Cabin in the City

Books, cats and midwestern charm.

Lisa

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Hey, 30

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I’m not going to get all deep or philosophical about what it means to turn 30. Instead, I’m just going to tell you that turning 30 was really, really great. As one friend wrote in her card to me, “Welcome to an even better decade that’s bound to treat you to the joys of giving fewer shits and doing more of what you want.” I’m really into that.

In some ways, that totally reflected the way I celebrated this year. I’m sure that’s why it was my best birthday yet. Here’s exactly why.

Waking Up to 30

Truthfully, I went to bed the day before feeling kind of down. Obviously, 29 is not the end of my youthful and interesting life, but I was treating it that way because I’m a drama queen and also the worst.

But all those feelings were gone when I woke up around 1:30AM. Sitting on the dresser was this wonderful and silly marquee sign that Michael lit up. It was a really special way to greet a new decade. I took this as a sign of things to come and went back to bed ready to celebrate come morning.

(Also, it didn’t say “Happy birthday” because the box was missing all the Ps. I think this message is better anyway.)

Indulgent Things

I decided to stack my birthday with all kinds of indulgent activities that I love, but rarely treat myself two. Chief among them: Visiting La Reve in the Wauwatosa Village for breakfast.

This place is a treasure. Go on a weekday for breakfast and you will find a fancy yet super chill atmosphere. It’s quiet, the mimosas are great and the pastries are even better. Swinging by for a fruit tart was a serious treat. And snaps for the Aries bartender who chatted rising and moon signs with me!

More indulgent things: a manicure at Neroli, a key lime pie from Honeypie and a great dinner by my mom. ☺️

The Real Kicker

As wonderful and relaxing as the day-of celebrations were, the highlight of turning 30 was hitting up Don’s Diner for a real night out.


First, of course, the fam and I did some dinner. There’s a new menu and it’s fabulous. But as soon as we were done, we made our way back to the Naughty Angel (the lounge there) and knocked back a few old fashioneds.

Hanging out in the lounge – which so many people said reminded them of their grandparents’ houses – was a real blast. The bartender queued up some Bob’s Burgers without me even asking and we listened to some 90s jams (I did request those).

In such a delightfully quirky place, it could be tempting to start living for the ‘Gram, but I decided to put my phone away for the night (here’s where the giving fewer shits come into play). My party didn’t need to be a photo shoot. Instead, I put out my Instax camera and let people do their thing.

And that was really great. I just got to hang with my friends and catch up with folks new and old. Honestly, I was really touched that so many people came to say hey. To all of you that made it, I can’t thank you enough. You made 30 super special.

Also, a special shoutout to Michael for helping to tee this whole thing up, my friends Matt and Amanda for coming a long way to see me, and my gal Eva who made a Tosi-inspired cake (and managed to transport it across the stat in one piece!) for the gods. It was fantastic.

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Small Goals // April 2019

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It turns out not every month is a good month for goals. See how I failed in a big way (and how I’ll try and pick it up for April).

  1. Create a game plan for the rest of the KonMari steps (and do part three). I am the worst. I didn’t do this, and the thought now overwhelms me entirely – even though I know having less and being organized will make me feel so much better.
  2. Rearrange the living room? Well, I went to West Elm and talked with a very kind designer there. She gave me a new floor plan to consider. I tried it out and it just wasn’t right. I give myself the point for trying.
  3. Record a podcast. Nope!
  4. Stitch up 15 hoops. Not even close. I think I whipped up about eight.
  5. Find a killer birthday dress. The jury is still out on this one. I have one new contender that I’m working with, though I’m not sure if it’ll make the cut.

1/5. My worst ever month for goals. I’m trying to tell myself that it’s OK since I spent a lot of March doing some cool things (seeing Michelle Obama at the Miller High Life Theater comes to mind!). However, I know that I really bungled my time for most of the month.

With Aries season in full swing, more daylight and the optimism that comes with spring, I want to turn it around for April. More stitching! More time outside! Maybe a bike ride or two?

  1. Celebrate 30 in style. I’ve got something up my sleeve here!
  2. Restock my fabrics. It’s been a while since I’ve done a fabric run. I’ve got a lot of new hoop ideas. They need some new fabrics to go with.
  3. Polish up the house. I’m thinking about skipping the paperwork step of KonMari because I’m an organizing heathen. Instead, I’d like to just tackle my craft closet and living room using her methods. You sick of this goal yet? (I am, but I also want a clean home.)
  4. Hit the gym 8 times (ideally 10). Back on the horse (as always).
  5. Plan a creative retreat for myself. I felt like I didn’t make a lot of time for my stitching this past month. I’ve got three fairs to tackle between now and the end of May. I’m thinking that getting away for a short solo trip might be good for me and my crafting.

Here’s hoping 30 is a good one and that April is a good month for goals!

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Spring Fever + Spring Shows

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I’ve got some pretty exciting news, folks! Well, exciting if you’re a big fan of craft fairs and art shows.

This spring I’ll be selling at not one, not two, but three craft shows in Milwaukee and Madison. This is my busiest season yet. I can’t say I’m ready quite yet, but I’m getting there!

I’m looking forward to these events not only because I love a good maker event, but because they’re a great reason to get out of the house this spring. If you’ve got spring fever, come check these out!

MKE Local Market 414 Pop Up

Sunday, April 14

This will be my first time selling with MKE Local Market, but I’m pretty excited! This market is on 4/14 – AKA Milwaukee Day. I’m excited to celebrate my city and experience a new space. Third Branch Creative Studio looks pretty swank!

Madison Makers Spring Market & Pub-Crawl

Saturday, May 11

I had so much fun at this event last year (and at its Black Friday slot, too). I’m happy to be setting up at Old Sugar Distillery again. Grab their homemade cherry soda or a Cuba Libre and let’s chat!

Madtown Artisans Spring Event at High Noon Saloon

Sunday, May 19

Another new-to-me show! This one will be at Madison’s High Noon Saloon and will be hosting some of my favorite Madison-based makers like TacoCat Creations and No Coast Paper Co. And let’s be honest, shopping with a drink in hand is always a fun time.

Of course, you can always keep up with all my events over on the Kaminski Handicraft Facebook page. Hope to see some folks at these events coming up!

And, yes, that Mrs. Maizel hoop up top will be for sale!

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A Junk-Foodie’s Perfect Dessert: Compost Cake

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It’s been a while since I’ve shared a recipe on this blog! Mostly because I’ve been sharing my bakes over at Taste of Home. But I thought I’d share a new-to-me recipe here today.

This past December, I got to interview Christina Tosi and I totally fell in love with her new cookbook All About Cake. I whipped up her birthday sheet cake for an assignment. It was fantastic, but a lot of work. Paging through the book, I found a casual recipe that was more my speed for everyday sweets: compost cake.

What really caught my eye was the pretzels and potato chips sticking out the top. I’m big on salty-meets-sweet desserts. This one was for me. It just might be for you, too.

I will say that I altered the recipe a bit to suit my taste. I nixed the butterscotch chips (they’re not my favorite) and added some more pretzels and chips in their place. I also simplified the method a bit. Give my version a go, but also grab All About Cake for the full experience (and lots of great cake recipes!).

OK, let’s start! To make this cake you’ll need:

  • 2 cups cake flour
  • 3/4 cup + 3 tablespoon sugar
  • 1/4 cup old fashioned oats
  • 2 tablespoons brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon ground coffee
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 7 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
  • 3 eggs
  • 1/3 cup buttermilk
  • 3 tablespoons grapeseed oil
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 3/4 cup mini chocolate chips
  • 1/3 cup crumbled graham crackers
  • 1/4 cup pretzels, lightly crushed
  • 1/4 cup potato chips, lightly crushed
  • 1 tablespoon flour

For the topping, you’ll need:

  • 1/2 cup chocolate chips
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons grapeseed oil
  • Handful pretzels
  • Handful potato chips

Mixing Up the Batter

I love this cake because it doesn’t require any heavy-duty equipment. Instead of breaking out the stand mixer, you can just use a spatula or a whisk. Major win for lazy me who doesn’t want to lift the ol‘ KitchenAid out of the closet.

OK, start by whisking together the cake flour, oats, brown sugar, sugar, coffee, baking powder and salt together. Then, in another dish, whisk together the melted butter, grapeseed oil, buttermilk, vanilla and eggs.

Take the wet ingredients, add them to the dry and give them a good stir until combined. Easy peasy!

Then toss the chocolate chips, graham cracker crumbles, pretzel bits and potato chips together with a tablespoon or so of flour. You want to give these ingredients a quick coat in flour to prevent them from sinking to the bottom of the cake.

Once they’re coated, just stir them into that batter. It should be pretty darn thick. Don’t worry – it just means it’s full of the good stuff.

Baking the Compost Cake

Grease and line an 8×4″ loaf pan with parchment paper. Then add your batter. Bake this for an hour at 350ºF. It’s a long time, but it’s kind of nice not to have to babysit something for a while.

When it’s done baking, cool it on a rack for about a half hour before removing it from the pan. You’ll want it to be completely cool (or at least nearly cool) before moving onto the last bit.

Topping It All Off

What really made this cake stand out to me was the topping. Pretzels! Chips! Chocolate! And making that topping is really easy.

All you need to do is melt together a half cup of chocolate chips with a teaspoon and a half of grapeseed oil. You can do this in the microwave if you have one – we actually ditched ours more than a year ago (and you can read about it here). Otherwise, melt it with a double boiler on the stove.

All that’s left to do is dip pretzels and chips into the chocolate and stick them to the top of the bread. Use whole pretzels and chips, crunched up ones, whatever you please. When I felt like the top was pretty packed with salty snacks, I drizzled a little bit more of the chocolate on top.

You want this to set up a bit before diving right into it. If you want this cake quick, pop it into the freezer for five minutes to set it. If you’re not in a rush, you can refrigerate for a half hour or so. Just be sure to bring it back to room temp before serving.

The Eating

In the end, this compost cake is exactly the kind of dessert I love: unfussy, slightly messy and almost overstuffed.

I sliced this up and served it during our podcasting practice (March goal!), and it definitely kept us going as we rehearsed. I really like how each bit is a bit different. Plus, as an easily adaptable recipe, I like that I can crunch up whatever snacks I have on hand (or whatever bits of candy) to mix into a future batch.

Give it a go (and get that cookbook, too!).

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KonMari Part 2: This Is Too Easy

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Let’s be real, part one of the KonMari method was rough. Really rough. After that, step two seemed easy. I could certainly thin my book collection.

First of All

Once the internet got wind of this step and how Marie Kondo only keeps about 30 books, things got pretty intense. Book-lovers were up in arms over this.

To this I say, hold your damn horses. If you think that the KonMari method is about throwing away books, you’re not listening. If your books spark joy, great – keep them and enjoy them. If they don’t, donate or sell them and don’t feel any guilt. That’s the method.

Also this tweet:


Don’t @ me on that one. You are not meant to keep every book you’ve ever read like some trophy.

Our Book Situation

OK, enough with my BS explanation of this books controversy (I have lots of opinions that you probably don’t care about). Let’s move on.

At home, we’ve got three dedicated book areas. This is, I realize, pretty scattered and kind of a lot. Running the width of our living room and dining area is a shelf. It’s home to my cookbooks, a few household resources (like my sewing bible) and plenty of knick-nacks. The rest of my books live in a cheap bookshelf in our bedroom.

Michael’s books are an entirely different story. He’s got three shelves full in his office that he’s not touching (yet). He’s a teacher with lots of textbooks and resources to manage plus a decently sized personal book collection. I’ll give him a pass for now. His book shelves are kind of the least of our clutter problems.

Overall, I think I have a fair amount of books. More than a lot of folks, but probably not as many as a lot of regular readers. I credit this to the library and a self-imposed limit. I never want more books than I can fit on my shelves – though, how they fit on that shelf is sometimes questionable.

To me, decluttering my collection isn’t high priority in terms of my clutter issues, but if Marie Kondo says books go next, well, books go next.

The Main Event

Now that you know my book sitch, let’s get to the main event, shall we?

I wanted to follow the method to the letter, so I started by pulling all my books off my bedroom shelf. It was hideously dusty because I’m a slob. I thought to myself even if I didn’t get rid of that much, at least I’d be rid of a mountain a few dust bunnies.

Taking the books out didn’t take long – maybe 10 minutes – but it was enough lifting to make me rethink grabbing all the cookbooks from the living room shelf. Getting a stepladder to reach them all and then carrying them across the house seemed like too much. Too much considering that I use most of those books regularly. As much as I wanted to follow Marie Kondo to the letter, I let the cookbooks stay. I’ll deal with the karmic consequences of that another day I’m sure.

Looking at my stacks of books, I was kind of underwhelmed by the amount. After being overwhelmed by Clothes Mountain last time, this was a good feeling. Before keeping and discarding, I tapped each stack to wake the books up energetically as Marie instructs. Does it do anything? Who knows! But it was kind of a happy way to start things off.

I worked my way through the piles fairly easily. My favorites were quick to spot and spark joy. I’m talking books by Lauren Groff, Louise Erdrich and Zadie Smith, my collection of scary stories and some reads I picked up on vacation this past year (and have yet to get to– oops). Also, you can pry my complete Calvin and Hobbes collection from my cold, dead hands.

As for the non-joyful books, I put them into two piles: one to sell now and another to pass along to my mom who called me asking for some books. I’ll be honest, having that “for Mom” pile was kind of a nice way for some books to get one last hurrah.

What Books Went?

After all this sorting, I’d estimate that I rid myself of 10 to maybe 15 percent of my books. That’s nothing to sneeze at, in my opinion.

So what books did I say sayonara to? Well, those fell into a few categories.

  • Books that have served their purpose: Books I needed for school, books that I read and thought were OK (looking at you, airport reads).
  • Books that had no purpose: The best of intentions here! I bought plenty of books thinking I’d get into a certain hobby or become a fan of an author only to realize that I wasn’t that interested at all.
  • Books that I’m over: Jack Kerouac? Overrated. I don’t need a physical reminder of the time I wasted on every twenty-something-year-old bro’s favorite author. Same goes for an excessive amount of cupcake cookbooks. 2006 called – it wants its food trend back.

Putting It All Back: Book Edition

Unlike clothing, Marie Kondo doesn’t really specify a way to organize books post-tidying. That’s fine by me. I generally organize by theme.

Looking at the keepers, I wasn’t too daunted by putting it all back. I feel like I’ve reorganized this bookshelf a lot (but apparently not lately because of all that dust). Since the bookshelf is broken up into nine sections, I started to group books to fit into each cubby.

I’ve got a few compartments dedicated to fiction. My favorite contemporary authors share a shelf. Classics and older books go together. I’ve got another section dedicated to spooky, supernatural and otherworldly topics. That’s the most fun one to me.

I had expected some gaps after putting everything back but had none. Kind of a letdown, but I realized I shelved some books that had been sitting in a stack next to the shelf, plus I gave my old yearbooks a home there. Overall, though, it’s organized and dust-free, so that’s not so bad.

How Does It Feel?

Honestly, this didn’t feel like the triumph of KonMari part one. That being said, it wasn’t nearly as difficult and didn’t require nearly as much time or effort. I’m not disappointed.

Like last time, I think I could have been a bit more ruthless, but I’m still happy with the progress I made. In all, I got rid of 28 books. And I made $10 at Half Price Books. It’s tempting to scoff at offers like that, but the way I see it, it’s $10. That’s more than if I dumped them off at Goodwill and it took infinitely less effort than me trying to shop around to sell them.

I’m still appreciating the slowness of this process. It is so so tempting for me to just rush through things and organize hastily for a short-term fix, but knowing that I’ll get to craft supplies and kitchen gadgets in their own time is a good thing for me.

The next step is paperwork. I’m not so sure if that needs documenting, but maybe I’ll run into some juicy stuff!

• • •

Like last time, you can see how I faired in real-time on my Instagram stories. There were some good finds!

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Small Goals // March 2019

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My overarching goal for February was to get my life (more) organized. Let’s see if that’s even possible!

  1. Go on a spending freeze(ish). I did this and I started making a grocery budget. Look at me!
  2. Tackle KonMari parts two and three. I did step two. I’m still committed to this project. I just need to regroup.
  3. Reopen my Etsy shop. Done! I even made a new logo (here it is ICYMI) and took new photos. 2019, I’m ready (finally)!
  4. Finish those books! I read The Nightingale and loved it! I also finished up The Au Pair and found it to be so lame.
  5. Plan a trip. Nope. This is very much in flux right now, but I’m scheming (as always).

3/5. Goals this month were hit and miss. But I’m not that disappointed because I went above and beyond on two of my goals. Considering it’s February, peak winter gloomies season, I’m really not too mad.

This March, I’m going to continue to tackle a lot of home and home-based projects with what I’m sure will be middling success! This being said, my social calendar is pretty packed for the month, so I’m crossing my fingers on getting much of anything done. We’ll see!

  1. Create a game plan for the rest of the KonMari steps (and do part three). I started with so👏much👏enthusiasm👏. I need to get back on track because I totally believe in Marie Kondo’s methods.
  2. Rearrange the living room? We have a pretty large living room, but I have a hard time arranging the furniture inside due to our home’s unique features (features that I love but are hard for me to work around). I’ve got an appointment with a designer at West Elm to tell me if it’s a lost cause or not!
  3. Record a podcast. As if I didn’t have enough interests and side projects! My boss/friend and I are going to try our hand at podcasting. Let’s see how we do!
  4. Stitch up 15 hoops. I really wanted to say 30. I thought about it again and thought 20. But I have to get real with myself. 10 is probably realistic, but you know how I love working myself too hard for nothing. Let’s go with 15!
  5. Find a killer birthday dress. I turn 30 the first week of April. You bet your behind I’ll have to have a dress to match the milestone.

Let me know what your goals are this month! I’m crossing my fingers that I tackle all mine!

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A New Look for Kaminski Handicraft

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Here she is! The new logo for Kaminski Handicraft!

I had tabled branding for my shop for a long time in favor of developing new designs. But a few weeks ago, I got the bug to give my shop a little facelift. While it’s not perfect and not too original, it’s a big improvement – and I’m learning more and more that done is better than perfect.

With a new logo under my belt, I decided to freshen up my product photography, too. It’s certainly nothing groundbreaking, but it’s an improvement and the style is manageable to me.

And I’m using my camera instead of my phone which makes an insane amount of difference!

My hope is that this small refresh gives my Etsy shop and business a bit more polish and makes people maybe slow down to take a peek.

You can check it all out my shop here for the full effect!

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KonMari: Step 1 (AKA Why Do I Feel Like Crying?)

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After a few episodes of Tidying Up, I decided I was going to KonMari my life. I was 100% on board. I bought the book. I told everyone I knew about the life-changing magic of Marie Kondo. I picked a day to kick the project off. I was in it.

Kicking Off KonMari

I was so jazzed about the first step of tidying up (going through clothing), that I started two days early. Snowed in on a Saturday morning, I took all the clothing out of my closet and the coat closet and heaped it on my bed. I was already embarrassed for myself and I hadn’t even emptied out my two dressers yet (yes, two – totally shameful).

I knew I had to commit, though, so I pulled everything out. It was pretty horrifying. But I decided to jump in and ask myself if each item brought me joy. My Jessica Lange-esque witch dress? Absolutely. All joy. My new winter coat from my sister? So much joy. The skirt I wore as Bonnie Parker last Halloween? Not really. Thanks for helping me make a costume. Bye.

Hitting a Roadblock

After 90 minutes of sorting (that’s on top of about an hour of just pulling stuff out of storage), I was having a hard time. Did a pair of sweats bring me joy? I mean, they were cozy. Is coziness joy? What about a skirt I made (but hadn’t worn in years)? It made me feel proud. But was that joy? Or satisfaction masquerading as joy?

I had to take a break. After an episode of Gilmore Girls, I came back refreshed. I plowed through the rest in another 45 minutes. But I kept tripping up on the same things: my makes (though they didn’t still fit).

Originally, I tossed a few dresses and skirts into the bag. If they didn’t fit, they weren’t really joyful, right? After all, I felt a lot of relief getting rid of other clothes that didn’t fit me well. But seeing pieces that I worked really hard on tossed in a bag with old band tees and too-tight skirts felt wrong. Or at least it made me feel really sad. More so than when I released some other old favorites.

Right about this time, Michael came home. I have to give him so much credit, first and foremost because he came home to our bedroom turned upside down and didn’t bat an eye. But he deserves even more credit because I had a meltdown (why do I have so many of these?) about saying goodbye to my handmade clothes. And he just said, “Why don’t you keep them? Even if they’re just examples for yourself?”

That’s when I pulled my favorites out of the bag – two skirts and two dresses. I folded them neatly, KonMari-style, and placed them in a basket in the basement. No, it’s not a perfect solution, but I’m happy with it for the time being.

With those items in a new home, going through the rest of my odds and ends was easy. In the end, I had four garbage bags packed full and ready for Goodwill (not to mention a half garbage bag of unrepairable and worn garments to toss).

Putting It All Back Again

Even though looking at four bags of donations was satisfying, looking at the keep pile was still overwhelming. Time for another Gilmore Girls break. If you are tacking this project, I highly recommend decompressing occasionally. Lighthearted TV, an easy read or a walk would all be welcome.

Returning once again to Clothes Mountain, I developed a bit of a game plan. First, I’d hang up what needed hanging. Then I’d deal with the folding – first basics like shirts and sweaters and then moving onto less regular things like tights.

Hanging clothes was fairly simple. Marie writes in her book that her preference is to fold clothes, but some clothes are happier on hangers – dresses, skirts, things that are light and airy. She also specifies that clothes should be hung rising left to right – meaning the longest dresses on the left and short top on the right.

I followed Marie’s directions as best as my closet would allow. In the end, it looked much nicer visually (to me at least). I was hoping that I’d have a wardrobe with some healthy gaps in it to really show me how much I improved. I didn’t quite get that. Instead I got a closet that was mostly full, though, most importantly, not overstuffed. I’d take it.

The Folding Method That Didn’t Make Me Hate Folding

After a low-key win in the closet, I turned my attention to everything remaining. I’d have to KonMari fold it all? I saw how long it took people to do it on Tidying Up. I figured I’d be there all night.

But after watching a quick YouTube video, I think I got the method down alright. After 90 minutes, everything was folded and put away. I even ended up with one empty drawer! And the rest looked near-picture perfect.

After all that work, being able to pull open a drawer and see everything was a huge reward. No longer would I be surprised by that sweater in the bottom of the drawer. My pajama drawer wouldn’t be overstuffed. All my pants could live in one spot! Getting dressed was easy!

What About Shoes and Bags?

I like my shoes and I like my bags, but I don’t have an outrageous collection of either. Thank goodness because I could not handle another tidying session like the one I did with clothing.

Because the first part of tidying was so exhausting, I admittedly half-assed the bag and shoe part. Or maybe it just felt that way because it didn’t take very long. Going through both took 10 minutes. I filled up an entire bag.

An Unexpected Stumbling Block

Along the way, though, I ran into sentimental items. A lot of them. My closet’s top shelf is apparently prime real estate for mementos of all kinds. High school yearbooks? There up there. Ticket stubs from all the concerts Michael and I saw while dating? They’re old and curled now, but yes, they call the top shelf home. Letters my great-grandma and great-aunt wrote? They’ve got their own shoebox there.

This felt like a pretty big stumbling block to me. Part because I was tempted just to deal with those items right there and then. Part because putting them back on the shelf felt like I wasn’t tidying right but leaving them out as clutter didn’t feel right either. I put them back – just for the time being.

How Does It Feel?

I couldn’t feel better about my drawer situation. It looks so darn good. My closet didn’t provide me with a dramatic transformation, but I’m thinking that’s fine for now.

In general, though, I’m really trying to learn. Pinpointing what sparks joy for me comes and goes, but Marie writes about how you develop this sense more as you go. I’m hoping that comes in subsequent steps.

My biggest takeaway so far, though, is to work methodically and not to rush. Yes, she describes the process as quick, but she clarifies that means about six months. As someone who is more a hare than a tortoise, this is a big lesson. So I’m trying my best to go by the book, to work one section at a time and resist the urge to tidy things before their time.

For me, this is very big since I love working on a handful of projects at once. But I think it’s time I try something new (like slowing down).

• • •

P.S. If you want to see how I really felt in real time, check out my Instagram stories. I was a disaster.

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Small Goals // February 2019

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January is over, which means post-holiday recover is over, too. Let’s see how the month went!

  1. Make it to the gym eight times. Done! I was hoping it’d feel better. Getting back into the swing of things is hard.
  2. Organize, declutter and repair my kitchen cupboards. Done! We donated two boxes of kitchen gear. We also started watching Marie Kondo’s new show (and then read her book) so we’re inspired to tidy up.
  3. Read two books (maybe even three!). I started three different books, but I’m not done with a single one!
  4. Try a new bake. I made the Baller Birthday Sheet Cake from Christina Tosi’s All About Cake. It was phenomenal.
  5. Get rid of my oldest assignments at work. Done. I got rid of some of the oldest items in my queue and am working on finishing the last ones up. Here’s one about Dolly Parton’s signature chicken and dumplings.

4/5. Sure, five out of five is always nice, but four feels good after the holidays. Outside of these goals, I spent most of the month enjoying slow nights making dinner, sipping wine, doing puzzles and watching Gilmore Girls. I regret nothing. I did have a good friend stay with us for a few nights. We ate cheese, shopped around and got matching lights for our homes. It was real good.

For February, I want to move from post-holiday recovery to progress at home.

  1. Go on a spending freeze(ish). I went a bit overboard with Christmas this year (and I felt that this January). I want to get my spending back on track. That means this month, money is for bills and food only – no clothes, no books, no impulse purchases at Target.
  2. Tackle KonMari parts two and three. Kondo-ing my closet was really freeing. While I don’t think I’ll be able to KonMari my home perfectly, I think I can do an OK job on the next two steps: books and papers.
  3. Reopen my Etsy shop. OK, OK. It was never closed, but I deactivated a lot of listings over the holidays. Honestly, a month-long break was exactly what I needed.
  4. Finish those books! I started three different books. Maybe I can finish them all? I’m trying to spend a bit more time reading this winter (and a little less time with Netflix).
  5. Plan a trip. About this time last year, Michael and I booked our trip to Bayfield. It did a lot to boost our moods. I’m hoping to do this same this February.

Let me know your February goals! I love reading them (and getting ideas for future months).

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The Life-Changing Magic of Getting Your Stuff Together

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Like most everyone, I got sucked into Marie Kondo’s Tidying Up on Netflix. After a single episode, Michael went through his closet. I cleaned up our kitchen. After the second episode, I bought her book.

I’m still working my way through the process, but the one principle that really help guide my way is visualizing the destination, which Marie writes a lot about.

Before you start getting rid of things, take the time to think this through carefully. This means visualizing the ideal lifestyle you dream of… The whole point in both discarding and keeping things is to be happy.

– Marie Kondo, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

What Is Our Dream Lifestyle?

Hoping to get Michael fully on board, I asked him what his picture-perfect version of our home would be so I could combine my vision with his.

His answer: I want our home to be cozy.

I agree with that 100 percent. And I think it’s very achieveable. After all, our home is, at its best, very cozy. Probably the coziest. Physically, our house is comfortable and small. Our sofa is layered with the softest blankets (and, consequently, cats). The light is soft, the living space is open and ready for visitors, though it feels full with just us. And most nooks and crannies are full of mementos that make us nostalgic and happy.

Of course, this cozy vibe is often harshed by clutter – I’m talking mail, laundry, craft supplies. So it’s not always the picture of comfort and warmth. But we try. Maybe after going through the full KonMari method, we could be consistently cozy (or mostly). I feel like coziness, as a goal, is definitely within our grasp.

My Ideal Vision of Our Home

When I asked myself what my ideal lifestyle in my home would be, though, I paused. Yes, absolutely, I want a cozy, comfortable and welcoming home. But what else? A creative space? I mean, sure. A place to entertain? Yes, we like to host parties and get-togethers. A retreat from stress? Yeah, that’d be pretty good. But these didn’t really fit.

But then it hit me. What I really wanted on a practical level was for those things – creating, baking, entertaining – to be easier because – clutter or not – I’m going to do those things. But as it stands now, working on projects and entertaining aren’t really effortless (or at least as easy as they could be).

Baking means having to clean off the counter, dragging the heavy KitchenAid from the closet. Crafting means pushing aside all the coats and digging through drawers. Certainly, those things aren’t that hard, but they weren’t really that easy, not for something fun, at least. It was like my old light table. Sure, it worked fine, but the process of using it made the project – something I should love – a chore.

So this is my goal: To make my hobbies and everyday chores easier and more joyful. This means reconfiguring my home to be more functional. Does that mean that where I store my food and where I keep my cooking gear should swap? Maybe! Does that mean that I have to reorganize the coat/craft closet. Oh, it sure does. Does it mean that I need to sort through everything I own so I can identify what’s really important? Most likely.

And that really doesn’t bother me too much. I’m looking forward to a life where baking is a joy, not a pain in the butt. A life where I manage to keep my craft supplies organized because putting them away is simple and not some outsize task that requires me to rearrange the whole closet.

And with all that stuff working for me on a functional level, maybe I’ll be able to reduce the clutter so I can be ready to entertain or just stay in and be cozy at any time.