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All Things Home

All Things Home

the lost art of polishing & ironing

Last week, I took some time to pay a bit of attention to my pens and pencils.  If you use disposable ballpoint pens, that might sound like an odd task, but I primarily use fountain pens, refillable mechanical pencils, and even refillable ballpoint pens.  Several of my pens and pencils are silver or brass, which need to be polished now and then.  I realize not everyone would want to spend time out of their day to polish their pencils and fiddle with a clogged nib on a fountain pen, but I found delight in the chore. Even though we have more time-saving and labor-saving devices than ever, we use more disposable things than ever. I’m not judging anyone who uses disposable things for their ease.  I used disposable diapers for my boys.  I use paper plates and cups when we have a lot of people over, paper towels for rags

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1970 home renovation

2025 home project wish list

I was amused as I was putting together my wish-list projects for this post because I know my eyes are bigger than my stomach when it comes to my home project ambitions.  I always overestimate my energy and underestimate the time and money it will take to complete a project.  I don’t know if I’ll ever learn my lesson in this area because I am an optimist.  I did leave some of the more expensive projects off the list, like new windows and bathroom renovations because it’s doubtful those will be a financial priority this year, but we’ll see. Here are my hopes for 2025… Paint the trim and doors along the back of the house and paint and install the shutters.  I planned on doing this last year when the weather was warm and we just never got around to it.  I even have the paint and the shutters

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1970 home renovation

2024 home project recap

If you’ve ever lived in a house that needs some work, even if it’s just customizing it to suit your tastes, you know it’s important to stop now and then and appreciate how much you’ve done.  It’s easy to focus on projects still hanging out on the to-do list and lose sight of all of the ones that are crossed off.  So, around the end of one year or the beginning of the next, I like to reflect in a blog post.  You can find 2023 HERE and 2022 HERE. So, I had an ambitious amount of projects on my list for this year and many of them didn’t get done.  We’re in a season of life where we need to buy cars for teenagers, pay for their car insurance (yikes), and pay for college classes.  New windows and bathroom renovations got bumped down the list.  But, we still got

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All Things Home

the Repoussé pitcher

When I shared my Christmas dining room last week, I received so many comments and questions about the silver water pitcher on the table. It’s a sterling silver pitcher by Kirk Stieff in the Repoussé pattern that was first introduced in 1828.  I’ve shared about this silver pattern before since it is my family’s silver and it makes a regular appearance here on the blog. Four generations of my family have collected this pattern and a portion of the collection was passed down to me, including this stunning water pitcher. Some of the pieces I inherited date back to the mid-1800s. Since Marian is a family name, a couple even have my name on them. My Oma collected things she loved, including this silver pattern that was passed down to her and added to over the years. I know this pitcher was hers because it wears her monogram. It may

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a slice of life

top 10 posts of 2024

At the beginning of the new year, I always like to check out my analytics to see the list of the most popular blog posts from the previous year.  I don’t pay too much attention to analytics generally, because I write for people, not for algorithms and search engines, but it’s nice to know which posts were most visited, perhaps most helpful, timely, or resonating.  Interestingly, the top posts were rarely written in that same calendar year.  They are usually posts that have gained some traction on Google, Pinterest, or a social media platform.  For years, my top post was how to make a seat cushion!  (You can find that HERE if you need it.)  It has fallen off of my top ten list and other practical posts have replaced it. Here are the top ten blog posts from 2024… Salt dough, humble as it is, has been having a

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All Things Home

Christmas dining room 2024

This year, I focused my Christmas decorating on our home’s three public (and most used) rooms – the kitchen, living room, and dining room.  Some years, I will add decor to the bedrooms, bathrooms, or my studio, but I decided to keep it simple.  I enjoyed decorating the kitchen and living room this year, but my favorite was the dining room.  For our first Christmas in the house, the walls still wore remnants of wallpaper glue and an old minty-green paint.  Last year, the walls were simply primed white.   (You can see that HERE.)  This year, the ceiling is freshly painted, wainscoting and trim have been installed and painted in Oval Room Blue, and a hand-painted mural (in the French block-print scenic wallpaper style) is about 90% finished.  There are still things to do, but it feels like a finished room. As I did with the kitchen and living rooms,

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Decorating

Christmas Kitchen 2024

I shared our Christmas living room 2024 yesterday and, if you missed it, you can see it in THIS POST.  Today, I’m giving a little tour of the kitchen and eating area. Last year was the first year I had the chance to decorate our newly-renovated kitchen for Christmas, so I had a great time with it.  This year, I kept most of the decor the same since I really loved it.  There are a few differences, though. antique baker’s table | hardwood floors | Ilve range | brass pot rail | quartz counters I used the same wreath I made last year (you can find details HERE), but the velvet ribbons didn’t store very well, so I changed those out.  I used the same dried orange slice garland along the pot rail.  I made it last year and stored it in a zip topped back in the basement and

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Decorating

Christmas 2024 Living Room

Well, I might be (literally) limping across the Christmas decorating finish line, but I’ve made it.  I added things this year and left other things out, making decisions based on how I felt at any given moment.  Sometimes I had a spurt of energy and was really excited about what I was doing and then other times I thought I might be finished.  In the end, nothing in life hinges on Christmas decorations, so I did what felt fun and most important to me.  While I do share my Christmas decorating online as a part of my job, I am woefully behind, weeks behind, for that to serve its intended purpose.  I’m sure your decorating is done, so you probably don’t need to see mine to get ideas!  But there isn’t a time limit on when ideas can be used or when inspiration will show up at just the right

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I’m Marian, a painter, writer, and lover of all things creative. From art and antiques to home projects and everyday life, I share my journey in hopes of inspiring you to embrace your own creativity and make beauty in the spaces you live.

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