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B L O G

Homemaking Vs. Decorating

July 5, 2017 maddie

A few months back, I got the opportunity to work with Home Reserve on styling some of their furniture in my home. Our partnership has grown, and now I get to play in their studio every month staging their furniture in all different ways, with all different styles. It's got me exploring interior design and decorating a lot lately, specifically on Instagram and Pinterest.

I think because of this I've been asked a couple times recently if I want to become a decorator, or at the very least, create a decor-focused Instagram account. With all the styling work I've been doing, and our move to the new house just days away, I really thought about it. I'd have plenty of material. It sounds like fun. It sounds scary. It's new and exciting. I know it would stretch and challenge me.

But, I've decided no.

The more I've immersed myself in the decor-inspiration current online, the more I realize decorating is not synonymous with homemaking. I've always considered making the home beautiful to be part of housekeeping, but I'm realizing there's this whole world of making things beautiful, that doesn't even really involve the housekeeping side of things. While there's nothing wrong with this whatsoever, I don't really want to separate the two. 

Being a decorator solely doesn't feel like me. In fact, Mitch and I have been talking about projects and ideas for our new house, mostly figuring out how to UNDECORATE it. We want to strip it down, take it back to a pretty raw state. I'm all about a place under a roof where we can make our food, bathe, rest, and sleep. We want cozy corners to read to each other, and soft rugs where we can have tickle fights, and areas to make and clean up messes. I want to be able to look around in that place and see comfort and coziness everywhere. And sometimes that's more than decor. Sometimes that's just fresh air, and amazing smells, and furniture and rugs that have wear, and plants that have had to fight a bit 'cause they haven't been spoiled (ok, honestly they've probably been neglected).

The designer in me wants to make it beautiful too. But, if we go into this focused only on getting pretty pictures out of it, while we keep ordering takeout and the laundry piles up, we're not going to get the home we're both dreaming of. 

I'm realizing my real intention is to be a HOMEMAKER. I love design. I love projects. I love a big transformation, and a magazine-worthy product. But not to the neglect of the magically mundane stuff: the laundry, the gathering, the cooking, the puttering, the nesting. It's sacred work to me. It's what's been in my heart since my girlhood—a haven of my own to pour my heart, sweat, tears, and laughter into. A setting for our life's stories.

So... I want to share all of that: posts for hashtag parties with my new decorator friends, who are hilariously awesome people with beautiful homes AND I want to share food, forts, Fridays, and feelings. You know, all of it. I'm still a newbie homemaker. There's lots to do and learn in the midst of decorating. The pretty rooms will be there, just hopefully right along with everything else that can be a little harder to photograph.


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In H O M E
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Hi. We're
Maddie + Cord.

Friends turned co-authors. We tell true stories about our lives-in-progress. Playing with food and essential oils, teaching yoga, mom-ing, styling and designing. Making and trying things, because we can't help it, not because we know what we're doing. We're here for the connections. 

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F O L L O W   U S

Current motto: ‘If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.’ - Wayne Dyer
A tidy corner in my office. Well nearly, the radiator is covered in dust bunnies still.
And 10 years later here we are... .
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Top left: our first official photo together.
Bottom left: our most recent photo together. 
Top right: our first summer together 
Bottom right: our past summer together.
.
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#10yearschallenge #happydatinganniversary
Facts: Freddie’s head is huge because her brain is awesome, also she holds her weight in her cheeks #wellfed Her eyes are still light blue, she’s turning me onto pink, and her little fists are hardcore af. She couldn’t get here soon enough. Like where has she been my whole life? #freddieanne
I like how life shapes these rooms. I decorate them, and then gifts and rituals and time and personality and lots of mess morphs them to better serve the souls that rest here. #nurserynooks
Dressed appropriately for bacon at the Friendly Fox. #phoenixwashburn

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