The Halloween Tradition That Is Haunting Me
Of all the things that could be haunting me, particularly since I live in a very old house, I find it is a Halloween tradition of my own creation that haunts me to this day. I can’t shake it. Is it a walk through a spooky cemetery? No. No, it is not. Is it the annual carving of pumpkins that inevitably ends with mom cleaning out the pumpkin guts that no one wants to touch? No. No, it is not. Is it all of the costume drama that inevitably comes with Halloween? Everything from someone wanting to switch their costume at the last minute after we spent a small fortune…
4 Places I Use Outdoor Rugs Indoors
Fun fact about me, I have never used an outdoor rug on a deck or patio. However, I have and do use outdoor rugs indoors. I do this for one main reason…to bring the outdoors in. Kidding! I use outdoor rugs indoors in certain situations because they seem to be a little less precious than their counterparts and can withstand a tremendous amount of wear and tear. And, when something particularly gag-inducing happens (no, I don’t want to talk about it), the ability of these rugs to be cleaned with a pressure washer or hose is a godsend. Now, I know rugs of all types have their particular ways of…
Happy List: #364
Hello, hello! Welcome to this week’s Happy List. I’m glad you’re here. This week on the blog I shared how we’ve been working on recreating the exterior trim on our house. Logistics have us putting that project on hold until the spring. We’ve been paying attention to the old houses in our area and it is incredible how many old homes have had their old trim replaced with something simple and modern. I also shared (finally!) the pictures of our completed fieldstone porch on the carriage house. That porch has come a long way in the last five years. It’s no longer an eyesore, that’s for sure. I can’t say…
Fieldstone Porch For Our Carriage House
Fieldstone can be used for many things and we put it to excellent use by upgrading the porch of our carriage house. Why did it “need” a fieldstone upgrade? Well, even though it was completely functional it was looking a little sad. Let’s turn that into a DIY word problem. Sad-looking plus completely functional equals unrealized potential! If you combine that with a train leaving the station my recently learned and very basic masonry skills, you get a match made in DIY heaven. First, a mini primer on fieldstone. Fieldstone occurs naturally in the soil, likely deposited by glaciers. The stones are comprised of granite, limestone, and sandstone and are…
Recreating Historic Exterior House Trim – It’s A Process!
Recreating historic house trim on the exterior of a house. If ever there was a labor of love, this is it. We own a really old home. The oldest section dates back to the 1780s and it has been added onto since. Like many homes of that era, the exterior trim is ornate, beautiful, and rotten in spots. whomp, whomp Guess what most contractors want to do in this situation? Gold stars if you answered, “Take it down and replace it with something you can get off the shelf.” In essence, make it look like every other house on the block. I will also award gold stars if you answered,…
Happy List: #363
Hello, hello! Welcome to this week’s Happy List. October is flying by, isn’t it? This week on the blog I shared pictures of our front porch all decorated for fall. I had about 10 days with all that goodness before I had to take the ferns and geraniums inside for the winter. Now it’s looking a little bare. I also shared the prettiest acorn decor and jewelry I recently found online. What a great time to be alive – so much creativity in the world! I know you have plenty of options for how you spend your time. Thank you for choosing to spend part of it here. It makes…
The Prettiest Acorn Decor and Jewelry
Did you know that acorns and oak trees symbolize, among other things, growth, fresh starts, and potential? Yes, please to all three of those things. I’ve been crafting with acorns for ages. Maybe you have too? There’s just something about them that is so compelling for the fall season. I found some of the prettiest acorn decor and jewelry to share with you today. Maybe this will inspire your fall decorating and holiday gifting. Or maybe, like me, you’ll come away with another idea for something fun you can make with acorns! Let the inspiration begin! Acorn Bells | Etsy A combination of bells and acorns in a rustic patina?…
Fall Front Porch And The Funny Place I Buy Mums
Can we talk restraint? Restraint is experiencing the calendar flip from August to September and knowing you can’t decorate your fall front porch yet because Mother Nature didn’t get the “it’s fall y’all” memo and it is still 85 degrees Fahrenheit outside. So what do you do instead? You console yourself with an apple cider donut (or two, I won’t judge) while you wait for the weather to catch up to the commercialized hype of our existence. I waited 25 days. Twenty five! There are no prizes for this sort of restraint. I know. I checked. Some of you wise ones might say the prize is that the mums I…
Happy List: #362
Hello! Welcome to this week’s Happy List. I’m glad you’re here. This week on the blog I shared the freshly painted ceiling on our front porch. That basic plywood ceiling has never looked so good. Total game changer. I also, finally, shared the reveal of our home gym. I like to sit with things before I write about them to make sure they work. I must say, it feels a little pretentious to even say that we have a home gym. Like we are fancier than we actually are. We’re still us but maybe eventually with stronger muscles. Haha! I know you have plenty of options for how you spend…
European Inspired Home Gym With RitFit Smith Machine
Welcome to our European-inspired home gym in the middle of rural New Jersey. Are you more surprised that a home gym can be European-inspired or that part of New Jersey is rural? New Jersey is used to being the subject of many jokes, but this home gym we created is no joke. It’s our new favorite place! We converted a room in our 250-year-old Carriage House into a European-inspired home gym because that made the most sense, right now, for how we could utilize this space. It started out looking like this. Then we made it look worse when we decided the stone walls needed repointing because no one wants…
