Orlando Sentinel: Living

When I heard that a book was coming out this month billing itself as the definitive collection of the world’s most fabulous home interiors of the past century, thoughts smashed up in my head like a three-car pileup: How could one ever pick?More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

Ah spring! The season of hay fever, taxes and deep cleaning. Yuck. Besides the general housekeeping that I know you do on a regular basis, (right?) — like dusting, vacuuming, wiping counters, changing your sheets and generally tidying up — once a year, we need to dive below the surface and get...

Within minutes of walking into my home, she’d flipped over four kitchen barstools with the moves of a wrestling champ, pulled out her electric drill and, like Rosie the Riveter, handily removed the stools’ seat cushions.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

Houseplants and I have a spotty record. Their survival around my place is hit and miss, mostly miss. If a houseplant survives more than a few months in my house, it’s DNA ought to go straight to the stud-farm equivalent for houseplants.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

I am a sucker for quizzes. What career should you actually have? (Writer. Phew!) What city should you live in? (Paris. I know.) What animal are you? (Otter. Otter?) So when I was offered an advanced copy of “The DIY Style Finder: Discover Your Unique Style and Decorate It Yourself,” (Harvest House...

If the last time you went out to buy wine glasses you came home with a five-alarm headache and a bag of plastic tumblers, you, like me, have probably asked yourself: Why, WHY are there so many kinds of wine glasses?More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

The trees in the yard had grown so big, while the slide in the playground looked so small. The walk to the elementary school seemed far less adventuresome, though the same sidewalk cracks were achingly familiar.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

Castles and cutlery. Foxes and flowers. Soldiers and sayings: Many hands make light work. Royal fetes and pastoral pets. All are the subject of tea towels, everyday household items that deserve far more respect (and better treatment) than I have been giving them — until now.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

Okay, so maybe the new dog beds were more for me than for Peapod and Pippin, but I thought I was doing us all a favor. Their old beds — two worn, janky, mismatched, biohazards that were a general disgrace to the master bedroom — needed to go.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share

Everything I learned about finding a mate I learned from hiring a contractor. So, men and women, listen up. If you’re entering a relationship or looking for one, you won’t find any better advice than this.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share