I'm a wife, stay-at-home mom, crafter, and blogger living in rural New England. As seen in Martha Stewart Living, Food Network Magazine, and more! | Tutorials, DIY, crafts, parenting tips, recipes, money saving tips, product reviews, local product features, New England living, intentional living, and more! |
A few years ago we built a detached garage on our property which we nicknamed “the barn.” We were on a tight budget when we had it built so we kept everything very basic - basic windows, basic doors, etc. Now that we’ve lived with it for a few years we’re slowly upgrading what we can with easy and cheap DIYs, like this two minute garage door makeover - no tools needed! | This post contains affiliate links |
The front of our barn just looked so plain and boring... it definitely needed "something" to give it more character and the basic builder-grade garage door just wasn't cutting it. One day while I was on Amazon I came across these magnetic faux hinges and handles with amazing reviews and thought that was perfect!
To install them I wiped down the garage door real quick first to remove any dirt and then just stuck the hinges to the door right from the box. There are several magnets on the back of each item so they’re easy to stick on and reposition as needed.
The faux hinges and handles are made from thick plastic so they won’t rust - but they certainly don’t look plastic! Even up close they have a lot of texture and really look like forged metal. The handles even fooled my kids and they totally thought they were real! And if you want to keep your doors more simple you could easily just put the hinges up or just the handles and leave it at that.
This quick addition to our plain garage door really has made a difference in making our “barn” look more finished and giving it better curb appeal. Hopefully next year we’ll get the driveway paved up to it and add some landscaping and then it really will be done.
Looking for more cheap and easy DIY’s? See our previous Blog Post on how I added “window panes” to our basic builder-grade windows and it’s made such a difference. They’re still up years later and look as good as the day I first put them up.
Now that we’re always eating at home and not going out for breakfast it’s great to have a fast and easy no-mess egg sandwich that you can make quicker than than it would take you to sit in the drive-thru line. This trick will make the perfect fluffy egg sandwich start-to-finish in just about ONE MINUTE. For reals. | This post contains affiliate links. |
Really, this “recipe” couldn’t be any easier… the bottom line is you will need an egg, an English muffin (or some type of bread), a microwave-safe coffee mug, and a microwave. That’s it!
You might also want some shredded cheese handy, small diced precooked veggies (leftovers from the night before work great), hot sauce - or any other topping of your choice.
First, crack the egg into your microwave-safe coffee mug and “whisk” with a fork to break up the yolk. Now is also the time to add a generous pinch of shredded cheese (shown here) or a small amount of chopped pre-cooked veggies (leftovers work great). Put the mug in the microwave and cook on high/normal for one minute* (*please note that depending on your microwave model and what you add, you may need to adjust your cook time. Also DO NOT microwave fork.) While the egg is cooking you can toast your bread, if desired.
Once the egg is done make sure it is cooked throughly (it’s opaque with no runny spots and steaming all the way through) by checking with a clean fork and loosen it from the mug. Then simply turn the egg out onto your bread and add any condiments you desire - I personally can’t eat eggs without hot sauce.
And that is it! Once the coffee mug cools, just soak it in the sink to loosen any stuck-on egg and run through the dishwasher like normal. No pans to heat up or clean after which is a huge plus in my book. Enjoy your easy breakfast :)
Disclaimer: Please note that depending on your microwave model and what you add, you may need to adjust your cook time. Make sure your egg is fully cooked before eating.
With the Covid-19 Pandemic still persisting and school in our state cancelled for the rest of the school year (and maybe longer), average parents have been thrown into the role of becoming teachers too and most of us weren’t prepared at all. While I have a degree in Art Education, I went a different career route after graduation and my teaching/classroom management skills are now quite rusty. So I pulled from my own classroom and remote teaching experiences - as well as polling many teacher friends, homeschooling parents, and regular now-remote-teaching-parents for ideas on what’s working for them and what supplies have been lifesavers as they navigate this new remote learning world. | This post contains affiliate links |
Give Yourself Grace
This is probably the biggest takeaway from everyone I’ve talked to…. remote learning during a Pandemic is definitely uncharted territory and everyone is trying to figure things out - readjusting roles, schedules, expectations, everything. Most of us weren’t cut out to be teachers, and it can be incredibly hard to motivate and focus your own kids as well as their teachers are able to. Ultimately, it’s a matter of doing the best that you can in the circumstance you’re currently in… and don’t beat yourself up if everything isn’t perfect.
Communicate with Teachers and Administrators
If you have a lot going on at home (working from home yourself, several kids schedules to juggle, other personal hurdles to deal with, etc) or if the teacher’s expectations for remote learning are just unrealistic, definitely reach out to them to voice your concerns and come up with a plan. Maybe deadlines can be extended, or the workload can be reduced to the essential assignments. Maybe the big group Zoom meetings are too overwhelming and frustrating for your young child and they need a one-on-one meeting instead. Maybe the schedule the teacher came up with won’t work for your family with your own work and other school schedules. The point is - if you or your kids are feeling overwhelmed and stressed about about the whole remote learning process, it’s worth discussing with their teachers and administrators so that you can come up with something that works for everyone and still meets all the learning requirements.
Come up With a Schedule that Works for Your Family
This will take some trial-and-error. And if you have older students with a heavier workload, their home school day might just look very similar to a regular school day schedule-wise and time-wise - especially if they can work pretty independently. But for us with younger kids, mom or dad needs to be there to walk them through each assignment, activity, and online meeting.
If you’re also working from home or juggling other kids schedules too this can be particularly challenging and exhausting... if you need something to buy periods of occupation from your kids (maybe so you can do an uninterupted confrence call, or you can concentrate helping one child with an assignment while keeping the other kids busy), consider giving them something they will enjoy doing and keep them safely occupied (but always under some parent supervision of course). Maybe it's educational games on the Kindle, or perhaps low-mess craft projects, or an hour of TV time, or reading a book series on their own that they enjoy, etc. Or maybe you find school work or office work done in fragments at unusual times is what works best for your family.
For us personally with younger kids, we’ve fallen into a good rhythm and schedule over the last two months of remote learning. For our family we’ve found it best to buckle down in the mornings and get the work done first thing when attention spans are at their best and everyone is well rested. So our daughter works through her assignments one-by-one every morning with breaks for snack and classroom meetings. Our goal is to have all her work completed for the day by lunchtime, and while some days that doesn’t happen and things need to be finished after lunch, most of the time she’s done by noon which leaves the afternoons for “free choice fun.” Typically, spending the whole afternoon outside if the weather is nice or inside playing legos or watching a movie if it’s raining (and while the kids are playing I can chip away at whatever work I need to get done too). Our days have consistent expectations and a nice rhythm to them now which helps a lot.
Set Snack and Meal Times
As anyone with kids home 24/7 can tell you, they can and WILL eat you out of house and home if you let them. By having set snack and mealtimes it will help your pantry and wallet by not blowing through all your quarantine snacks in 2 days flat. I’ve seen some parents even pack their kids lunch box every morning, just like they would for school, so the kids have a finite amount of snacks and lunch food for the day.
Designate a School Space and Stay Organized
Having a designated “school space” that has all the supplies your kids will need to complete their assignments at their fingertips can be crucial to success. Ideally having a desk or separate workspace would be ideal, but any designated space can work. For us, we set up one end of our kitchen island - it has a laptop where our daughter completes most of her assignments online and a small basket where we store paper, workbooks, flashcards, and a few ziplock bags containing different supplies that she uses often (markers, counting chips, etc). By having everything ready to go each day, there's no excuse when it's time to get to work.
I polled many friends, both teachers and regular parents who are now remote teaching, and compiled a list of things they have needed or found to be extremely helpful during this time. Younger kids definitely tend to need more learning aides so the list has many items geared to younger students but there are also some items that can be useful for older grade levels listed too. Click the button below to browse our picks, which I will be periodically adding to as I get more suggestions:
Our home came with a classic late 90’s “builder’s grade kitchen” - you know the type: honey-colored basic cabinets with no hardware and laminate counters. Someday we’d love to totally overhaul the space and paint the cupboards, trim them out, and install granite countertops - however all those things involve a lot of work and money and just aren’t in the budget right now. In the meantime we’re working on making small upgrades ourselves that will make the space look more finished. And what’s the easiest, budget-friendly way to update the look of your cabinets? Replace or install new hardware! If you’re installing new hardware on blank cabinets it can be a bit intimidating, so read on for my tips on installing for the first time. And don’t forget to enter our GIVEAWAY over on Instagram for a $50 Credit to Cosmas Hardware! | This post is sponsored by Cosmas Hardware and affiliate links |
If you’re installing new hardware on a blank cabinet door, the first step is deciding hardware placement. I’m a very visual person so to help me decide on where things would go I first traced the hardware on a piece of black construction paper, cut it out, and taped them to the door and drawer fronts. This way I could step back and play around with the placement before I finalized it.
For our cabinets, we decided we liked the knobs two inches from the edge of the cabinet (not including the beveled edge). Once we decided on this placement, it was just a matter of measuring it out on all the cabinet doors so they were centered side-to-side on the trim piece as well as two inches in. Consistency is key to having uniform placement - and I made sure to measure multiple times in both directions before marking it with a pen
It’s important to measure the knobs on each door independently - if the doors aren’t hung evenly, it may look off initially but the hinges can be adjusted later so everything (the doors themselves as well as the hardware) will line up visually.
When it comes time to drill the holes, it’s important to make a small pilot (starter) hole before you drill the full size hole. There’s several reasons for this, but the two most important ones being that larger drill bits tend to “walk” when you drill on a smooth surface, and without drilling a pilot hole first you might end up off your mark. The other important reason is that pre-drilling the hole smaller first will help lessen the chance of the wood splitting. Be aware of what’s behind the cabinet front when you drill! Make sure you aren’t drilling into the cabinet frame or dishes that may be in the cabinet behind the door. For the larger hole you’ll want the drill bit diameter to be just barely bigger than the diameter of the screws that come with the hardware.
Once the larger hole is drilled, slide the screw in from the back and use a screwdriver to hold it in place while you thread the knob on snuggly.
Deciding on drawer pull placement. (Note that while the lower cabinet knobs are each in the correct place, they look off since the cabinet doors are uneven - this can be fixed by adjusting the cabinet door hinges, which I did once I was finished installing all the hardware.)
For the drawer pulls I followed a similar procedure as I did for the door fronts. One thing I had to keep in mind though is the drawer pulls I chose aren’t symmetrical top-to-bottom - the mounting screws are towards the bottom of of the pulls. Therefore, playing around with the placement of the drawer pulls was very important - the drawer pulls needed to look centered visually from top to bottom on the drawer fronts, even though that made for the screw placement to be slightly below center.
Once I liked the visual placement of the paper templates I carefully measured out the spacing on each side as well as down from the screw holes to make sure everything was accurate and even. These particular drawer pulls have screws 3” apart so I made sure that the spacing between the screw markings was accurate as well. (Once you get an idea of placement, you could also use a Cabinet Hardware Template here to help mark everything out.) In our kitchen the drawers are three different sizes, so this process needed to be repeated several times - on the shorter drawers I used one pull, and on the longer drawer I used two pulls.
After the hole placements were marked, I remeasured the spacings several times before drilling the pilot holes and then the screw holes. Then it’s simply a matter of screwing the screws in from the backside of the drawers with a screwdriver into the drawer pulls.
AFTER
And that’s it - the whole project took less than an afternoon to do and it really helps our kitchen look more finished. I just love how it came out! Once we replace our countertops with a more modern granite counter the space will really look sharp and the hardware will compliment it beautifully.
GIVEAWAY!
Head on over to our Instagram for details and to enter our Giveaway with Cosmas Hardware for a $50 shop credit so you can update the look of your kitchen too with the hardware of your choice!
- I received these items from Cosmas Hardware but all opinions expressed are my own. Please read our full Disclosure Policy for more information -
Disclaimer: Installing new cabinet hardware from scratch is something that most people can very easily do on their own and here I’ve shared my tips on the easiest way I’ve personally found to measure and install them. However, use your best judgement when installing your hardware - if you’re in doubt of your measuring or drilling skills, there’s no harm in consulting a professional before you tackle this or any project.
As you know by now, I love sharing about companies and products we love on my blog and our Instagram - and most especially those made right here in New England. I decided it would be so fun to highlight some of our local New England Makers regularly on my blog and thought I would kick off the series by sharing a little bit more about myself and Birch Landing Home by answering some frequently asked questions.
Birch Landing Home is best known for hand-etched wooden ornaments, garland, and other handmade crafts. I also run this blog where I mainly focus on New England lifestyle, motherhood, and budget-friendly DIY projects.
Tell me a little bit about yourself and your business.
My name is Sarah and I’m a wife, stay-at-home mom, and self-confessed Pinterest addict living in rural New England with our dog and chickens. I started Birch Landing Home a few years ago after our daughter was born because I was looking for a flexible, creative outlet to work from home while still being a stay-at-home mom. I’ve always loved making crafts and thought selling them on Etsy was a good start, I also thought it would be fun to document the little DIY projects I was doing around our home and so I started this blog also.
What does a typical day look like for you?
My #1 job is stay-at-home mom… so my priority is taking care of our daughter, our animals, and chores around our home. During nap time and after we put our daughter to bed for the day is when I get a chance to work on crafts for my Etsy shop and write articles for the blog. I’m thankful for the privilege to be a stay-at-home mom and the flexibility to be able to work on Birch Landing Home when I’m able to.
What’s your favorite part about owning your own company? And least favorite part?
My favorite part about running Birch Landing Home is the flexibility and adaptability… when I first started my Etsy shop I was making jewelry but then decided to go in a different direction and focus more on rustic-style crafts. It was great being able to change my focus like that and make Birch Landing Home what I wanted it to be. My least favorite part is probably self-doubt… Every time I send out an order I worry if the customer/store will like it, what they will think of it, etc - I don’t want to disappoint anyone. Also, because I use a lot of natural materials there is quite a bit of variation in my work too and I worry people won’t appreciate that rustic aspect of it.
What has been the most exciting moment for Birch Landing Home since starting?
By far my most exciting moment for Birch Landing Home has been being featured in Martha Stewart Living Magazine as the Instagram Favorite for that month. I was so thrilled to be selected and featured - I have been reading Martha Stewart Living Magazine for years and have several of her craft and cookbooks. Such an honor!
What advice do you have for people just starting out?
My advice for those who want to start a handmade business or blog is… just start! It’s easy to overthink everything, over plan, and obsess over details and never get anything in motion. In my opinion it’s better to get things started and then tweak and finalize things as you go. It’s also important to keep finances separate and keep track of all income/expenses for tax time.
What is your long-term goal? Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
My long-term goal is to continue to grow my Etsy shop and blog. I would love to get more wholesale accounts for my crafts throughout New England, it’s so exciting to see my items in local shops. I also hope to continue to grow my blog following and hopefully get more opportunities to be featured in print. I’ve been lucky enough to be featured in a few print magazines so far (including Martha Stewart Living Magazine, Food Network Magazine, and New Hampshire Magazine), and I hope exciting features like that will continue in the future.
Why do you love sharing about New England Makers?
I love sharing about New England Makers because I think there is so much talent in our area that deserves to be shown off. There are so many wonderful, hardworking, creative people who work in lots of different materials and styles. I always love discovering new-to-me businesses and sharing about them.
DO YOU OWN A NEW ENGLAND-BASED BUSINESS AND WOULD LIKE TO BE FEATURED IN AN UPCOMING INTERVIEW? OR WOULD YOU BE INTERESTED IN HAVING ME STYLE, REVIEW, AND FEATURE ONE OF YOUR PRODUCTS? Please drop me a note.
