In my house, there are many rooms.

They all have names, my rooms. There are the kitchen and the dining room, of course, and a den and a living room – but we don’t call them that.

When my son was 2, he could never figure out which room was the den, and which one was the living room. After all, they both had couches.

So we started calling one the Front Room (because it was in the front of the house), and the other the Ruthie Room (because it was the room our dog, Ruthie, liked to sleep in).

Ruthie passed away three years ago, but we still call it the Ruthie Room.

Our new dog, Kit, doesn’t have a room named after her. She sleeps all over the house, even though her dog bed is in the office. Why we call it the office, I don’t know. No work ever gets done in there.

We call the master bedroom the Big Bedroom. Because that’s where the Big Bed is.

Growing up, my family didn’t have a laundry room, we had a utility room.

We didn’t have a breakfast room, either. We just had a kitchen table.

I still have that old kitchen table, only now it’s an art table.

In the house I grew up in, my father built a workshop/storage building in the back yard. It was a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. (My father was a carpenter in his soul. He just masqueraded as a pharmacist during the week.)

He built the workshop to look like our house: peaked roof, matching windows and paint. We called it the Little House.

We have something similar in our backyard now. It used to be the maid’s quarters, but now it’s a storage house stuffed with unused furniture, Christmas decorations and bike gear. The homeowners before us called it the Back House. We call it the Little House, even though it’s not nearly as nice as the one my father built.

If there was a contest for best room name, my husband’s family would win. For generations, going back to his great-grandparents, his family has called their attic the Plunder Room.

“It sounds like we’re a family of Vikings or pirates,” my husband says. “But there’s no winnings from great battles in there, I assure you.”

Growing up, one of my husband’s favorite things to do was go exploring in the Plunder Room. It was – still is – a labyrinth of old furniture, knickknacks, books and clothing.

Now that I have married into the family, I have been allowed to plunder the Plunder Room on occasion. I have a dining room set and antique mirror to prove it.

Over the years, my kids have laid claim to old school desks, end tables, books and hand-made chests. They have put on plays and fashion shows using the boxes of old clothes they have found in the Plunder Room.

I’m going to have to disagree with my husband. There is great treasure to be found in the Plunder Room.