Home-birth? Messy nuisance or life affirming experience?

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DS3 due in Feb.
First two were super quick so opting for HB, hopefully.
Have heard mixed reports that its either totally amazing experience, or else its messy and you're straight in at the thick end of tidying up after yourself...?
Anyone share some realistic experiences with me please?

Messy AND life affirming. Not a nuisance at all. Midwives cleared up though! Just needed to wash blood out of towels and sheets and deal with birth pool.

Was my first dc and I would do it again. It was private and special. The birth was hard and painful and not that short. however I felt safe and looked after at all times and I only have positive memories of it.

I'm not entirely sure I get the whole "life affirming" bit. It didn't affirm anything to do with my life and I don't feel any differently about my home birth than I do about the hospital ones. The homebirth was a better environment with none of the downsides of being in a hospital but that's it.

Giving birth is pretty "life affirming" however you do it I think. :)

Soup I didn't mean to suggest that non home births are not life affirming (I too have had one normal hospital delivery and one MLU delivery) and dont feel different between about those two births.
I was just trying to sum up a 'positive experience' for the title!
No offence intended.

Not messy - just use birth pool/inco pads.

You get one to one care, everyone involved has easy access to food, toilets, bath and shower, TV, music collection etc.

It smells of home, not hospital.

You get to move around the house freely while naked if you need to.

Mire control of lighting and atmosphere.

You don't have to listen to other women in labour at the same time as you.

If you suddenly develop a diva-ish desire for ice cubes/ a bath/ your childhood teddy/ home-made soup etc, you are mire likely to get what you need.

You get to decide the temperature of the room.

You get to spend the rest of the night/day snuggled up with your new baby plus OH and kids instead of in a post-natal ward.
I like home births.

Again just echoing everyone else, midwives cleaned up any mess and remade the bed while I had a shower so there was no mess for us to deal with at all (they took the towels we used with them to burn as they were old and knackered and we didn't want to keep them)

On a practical note, if you are planning one, I'd recommend getting something like this - link for only a couple of quid, it saved our bed!

Oh, I'm not offended :)

Another great home birth here after a great MLU leading to forceps birth. Both life affirming, both wonderful. At home it was just more comfortable, personal and wonderful to just stay in bed after. Best of all though was using MY shower. That was brill. I brought (well, DH did) a small plastic chair in and sat down. No flip flops..bliss!

One think to think about is make sure you know exactly what the midwife will need want (bin bag etc) and have it ALL in one place from the moment your due date window starts. We had everything, but baby came sooner than expected (no Braxton Hicks as a warning) and then very quickly. Midwife was trying to find everything as I was in transition and DH was trying to get neighbour to look after our son at last min (no time for friends who were going to take him to take him) so couldn't help. It's an outside chance, but just worth having it all in one place!

I also bled a lot after and it was all cleared up.

Hydrogen peroxide is great for cleaning blood stains (apparently hospital laundry uses it). It's just water with an extra oxygen molecule and you can get the 3% solution. I had some in case there was massive mess, but there wasn't.

Thanks all.
I'm pleased soup, I seem to be offending people without even trying at the moment. Pregnancy brain must mean I'm not phrasing things quite right! Thinking of giving up on facebook too...

And it sounds like with a bit of planning a HB could be a wonderful experience!