As I wrote in an earlier pre-renovation blog post, Building a tower of giraffes, since my university years I’ve been the recipient of giraffes of all sizes and applications — from sweatshirts to salt shakers.

Most people have a favourite animal or creature with which they feel a kinship, or at least other people see the connection. My partner has a primary favourite, and a more-recent secondary one.

Primary is the hedgehog. He’s had pet hedgehogs in the past and there’s something about a “prickly creature with a soft underbelly” vibe that suits. His son is the “little hedgehog” and his daughter’s favourite is rabbit, which was also my mother’s animal: my dad called her “Bunny” in their courtship years and on birthday and Valentine Day cards throughout their 50-year marriage.

My partner’s secondary creature is chickens, subcategory roosters. If I had a dollar for every time he said, “We should keep chickens in our apartment. The clucking would be very soothing”, I would have ample funds to buy a pricey panel-ready refrigerator.

So why I am I talking about critters in the middle of a renovation series? Because things such as our favourite creatures are what make a house a home: what will make our home different than someone else’s.

For a home to have a personality, it needs to reflect the people who live there, and what makes them smile. These things gather under the broad tent designers call “décor.”

Just like a colour scheme, design can have a “creature scheme”. You don’t want to go overboard: we’ve all seen the head-shaking images of a kitchen with duck border wallpaper, duck canisters, duck tea towels, duck clock and duck draperies.

With this renovation, I’m facing the challenge of how to artfully welcome creatures both wild and domestic, from Africa (giraffes and hedgehogs), Europe (larger hedgehogs) and, well, everywhere (where are there not chickens in this world?)

As well, we’re based in Stratford, Ontario, and we have wee rabbits hopping around our yard the way we used to have raccoons skulking about our tiny urban Toronto patio. Stratford is famous for the swans put out on the Avon River each year, but there are also wild birds — from blue herons to snowy owls to kingfishers — that we’ve spotted on the river. And — the same as in Toronto — there are squirrels everywhere.

Many of the giraffe, hedgehog and rooster bits we have now are practical things we’ll continue to use as part of everyday life, from a hedgehog crumb brush to giraffe bookends. What creature art we have is small: a couple fun little rooster paintings (currently keeping each other company in our guest room) and these two small watercolours from a fundraiser run by artist Jane Roy.

Kickstarted by suggestions from the designer we hired for a colour consultation, I spent time last summer online exploring wallpaper websites and one day came across one called Lord Twig. While it feels very British-y and posh, and the paper is made in Lancashire, England, the company and its founder Daniel Twig are based in Vancouver, B.C.

I flipped to one pattern called “Hedgerow, ” the cover image for this post. Be still my heart! Hedgehog and bunny, oh my, along with squirrel, red fox, owl and a wee bird that might be a white-breasted nuthatch.

I ordered samples and have hauled them around along with other accumulated colour swatches and bits for the last nine months. Still, I could not figure out any way to use it that would enhance, rather than overwhelm, our design.

Besides, remember? I don’t like wallpaper.

Then one day recently, after flooring, wall fix-ups and painting were completed at our house, I once again wandered around with Hedgerow samples. Suddenly, there was a spot where this wanted to live: on the west wall of the new dining room, a wall broken up by a door to the porch and a large window with stained glass squares in tones picked up exactly in the wallpaper flora. As well, the pale aqua background of one version of the paper plays very well with the Harbour Side Blue painted accent wall with which this west wall abuts.

Embracing this paper means embracing plain and simple with what comes near it: thoughts of a colourful Roman blind over the porch door window is now switching to the simplest of white roller blinds with a subtle white-on-white leaf pattern. The farmhouse / mid-century-modern simple lines can only take so many bashes of boisterousness.

We may not keep this wallpaper up for all the years we use this dining room: We may tire of having that much pattern and can always get it removed, returning to the white wall of our original plan. On the other hand, there are hedgehogs and bunnies.

Somewhere out there, the soul of my wallpaper-loving “Bunny” mother is smiling.