#182: A Big Catch Up Holiday-ish Special (Surprise!): a house log

So much has happened since we last picked up the podcast mic, so we have a jam-packed show to catch you up on all the things. We are talking house updates, embarrassing stories, renovation plans, and we even worked in some bad metaphorical diagrams (because describing graphs and charts you cannot see consistently goes over well in an audio format). We are also diving into how house projects have slowed down around here, the remaining projects on our list, and how our attitude towards having less on our to-do list has changed fairly dramatically over the years. Plus an impromptu musical exercise that captured our family’s contentment for living in a smaller home, and why Sherry can never show her face in one Florida city again. Also, a lively holiday game and the TV show we have been dying to tell you about.

You can also find this episode on your go-to podcast listening app, like Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, TuneIn Radio, Stitcher, and Spotify.

What is New

• We shared in the episode why we are not returning to weekly podcasting, but our hope is to drop in periodically with big catch-up episodes like this one. And above, you can see our extra fancy recording set-up from earlier this week when we recorded (and the Ikea cabinet boxes that we mentioned in the background).
• You can scroll down our journal’s homepage to see any and all house updates you might’ve missed over the last year, but some specific things we mentioned in the episode include our new pool, the pantry we brought in to our kitchen, the closet we brought in to our bedroom, our little firepit area, our hanging daybed, and our recent kitchen porch (and here is what the inside of the kitchen looks like these days).
• Additionally, we shared a holiday gift guide, an update on our family room, 7 of our go-to storage pieces that assist our house work harder, and a tribute to our dog Burger, who passed away in October. We never tire of looking at pictures of him, so here is one for good measure:

• As for that narrow drawer we spoke of next to our stove, here is a photo from an old kitchen organization post, back when it housed a single bottle of olive oil (and a jar of salt). You can also see how the frames on these old cabinets take up a lot of space. We will gain a lot more storage with our newer frameless cabinets (especially because we are shifting the stove over a bit).

• We also spoke about paving our front driveway at some point, since we right now have this fancy pine-straw-over-sand setup (can you see my tire marks below?). Although our new go-to parking spot is around the side (right off the new kitchen porch) – so this spot will mostly be for guests. Yup, we are still a one car household and we still have the same 8 year old Toyota Highlander (150,000 miles and going strong!).

• If we were ever to construct the “guest house” building (aka: our shed with a bed), it would in short go behind that large tree where the green fence is (the pool is on the other side of the fence). Obviously we’d have to reconstruct the fence differently, but our whole goal was to work around that vivid tree!
• Also, Sherry mentioned that “circles make you glad,” which is something we learned from the book Joyful by Ingrid Fetell Lee. We discussed the book in Episode #130 and later interviewed Ingrid in Episode #136!

What is Not Game: Holiday Towns

• Here is the article that rounded up the 29 American town names that “embody” the holiday spirit.
• You can also see more pictures of Santa Claus, AZ (the abandoned theme town) in this article

That is Embarassing

• We did not capture Sherry’s embarassing moment in St. Augustine on camera (mercifully for everyone involved) but luckily it did not dampen our enjoyment of this striking historic city – which we happened to catch simply after it was lit up for the holiday season!

• Beyond some of the usual/tourist trap stuff, some of our go-to things while we were there were Osprey Taco (the only place we ate twice in three days!), Mayday Ice Cream, and walking around the Castillos San Marcos.

We are Digging

• Here is Home Before Dark by Riley Sager, one my go-to books that I have lately read (which is why I also included it in our holiday gift guide last month!
• Also, here is the trailer for Only Murders In The Building on HULU (warning: some language). We both enjoyed it quite much.
• This is the weighted blanket Sherry sleeps with every night (it is the OG I gave her years ago as a Christmas present). The washable cover, softness, and not-too-hot fabric is what she considers a few of its best features.
• But if you are looking for a lighter option, this is the furry throw blanket we got lately for our downstairs sofa. The whole family is obsessed with (we have it in the neutral color).
• Here you can see the bed made with Sherry’s weighted blanket under the duvet on her side (hi again, Burger!). So it certainly can be made into the bed fairly discreetely.

If you are looking for something we have dug in a past episode, but do not remember which show notes to click into, here is a master list of everything we have been digging from all of our past episodes. You can also see all the books we have recommended on our Book Club page.

And lastly, a big thank you to Agility Bed for sponsoring this special episode. Before December 31, you can use the code YHL to get 25% off any mattress + your choice of free gifts (a pair of cooling pillows or sateen sheets). And after December, you can still score $300 off any mattress by using that same YHL code. Simply got to AgilityBed.com to snag either deal!

Thanks for listening, folks!

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