We’re still surrounded by piles of wrapping paper, but we wanted to share a special holiday giveaway with you. The prize is an iPad 2 with a custom iPad cover from StickyGram. You may already know StickyGram for the fun magnets they make from Instagram photos, but they also offer customized phone and iPad covers—the … Read more

***This giveaway is no longer accepting entries – see who won below!*** After an astonishing 18,018 entries across two posts (the first post reached capacity at 10,680 comments, so we opened a second), we finally have a winner in our biggest giveaway yet. To ensure fairness we used random.org to pick a number between 1 … Read more

Christmas often works against our efforts to declutter and simplify our homes, so this year we tried four strategies to minimize excess without losing the magic of Christmas morning. It mostly worked—there was one memorable misstep—but overall it felt calmer and more intentional. We also have very different approaches to New Year’s resolutions, so we … Read more

Since we shared our house wish list back in the fall of 2010, we’ve been meaning to update it. I recently found the original list tucked into a vase on the bedroom floor, and it was fun to see that, after seven years of homeownership, much of it remains the same. We crossed items off … Read more

When Lee sent her Design Dilemma after photos, we were excited to share them. Many of you are eager to see how our mood boards translate into real rooms, and this makeover is a great example. Lee asked for help turning a mismatched, unfinished space into a practical and attractive zone for sorting mail, doing … Read more

Call me crazy, but I wasn’t thrilled with Sherry’s latest “furniture arrangement” when I first spotted it in the corner of our living room. She loves lighting, sure, but a chair positioned solely to stare at a lamp felt like something out of a quirky design blog. Then I looked up and realized she still … Read more

We started with a bit of spring cleaning and gave the site a fresh header and a lighter, brighter background. Hope you like the update as much as we do. Update: if elements look off, try refreshing and clearing your browser cache/cookies/data. It’s been a while since our last window-shopping post, and this one was … Read more

Sorry for the delay in updating our house to-do list — we first shared it back in May and refreshed it in July, so this check-in is long overdue. The upside of waiting longer than planned is that we’ve been able to cross off a lot of items. It’s satisfying to look back and see … Read more

Like our previous gift guides, we’ve gathered all three lists into a single handy post. Below you’ll find our annual categories: Gift Ideas for Grown-Ups Gift Ideas for Kids Gift Ideas Under $12.99 Each year we include items we actually own, things we’re buying for family or friends, and things we genuinely love. Nothing in … Read more

Q: I am wondering how you keep all your decorating ideas and images organized. Do you keep all the magazines and catalogs with good design ideas (if so how do you organize them?). Do you cut out images? Do you keep everything electronic or scan in images? Just wondering because I always want to keep … Read more