• overwintering plants on a navy blue sunporch
    decorating,  gardening and landscape

    A Mixed Bag For Overwintering Plants This Year

    It’s been a mixed bag for overwintering plants this year (2024-2025). We’ve had some successes and some unfortunate failures. Have you ever had one of those restaurant experiences where the food was great, but the service was terrible? You think to yourself, “I don’t know if this was worth trying again.” That’s me right now with overwintering plants. Keep in mind, I also forgot childbirth was painful, and I had more than one child. So, take my whining with a pound of salt, and meet me back here next year for another update. Ha! Seriously though, we have the ideal setup for overwintering plants on our sunporch. It’s like having…

  • vintage floral easter eggs using temporary tattoos temporary tattoos applied to wood easter eggs
    Crafts,  decorating,  holidays

    Vintage Floral Easter Eggs Using Temporary Tattoos

    Breaking Crafting News! I made vintage-looking floral Easter eggs using temporary tattoos. Yes, temporary tattoos…for that vintage look. HA! Until last week, I had lived my whole life not knowing that temporary tattoos can transfer to items other than skin. I saw a video of someone customizing sneakers using temporary tattoos. Do you know what’s related to sneakers? Not wood Easter eggs! But that’s where my brain went, and I needed to see if that technique would apply to Easter eggs. Spoiler: It works beautifully. This is a game changer for someone who can’t paint to save her life. Fake it till you make it, which is kind of the…

  • cream cabinets with painted wood knobs kitchen annex farmhouse style butler pantry wood knobs and pulls
    decorating

    9 Wood Knob and Pull Ideas For Your Cabinets

    It is safe to say I like wood knobs and pulls. I have them in at least four places in our home. Some are painted. Some are stained. I was painting a set of wood knobs a few weeks ago for the desks in our office and thought to myself, “Gosh, I really like wood knobs.” And by “thought to myself” I mean I was talking out loud in that voice you reserve for babies and cute dogs and saying, “You look like a million bucks all painted! Yes, you do!” Embarrassing gushing to inanimate objects aside, there is a certain charm to wood knobs and pulls. I mainly think…

  • nature art gallery wall next to stained glass doors gallery wall wrapping a corner
    decorating

    Nature Art Gallery Wall – Oh, It’s Expanded

    In October 2023, I shared the nature art gallery wall in our living room here on the blog. In the 16 months since that blog post, it is safe to say the nature art gallery wall has expanded. If you give a mouse a cookie a woman a thrift store painting… Here’s how the nature art gallery wall looked way back in the olden times of 2023. (It wasn’t that long ago and yet it feels like three lifetimes have passed since then. Why is that?) Here’s a pulled back view of how that wall looks now in February 2025. It’s cold and barren outside, but inside I’m faking it…

  • wooden bunnies from west elm prettiest easter decor
    decorating,  holidays

    The Prettiest Easter Decor

    Do you know what is in stores already? Easter decor. How quickly we move on from holiday to holiday in the U.S. Is it like that everywhere in the world? Weigh in and tell me! The good news is Easter is in late April this year (April 20), so you’ll get a lot of bang for your decorating buck if you sprinkle a little Easter decor around your home this year. Check out the prettiest Easter decor I found: Empty Tomb Scene | Amazon I know we do a lot of woodworking, but this empty tomb scene would be tricky to cut for us, so I’d gladly spend $20 on…

  • DIY under a table pull out trash cabinet rustic farmhouse kitchen partially fitted kitchen
    decorating,  DIY

    Under-A-Table Pull-Out Trash Cabinet

    With limited kitchen cabinet space and nowhere to conceal the trash and recycling cans, we got creative and made a pull-out trash cabinet to go under a table. Yes, a table! We have a partially unfitted kitchen, meaning not everything is fixed in place. We use furniture to supplement our lack of kitchen cabinets and counter space. In particular, we have a rustic table pushed against one wall that serves as a counter, coffee station, and eating area. That’s where we decided to tuck our pull-out trash cabinet. Here’s that rustic table before we started this project. And, ahem, here’s how that table has looked on any given weekday with…

  • DIY Copper Toe Kick For Built-In Desks to solve the problem of feet scuffing the trim using adhesive copper toe kick cut with metal snips farmhouse style desks
    decorating,  DIY

    Copper Toe Kick For Built-In Desks

    Allow me to acquaint you with the most amazing thing – a copper toe kick with an adhesive backing. If copper isn’t your color, don’t write this idea off. Brass and nickel toe kicks are a thing too. Sure, toe kicks or kick plates are not a new invention. They’ve been around since women started complaining about people and pets damaging their gorgeous front doors or so I assume. Seems like something that would drive me nuts. However, we’re not getting distracted by assumptive history today. We’re focusing on what drives me nuts creative problem-solving with gorgeous materials. I most often see a toe kick or kick plate on the…

  • old fridge built in to look cabinet ready with custom hinge cover cabinet feet how to customize an old fridge
    decorating,  DIY

    Building In Our Fridge: The Reveal

    It’s reveal day! We’ve been working on building in our fridge and customizing it to make it look panel-ready(ish) and now I get to show you how it looks. It does make me a little insecure to release these photos into the wild because I know this is just one step in a multi-step process of making over our kitchen. There is still more to come as time and budgets allow. I hope you enjoy seeing a transformation over time because that’s what happening here. Here’s the original before photo of the refrigerator. Try to contain your jealousy. Fast forward a few years and we removed some wallpaper, painted, and…

  • magnetic bulletin board made with sheet metal hung on a stone wall in a gym
    decorating,  DIY

    Make A Magnetic Bulletin Board With Sheet Metal

    I prefer to test out our DIY creations before I share them on the blog and the magnetic bulletin board we made with sheet metal is no exception. It is the second bulletin board we made for our Carriage House Gym and we have put this magnetic bulletin board through its paces to see how it will hold up. If it can survive being hung in a well-used gym with no heating or cooling and some moisture issues (humidity, not sweat – but a little of that too), it can survive your house or business. Why did we make magnetic bulletin board instead of a cork board? First, they are…

  • cardinal welcome door hanger from etsy shop annie lynn creations winter wreath ideas
    decorating

    Winter Wreath Ideas To Get You Through To Spring

    Editor’s Note: The first part of this blog post is a reshare of an idea from two years ago. The end of the blog post has a bunch of winter wreath ideas that I adored and you might too.  Have you ever transitioned your holiday wreath to a winter wreath for the months of January and February? By transition, I don’t mean leaving the holiday wreath in all of its festive splendor up. Ha! Although, if that makes you happy, you do you! This year after the holidays I wasn’t quite ready to take down all of my holiday greenery, especially my wreath over the dining room fireplace. This was…