How to blend two schools of thought about cleaning under one roof
I try to do daily cleaning until I get behind and overwhelmed. Then he will take a weekend and do a massive cleaning. We both end up feeling like the other one never does any cleaning. How can we find a better compromise?
Agnostic seasonal decor: it’s winter, not Christmas
I’d love to get some ideas for non-Christmas-holiday decorations. DIY would be especially treasured. Something more winter solstice-based…or really just not anything overly Santa Claus/presents/Christian-centered.
I am really awful at bringing details together, and I would love some offbeat advice!
I sold everything I own to make room for something amazing
I’ve never been one to amass collections of anything. I’ve moved…a lot. A lot a lot a lot; over 30 times before moving out after high school a lot. But selling everything I owned to move across the planet was still jarring.
How do you guarantee a white Christmas?
By building a homemade snow machine. This Instructable has all the info.
Remembering the convent: our 8-person intentional community on the south side of Chicago
Our home in the convent brought together eight people united by the desire to work for social justice. When I lived in this house we were all fresh out of college and ready to fight poverty, the education gap, global warming, and anything else that stood in our way. Almost all of the occupants still work in urban education and live lives to limit our ecological impact.
Everyone you live with has something to teach you. I learned how to cook for eight, how to container garden, how to make homemade cleaning supplies work, and how to love urban biking.
When home is a hospital room
The hospital was my literal home, but I soon realised I had to spiritually embrace my time there as well if I wanted to get out and make a recovery. I filled my room with little things to empower me to say ‘this isn’t just another nameless, faceless hospital room, this is MY space and goddammit, I’m owning it!’ With that ownership slowly came empowerment and a slow, slow process of finding myself again.
A Beastlie, shotgun shells used in decor, and Darth Vader snowflakes in this week’s reader photos
Start your week with our collection of interesting articles on the web and photos from our readers. In these Clicky Links you’ll find lots of sites to waste a little time on.
Click through, too, to find our links on submitting YOUR stuff to Offbeat Home!
Danielle lives in a barn built against bluffs along the Mississippi
I love so much about my barn. The original wood and stone is still visible despite all the renovation. The house is completely covered in ivy, which I thought looked really cool when I moved in this summer, but it completely blew my mind when it started turning red and gold this fall. I LOVE that it still has an open hay-loft type layout. I think that all of the old-timey features that make this place completely unique fit in with my personality (out front I still have a hitching post — A HITCHING POST — for realz) since I’ve always wished I was born in my parent’s generation. There was much better music back then.