Category: home

tidying up

A while back I talked a bit about the Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo.  Well last month I put her trademark Konmari method into action, and I am so glad I did!

The Konmari method applies not just to clothes, but to all objects around the house including paper, books, momentos, housewares, etc.  Clothes though are the starting point.  I emptied my two closets onto the bed and floor.  My closets are averaged size by San Francisco standards, but relatively tiny in my opinion.  All of my clothes managed to fit inside, but just barely.  After going through each item, identifying those that still spark joy, and discarding the rest, my closets were transformed!

I’ve even gotten rid of more items since the purge and I haven’t missed a thing.  Goodbye jeans that no longer fit, goodbye dress I never wore, goodbye clothes that were loved and worn tons but are no longer my style, goodbye clothes I binge bought on a too-good-to-pass-up sale that no longer get me– goodbye and thank you.

But the changes went beyond the closets.  As I applied the Konmari method throughout the house the energy in the space shifted – and my energy shifted!  Guests that stopped by would comment on how nice the house looked — “Did you paint?  … The trim, you changed the color of the trim?! … What did you do?  Your house looks great!?!”  And the answer was simply that I got rid of stuff that I didn’t need and that didn’t spark joy!  That’s it.  It is so simple and has such a huge impact.

Imagine sitting in your home and everywhere you look are things that spark joy — no, everywhere you look there are only things that spark joy.  Can you imagine?!  How awesome would that be?!

I had heard about Marie Kondo’s methods and I’d thought I got the gist, but it wasn’t until I actually started listening to her book that I really drank the Kool-Aid.  I commute 2 hours a day for work and I fill the ride with audiobooks.  The first day I started listing, I could not wait to get home and to start the tidying process!

So if you haven’t already read or listened to Marie Kondo’s The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up – IN ITS ENTIRETY – then do so stat!  You’re going to love yourself for it.

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Happy tidying!
xoxo

ashLeave a comment

BFHU – adding style

A budget friendly house update (BFHU) style edition.

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Tada!  The living room is complete.  While there are still things I may want to change eventually, for now it is balanced and happy.   In my quest to create a serene living space I learned quite a bit.  Those nuggets of wisdom are memorialized in the below list of do’s and don’ts.  And for full disclosure I included a summary of my costs.  Spoiler alert– I did go over budget by $24.

before
after

(the before and after)

As you can see in the previous post, we managed to spiff up the fireplace and shelves in the living room with some simple white paint.  With no style direction though, the improvements fell short.  The room felt unfinished.  It felt eclectic and cluttered and I was stressing about it.  The room was giving me anxiety.  Silly maybe, but true.

Do’s and Don’ts of Style on a Budget

  • Do have a clear picture of the style you are wanting and stick to it.  This was really hard for me because I love lots of styles and tend to change my mind frequently.  This may be fine when choosing an outfit to wear, but it can get really costly and time consuming with interior decorating.
  • Do choose a neutral color palette for the walls and furniture.  This is particularly true if you are someone who wants to change up the style of your room regularly.  You can then mix up the style on a whim with less costly and easy to switch out pillows, throws, side tables, and other accents pieces.
  • Do research to learn what you like and discover your style goal.  I spent a week looking at photos of living rooms on Houzz, going to open houses, flipping through home decor magazines (Restoration Hardware, West Elm, Anthropologie Home, Pottery Barn, and Wayfair to name a few).  I would take pictures of anything that caught my fancy, and then review the photos later for patterns and common elements.  I noticed that I was gravitating toward rooms with lots of light and white, and loads of texture.  And so my style goal took shape:  a clutter free contemporary light drenched room with lots of white and cream and accented with pieces having cozy textures.
  • Do identify the pieces you have that you love and incorporate them.  For me these were the coffee table, white throw blanket, and gold polka dot pillow.  These are the pieces that make me happy whenever I see them.
  • Do set a budget.  Once you have a style goal, figure out how much you’re willing to spend to achieve it, and the cost range of the items you want in your ideal space.  Then start prioritizing.  For me, I could not afford to go over $1,500, and I felt that (in additional to painting the fireplace and shelves white) changing up the rug would make the biggest impact.  So while I don’t really love the current couch and chairs, given their relatively neutral color I figured I could work with them.
  • Do get rid of clutter.  Getting rid of clutter is the most cost effective thing you can do to improve the space.  If you don’t love it and you don’t absolutely need it – get rid of it.
  • Don’t buy things just because they are on sale.  This goes out to all you Target shoppers.  I know how it is.  You go in for toilet paper and socks and you come out with a decorative deer bust, cutesy burlap wall decor, throw pillows, candle holders, and maybe even a rug.  These impulse buys are mistakes you make when you don’t have a clear style plan.  They’re on sale and you think you’re saving money, but more often than not they’re a total waste.  Don’t do it.  Focus on getting a style plan first, and then if you find something on sale that fits into that plan – GREAT!  Plan first, shop second.
  • Don’t shop where you can’t afford.  It’s just a depressing time suck.  I love Restoration Hardware stuff, so I look through their catalogs for inspiration – but for this project I did not set foot in their store.  I was in love with an RH fireplace screen, but at $600 my budget would have quickly be blown.
  • Don’t ask everyone for their opinion.  Asking lots of people with differing style persuasions will yield many opinions and could lead to self doubt, frustration, and even depression.  Don’t do it.  Limit your opinion asking to a very short list (1-3 max) of people whose style you admire.
before
after
before
after

(before and after)

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Total cost:

  • Souk Wool Rug from West Elm.  The 9×12 is normally $1,329, but I was able to snag it on sale.  Still with tax and shipping it ended up being right at $1,000.  It was important to me to have a good quality real wool rug, so I was fine with spending the bulk of my budget here.  Still that meant only $500 for any and everything else.  Eek.
  •  Ultra Plush Rug Pad on Amazon.  The 9×12 rug pad cost roughly $75 and included free shipping.
  • Pleasant Hearth Fireplace Screen on Amazon. The screen cost me $75 (a tiny fraction of the cost of the RH one) and I love it!
  • Bevel Rectangular Mirror from Pottery Barn.  On this item I really lucked out.  I saw it in store, but at $399 it was beyond my reach.  Then a few days later I happened upon it at a warehouse sale for $190 and snatched it up!
  • Gallery Carbon 5×7 Picture Frame from CB2 for $40 each; so for 2 I spent $80.
  • Faux Fur Euro Pillow at Target on sale for $25 (orig. $35).
  • Blown Glass Lantern at Target for $17.  I bought 2, so $34, to balance each other on the shelves, but one is currently acting as a flower vase elsewhere.
  • Stainless Steel Lantern at Target on sale for $5 (orig. $19).  I found this lantern on clearance at my local Target and I really quizzed myself on whether or not it fit into my style plan or if I was just buying it because it was on such a good sale.  Clearly I decided it fit, but do beware of impulse sale purchases!
  •   Orchids and succulents.  These I picked up at my local Home Depot.  The orchid was about $20, and the succulents about $2.50 each x 8, or $20, for a total of $40.

TOTAL:  $1,524

I admit I came in slightly over budget… but overall I’m super happy with the results.

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And finally, a HUGE shout out to my extremely talented mom who created the painting of Charles Bridge for the room, complete with gold splatters to compliment my favorite gold polka dot pillow.  It is true that most custom art would have thrown this project way off budget, but thankfully I was able to pay her in peanut M&Ms and diet Dr. Pepper.  THANK YOU MOM!!

(FYI – turn books around for a more neutral palette)

Happy renovating!
xoxo

ashLeave a comment

BFHU – the fireplace

A budget friendly house update (BFHU) for the fireplace.  Here are the details of my experience, and some super simple directions for whitewashing brick.

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It was a tough decision whether or not to paint the brick fireplace.  While we love the look of natural stone and brick, our fireplace was just not working.  And those mirror tiles in the back of the shelves… wow.

I started by getting rid of the mirror tiles, which came down surprisingly easily.  And to our   surprise we found that the wall was made of thin wooden planks and was signed and dated by prior owners!  Super cute.  After removing the tiles I sanded the wooden planks a bit to remove any leftover sticky from the mirrors and wiped away the dust with a damp rag.

With the wall prepped I wanted to start painting straight away.  Literally could not wait, so I used some white paint we had leftover from painting trim around the house (Benjamin Moore Regal Select in White with Pearl Finish).

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And when I was done it looked SO MUCH BETTER! … but still didn’t feel quite right :-/

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(Still less than good, huh?  Yah, I was a bit bummed too.)

All that work, and it still felt like a cluttered mess with no clear style direction.  Sigh.  But that was about to change.  My mom and sister came for a visit and the three of us decided to see what the fireplace would look like white.  So we read some online tutorials for whitewashing brick, watched a couple YouTube videos, and went to work.

As an aside, I might suggest giving your husband or domestic partner a heads up before beginning similar projects.  I did not, and there was an initial adverse reaction.

A short time later, the fireplace was white – glorious gleaming white!

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I instantly LOVED the crisp clean feel of the white… but how to style it?!  Well the big style reveal and details will be up on the blog soon.  In the interim I’ll leave you with some super simple whitewashing instructions.  🙂

 

Whitewashing Brick

You’ll need:  

  • rags
  • painter’s tape (optional)
  • drip cloth (optional)
  • paint brushes
  • white paint (we used Benjamin Moore Regal Select in White, Pearl Finish)
  • 1/2 gallon(ish) sized container  (we used tupperware)

Directions:

  1. Use the painter’s tape and drip cloth to cover anything you don’t want paint to get on.  (good luck)
  2. Using the 1/2 gallon container, mix some white paint with water –  roughly 50/50 mix depending on how opaque white you want the result. (FYI:  We ultimately decided we wanted the bricks solid white, so our ‘mix’ got progressively thicker… hindsight we probably could have just applied the paint straight from the bucket.)
  3. Paint a section of the bricks (maybe 1.5 ft square) and then dab at the wet paint with a rag to give a slight texture and remove any drips.
  4. Then move on to paint another section of bricks, dab at the wet paint, and repeat.  After 5-10 minutes you’ll notice that the bricks will have absorbed some of the paint and the white will fade a bit.  Simply keep repeating the process until the desired color is achieved.

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Happy renovating!

xoxo

 

ash1 Comment

BFHU – the bathroom

A Budget Friendly House Update (BFHU) for the bathroom.

The MLS photos of the house we bought literally showed it in the best light – like with a magic filter that brightened all the rooms, blurred the cracks in the walls, and changed the tint of the tile in the split bathroom.  Because of the bright yellow tile and faint moldy smell, updating the bathroom was a priority.

Ideally we would have loved to gut the split bathroom and merge the rooms into a shiny new full bath, but we’d sunk all of our funds into the downpayment.  That tile though.  So I had a google and found the Homax “Tough-as-Tile” Tub & Sink Refinishing Kit ($38 at Home Depot).  I think this stuff is really intended for smaller jobs, but I figured if I could give our bathroom a facelift for less than $40 per box it was worth a shot.  I picked up 4 boxes of the Homax brush-on product ($38×4), a vanity that was on sale for $99 (similar here), a faucet for $40 (similar here), a new light fixture for $80 (similar here), and some paint.  I then spent a three day weekend on the project.

(Instructions say don’t use an electric sander, but do you see all those tiles?!?!)

I used the Homax product to paint the tiles on the walls and in the shower.  I did not use the product on the tub itself.  To prep the tiles I used an electric hand sander with 35-40 grit sandpaper and I went over the tiles with the sander only once.  I note this because there are warnings not to use an electric sander as it could tear up the surface, but I did not have an issue.  The instructions also say to prep the area by sanding three times, but I did not have the patience.  I do think some additional sanding prep would have been beneficial, but for me it wasn’t worth the time or energy.

(The tub appears to bow a bit, but that’s just my bad photography.  What’s that brown stuff?  #gross)

The actual painting of the Homax product takes s o  m u c h  l o n g e r than I thought it would.  The paint is thick and sticky, and you really need to apply it in relatively thin coats for an even finish.  I also found that the instructions aren’t kidding when they say to paint in a single direction with overlapping strokes.  If you think this stuff will go on just like painting a wall in your living room, you are wrong.  If you are painting a large area it will take a long time and it will be painfully slow and it will suck.  I also did not follow the instructions about using a good quality mask and I was quite ill with a horrible headache the next day… but some inexpensive Advil fixed that.

(Forgot to mention that I had an old mirror that I repurposed over the sink here.  And yes the cavity of lathe and plaster is simply hidden behind it.)

It took 3 cans/kits of the Homax product to paint 2 coats for my project.  I kept the 4th can for touch ups, and it turned out that I needed it (though not a lot).  When I taped the tiles to paint the walls, some of the tough-as-tile paint pulled off when I removed the tape.  There were only 3-4 bits that pulled off, and the amount that pulled off was smaller than a fingernail in size.  I just touched up the few spots with the extra product, no biggie.  For what it’s worth, I think the bits might not have pulled off had I done the 2nd or 3rd recommended sanding/prepping sessions.  Also, definitely wait the full 72 hours cure time per the instructions too!

All in all we are very pleased with the results.  It’s been over 2 years since we painted the bathrooms, and so far so good!  We were able to completely re-do the (split) bathroom for less than $400 and would highly recommend the Homax product to anyone with icky tile to cover on a budget!

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Happy renovating!
xoxo

 

 

ashLeave a comment

BFHU – preamble

Finally!  As promised this is the kickoff to several installments of Budget Friendly House Updates (BFHU), a series of blog entries that highlight some relatively simple and cost effective ways to take your space next level!

For those that don’t know, we live in San Francisco where the housing market is insane.  It is very common for multiple all cash offers to be made at well above the list price.  When we purchased our home 3 years ago, we did not have the option of making an all cash offer.  We barely had enough for 10% down.  To be as competitive as possible, we would routinely waive all contingencies, including inspections, and submit our offer with a personal cover letter detailing in earnest how we would love and care for the home.

When we made the offer on our current home, we had been house hunting for half a year, submitted offers on 4 homes, and were becoming discouraged.  We learned that 32 offers had been submitted, and that we were not the highest or the cleanest offer, and yet the seller chose us.  Then our lender tried to renege, but that’s another story.  We closed on the house 2 weeks later and words cannot describe how lucky we felt and still feel.

Since that time we have been tackling one project after another to fix up the house; keeping our promise to love and care for the home as we make it our own.

As a starting point, below are the photos from the original MLS listing for reference.

entry hallhouse2

living roomhouse3

dining roomhouse4

kitchenhouse5

hallwayhouse6

bathroom

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master bedroom and sunroomhouse7

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guestroomhouse9

backyard
(fyi – those are very large and thorny blackberry bushes)

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xoxo

ash2 Comments

shortbread and jam

Shortbread is my favorite.  And lavender-rosemary shortbread is my VERY favorite!  For six months I lived in London and shortbread and tea became a favorite snack.  So did chips and beer, but that’s for a different post.  Another UK takeaway?  Strawberry jam.  For whatever reason, strawberry jam is the most popular flavor in the UK, and all of Europe for that matter.

With spring in full swing my rosemary and lavender plants are ready for picking, and rumor has it that strawberry season has arrived.  So it’s time to stoke that London Town nostalgia and cook up some UK inspired treats!  Or do what I did and ask your sister to make them for you 😉

shortbread ingredients

lavender-rosemary shortbread cookies
ingredients:
3/4 tsp rosemary, chopped
3/4 tsp lavender, chopped
2 heaping tablespoons honey
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter (room temp/softened)
1 cup sugar
2 egg yolks
2 2/3 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
directions:
combine the sugar, honey and butter. mix them together in mixer (with the paddle attachment if you have one). add the lavender, rosemary, e.g. yolks, and vanilla. mix everything together again until thoroughly combined.
add the flour and baking powder to the wet ingredients. mix everything on the ‘stir’ setting (or just hand stir) until everything is combined. CAUTION:  don’t over-stir. the dough should be sticky and a little wet
dump the dough onto a piece of parchment paper or cling wrap and form into a log about 1 1/2in in diameter. freeze for a half hour or so.
remove dough from the freezer and slice 1/2 in thick. (or you can roll out on a floured surface and use a cookie cutter). place on baking sheet lined with parchment paper, sprinkle with sugar, and bake at 350 for 9-10 min – or when the sides start to turn golden but NOT brown.  remove from oven and cool on cooling rack.
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strawberry chia seed jam
 
ingredients:
24oz strawberries -sliced
2-4 Tbs honey, maple syrup, or agave
2 tbs chia seeds
directions:
in a medium saucepan, combine the strawberries and 2 Tbs honey. cover and bring to a simmer over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until it begins to liquefy (about 5 to 10 min). once the fruit is liquid, bring it to a gentle boil and let cook until it breaks down and becomes saucy, about 5 min. mash lightly until at your desired consistency.
taste the jam for sweetness. if you want it sweeter, stir in additional honey a few tsps at a time.
stir in the chia seeds and let cook one minute. remove the pan from the heat, stir once more, and let sit for 10 min. the jam will continue to thicken as it cools. (if it’s still too thin, add 1-2 tsps of chia seeds)
transfer the jam to an airtight container (mason jar if you have it).  the jam will keep in the fridge for up to 2 weeks, or the freezer up to 2 months.
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enjoy!
xoxo

ashLeave a comment