Friday Favorites 1.26

Friday favorites today involves designs I’m inspired by, health issues, what our next house project is, and what I’m REALLY looking forward to! Affiliate links are included in this post – full disclosure here.

I’m fully embracing the cozy winter season this year, and let me tell you, it feels great! I went on a walk the other day, and I thought to myself “This is the first year I have TRULY thought winter was beautiful”. I have always thought of winter as the ugly season. When switching my mindset, I have been working on trying to find beauty in every season. This year, I’ve finally done it!

While embracing the coziness and quiet of winter, this season of rest, I wanted to share some interiors that are inspiring me lately.

This fireplace scent makes my book loving heart so happy. What a cozy scene! It’s from Candlewood Cottage – her whole house is beautiful!

 

There’s just something about a cozy nook. I love this little space under the stairs – it’s just the coziest little space:

 

Did you know that a butler’s pantry could be so pretty? This is just beautiful and I love it so much! Via Samantha Stein Interiors

 

Recently purchased:

I’m always curious as to what’s made it out of people’s carts and into their homes, so here’s what I’ve purchased lately!

I have been getting back into embroidery – I have 2 completed on our family room walls and this will be the third (I think I’m going to leave the text off of the bottom):

This sweatshirt is so inexpensive and I truly love it! I thought with the price tag that it wouldn’t hold up, but I now have it in 2 colors (black and green) and it’s the perfect medium weight crewneck. I sized up one for an even more oversized look.

I’ve given up my afternoon coffee and I’m working on trying to love tea. It’s a … process haha. Lots of people on Instagram told me that I needed to upgrade my tea choices, and that’s what I’m doing! I’m giving loose tea a try too – here’s the infusers I just bought:

Health update:

If you follow me on Instagram, then you saw that I shared about my health issues lately. After being diagnosed with Graves Disease in 2019, I’ve been only getting better for the last 4.5 years. I was allllmost off of my meds (we were going to trial going totally off of them in about 2 months) and recently had a massive flare-up out of (seemingly) nowhere. While I’m frustrated and discouraged, I am thankful that I DO have medicine that I can take that I know works to calm my thyroid down. I also know I’m not starting from zero this time – I have knowledge and tools that have helped me over the last few years. 

I share this because I know many of you also struggle with autoimmune disease. It’s so frustrating, and it feels like such an uphill battle so often. I’m working on getting adequate sleep, continuing to eat nourishing whole foods, and moving my body with some form of gentle exercise daily. Also eating brazil nuts + bone broth (here’s my EASY homemade recipe) daily, and fired up my rosemary water again (for hair loss).

 

Our next house project:

Our next house project is…the girls bedroom! While it might not be exciting for all of you, I promise it’s VERY exciting for our girls! After a few years of sharing a room, but in their own twin beds, our girls have finally said they’re ready for bunk beds! Neither of them was ready to sleep on the top bunk for a few years, and I figured it was OK to just wait it out until they were ready. Their room is small for two individual beds, so having bunk beds will be a game changer! I can’t wait to get started.

I talked about how we try to maximize the space in their bedroom in this post.

Once we get going on the room, I’ll share on Instagram more. I’m trying to work with the girls on letting them have some creative freedom in the room, while I try to not let it go off the rails. I feel pretty good about where we’re at right now!

So far they’ve wanted a:

• plant room (I loved this idea, then they changed their minds)
• bright yellow room (they wanted it to also have a big sun?)
• we changed direction to a “sky room” – we were going to paint it blue + then put a little sun by each of their bunks. Then they were asking for clouds and things quickly spiraled…
• while looking online at ideas on Pinterest for “sky rooms” – we came across night sky rooms. Dark blue accent wall with gold stars…right now that seems to be the winning direction. But we’ll see what actually happens!

Here’s a few of the ideas we’re inspired by:

This is the kind of accent walls the girls are hoping for:

Image (wallpaper) on Etsy:

 

The girls really liked the colors in this room via Sash Blessed Home:

 

My girls LOVED this idea and were slightly sad that we couldn’t get a bunk bed that was just like one  (via Livette’s Wallpaper)

 

Getting ready for…

gardening! Last summer was kind of a bummer of a gardening year. We had Buddy as a tiiiiny puppy (we got him at 7 weeks on Memorial Day weekend). Since last year was the “summer of puppy”, we weren’t able to spend a lot of time gardening. This year, I’m excited to get going again and really make it a redemption year. I planted a ton of bulbs this fall, so I’m looking forward to beautiful tulips and new peony bushes. We have picked out our seeds for the summer, and are getting excited to plan out the whole layout soon! 

Here’s some helpful posts I’ve written about gardening in the past few years in case you’re needing some inspiration and ideas too:

8 gardening essentials (from a gardening minimalist)

Vegetable Garden Lessons, Plans, and Inspiration

How to fill raised garden beds without spending a lot of money

Our new DIY raised garden bed build