Settling in...

This is a post about how not quite a year, but more than six months after really and truly settling in Grand Junction, Colorado (and I use the word settling in the purest since as in getting settled, moving in, and making a place for myself), I am beginning to feel at home.
And, it wasn't just buying a house that did it. Buying a house is kind of unsettling, actually. The economy is down, I'm officially only kind of employed, I'm in school. Yet, when you sell a house in one town and you have dogs and you start trying to rent a house in a new town, you come up with some creative ways to be a homeowner again.
Animals, dogs, have always been my primary motivation for home ownership. Dogs make me feel at home and landlords tend to disallow them completely, or charge crazy amounts of unrefundable money for any "damages" that only a very bad dog would cause. My dogs are good dogs.
When I move into a house, I move in slowly. I unpack in stages. First the essentials are unpacked and put into what I call their "first draft" location. They are moved around as it makes sense and as you learn where you want to keep your hair brush, spatula, forks, etc. I hang and rehang pictures and paintings, they may grace a few walls before I decide where they should be long term. Once things are mostly unpacked, the rooms start taking on their own sense of purpose. The kitchen has an obvious purpose, but the spare room, the hallway, I want to walk through them and know that I keep my magazines in that corner and the lamp I love that my daughter made when she was in elementary school is over there. Does this make sense?
That is starting to happen in my new house. I have sort of mastered the garage, too and the little storage nook between the basement and the main part of the house. I found a place to put the Christmas decorations and the birthday candles and packing tape.
The dogs are settling in, too. Cowgirl did this quickly, she knows her home is my home. Phil, who is only beginning to realize that he truly lives with me forever, took a little while before he found his favorite napping spot.