Craving Some Southern Nostalgia and Hospitality

It's been a long time since I wrote anything here on this space. Let's be honest it's been a long time since I've written anything. The other day I was watching HGTV's new show Hometown and it made me quite nostalgic for the south. However it made me nostalgic for a south that I would argue doesn't exist in most cities anymore. I wanted to be transported to a town where you truly know everyone and  friends and family stop by your home on a regular basis. It had me longing for a community feeling that I am not sure exists in today's world. It also had me longing for just a few more hours with my granny to sit on her porch and hear the story about how I beheaded all of her daffodils and tulips one spring when I was about two because "I wanted to pick her and my mommy some pretty flowers", or to tell her all about how my life is now and how her great-granddaughter has her name and arguably the strong female attitude of our family.

Anyway all of this nostalgia seems to come creeping in every year around this time. While Minnesota has become home and I love it, I still long for the first days of spring in the south. When you throw open all of your windows and probably your doors too in order to let the fresh warm breeze air out the house. When flowers are blooming and you can see the end to winter. I would say I have adjusted here to the winter and can even say that I feel spring in the air when its thirty degrees but there is nothing like those first warm days of a southern spring. I also read an article recently that spoke of messy hospitality and just having people over no matter what the house looks like. Understanding that the value is in the fellowship with others and not the magazine worthy pictures. It really struck a chord with me and I hope to implement that more soon. I want our home to be a place of fellowship with friends and family (when they visit). To be that place that everyone knows they are always welcome to stop by for a warm meal or a glass of something refreshing to drink. A place of conversation and welcoming, of differing views but still coming together to respect that view. I want our home to be a place of hospitality and not that fake kind sold to you by travel agents but the genuine kind.

Well I write all of this to say that I am hoping to make this a goal of mine to create this community and hospitality but also to say I plan to get back to blogging however this will probably be more an online journal than it was before. A place for me to brain dump and catalog all our happenings. I haven't been excited about writing in a while but I think I might have found my excitement in it again. So I guess a thanks is in order to Hometown for making me nostalgic and making me want to put these words onto a page.