The “Do One Thing” series chronicles my yearlong effort to tackle one project every day to organize my life and home.
Day 6: I decimated a pile of travel magazines taking up space in my home office. The recycling bin is going to be heavy next week.
Posts Tagged ‘home’
Do One Thing: Magazine reduction
Posted in Do One Thing, Home, tagged challenge, decluttering, Do One Thing, home, magazines, New Year's resolution, office, recycling, resolutions, travel on January 7, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Do One Thing: Decluttering and remodeling
Posted in Do One Thing, Home, tagged bathroom, challenge, contractors, countertop, decluttering, Do One Thing, faucets, granite, home, home improvement, New Year's resolution, postaday2011, remodeling, resolutions, shelves, vanity on January 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »
The “Do One Thing” series chronicles my yearlong effort to tackle one project every day to organize my life and home.
Day 4 saw the decluttering of one small shelf. Baby steps, people.
Part of Day 5 was spent waiting on the contractors to install a granite countertop in the downstairs bathroom, and the rest of it was spent obsessing about said installation and trying to pick out a faucet. Home improvement: It counts.
As Pictured Below: Rare find
Posted in As Pictured Below, Christmas, Home, Huntsville, Photographs, tagged accessories, animal rescue, cats, Christmas, Christmas tree, collection, decorating, fireplace, golden, Hipstamatic, holidays, home, Huntsville, iPhone, mantel, New Leash on Life, New Leash on Life Marketplace, photograph, sparkly on December 23, 2010| Leave a Comment »
I have a ramshackle collection of holiday decorating accessories — when you don’t put up a tree due to extraordinarily inquisitive cats, you make do with whatever fits on the fireplace mantel. You also don’t buy many new items, since that mantel’s not getting any bigger.
I couldn’t let this golden burst of sparkle sit on the shelf, however, when I found it at the New Leash on Life Marketplace today. Only 25 cents, too, since all Christmas items were half off.
I’m not entirely sure it’s going back in the Christmas box after the holidays are over.
As Pictured Below: Bringing the Heat
Posted in As Pictured Below, Home, Photographs, tagged cold weather, favorite things, fireplace, fireplace insert, heat, Hipstamatic, home, husband, iPhone, Presto HeatDish, remodeling, renovations, salad spinner, space heater, TV on December 18, 2010| Leave a Comment »
We were going to spring for a new fireplace insert this year to heat the first floor so we wouldn’t have to move the TV upstairs for the next few months. Turns out that, like so many renovations we attempt to undertake, this one’s going to require a lot more work and money than we had planned on.
Rather than lugging the TV upstairs, however, the husband came home with the
Presto HeatDish Parabolic Electric Space Heater. It is quite simply amazing, putting out enough heat to keep us warm and toasty on the couch. It’s made it onto my list of Favorite Things (it’s kind of like Oprah’s, but with more Apple gadgets and a salad spinner), a list that’s pretty difficult to get on.
No Place Like Home
Posted in Travel, tagged Atlanta, car, Chicago, coach, food, home, Huntsville, iTunes, jetsetter, playlists, road trip, singalong, travel on October 20, 2010| Leave a Comment »
I’m finally back home after eight days of running. We drove to Atlanta, drove back to Huntsville, then flew to Chicago and back. I actually woke up yesterday morning slightly puzzled as to what city I was in.
I sort of feel like a jetsetter, only I don’t think jetsetters fly coach. Or make special iTunes playlists and assign car occupants individual singalong duties.
Anyway, more to come on some delicious food in Atlanta and how awesome it is to reconnect with old friends.
As Pictured Below: That Smell
Posted in As Pictured Below, Eats, Photographs, tagged aroma, baking, cookies, cooking, dishes, food, home, kitchen, oven, pine nuts, smell, square silver bowl, toasted pine nuts on September 15, 2010| Leave a Comment »
Freshly toasted pine nuts: I don’t believe anything else makes the kitchen smell better, except maybe cookies baking in the oven. Cookies that someone ELSE is baking in the oven. Right before they wash their own dishes.
As Pictured Below: Curtain maintenance
Posted in As Pictured Below, Home, Photographs, tagged curtains, decorating, drapery, fusion tape, grandmother, hem, HGTV, home, IKEA, iron, puddling, sewing, truTV on September 11, 2010| Leave a Comment »
I FINALLY hemmed the IKEA curtains that I’ve owned for nearly five years. I had to, because they were puddling on the spice cabinet that I inherited earlier this summer when my grandmother died. And not puddling in an HGTV kind of way, but more in a slovenly truTV kind of way.
By hemmed, of course, I mean that I ironed on the strip of fusion tape that came with the curtains. I bought red curtains at IKEA. You think I’m going to sew?
Pie safe comes together, still holds no pies
Posted in Home, Photographs, tagged alabama, Anthropologie, bookshelf, cabinet hardware, cabinetry, coffee, decks screws, decorating, drawer, drawer pulls, furniture, garage, hardware, home, Huntsville, knickknacks, pie safe, restoration, Trader Joe's, wood, woodworking on August 11, 2010| 3 Comments »
Several years ago, a good friend offered me an old pie safe that belonged to his sister, who had recently died. Honored by his offer, and in dire need of a little extra cabinet space in my humble kitchen, I accepted. This unique piece did kitchen duty for several years until I moved to Huntsville, where I found a home with plenty of cabinet space. The pie safe accepted its new assignment as eccentric bookshelf/knickknack area.
One thing that always bothered me about the pie safe was the drawer on the bottom. It didn’t belong there. It wasn’t made out of the same aged wood, and it was much more stylized than any other part of the cabinetry. It seemed like it was added as an afterthought, perhaps as a replacement for another drawer that had fallen apart.
I bought new drawer pulls for it at Anthropologie a few months ago, but all they did was emphasize its non-belongingness. Another plan was in order.
Yesterday, I finally fixed it. I toured the garage until I found a piece of suitably aged wood (my garage is, indeed, full of surprises) that only needed one cut to fit the drawer opening. After worming my way underneath the pie safe, I secured the board from the back with three beige deck screws (you can’t see them).
Voila! It’s as if the mismatched drawer never existed.
My love of Anthropologie’s cabinet hardware collection was satisfied, as I installed two bright, bubbly pulls on the pie safe doors.
It’s always been a fun piece, but I think I’ve managed to update it without changing its overall character.
Stripes of Aggravation
Posted in Home, Photographs, tagged bathroom, decorating, home, Huntsville, mirror, pastels, remodeling, renovation, stripes, wallpaper on June 14, 2010| Leave a Comment »
I found this today behind the giant bathroom mirror I’m replacing. Who wallpapers an entire half bathroom with pastel-striped wallpaper? I don’t care if it WAS the ’80s. The room has a VERY high ceiling and that is a LOT OF STRIPES.
And the renovator who hung a mirror over it instead of taking it down with the rest? Let’s never meet in a dark alley.
Finding your Franz
Posted in Home, Photographs, tagged A New Leash on Life, animal adoption, animal rescue, animals, candles, decluttering, decorating, estate sale, gifts, grandmother, home, Huntsville, knickknacks, neighborhood, thrift store, townhomes on May 21, 2010| 1 Comment »
Meet Franz. I bought him for $2 at an estate sale I attended just so I could get a look at the interior of some townhomes in my neighborhood. He looked lonely and in danger of being shipped off to a thrift store with the rest of the unsellables. Franz was hand-sketched in charcoal. He deserved better.
Plus, let’s just admit it, I decorate like a lunatic.
Franz hangs by my desk at home, though he’s not so much inspiration as he is entertainment. I just like him, even though I’m really not sure what sort of animal he is. I’m not even sure how I decided he was German.
I thought of Franz today as I was dropping off a few things at a thrift store, items that were cute and in good shape, but items that I just could not bring myself to love.
I decided a few years ago that open space was my decorating style, and I’ve been decluttering my way to that goal ever since. Gone are the knickknacks that someone else chose for me, the extra set of everyday dishes from my grandmother’s house, the candleholder collection that accumulated after a few people saw me burning candles at a couple of parties.
The things that stay are the things I use and/or simply love. The best part about bringing the rest to a thrift store isn’t the empty space left behind in a closet or on a shelf, but the idea that someone else WILL love these things.
Every item that I give away may become somebody’s Franz. How awesome is that?
My favorite thrift store, by the way, is A New Leash on Life Marketplace at 707 Andrew Jackson Way in Huntsville. It’s a cute little store, filled with a nicer selection than you find in larger thrift stores, and there’s sometimes a couple of adoptable animals there for a visit. A New Leash on Life is a non-profit animal rescue group that houses adoptable animals in approved foster homes.
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