers, and birthday wishes for family. You can paint a simple chalkboard on a piece of wood to make your own chalkboard and hang it on your porch to welcome guests into your home.

When Elise arrived, I had a tray on her bed with a couple of magazines that I knew she'd probably enjoy, along with a basket of goodies. I got a few small gifts that I hoped she would enjoy, and I also put toiletries that she may need in the basket. There were some hotel toiletries that I'd saved (that smell really good!) and a new toothbrush and toothpaste. I also put some fresh cut daffodils by her bed for an extra touch to let her know I was glad she was here.

I had her towels handy in her room so that she wouldn't have to search for them when she was ready to shower. I found some of my better towels (still not the greatest, but it's what we had :)) and put them in a basket with a new loofah sponge and a bottle of water.

I didn't do anything elaborate or expensive, I just opened up my home and took a little time to fluff things up a bit for her. I also sprayed her sheets that afternoon with linen spray to make her bed smell nice and fresh when she climbed in that evening.

Be sure to check out Simple Mom's tips for making houseguests feel welcome in your home.

Tomorrow, I'll share some tips for opening your home for guests just for fellowship.

This is my submission for Works for Me Wednesday. Check out more WFMW at We are THAT Family.