I never mind waiting for a doctor or other appointment if the waiting room is stocked with interesting home decorating magazines (and if my children are either not with me or are happily occupied with something else). Flipping through pictures of gorgeous kitchens, organized mudrooms, elegant living rooms, and spacious bathrooms gets me to daydreaming about my “perfect house.” That “someday” house.

Although there are some styles that don’t suit me or my background or where I live (Southwest and African themes just don’t work for me), most of the time I argue with myself as to what style I really like. For example, I find the sleek, simple and clean lines of Contemporary, Japanese and Swedish designs really please the organized and uncluttered side of me. Cottage and Country styles appeal to my desire for comfort and a house for living (not for show). And Traditional or Victorian styles harmonize with my old-fashioned nature.

Despite hundreds of hours logged at pouring over various magazines throughout the years, I’ve yet to see any that truly capture my own style of decorating. I guess “Eclectic” might be a good catch-all phrase, but I think there may be better, more descriptive identifiers for the various stages of my home decorating life.

My first apartment, as a new college graduate, I shared with my sister. It was done in what I like to call the Dumpster Diver style. At first, few of the pieces were actual curbside retrievals, but after a while, my sister became quite adept at locating not just new items to add to our collection but also young male owners of pickup trucks who were willing to do all the hard work.

After a few years, I moved from the Dumpster Diver style to what my husband’s parents call Early Married. This consists of two different Dumpster Diver collections joined with some cast-offs from sympathetic family members plus furniture left behind from previous tenants/owners of your apartment/house. Also, your combined incomes enable you to buy used furniture, like a matching crib, changing table and dresser set for your great expectation.

After children arrived, and one big salary departed, I found myself stuck with Early Married well past what one would consider the newlywed stage.

Then, for a brief period of time, I flirted with a comfy version of a traditional style, but rapidly moved into my current style: Homeschooler. My dining room walls have a nice print alphabet with animals for the different letters. This will soon be joined by another alphabet in cursive. There is also a big calendar where the kids can add the date as the month progresses, and of course, there is a big clock. Once school is underway, we’ll add maps and samples of their schoolwork to the walls.

Instead of knick knacks, cabinet-tops are filled with math manipulates, puzzles, a pencil sharpener, and a CD player for listening to the Music Masters CDs. At some point this year, we’ll add a globe.

The Homeschooler style is not usually restricted to one room of the house. Other rooms may have more art displays, art-in-progress and art supplies on any free flat surface and science projects in windows, closets or on top of the piano (the ultimate out-of-baby’s reach spot). And no Homeschooler style home would be complete without piles and piles of books.

The most notable aspect of this style is shelving: everywhere, burgeoning. This year, with three elementary aged children plus a preschooler, the amount of easy readers, workbooks, manipulatives, pens, pencils, crayons, markers, glue, scissors, paper, and whatnots is becoming overwhelming! I just bought a new 8 cubby organizer from Target, and each kid picked out his or her own color canvas basket to store loose items (you can buy them individually at the store). But it’s not enough. Fortunately, this shelving unit is stackable, and I’ll be adding another one for 16 cubbies of storage. Where a non-homeschool family may have a beautiful china cabinet displaying grandma’s favorite gravy dish or an heirloom porcelain tea set, I’ll have a 4′ x 4′ grid of pigeon holes.

I’m not complaining, really. I don’t have an heirloom porcelain tea set to display. I love teaching my kids, I love books, and I even love math manipulatives. I just didn’t realize that these things would one day become my decor! And although most decorating styles make some sort of statement about who you are, few are quite as overt in proclaiming your lifestyle to a random guest.

My house is far from the house of my daydreams, whatever that may be. I definitely don’t plan on continuing in the Homeschooler style once I am no longer homeschooling! But even if my real house is not my dream house, my real life is my dream life.

I can wait patiently for an heirloom porcelain tea set to adorn my shelves in my “someday” house. And if I had the capital, I’d start up a home(school) decorator magazine. There’s an ever growing market…