On fashioning a beautiful home

Written by contributor Maggie Whitley of Gussy Sews.

Sometimes I’m too quick to want a beautiful home but not quick enough to want to create that beautiful home. And I know that may sound silly and yes, it’s not true all the time. And maybe it’s even a bit lame to admit that, but when you work from home and spend a lot of that time online, dreaming new product designs or researching fabric or connecting with customers, it’s easy to feel creatively zapped once six o’clock hits.

Does that surprise you?

Gosh, I hope not. I know it can’t be that hard to create a beautiful home. Many of my friends share simple + easy tips on creating an imperfect, beautiful home.

Finally one day I sat myself down and had a serious talk. With myself. Yes, myself.

I told myself, “Maggie, don’t make this harder than it needs to be. You only need a few things to create a beautiful mantle that loves you, too. Now go on, get started!”

And so I did. I gathered inspiration from my friend Lisa’s mantle + added in some of my own pretties that make me feel happy. I wanted our home to be relaxing once six o’clock came, but still inspiring enough that I felt encouraged to dream + play during non-work hours.

A friend mailed me a darling string of paper garland she made + I knew that would be the finishing touch to our living room’s decor. To creating that beautiful home.

Sometimes decorating our living room feels super hard because of the dark, original wood details or the old {that doesn’t work anymore} fireplace, but since we rent I know these are things I need to work around.

Fashioning our home in a style that makes me proud is a home decorating challenge I find myself in often. I think because I spend so much time with fabric + zippers I forget how much fun it is to work in a new medium, like books + candlesticks. Do you have any decorating challenges in your home that you’ve been able to creatively work through?

Here are three quick tips to decorating your home:
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When simple was easy(er)

Written by contributor Emily Walker of Remodeling This Life.

I’ve spent a lot of time lately feeling frustrated with my home. I went back to working outside the home after six years, and as a result, went from having plenty of time in a day to make things just the way I wanted them in my home—to having just enough time to make things pretty good.

I’ve had to let go of perfection and be okay with pretty good. If the laundry is done and the kitchen is clean simultaneously, I am fine with there being toys everywhere (or at least I try really hard to be). I am not going to lie, it hasn’t been easy. Somehow, having kids right under my feet making art and toy messes zaps all my motivation to clean up. It feels like an uphill battle, and more than ever, it feels like if my home is anything, it’s not a simple one.

This morning, like many others, I spent some time grumbling inwardly (and a little bit outwardly, too) about how complicated it seems to just keep the living room clean for more than twenty minutes. The second a surface is cleared, it becomes a magnet for more stuff to get set there.

As soon as I clean the floors, someone tramples them with summer feet.

As soon as I get to the bottom of the laundry hamper, there is more thrown in.

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Be online. But be offline, too.


So friends? I just spent a week almost completely offline. Aside from the very occasional Instagram-turned-tweet, I was blissfully and fully among the three-dimensional world. And it was heavenly.

It wasn’t expected, to be honest. Norwegian Cruise Line sent the five of us on a cruise to the Bahamas (and I’ll be writing about it over at Babble), and for that we will be forever grateful. We had no idea how badly we needed a family vacation until we actually went on one.

But it turns out that the Internet is pretty sketchy on a cruise ship—it has to be done via satellite, which means it’s unreliable, expensive, and slow as molasses. Kyle and I were transported back to Kosovo in 2000, when we’d only get online when it was absolutely necessary.
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Weekend links

blue ocean

The winners of the Plan to Eat giveaway are Liz, Kelly, Jen, Jill, and Amy! Congrats, ladies! We’ll be in touch soon.

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” -Albert Camus

Weekend giveaway: Plan to Eat

Today’s giveaway comes from loyal monthly sponsor Plan to Eat, a genius little online program that pretty much does everything for you but actually cook your meals.

This is a simple tool that allows you to store your favorite recipes (and import them from around the Internet!), create menu plans using those recipes, and even provide grocery lists based on those same recipes.

My favorite feature? How simple it is. Its clean interface allows for intuitive interaction — it took me mere seconds to get my account up and running, and I had my weekly menu plan created in minutes.

This is a great tool for busy families with hungry kids.
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