Make it Cozy: Settling Into Your New Home

Today’s post is a guest post brought to you by Natalie from Home Owner Bliss. I’m excited for you to get to read this creative post on ways to settle into your new home… enjoy!

So you just moved into a new home. Congratulations! The next few weeks will be about personalizing and perfecting your space to make it feel like yours. While there are things you can do to help make it feel cozier as soon as you arrive, some things may take up more time. All of the following actions, however, contribute to making your new house (apartment, town home, or whatever you have!) feel more like home.

Set Down Your Welcome Mat

A welcome mat is an easy way to tell visitors a little bit about yourself as soon as they step up to your front door. The real question is, what do you want your mat to say? Are you funny and witty? Warm and hospitable? A DIY-er? Whatever your style, laying down that mat on your first day in the new home is a quick and easy way to make it yours.

Create a Familiar Scent

One of the reasons a new house may not feel like a home is because it doesn’t have that lived-in scent profile from the combination of air fresheners, household products, and home cooking. Instead, new homeowners are often surrounded by the smell of fresh paint from the coat or two the previous owners slapped on.

You can work on making your new place smell more like you by giving the whole place a thorough cleaning with your favorite cleaning products. Furthermore, light a few candles, diffuse some essential oils, and break out the reed diffusers with familiar scents. You can also try a trick like crafting a batch of stove-top potpourri that fills the place with the scent of your favorite fruits, herbs, and spices, even before you cook your first meal in the kitchen.

Soften the Air

Stale and dry air can irritate the respiratory system, exacerbate allergies, dry out skin, cause static electricity, and damage your home and/or furnishings. If you notice you are experiencing cold-like symptoms and dehydrated skin since moving into your new place, invest in a humidifier that helps relieve dry-air symptoms. Plugging in a humidifier is an easy way to add moisture that softens the air and make the entire room more comfortable. Furthermore, it aids in your new home’s upkeep by preventing the cracking and warping of wood furniture and floors.

You can also look for a version that disperses essential oils into the air as way to create a more pleasant scent, as mentioned above. Try scents that promote comfort and peace such as marjoram, cypress, juniper, and myrtle. Or you can create your own blend with a combination of coriander, ylang ylang, bergamot, geranium, melissa, frankincense, spikenard, myrrh, rose, and neroli.

Organize Your Wardrobe

Hanging up your clothes and putting away items in your drawers gives you an awesome opportunity to organize and assess your wardrobe. As you start unpacking, make mental notes regarding what you wear the most to determine which items get a spot in the front. Put heavy coats, jackets, and other outwear in a hall closet so you can grab them on your way out. If your wardrobe tends to change up depending on the season, keep seasonally appropriate pieces together. You can also consider vacuum-sealing them and storing them in another part of the house until they are needed.

When you move into a new house, it can take some time to make it feel like your home. Start off by adding some of your own flair to the entryway with a welcome mat. Creating a familiar scent profile in the home is another way to make it yours. If the air is dry and uncomfortable, add a humidifier that will also protect the condition of wood in your home. Finally, use moving as an opportunity to organize your wardrobe to make mornings easier in your new habitat.