Welcome to our home tour! This post has been a LONG time coming! We moved into this condo late December (mid renovation - no floors, no kitchen, and wires hanging from the ceiling. Yikes!). It was a complete overhaul. It's 99% complete; I'm pretty sure I'll always be changing things up! 

Northern Michigan features an abundance of quaint, charming towns that litter the lakeshore. To be honest, even though I grew up in Michigan, I didn’t even know many of these towns existed until I traveled north with my wife for her sales job and began exploring with my free time. To my pleasant surprise, there is an absurd amount of cute, small towns to explore, all of which have their own flavor and feel. Northern Michigan is absolutely worth your time. Even those from out of state should venture to the great north to see what it is all about and all it has to offer. NOTE: The water color in the summer literally resembles a tropical paradise.


This is the first in a series of five Northern Michigan must sees. Stay tuned! 

T-Town. The 6. Air Canada. Drake.. Bieber. Toronto, Ontario, is an incredible city with world class cuisine, more than a weekend's worth of sight seeing, and only a 6.5 hour drive from Grand Rapids. This was the first trip we took with friends. And let me tell you, it won't be the last. Between the laughs and copious amounts of walking, our friend and photographer, Ellen Kermeen, helped to capture the weekend. It was a BLAST. 

The question we get asked most frequently is where we found our matte black hardware. This post has been a long time coming! Finally, all of the links are gathered for you in one place. Matte black finishes are perfect for a minimal scandi vibe. They are dramatic, yet subtle. I had my heart set on matte black. Naturally, all of the black faucets I gravitated to were $700+ (I know I'm not the only one who suffers from always-finds-the-most-expensive-thing-on-the-rack disease). Because I value my marriage, I knew I needed to get creative. Determined to find affordable pieces (that weren't cheesy or plastic looking), I scoured the entire internet. Here are my "go to" matte black selections. 

I have attended the Grand Rapids Parade of Homes for YEARS. My Mom and Dad (who have always been involved in building and flipping) dragged me along each year since elementary school. I still look forward to it every spring and fall. This year, I am thrilled to be working with the Home Builders Association to promote this event! You are going to LOVE the homes in the parade this year. 

Welcome to the honeymoon series! For our honeymoon, we passed up the traditional lying on a beach in the Caribbean for a NorCal road trip that spanned 12 days and the northern half of California. Post one? The one and only San Francisco.  Arriving in San Fran, we were instantly enamored, driving the hilly streets that lead to views of splendor. Maybe it was tasting the gusts coming off the mountainous coastline while peering at the unbelievable Golden Gate Bridge. Perhaps it was the infusion of culture.  Either way, it was spectacular.