This topic hits close to home, Amy!! Just 2 weeks ago I helped my parents move out of their house. They had lived there for 13 years, and my grandparents had owned it for 30-something years before that. I never lived there, and for the last 13 years it has still be "grandma's house" in my head...even visiting and having all Mom & Dad's stuff there. Yes, we will miss the big, Victorian house around the holidays, but we have already created memories in the new place. It feels more like "home" than Grandma's house ever did.

I have more memories about the land I grew up on than the house we lived in. We don't own it anymore, but I try to go look at it when I'm back in that part of the country. Someday, I would like to own it again.

Emotions and attachments are unique things, aren't they?

My parents' home is special to me because I grew up there with my brothers. I always get that cozy feeling when I go to see my parents.
This past summer my grandparents' home fell victim to arson. We all were devastated when this happened. Even though they are no longer with us, we still thought of the house as their home and we had great memories of visiting there.

I can so identify with this, Amy. My 'home' was the house my parents built, oh, five or six houses ago. It was where I grew up, where I tacked up posters on my closet door, where my room was actually painted the color I wanted because it was the *only* thing I asked for for my birthday one year. But like contractors do, they sell, and my house was gone. I lived with my parents for one more house and then moved away once I started college and married, but that last house, and every house since that they've built, has never been home. To this day I miss the old one.

Can't wait to read the story! I'm off to Wally World today and will look for it.

Kay
Kay Stockham
Montana Skies, Harlequin Superromance, Jan '07
His Perfect Woman, Harlequin Superromance, June 2007
Untitled (Jack Brody's Story), Harlequin Superromance, November 2007
Coming 2008 ~ The Tulanes of Tennessee!
Want to win fabulous prizes

So great to have you back, and what a great topic. I have DIHH on my Axim, and reading it soon...

I have to say the house that's meant the most to me so far is the one I'm in -- I actually had a nightmare a while ago, a few months ago, that we'd sold it, or something on that order -- like someone came in our house and told us we'd sold it to them, and we had to move, and I was completely devastated. I was so relieved to wake up and realize we were still here! :)

It's the first house I've owned, and the first house Mike and I have owned together -- we lived in rentals to this point, and so this is "ours" and everything in it is "us." It's not a mansion or anything, and as you know, we've had to work on it a lot, but I feel like it's a more beautiful house than I ever imagined having for myself. We knew even when we first walked in that this was our place -- we'd looked at dozens of homes and just walked into this one, knew, and walked out and made the deal in the driveway. No dickering, just bought it. :) We've only been here for 4 years, but that's been enough time to already put our stamp on it. It's where I feel happy, safe, and have all positive things around me.

My childhood home is still there, my Dad lives in it and we even visit every week, but strangely, I can't say I have the same sentimentality about it, for whatever reason. I think the grandkids probably do, but I don't.

Sam

Hi Amy--I'm one of those people with more of a connection to land than a specific house. When I think of places that I love, it's always the land that I think of. The place that I consider my childhood home had a wooded pasture, with trails and a culvert big enough to walk through that went under the county road to another wooded pasture. Heaven for a kid with an imagination. I hope other kids have enjoyed those places as much as I did.
Jeannie

Glad to see your post and topic! My parents are still in the house we lived in when I grew up (and I'm no spring chicken ;))--I have mostly good memories, and because we're blessed enough to live pretty nearby, I bring my kids over once a week or so to visit. They've changed things somewhat, but they're still there, so it's still "home" although the neighborhood has changed quite a bit (way more businesses, far more cars).

I would be sad to leave our current home--we've lived here since before we started having children, and this is the place that our kids know as "home." We just finished remodeling the kitchen and making it "ours," so to speak :)

Enjoy the cigars, Amy!

first of congrats to your newest release!

I don't have a special place that I call home here in Germany, guess the reason is that I somehow have the feeling that I don't belong here.

Hi Amy, it's great to see you here!!

I spent the first ten years of my life in an old Victorian that had been in my family for several generations. As a kid, it was actually kinda creepy, with lots of staircases and "secret" rooms, and strange things that went bump in the night! But my grandparents lived in the house next door, so I was really sad when we moved to a newer house on the other side of town, and I could no longer run to my Grampa when I was in trouble, or go beg a lollipop from my Gramma's candy jar! Even though my parents have been in this newer house for more than 30 years, I've never felt the same connection to it as I did with that Victorian. I've driven by the house so many times as an adult, and have often wanted to knock on the door and ask the owner if I can walk through it, just for old times sake. But I guess some things are better as memories...

Such a good post Amy!!! Home, for me, despite owning my own, is still my parent's house where I grew up and they still live. They've talked about selling for about a gazillion years and should they ever do it I really don't know what I'll do -- chain myself to the front hall closet? Lie down in front of the moving van? I'm only a little joking...

Molly O'Keefe
Harlequin Superromance
Baby Makes Three 11/07 RT TOP PICK!!
A Man Worth Keeping 04/08

My father worked for an oil company and we moved frequently so there was never a house that was "home" for me. I lived longest in the house I live in now but it is a house I bought and I have no real connection to it.

First of all, what a gorgeous cover! I love it!

I've never wanted to move at all and would've chosen to still be living in the house where I lived as a child. Instead, the longest I've lived anywhere is 8 years. I become attached to every new home and when moving time comes I feel like an uprooted tree. DH and I hope to live in our next home until we croak---er, for as long as we can.

Home sweet home will always be the NY apartment where my parents still live. It's been 25 years since we moved in when I was in elementary school. It's really the only home I've remembered living in.

Doesn't the hero on the cover look like Nathan Fillon? (Who actually does play a doctor on DH, and he was a doctor on LOST, too, wasn't he?)

Sam

My parents also stayed in the same house for over thirty years. When they left it I was a little sad but at that point I was married with a family of my own and we had been in our own house for years.

I still live in the house that I grew up in. My parents bought it 30 years ago and other than the 4 years I was at college, it is the only home I have ever known.

Even though I am not fond of the old house and can't wait to get a new place to live, it does have fond memories so I will probably miss it a bit. The house has character...there's the marks on the door to measure our heights, there's the huge star I drew on one wall with magic marker as a kid that won't go away, there's the bookshelves my grandpa built for me, etc. And those are just the memories you can see...each room has a special meaning to me.

I lived with my parents up until I got married so every time we go visit them it feels like I am coming home. It is interesting to see how the area has changed with time.

I've been out most of the day and you ladies have been busy! Thanks so much for all the comments. I guess "home" is a powerful concept for a lot of people. Reading your comments brought back more memories of my own home where I grew up...everything's so clear to me even though it's been years since I've been there.

Thanks to everyone for sharing your idea of home. I've enjoying thinking about it and reading all the messages. Keep 'em coming. Now that I'm here, I'm going to wait a while to pick a winner, so post away! :)

I live in the house where I was born and have still not left it... it is going to be a shock when it will be time to say goodbye!

Home is not about a house, it is more about a sense of belonging, so home whill always be where my family is :)

The house i am living in at present is home to me. I have ony lived here for 9 months, but it is much closer to my family than the previous place.

Sam has probably already given up on me and gone to bed since she's on the east coast...but I'm here and ready to announce that the winner of DOCTOR IN HER HOUSE is Maureen! Maureen, please email me at amyknupp at amyknupp . com with your postal address and I'll get that in the mail to you!

Thanks to all of you for talking about your homes! I've loved the discussion. :)

And thanks to Sam, Karen and all the Cigar ladies for allowing me to visit!

Hi Amy :-)

Welcome to the Cigars- what a great question. My current house is the longest I've ever lived in one place. I'd moved 31 times before I was 30. When my husband and I bought our house and I was oh-so-carefully breaking down and folding the packing boxes, my husband asked me why. "So we can store them, of course." I mean, there were years when I didn't even unpack some things, you know? He, who's parents still own the house they'd bought when he was a year old, was shocked, then told me he hadn't planned on moving again. We'd bought the house, he figured we were here to stay. Then I was shocked. What a concept!!!

To keep myself from the occassional stir-crazies, I tend to redecorate and paint a lot :-D But... I'll admit, there is something wonderful about the memories we've built here, the energy that is a part of the house. And that my youngest daughter has never lived anywhere else is kinda great too :-)