If I could share one lesson that I learned in 2018, it would be this: pursuing a peaceful life sometimes requires drastic action, diligence and determination. There are times that life requires you do hard things. To "rip off the Band-aid" (as Mark likes to say). It means undoing the things that aren't working for you or your family. It sometimes means becoming brave enough to make big changes in … [Read more...]
12 Welcoming Holiday Entrances
Merry Christmas eve, everyone! I hope you are enjoying the holidays and soaking in all of the gifts this season has to offer. Today our porch reveal marks the grand finale of the "12 Doors of December" holiday campaign, sponsored by Delaney Hardware. Visit Delaney's blog to see all 12 doors transformed by an easy hardware upgrade, each porch decked out of the holidays. You can see for yourself … [Read more...]
New Paint in the Kitchen
Today I thought I'd share a quick snapshot of the new paint in the kitchen. Almost everything we are doing is not sponsored, all real budget out of our own pocket. The kitchen paint supplies cost $95! Now we are up to 10 spaces that we've remodeled in 4 months (if you include the dinette area adjacent to the kitchen)! There is still a lot left to do, but we're happy with the results so … [Read more...]
16 Easy-To-Store Items for a Festive Holiday Home
I took this photo on a warm December day. Buddy was keeping watch over me as I decorated the front porch for Christmas. If you're not following the #12DoorsofDecember tour, 12 bloggers are revealing their front door makeovers every day until Christmas Eve. It's happening right now on Instagram, and this is just a sneak peek of my porch. My full porch reveal is on December 24th! On a side note, … [Read more...]
Family Room Update
Our pre-holiday remodeling frenzy continues. We (well, Mark) painted the entire 2-story family room over the course of two days and it completely transformed this space. I happily let him do it since I'm finishing up the kitchen project and my wrist hasn't fully recovered from painting our last house. So here is our family room update, painted in "Simply White" by Benjamin Moore: The family … [Read more...]
4 month recap: 7 rooms updated!
Things seem to be clipping along nicely with our whole-home remodel. First, I thought I'd share some recent pictures I snapped of our neighborhood. Mark said it's like living inside of a miniature train set. Our neighbors agreed :) Here is a glimpse of what I get to enjoy during my walks. The neighborhood is filled with row house style homes, picket fences, tree lined streets with … [Read more...]
12 Days of Holiday Crafts You Can Make Before Christmas
Crafting for the holidays is like leaving yourself a time capsule to enjoy year after year. As I pull out the little trinkets or holiday doodads I made over the years with the kids I can remember the songs that were playing, the smells of food in the house and the conversations we had. Crafts have taken on a special meaning now that we've moved from that home. The kids, too, remember these … [Read more...]
Yep, We’re Painting Our Cherry Cabinets
We are on month #4 in the new house, and our home renovation chronicles continue with a budget kitchen remodel, and yes we're painting cherry cabinets. So far I'm $93 in :) In today's post I'll share before photos, the paint I chose and some tips for prepping your cabinets. I've been studying what are the "hot" kitchen trends in 2019 and our ideas are mostly on-trend which is so important for … [Read more...]
Foyer Makeover Reveal
We are so excited to share our new and improved entryway! In this DIY project, our goal was to freshen up the look with a coat of white paint then add architectural interest. In this round of upgrades (you can see the video progression here) we installed crown moulding at the ceiling, crossheads above doors, pilasters around the front door, new casings and louvers using Fypon products. Visit this … [Read more...]
Easy “Vintage” Gift Tags
Last year I made some really cute paper gift tags that I ended up throwing away. I posted a picture but never a tutorial about them because they didn't come out "perfect". I was learning how to use my Silhouette Cameo and didn't think through all of the cuts. What a shame...because now I love them! So in this post I'm sharing my tutorial so that you can achieve the same level of "imperfection" … [Read more...]
Why You Should Add Interior Millwork in Your Home
We are huge fans of creating a classically styled home that transcends time and survives ever-evolving trends. This is one of the reasons we love adding interior trim and wainscoting in our home. If you’ve followed my blog for a long time, you know that we did this once before and installed interior millwork and wall trim in our previous home, and we loved it, so we were thrilled to partner with … [Read more...]
Guest Bedroom Makeover
It's REVEAL DAY of our One Room Challenge! I'm so excited to share our basement guest bedroom remodel with you. We moved into this house only 3 months ago, and so far we've updated 5 rooms. Without this challenge I would have definitely back burnered this mini-remodel. It forced me to focus and think on how we want to use this space long-term. We consider this the "1.0 update" with more changes … [Read more...]
Week 5: Accessorizing the Guestroom
Welcome to week 5 of the One Room Challenge. In case you're just tuning in, welcome! We are remodeling our basement guest bedroom on a modest $500 budget. This week I'm sharing all of my shopping sources thus far. To see all of our previous weeks: Week 1 // Week 2 // Week 3 // Week 4 The reason we are keep our budget low? We just moved into our "new to us" home three months ago and taking on … [Read more...]
Week 4: No More Shiny Green Walls!
Welcome to week 4 of the One Room Challenge, and I'm making slow progress, but I did finally paint! No more shiny green walls! Finally this space is starting to look like home to us. Even though it might blow our budget, an expensive a high-quality single-coat coverage paint saved me so much time and frustration. The high gloss green would have been hard to cover unless I primed it first. … [Read more...]
Week 3: $155 Left and Choosing Paint Colors
Welcome to week 3 of the One Room Challenge, and they don't call it a challenge for nothing. Staying on track this week has been…well…a challenge! We are juggling multiple projects including the plumbing issue which I mentioned in week 2. In true “If You Give A Mouse a Cookie” form, one issue is leading to another, we need an even bigger plumbing job which will happen soon. We are also … [Read more...]
150+ Kid-Friendly and Gore-Free Halloween Ideas
Good, clean Halloween decor that doesn't make little kids cry is sometimes hard to find. I don't necessarily want a G-rated Halloween. I still like decor that's creepy, slightly scary yet still kid-friendly. More like PG-13, creepy without the gore (and to me that means no blood or body parts strewn across the yard). I get the sense many of you feel the same way. That's probably why my … [Read more...]
Week 2: The Plan (and $225 Left in My Budget)
Welcome back! We are in Week 2 of the One Room Challenge, and our basement guest room makeover is well underway. Six weeks will be over before we know it, but the great thing about this challenge is we will have a pretty new space just in time for the holiday season. I set a strict budget of only $500 for the guest room makeover. It may seem crazy or impossible. But keeping the budget low has … [Read more...]
Front Porch in the Fall
Our front porch is finally coming together, so I thought I'd share a few snapshots in my "nod to fall" front porch tour in honor of my favorite season. We've fallen in love with our new home. We feel like won the lottery in terms of outdoor amenities, fun neighbors and a beautiful historic downtown. I didn't go crazy with fall decor this year, my goal was to get past the "just moved in" phase and … [Read more...]
Week 1: Guest Bedroom (Before)
The One Room Challenge™ is an exciting and challenging DIY and home decorating event that provides and encouragement to anyone that wants to redesign their spaces - in six weeks! ORC features 20 veteran bloggers who post each Wednesday. On Thursdays guest participants like me share their room progress. The big reveal is November 8th! I finally decided to jump in as a guest participant, so follow … [Read more...]
Modern Classic Foyer Design Plan
I can't wait to tell you about a few home improvement and decorating projects that I'll finally be tackling this month. I set myself up with hard deadlines which I needed as the kick in the pants to get started. It's about time, right? I've experienced a slight setback health-wise. Nothing major but I'll share a bit later in this post. We've taken this as a sign to indulge in the "fun" side of … [Read more...]
Embracing NeoClassic Style
I've always had a thing for neoclassical interiors. In our previous home we traveled down a more classic decorating path and installed wainscoting and lots of trim. It was around that time that the farmhouse "explosion" happened in the decorating world. While I love looking at farmhouse style in other homes, I struggled to make it work in our already-traditional style home. When I did pull it … [Read more...]
Front Porch Decor Elements (a video tour)
The front porch has become one of my favorite places to sit and enjoy a coffee while I watch for the bus with Avery. Until yesterday, the porch remained empty since we sold all of our exterior furniture with the old house. We've done a few things like power washing and trimming the tree (to the tune of $400) - but that's about it until this week. I've missed the boat on most fall porch tours, but … [Read more...]
Mudroom Mini-Makeover
I've been sharing snapshots and videos our first days in our new house on Instagram, if you're not following me there be sure to stop by and say "hi". We closed on the old house August 24th, and we are happy to say that we officially moved into "The Picket Fence House"! I shared more details about our experience selling our house and whether our DIY efforts paid off in last week's post. Today I'm … [Read more...]
Tips for Increasing Your Home’s Value
Mark and I love dreaming up design plans for our home and renovating together. But the truth is we have always been laser-beam focused on improving the resale value of our home. In this post I'll share real numbers of our home's value before-and-after our budget DIY renovations, answering the most important question: did it pay off? Selling our home has offered us a "moment of truth" providing us … [Read more...]
We bought a new house!!!
Never, ever in a million years did I think I'd be writing this post. Not right now anyway. The original plan was to wait until all of our kids flew the nest before we'd contemplate another move. But here we go! We bought our next house! And...we are moving in just a few short weeks. Tour "The Picket Fence House" listing photos In many ways our new "Picket Fence House" feels like … [Read more...]
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