Home

Decor

A Little (More) Help Over Here, Please?

July 27, 2017

I would like my table to look like this, please.

I'm on a big redecorating kick, as you might be able to tell. First there was the exterior makeover, and then the kitchen makeover, and then the backyard makeover, and then there was the kitchen island/bar addition (I'm STILL waiting on barstools for this, and will definitely post about once I get the stools in, because I ENDED UP MAKING THE BAR MYSELF AND IT'S AWESOME).

And then I decided every single plant in my home needed to be moved to another location, and then I replaced my wood coffee table with a glass one, and then I started getting weird about artfully arranging books on top of it...and now I'm trying to figure out what to do with the console I bought to make the kitchen/dining room not feel horribly unbalanced once the new island/bar thing was in.

Decor

Figgy Figgy

July 21, 2017

Image via

Five years after every other blogger on the planet decided to own a fiddle leaf fig, I decided I wanted to own one, too. (I am nothing if not consistent in my late-to-the-game-ness.)

Remember the kitchen island that I bought? The one I needed your advice on stools for? It arrived, and I put it together...and then I decided that I hated it (too bulky for the space; totally not barstool-friendly thanks to the shelves that I totally neglected to consider; too dark of a tabletop for the room). And sold it. And then I searched online for the kind of table I wanted, couldn't find it, and decided to just go to Lowe's and buy a whole bunch of plumbing pipes and make one myself.

Eat

I Can’t Stop Eating Shrimp Rolls

July 18, 2017

It took me years and years to understand the appeal of shrimp rolls. I think this is because I tend to only encounter them at places where you can also eat lobster rolls, and...I mean...eating shrimp when you can eat lobster is sort of like eating white chocolate when milk chocolate is available, no? Like, why would you do that?

The answer, as it turns out: Because lobster is expensive, and lobster is really only great when it's fresh...but shrimp? Pretty cheap, actually - especially if you get it at Costco, ahem. And shrimp are delicious even when they've been frozen and defrosted, making them practical, as well.

I'm very particular about my lobster rolls - I need them to be juuuust the right combination of lobster meat and mayo, with very few other ingredients gunking up all that perfect simplicity - and it turns out I'm equally particular about shrimp rolls. Which means that when I tell you that the one that I have been making constantly these past few weeks is perfect, I mean it. It's perfect. (Did I mention that you can easily make it in large quantities for guests, as a much more swishy take on regular old hot dogs?

Decor

I Bought An Island

July 7, 2017

(Spoiler: that is not my kitchen up there. That is a kitchen belonging to a person with much, much better hydrangea-cultivating abilities than I will ever have. If you ever see an alive hydrangea in a photograph on this site, please rest assured that I had nothing to do with it.)

When we were house-hunting (both times), the big thing that I really wanted - that I would not compromise on - was one of those kitchens that everyone can hang out in. And to me, that means a kitchen with a center island and a couple of bar stools. Our kitchen is sorta open - at least, it's more open than the kitchen in our last house, which could more accurately have been described as "completely and utterly isolated from the rest of the house and anyone who might be in it." But it's still missing that sort of breakfast-y hangout area that I've always fantasized about.

I can't install a *real* island in the middle of the kitchen because the space (which you can see here, in my kitchen makeover post) is too narrow, and I can't install one off to either side because there are doors in both spots - but one of those doors is a glass slider that doesn't open anyway, so I don't mind having something blocking part of it so long as that thing can be moved.

DIY Projects

Last-Minute Fourth of July DIY: Super-Simple Paper Lanterns

July 2, 2017

I have officially decreed today - Sunday - to be the Fourth of July, because the actual Fourth of July is on a Tuesday and having two days to recuperate after Fourth of July festivities sounds like a much better idea to me, especially since I'm the one throwing the party. But since I only decided this on Friday, I was left with next-to-zero time to prepare and/or decorate. Enter: these ridiculously easy (and cute) paper lanterns.

What You Need:

Construction paper in whatever colors you like (this project doesn't have to be Fourth of July-themed, obviously)
Scissors
Stapler

What You Do:

« Previous 1 … 37 38 39 40 41 … 321 Next »