We’ve had several requests for a monthly roundup to make it easier to find recent posts and see what we’ve accomplished at a glance. While out to dinner (our first date since Clara was born), we joked about naming projects with cheeky superlatives, and the idea stuck. So, here is our July roundup with a playful awards twist—plus the admission that we probably shouldn’t be talking about the blog on dates.
Before the list, a quick bit of trivia: John’s high school marching band once voted him “Friendliest Male” three years in a row, while I ended up in the yearbook as “Best Friends” alongside Jenny Czajkowski (who once helped me highlight my hair with bleach in her sink). But enough about that—on with July’s superlatives:
Most Cheerful: Painting the Laundry Room — a happily bright greeny-yellow that instantly lifts the space.
Most Improved: Adding Built-Ins to the Laundry Room — we built simple storage, painted it, and filled it with things we already owned to make the room much more functional.
Nicest Legs: Refinishing Parsons Chair Legs — a small makeover with big style impact.
Most Likely NOT To Succeed (first try): The Guest Room Light Switcheroo — we tried a switch change that required a re-do, proving some projects take multiple attempts.
Runner Up, Most Likely NOT To Succeed: Framing Our Anniversary Note Cards — we reframed them once, then reworked the frames again to remove the borders.
Most Likely To Please The Queen: Tea-Dyeing Pillow Covers — a charming, inexpensive way to age fabric and add depth to pillows.
Most Likely To Result In A Crack Joke: Filling Patio Cracks with polymeric sand — oddly satisfying and definitely worth the elbow grease.
Runner Up, Most Likely To Result In A Crack Joke: Caulking the Laundry Room Ceiling — which sparked additional small projects in that area.
Most Outdoorsy: Spray-Painting Patio Furniture — another round of ORB (oil-rubbed bronze) for refreshed outdoor seating.
Runner Up, Most Outdoorsy: A Mini Porch Spruce-Up — small curb-appeal wins that make coming home nicer.
Class Nerd: Coding a Room Gallery — a bit of front-end work to showcase our rooms in an organized gallery.
Most Breastfeeding-Focused: My Breastfeeding Post — a personal diary-style entry that prompted nearly 1,000 comments and a lot of honest conversation.
Most Free-Spirited: My Unironed Ribbon Chandelier — the ribbon remains intentionally unpressed, and I’m oddly fond of its imperfect charm.
Most Controversial: Priming and painting our laundry cabinets, switching out hardware, and hanging our ironing board — that one sparked a lively debate about direction and placement.
Most Glamorous: Painting Clara’s Closet Pink and Experimenting with Champagne “Stencils” — the stencil experiments continued, and I’ve completed about a fifth of the closet so far.
Most Embarrassing: The Pinterest Challenge Video — easily our most cringe-worthy moment.
Most Spontaneous: Around early July, Clara surprised us by deciding to walk. She skipped a long crawling phase and suddenly she was off—independent and a little too cool for us. We didn’t do a full post, but we shared a clip for anyone who missed it.
Most Immature: The Twig & Berries Project — spray-painting frames and mats, misplacing a duvet, and generally embracing the silly side of decorating.
So there you have it: July in one tidy roundup. It was fun to reflect on small, inexpensive projects—like tea-dying pillows, painting the laundry room and Clara’s closet, and crafting a ribbon chandelier for under $2—alongside larger undertakings like custom built-ins and a room gallery. We bounce between quick transformations and longer DIYs, and reviewing everything at once feels satisfying. What did you tackle this month? Do you ever make a list of accomplishments to look back on? Stopping to appreciate what’s done, instead of only adding new items to the to-do list, can be surprisingly rewarding.