5 minute read Hi Reader! I am so excited to share today’s project with you. Because while it may seem like I crank out project after project with ease, very few come together flawlessly and exactly as I imagined. In our new home, I had a huge wall and only one frame to put on it. So it was time to get creative. This wall project was quick. It was easy. It was affordable. And it was wholly transformative in all the best ways! Read It: Filling a Big Wall with a Single Frame More Like This...
13 days ago • 1 min read
2 minute read Hi Reader! As I’ve been recounting the details of all our recent moves (4 in the last 5 years), there is one question I’ve been getting a lot lately: “Surely, the landlord (or next tenants!) must appreciate your changes! Why do you always take everything apart?” Unfortunately, over our 20+ years of being renters, we’ve been able to leave behind only a very few of our projects. In this month's Coffee Break, I’m breakdown why and sharing how it doesn’t really stop me from doing...
20 days ago • 1 min read
2 minute read Hi Reader! When moving into a new house, sometimes you are lucky enough to connect with the existing/previous residents. Oftentimes they’ll give you pictures and videos (and even answer all your nagging questions!); but every now and then, they’ll offer you something specific to the house that they no longer need. The folks previously living in our new house offered us a shoe shelf they custom built for the master closet. At first glance, I wasn’t interested. But upon further...
27 days ago • 1 min read
2 minute read Hi Reader! Have you ever tried to figure out a room layout and thought, “Man, I wish that window wasn’t there!” Yea - us too. For the past 20+ years of rental living, we’ve had to deal with the placement of windows, outlets, doors, vents, nooks (and more!) that we can’t change. Early on in our rental journey, I’d let these features dictate our furniture placement. But as time has gone on, I’ve grown more bold in ignoring, changing, of “fixing” these “permanent” features to...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
2 minute read Hi Reader! Last week, I revealed that we moved into a new home about three months ago (surprise!) I also shared that we had about three days to get everything moved from one house to the other. That didn’t give us a lot of time to hem and haw over what was going to go where. Thankfully, since we’ve now moved so many times, I have some reliable tricks to help me figure out room layouts before we even get the keys. I often get asked about our move-in process, so I wanted to share...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
2 minute read Hi Reader! Last June, our family moved into our 11th home on Camp Pendleton, California. And then just a few months ago, we moved again. I know. I kinda can’t believe it either. This move, however, was unlike any other we’ve tackled in the 20+ years of my husband’s military service. In this month’s Coffee Break, I’m breaking down where we moved to this time, why it was so sudden, and why it means even more good news for you and the blog! My monthly Coffee Breaks are always over...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
1 minute read Hi Reader! I have somewhat of a complicated relationship with product packaging. Most, I get rid of almost as soon as the item is in our house (food, cleaning and laundry supplies, hygiene products.) But there are some things I tend to store in their original packaging (board games for sure, but also some craft machines and specialty kitchen gadgets.) Our two Christmas Nativity sets were also in this latter category. But after years of frustration, I finally decided to ditch ALL...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
1 minute read Hi Reader! Partly because I love to craft and partly because crafting eventually became my job, I’ve been fortunate to have a dedicated craft room in most of our rental homes. When you have an (often) large and dedicated space for crafts…you tend to fill it…with LOTS of crafts. But when we moved into our (much) smaller home here in southern California, there was no such space. In fact, all we could realistically fit was a single IKEA Kallax unit. So very quickly, I had to get...
2 months ago • 1 min read
1 minute read Hi Reader! Years ago, I went on a mission to find “the ultimate” bike storage solution. I eventually landed on this rail+hook arrangement that accommodated all 5 of our family bikes. And at first, I was smitten. Toppled bikes in a pile in the middle of the garage? Nope! Bikes taking up precious floor space? Nope! Bikes easy to get down and put back up? Nope…not at all! Eventually, the bikes no longer made it up on the wall and were back on the garage floor…all.the.time. So when...
2 months ago • 1 min read