I'm lucky, nobody dares mess with my place the one that do depart immediately.... Friends dont wreck you place they treat it with respect and if they cant they you dont need them in your life..... Sounds hard but it work, People know the guidelines in my house/yard, I respect their places and if they cant respect mine, dont bother coming... Probably the worst I ever had was a nephew who was bossing the younger children and not letting them have a turn on the trampoline, woke me up I was sick in bed and I got out of bed when they woke me up and heard the language, the rest of the family were outside my bedroom. Nephew didnt know what hit him verbally, [did apologise later] and went running to mum, who told him I was the boss as it was my house and she wasnt there so couldnt comment. Didnt like me for 3 days until he wanted to come up again to ride the dirt bikes around the paddock, Was an instant when parents, grandparents etc, dropped their guard and no one was supervising....... I was one pissed off person, being woken up, bad enough having to be so ill on birthday, everyone else celebrating and kids acting up.... But we are still best friends and nothing else has happened before or after.

my MIL is one one those that won't fetch anything for herself ..she expects you to get up when she gets up 5-6am and fetch her breakfast..and it's no good offering would you like some toast as she'd be like oh no I'm fine.. you need to cook breakfast and plop it in front of her.. she wouldn't let me wash her clothes so showed her how to use the machine..she hand washes them and pop them on the line right on top of my rack of dried clothes..she took my clothes down so she had room to hang hers out..and of course her dripped on mine ..?? and if she dries the dishes she must do it intentionally to annoy me as it takes me ages to find bits and pieces to my rice cooker..?? amongst other things that happened .. my MIL is hated by all of his family..because she's the second wife..his biological mum is the best MIL you can have she's kind and loving not like this one..calculating ..stabs you behind your back and the list goes on.. my husband must takes after his mum..he's kind and caring.. thank goodness she's overseas now..only lose him to get twice a year for 10 days each..

Loving these hilarious stories ... makes mine seem tame. My flatmate and I had a spare room and kindly offered it to a friend. She moved in and all was going quite well (except the cartoons every morning, the late night fry ups and the various articles of clothing left lying ALL over the house). One evening when 'friend' was out, we two had a few friends over for drinks and a movie. Everyone was being polite and trying not to mention the smell that became increasingly offensive as the night wore on. Half way through the movie it was no longer tolerable ... "What the hell is that smell .. sorry girls, but I think you have a dead animal in here somewhere". So six of us went searching for about half an hour ... it was a pair of 'friends' shoes left pushed under the couch. The smell, up close, was worse than BAD ... no words! I decided to just throw the shoes into 'friends' bedroom but .. when I opened the bedroom door .. the full force of her many pairs of smelly shoes hit me and I almost passed out. The smell lingered in the living room for days later. We confronted 'friend' about the shoe problem and from that point her shoes had to be stored outside on the veranda, away from all doors or windows so the smell could never be allowed to permiate the indoors again. 'Friends' response was "how dare you open my bedroom door". All this led to us lying ... told her the lease was up, planned moving day, she moved, we stayed, and for the remainder of the lease we lied about where we lived. All that deceipt over smelly shoes.

I guess all people don't have the same budget with which they can purchase a home so the demands of the people who have less drives the 'cookie cutter' home I guess it is then up to the home owner to stamp their own individuality in both garden and inside the home so that each and everyone who enters said home can express how much they love the owners sense of style, these days if you look about you can take a lot of great ideas and you can buy items that look very similar from a 'cheaper' end shop to achieve a lux look that can also be enhanced by buying a few 'good or lux items to uplift the style. I am lucky to have a bluestone villa on a fair piece of surrounding land which we have lawn and garden which over the years, inside have decorated as well as built on making sure the features are in keeping with the age of the home (over 100 years old) but yet bringing it into the modern comfort we all desire. I say if you want to do design of any kind go for it, don't wonder if, but in saying that make it both lux and affordable and I am sure you will gain many clients, each person has their own ideas that can be incorporated or enhanced. Here in Adelaide there is SO much 3-5 story and more, what I call 'boxes' and even in the inner city area where I live a few streets away the road is being taken over with these ugly monstrosities but I then think that it is so expensive for a lot of people to even own a house that the 'boxes' are driven by the need for housing by those who want to own but can't afford a house. We have many antiques that suit our home but these days people don't want antiques as the homes are so modern, I have added more eclectic pieces with our antiques that suit so it is not all old looking, I love my home and how it looks and no matter what, I think that is all most people aspire to, a home they can be proud of and a place to live a life with family around them. Alisa go find your inner artistic side, I lived my life as an art restorer and LOVED every minute of it, it is feeding the inner soul and gave me so much pleasure as well as pleasing the clients, that never gets old, good luck if you go down that path.