Our hallway on our main level needed a little updating. We had painted the entire house in Cloud Cover from Benjamin Moore, I loved the wall color, but the space was still missing something. I knew I wanted a rug, the funny thing is my girls actually play in the hall, they like to be right in the middle of everything. I also had some extra wood left over from our wood floors upstairs. I would see the leftover wood sitting in our basement taunting me to be used somewhere, I couldn't let a stack of wood sit there unused. So I talked my husband into starting yet another project. This is ... Read More
Outdoor Living Inspiration and Progress
We have been getting our deck ready for Spring and Summer. We just started to get all of our furniture delivered from Raymour and Flanigan. My husband spent some time setting it all up, with excited girls watching. With a tiny house you really look forward to your outdoor space becoming an extension of your home. It allows us to invite friends over and not feel so stressed about where to put everyone. When we purchased our home one of the big things that sold us, and mainly my husband was the large backyard and deck. I like to gather inspiration on Pinterest. I start by pinning ... Read More
Our new Baby Bassinet and making room for baby
With my other two babies I used a bassinet for about 2-3 months. In our other home our master bedroom was further away from the nursery so it made sense to have a bassinet. This time the nursery is pretty close to the master, basically I could lay in bed and touch the other room, maybe exaggerating a little, but honestly it is like 10 steps away. I think that I just love the look of bassinets, they just make me yearn for a baby! Cribs are sweet, but not like a yummy little bassinet. Not to mention the convince. So I spent some time, more than I should have on Pinterest looking at bassinets or ... Read More
Party Slush and Party Favor
This slush recipe has been in our family for four generations. I had asked my mom for family recipes when I was in middle school for a school assignment, this slush was one of the recipes along with caramel popcorn and apple cobbler. It was my great grandma Smart's recipe, so that is why I call it Smart Slush. I like to make this slush for Holiday parties, Showers or Book clubs really any and every party. Perfect for Easter this coming weekend. This is all you need- 1 Jar of Maraschino Cherries (without stems) chopped up and drained 1 cup Lemon Juice 1 20 oz Can ... Read More
How I used Mud Paint and Chalk Paint
I have painted about 7 of my own pieces of furniture with Chalk Paint or Mud Paint. I get asked often what the difference is between them, so I thought I would share my experience with both Mud Paint and Chalk Paint. Both are great products. Both took only one coat of paint then a light second coat. I love how fast the process was. Now I know that is not always the case for everyone, it depends what you are painting over. All of the pieces I painted did not have a lot of lacquer or had been treated with a lot of cleaning products, both important to factor in before ... Read More
Tips on De-cluttering your Home
I went out to dinner with some friends the other night and we were catching up on what we have been up to. One of my friends is moving so she has been de-cluttering and getting rid of things. They moved from Utah when we did and she was shocked with how much stuff they brought with them that they haven't even unboxed or used in over a year. She found a box of clothes a year after living here and didn't even open it, just took it straight to Good Will. She figured if she had not used it or needed them in all that time why would they now. My other friend shared that she read something online ... Read More
Best Rocky Mountain Cookies
It was my hubbies birthday this past week. He loves cookies more than anyone I have ever met. When he travels for work he makes sure to go and get cookies from the store and some milk to have at night. He has really high metabolism, so we all should hate that he can eat cookies nightly and still stay so lean. So when deciding what to make him for his Birthday dessert, cookies were a given. They had to be regular full fat cookies, not paleo or anything healthy. This is the cookie recipe that I made, they are one of his favorites, Chunky Rocky Mountain Cookies. I found this recipe a long ... Read More
Ikea Hack Toy Chest
We had these Ikea white cabinets with the plastic bins in the girls playroom in our old house. I know you have all seen them if you don't own one yourself. The plastic always kind of bothered me, but I thought "relax Brooke, it's a play room." Now that we are in a smaller house we use the bins in the girls bedroom. They have a good size bedroom and there was plenty of room for toys. But now that it is all open the plastic bothered me even more. So I came up with a Ikea hack to create something more pleasing to the eye. Now they don't look like a cheap Ikea toy chest, it looks like a ... Read More
Adding Purpose and Style to your home
We started a hashtag campaign #purposeinstyle with four other bloggers The White Buffalo Styling Co, My Sweet Savannah, Hammade Furniture and Craft Berry Bush. The purpose is all about sharing photos of our homes being lived in and the purpose of why we design and decorate it the way we do. You can read all about why we started it HERE and I shared our last months round-up HERE. We encouraged others on Instagram to share their home by using our hashtag #purposeinstyle and telling us what living with purpose in style means to them. These were our top picks for the past weeks along with my ... Read More
Top Tips for Buying and Selling used Furniture
When we moved from Utah to Connecticut we had to sell and giveaway A LOT of our furniture and accessories. Our new home in Connecticut is about half the size that it was in Utah, we had a lot of things we were not going to have room for. I was able to sell several pieces with the home. There were extra things that I knew had value and I would have to replace like sofa's, dining table and beds so I wanted to make some money off of them. I used to be a store buyer and manger of a store in Utah, clients would often ask how much to sell used pieces for when they were buying new things. I thought I ... Read More