gift guide for kids | target is my favorite + one delightful home

Need a gift for a little person? Or multiple gifts? Here are a few things my kids have loved, or we are giving them for Christmas this year!!

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• INSTAX CAMERA I got this last year and my 5 year old loves it!

• Magnatiles, great gift for little people. My 5 & 8 year old will still play with them after years of play!

• Jetson hoverboard ….our son is getting this and I think he is going to love it.

• Osmo Creative Kit (or these OSMO products! Interactive, educational + entertaining! Hot Wheels // Genius Starter Kit // frozen creative kit // coding kit )

• Crayola Art Kit (love things that allow kids to create like this!)

• A magazine subscription - we are doing Sports Illustrated for Kids for our son

• Harmonica…this is possibly my most random suggestion, but my nephew (age 2) got one for his birthday and it was wanted by kids all ages at the party!

• Lol Surprise Dolls. My 5 year old daughter LOVES these. She loves the surprise of opening the new doll + each one has lots of little packages inside. We got a small set for her this year.

• Nerf Dart Rover. I haven’t tried this, but there is a chance this would make my son + me very happy.

• Fossil KIt. Looking for an activity to keep little ones busy? I have heard nothing but good things about these kits!

Ok - so there are some tried + true suggestions for kids! Hope it helps simplify your shopping this holiday!

Alternatives to Ugg Boots

Every winter I regretfully find myself slipping back into my old Ugg boots. They have held up well over the past I don’t know ten years…and they are like wearing slippers in public. BUT I don’t feel great about the fashion statement I am making.

I am guessing I’m not the only one…I polled you all on my target instagram account and I had a lot of requests for suggestions.

I am on the search for something that will:

• keep my feet warm

• be easy to slip on

• preferably not tied

• feel a little more stylish than my tall Ugg boots

Honestly, after all these years, it’s hard to beat Uggs, but I tried to come up with some alternatives.

Some are still Ugg brand, but feel a little more stylish than my current tall ugg boots. I am noticing the shortest version around online and I do prefer the look of those. (I have owned this style, but they were harder to get on….you might need to size up)

What do you think? Should we all just keep rocking the Uggs and embrace the comfort?

xo, Katie

Airbnbing Your Home

If you had told me that we would Airbnb our personal residence, I don’t know if I would have believed you. I liked the income potential, but I had a lot of reservations about opening up our home and trusting other people I didn’t know with my home and belongings.

I can share more on how we finally decided to Airbnb our home if anyone is curious…the short of it is AirBnb does support the people that rent through them and we have had mostly positive experiences with guests, but we have had even more positive interactions with Airbnb as a company.

We are now airbnbing our second home. We did this when we lived in Massachusetts and now we are in Virginia doing it again. Our plan was to rent out our basement, but the construction has taken longer than expected.

So plan B. We are renting our entire personal residence. If you would like to see the listing, here is our listing if you are curious.

So here are 10 quick things that helped up Airbnb our home.

Click the Button below to view the PDF.

If you have questions feel free to leave them in the comments or find me on instagram and send me a dm.

Updated Foyer: The Rowe House

We have made enough progress on our house that it feels like we can start making some fun additions. It’s not all just getting things to status quo livable, but I’m starting to play around with some design decisions.

Here is our foyer after we removed the fuzzy yellow wallpaper that was kind of fun, but ultimately smelled dingy after hanging on the walls for 60 years. Its not that I didn’t love the wallpaper, but it needed to go.

BEFORE

I had thought of a few options to spice up the entryway….I considered painting a pattern myself on the wall to save money, using wallpaper that I already had from an old project…but ultimately I went with this wallpaper on Amazon.

AFTER

Some details.

The walls door is Benjamin Moore Marblehead Gold. I’m really happy with the color and really happy it pays homage to the North Shore of Boston that we miss so much.

The wallpaper is linked here.

And the rug is here!

I’m glad I took this little risk and wallpapered the front foyer….now to decide on the bannister. :)

The pink bathroom update

Would I have liked to save the pink bathroom? Yes. I love the idea of the save the pink bathroom movement.

BUT, when you have missing tiles exposing subfloor and a moldy pink toilet that doesn’t always flush, I am much less pro-the pink bathroom movement.

So this is our before….

I knew I wanted gold hardware as much as possible and decided to do black as a second accent.

I initially ordered these beautiful mirrors from Target - but it felt like too much gold.

Sources:

vanity / wayfair

tile / wayfair

faucets / amazon!

shower curtain / target

faux eucalyptus / amazon

lights / amazon

mirrors / amazon

blinds / similar

stool

Laundry room refresh

I knew this little laundry room had so much potential and with it being a small space we could take a risk without spending too much money.

Here is the room before…

Before laundry room

I love Grace in Magnolia’s laundry room & used it for inspiration. I didn’t choose the same paper - mostly because Target’s is easily accessible & returnable & affordable.

Grace in magnolia’s Laundry roOm

What I learned from wallpapering this small space:

• You’ll need more than you expect (we went back to target twice!)

• This particulate pattern is very forgiving. My mom and I obsessed over lining it up just right and the pattern is so crazy it doesn’t seem to give away any flaws.

• Target’s Devine wallpaper is very affordable as far as wallpaper goes - but you pay for it in frustrations with hanging the heavy duty contact paper substance.

Sources:

• wallpaper

• Shelves are a polyurethane/stain combo in black.

• Brackets (Home Depot)