What says “luxury" to you? Is it a beautiful bedroom or a sumptuous shower? Is it a large living room with plenty of space for that huge comfy couch? Or is it something different? I think that luxury to me would be having a bathroom large enough for the assortment of shampoos and conditioners my teenage daughter thinks she absolutely positively NEEDS. (Seriously, kid. How many do you have now?) A great house plan can take your home from a normal abode to a luxury manor. It’s not just about the

Life can be hard sometimes. Stress can wear you down and make you yearn for a retreat away from it all. I feel like everyone deserves a place that gives them comfort. Whether that be a beautiful bathroom where you can soak all your troubles away, a nice outdoor area where you can take in the simpler things in life, or even a wonderfully organized closet. (Can you tell what I did this weekend?) Getting away from all of the stress and harshness of life is the key to a luxurious home. Your home doe

Thanks to Chip and Joanna Gaines, the Farmhouse style has spread across the country and basically taken over as the predominate theme for home decorating. And unless you are fortunate enough to live in a farmhouse style home or in an older home, you are going to have to fake it until you make it. The great thing about this style of décor is that it is very easy to do this. So, what makes a home have that farmhouse look? Is it something that you can go “Take a dash of this and a smidge of that"

Farmhouses are incredibly popular right now. I think that may be due to our hectic lives. The farmhouse comes from a time where things moved just a bit more slowly. My husband and I were talking about how different shopping for gifts has become just last night. I went online and purchased a quick little thing for the youngest and he was explaining to the girls how long it used to take to get things in the mail. The speed at which business and our lives move has grown exponentially over the last

It comes as no surprise to me that the Farmhouse style is still one of the most popular styles of house plans. They have to be one of my favorite styles, personally. I find that the styles can be very simple, or they can be very complex. Really, with a Farmhouse house plan, the sky is the limit. You really can make them into anything that you need them to be. Another great thing about this style that is still sweeping the nation is that it can be incorporated everywhere. I think that the Farmhou

I love to cook. I mean, I really, really love to cook. Cooking has always been something that has allowed me to make people happy in a very rewarding way. (I hate doing dishes, but that’s why they invented dishwashers, right?) I have wonderful memories of cooking with my grandmother and mom. Cooking is one of those things that can help make a bad day better. Labor Day is Monday. Traditionally, BBQ is the way to go. It’s the last time that you really get to go swimming. It’s the last time that yo

The end of summer means the last of the barbeques, pool parties, and outdoor fun. Most swimming areas will be closing on Monday and traditionally Labor Day is the turning point in the weather. (Well, everywhere but the south where summer will hold us in its sweaty palms until closer to Halloween before finally releasing us.) So of course, we want to enjoy all of that glorious sunshine before winter comes barreling in. Great Outdoor Living Spaces We have some amazing house plans that have great

The beginning of the school year always makes me more aware that my wonderful summer days are coming to an end. Fall and winter are coming and that means that I need to enjoy the last of the summer days before they are gone. One of the things that I enjoy the most, and I got this from my grandmother, is enjoying a nice cup of coffee on a summer morning and watching the sun come up. It’s a simple thing, but it just brings me so much joy. I actually get up early every morning. My husband has to be

I guess you could say I’m a “seasoned" parent. My oldest daughter is in Junior High and I pretty much have the school shopping thing down. I was thrilled that this year she didn’t have a school supply list. I could get her what I thought she might need instead of sticking to what the teachers thought they might use this year. Over the years I have figured out that some things are good things to buy for kids for back to school no matter how old they are or what classes they are taking. Now these

While some parents are getting their kids ready to go back to school and shipping them out the door, others are getting ready for the long haul. There is a growing number of parents who are deciding to home school their children here in the U.S. And while there are many reasons for parents to choose to home school, one thing remains the same: you need to have a location set aside for them to do the work. There are house plans that lend themselves to the home school lifestyle better than others,

It’s that time of year, again. The time that parents everywhere both love and hate. It’s time for school to start back. This year I have one child on the Elementary school campus and one child at the High School campus, so my days just seem to get more and more hectic as the week moves on. We’ve all been there. It’s 5 minutes before the bus is supposed to run and you are desperately hunting for that one shoe that the kid wants to wear. (Never mind the fact that they have 4 pairs that would be so

I always greet the beginning of the school year with an odd mix of nostalgia, excitement and dread. I miss going to school. I have always loved to learn and to challenge myself, which is probably how I ended up writing blogs full time, so school was great for me. I never really had a day when I didn’t want to go to school. That makes me super excited for my kids. I know what they are going to get to learn and it makes me happy. I also kind of dread the new school year. New clothes to buy, that l

Well I just dropped my youngest daughter off for school for her first day at Pre-K and my oldest daughter got on the bus this morning to go to her first day as a High School student. And I was supremely tempted to go back home and take a nap in a quiet house. And that makes me wonder about the parents who are sending their kids off for an extended stay at school or moving them out of the house for good. Do they get the urge to go take a nice nap in a quiet house? I bet they do. Parents all have

Traffic is crazy right now in our little city. For my kiddos school starts tomorrow. In fact, most of the school districts in this area are starting this week. So, everyone is finishing up their school shopping, but the big thing that is congesting the streets is that its move in week over at the local college. Last year there were over 81,000 students living on campus. That’s 81,000 people trying to move back into the dorms and on campus apartments in one week. That’s a lot of traffic. Since it

As the mother of a teenager, I try my best to keep up with what is cool and hip in the world. I’m really good with music and tv, not so much with video games and fashion. (Why are skinny pants the rage? Don’t they cut off your circulation? You’ll have to pry my bootlegs off of me to get me to wear those.) One of the things that I have realized a little too late is that a game called Fortnite is really cool right now. Apparently, we are on Chapter 10 of this? My first introduction of this was my