As we near the last few months in our house I thought it was appropriate to take the time to answer a few of the questions y’all have sent my way since we bought our first home. How has it almost been a year?! It feels like yesterday we were moving in and bribing our family members to come help us paint (thanks, crew!) Come to find out, many of you are in the process of buying or building your first homes or your forever homes! It’s an adventure and I’m pleased as punch to help answer any questions you might have about the process or decisions we made.
where do you find your art?
Shopping for art is one of my favorite evening activities. While I love browsing galleries here on the island or on our getaways, I usually have much better luck finding pieces in my price range online. When we started designing our house I requested plenty of wall space to display some of my favorite pieces and room to add to our collection. We have a few family pieces that we’ll hang onto forever, and a few pieces we fell in love with and had to add to our collection. But I also have a ton of easy to change prints in frames throughout the house. I love to mix up my decor from time to time so it’s nice to have inexpensive art prints in standard size frames. Those are the easiest to swap out! I adore the Minted art gallery, browsing for prints on Etsy, and shopping direct from my favorite artists.
do you regret installing marble countertops in the kitchen?
I don’t! We still love our marble countertops even with the Florida hard water and busy lifestyle. We knew going into it that they would require some maintenance and wouldn’t always look squeaky clean. I love them so much that we’re going the marble route again in our new house. And probably in our third house too. I know there are really pretty quartz products on the market (I see a lot of these throughout my work week!) that get pretty close to replicating the true marble look but I haven’t found one I love enough to switch to. For me there’s nothing quite like the real thing but I fully agree that they are NOT for everyone. If natural etching and the occasional stain (yes, it happens – almost all of ours, even the set in stains have come out but we have a few lingering coffee spots!) will drive you crazy than marble is NOT for you. I repeat, not your thing. Don’t do it. I personally appreciate the etching and the slighlty “worn” look that develops over time. For some reason it reminds me of a french coffee shop or bakery. Not that I’ve ever been to France, haha! Our countertops are honed (no shiny finish!) which lends to a more natural/organic look. We might switch things up and have ours polished in the new house to coordinate with our plumbing and hardware. Will keep you updated!
how has your coffee cabinet held up?
I laugh because it seems like such a minor detail but we have received sooo many questions about our handy little appliance cabinet. We designed the small cabinet to serve as a hidden coffee station by adding additional outlets and making sure the height was juuuust right to grab a cup of joe each morning. There’s room in this cabinet for coffee mugs, extra coffee pods, to-go cups, and stirrers. I love the cutesy coffee bars I see on Pinterest but I’m usually in a hurry when making my coffee so keeping that station pretty seemed like a nightmare. I’m still digging the concealed station! A few folks asked about how the cabinets have held up with the steam. I haven’t noticed a single issue! 90% of the time we leave the cabinet door open while the coffee is brewing/pouring so the steam hasn’t been an issue but even when we close the door in an attempt to mute out the noise, I haven’t noticed any problems caused by the steam.
tell me about your floors!
The floors aren’t my fave. In fact, it’s safe to say they were the biggest mistake we made with our current house. Don’t get me wrong, there are some AMAZING vinyl products on the market but unfortunately we did not select one of those amazing products. Our floors don’t do well with moisture (even just a bit from watering plants!) they always look dirty to me no matter how often we clean them, and after a year I’m not impressed with how they’ve held up. If you’re in the market for wood look vinyl flooring, let’s chat!
how do you keep the house clean with SO much white?!
Ha! This seems to be a favorite conversation topic with house guests. We don’t have any kiddos yet so that helps a bit with the overall clean factor. We know what we like and aren’t really willing to sacrifice our style because of maintenance. Honestly, with white walls, white furniture, and white cabinetry I haven’t had a difficult time cleaning. The upholstery can be bleached, the cabinets always wipe clean, and the magic eraser is my best friend. Now our new house has white plank siding so we’ll see how that one goes, haha! I see a pressure washer purchase in our near future! Advice to other white house lovers – do what feels right and you won’t mind the upkeep!
Have a question about our current house that I didn’t answer? Shoot me a message and I’ll be glad to answer!
xx, McKenzie
