Dream This Home

Building and Maintaining your forever home.

Purge your Domain

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I am a freak when it comes to clutter in my house.  When there is crap I don’t know what to do with or have not used in a while, it goes in a box.  Once full, these boxes get dropped off at Goodwill.  I never feel a shred of remorse.  You will never hear me say, “Darn, I shouldn’t have given that ______ away!”  Because in our tiny house, there is zero room for crap.  Yes, you could say my bookshelves look like they have “things” that appear like clutter on them, but they’re there for a reason.  My chatchkes are curated to my standards.  I know exactly how I became this way.  It was my mother.  The woman (rest her sweet soul) kept EVERYTHING.  When she passed away suddenly from a brain aneurysm, my sister and I flew to Japan and it took us and my extended family a full two weeks to sift through her treasures.  It was heart-breaking, nostalgic and horrible.

I think the OCD was there long before my mother died, but it surfaced full-force after going through her belongings.  I wanted to throw everything away.  My sister wanted to keep everything.  In the end, we packed a shipping crate full of stuff and sent it across the ocean only to sit in a storage facility which I paid for.  What a waste of money.  We had boxes upon boxes of memories which we would never use or see or care about.  It all was just sitting there costing rent, collecting dust as it did in her home in Japan. Photographs and family heirlooms are one thing, but the rest?  Total junk in my opinion.

My husband and his brothers quite recently endured a similar experience when their antiques dealer father passed away.  Their childhood home was massive and literally full to the brim with stuff.  Basement, three floors and even in the attic, the sheer amount of stuff was beyond overwhelming.  There was an auction and a separate estate sale involved to purge that house and there is still stuff lingering in there to this day.

My daily life is simple and I feel that less is more when it comes to what we surround ourselves with.  Stuff accumulates over the years and kids are the worst since their stuff seems especially in excess; from birthday presents to over-zealous aunties that buy gifts just because.  I like to think that a well curated home speaks to one’s state of mind.  I’m basically a simple person and I like things to be accessible, practical and simplified.  I don’t need stuff to make me happy.  The more stuff I have, the more stressed out I feel. Those hoarder shows on TV?  Good Lord they stress me out!  I just can’t deal!

Purging takes time and tackling it takes baby steps.  One room at a time is my philosophy. Maybe one drawer at a time.  And boy, does it feel good.  You do good to give things away too.  One man’s trash is another man’s treasure right? Things that clutter your house inevitably clutter your mind.  Start with the junk drawer in the kitchen.  Move on to your closet. Little by little, your house can be clutter free and you are left with the essentials.

My next project is a hutch with old CDs and dead electronics in it.  The digital camera from 10 years ago is still in there unused since our phones are so handy these days.  I teach my children by setting an example.  The toys from their baby days can find a home in another family’s toy chest.  Just like that old coat that I wore last, when?  It can warm the shoulders of someone in need.

Purge.  Do good.  Feel good.  Don’t look back.  I don’t want so much stuff that when my time comes, my children have to sift through scraps of their artwork from when they were in grade school.  They will hopefully thank me for it.

Only beautiful things with true meaning to your heart should clutter your home.

-K

Big Kid Rooms – Taking pride in place

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I think transitioning into a big kid room of their own is something kids need to be emotionally ready for.  Changing a room up is exciting but it also means getting rid of comforts that children have grown accustomed to as a baby or toddler.  I found that when we initially moved our children into their own room, asking their opinion in the matter was a huge part of preparing them to take ownership of their domain.  If you are like me and have a theme and look in mind, warm their minds up to the idea of what it’s going to look like and ask them to help in making smaller decisions.  Offer simple choices and let them decide on a few things.  What color sheets they want, or what their favorite things are that will carry over.  If their walls are going to be a certain color, let them pick out the color from shades you can live with.  If their decor is going to follow a parent-directed theme, let them choose their accent pillows.  My kids love choices and I wanted to make sure they felt they had a say in the process of creating their personal space.

Currently at the ages of 5 and 2, my kids share a room and will continue to share a room in the new house.  They are getting a black and white room in the proposed plans. They have no say in this. But they will individually have choices in what books and toys they want to keep and what they want their individual accent colors will be.

I think another great offering to ease the transition is to do a few DIY projects together (monitored of course) so they feel they had a part in making something useful specifically for their space.  My kids helped to paint pre-existing storage cubbies for their toys and picked fabrics for matching pillow cases I made.  Ownership and pride of place is just as important for kids as it is for adults.  Make them feel proud of their participation.  I want the nighttime rituals and other activities that occur routinely, to become memories specific to their childhood room and the choices they made in making it just so.

I say, start small.  Don’t overwhelm.  Even the simple choice between two options is still a choice in their minds and you show them that their voice matters; because they do and should matter.  In many ways, in this world of over abundant options for everything, even we adults get overwhelmed by decision making.  I think it’s important to teach that nothing is necessarily ‘final’ and most importantly, no decision is ever ‘wrong’.  There are always ways to make modifications to a decision once made and that’s okay.  Steer your littles to take charge in the smallest ways like their rooms and hopefully soon they will voice their opinions in bigger ways.  I’m not talking about the child whom declares that, “from today, I denounce vegetables!” but more along the lines of, “I want to drive a garbage truck when I grow up!”  I think that’s an important lesson for any child no matter how young.  The power to say yes, or no, the power to see that their opinion on things matters greatly not only to the immediate family, but to society at large.  I believe the confidence to make good choices comes from empowerment and taking pride in themselves within the things they can control.  I want to help my kids make good life choices now so that later down the line, when life gets tough at times, they feel they have the tools to figure things out on their own based on what they believe is important to themselves individually.  I have started with what I know I can help them achieve in their own little space in this world – their very own room.

Trying my best to raise empowered children who make good choices in life.

-K

Let there be light!

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I work on a contract basis for an electrical engineer/home automation company so when it comes to lighting a house, my bias is a bit to the extreme.  I truly believe that well designed lighting can make or break a house.  Planning from the early stages of design is key.  Once the rooms are laid out, start thinking about how you want each space to get lit. Ambient lighting, task lighting, mood lighting, it all makes a huge difference.  I picked out the majority of my light fixtures early on because I wanted every piece to be set in the budget.  I am not going to compromise on the lighting design in our new house.

My process:  I drew my wish electrical plan and my must electrical plan.  I already know that my double height living room space will have fixtures that retail at almost $1,500.00 a pop x 2.  They may not be hanging on move-in day, but there are J-boxes in place for when we do buy those damn lights.  And we will…  Eventually.  I also accounted for the exact number of can lights for ambient lighting, 35 to be exact.  There are certain lights that are a definite must, like the 6 well lights (3 for the outdoor walkway leading to the front door and 3 for the interior foyer).  These up-lights will be put in from day one.  We will not be saw-cutting through concrete and laying conduit later.  Therefore, they will go in when we pour foundations.

It’s all about pre-planning.  Don’t wait to tackle lighting as an after thought or you will end up with lighting that  looks like a spec home.  Know where your furniture will live, know how you intend each space to be used.  Dream about the feeling you want to convey when you enter each room.  Start looking for deals on your favorite fixtures and buy them on sale.  It’s better to store the box and have it ready to go (having the option to return later of it doesn’t work out) than to pay full price on a piece or God forbid, figure out at crunch time that it’s out of production.  I have a Pinterest board dedicated to lighting fixtures and I obsessively add to that board whenever I see a beauty.

The Kartell Ghost Lamp – Get in my house now!  gallery_3

The Mooii Random light – I want 2 pronto!AED_Moooi-random-light-twiner-bertjan-pot-pendant-L6p_8_large

Know your style, shop smart and remember that there are tons of ingenius and innovative ways to beautifully light your home.  LED strips that can change colors or hanging pendant lights in bathrooms…  The possibilities are endless but you have to plan early!

So go through your plans and figure out where all those sconces should go.  Add a diminutive cover on the J-box if you can’t afford the fixture of your dreams right now. It’s a whole lot easier than busting up your walls and pulling conduit later.  After-the-fact lighting is always more expensive.  Trust me on this one.

-K