English Fireside Tea

Hello everyone, This afternoon I am enjoying an English afternoon tea in the library by the firesde. Last year we gave our library a makeover to make it more cozy. Tea by the fire while enjoying a book is my idea of a relaxing winter day. I love my English style teapot with a pretty English cottage on it. I have a small collection of dogs in the library. The Irish setter

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Too many smelly candles? Here’s how scents impact the air quality in your home

While candles, diffusers and air fresheners are designed to give off fragrant smells, research shows they can emit chemicals that are far less pleasing

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There’s nothing wrong with wanting your home to smell nice and fresh – and from candles to diffusers, there’s no shortage of home scent products to help you achieve that.

But having rampant fragrances in our indoor air can dramatically impact air quality, coming with a host of potential problems.

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Loch living: a beautiful home on the banks of the Tay

A design journalist and her family had always relished their trips to Scotland, but when a field by Loch Tay went up for sale, their dreams became reality

In 2013, Jill Macnair and her husband, Neil, bought a field on the edge of Loch Tay in Perthshire. The loch is a long, narrow stretch of dark water flanked by the Ben Lawers mountain range. The area had made a lasting impression on the couple almost 10 years previously when Macnair’s father had led them on a cycling expedition that skirted the south side of the loch. “The beauty of the landscape hit us both,” Macnair recalls.

Years later – married with two kids and living in London – the young family were on holiday on the Isle of Mull when Neil saw an ad for a field with planning permission. “We weren’t particularly thinking of doing anything like this,” says Macnair, “but we had such lovely memories of the area. On the drive back home, we took a detour to go and see it.”

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The best way to repair bathroom tile: Rip it out and start fresh

The tiles around a bathtub faucet are loose after the greenboard behind them deteriorated. Is there a way to repair it without completely retiling?

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LADISIC FINE HOMES HOUSE BEAUTIFUL WHOLE HOME 2022

Well...we made it through Christmas....I loved seeing all of the pictures of families and Christmas decorating.   Since I lost my sister to cancer in August of 2021.....the holidays feel a little sad for me. I know sometime soon it will be better as "time is the great healer"..... We have been through 2 showhouses on the last few post and now I have the last one that my friend Michael

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Winter White

Hello everyone, I hope you enjoyed the holidays and once again I wish you much happiness and good health in this new year of 2023. I hope you have time to relax now that the hustle and bustle is over. I am enjoying this little nook in the bay window.                                                            Tea Time                                                                 

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Winter colour: evergreens can also come in uplifting reds

At this darkest time of the year, we depend on evergreens to do the heavy lifting. But don’t forget they come in a range of colours

There are so many reasons to love evergreen plants, from their unique ability to create all-year-round screening, to how they generously provide a green canopy without the need to sweep it up by the bag-load every autumn. With scientific research into the health benefits of plants even suggesting that the colour green itself may be – at least in part – responsible for their therapeutic effect, these plants that are perpetually in leaf are probably some of the most effective at enhancing our wellbeing. If you, however, have been put off evergreens because you feel they lack autumn colour, these four have-your-cake-and-eat-it plants might just change your mind.

The heavenly bamboo Nandina domestica creates an airy canopy of elegantly divided leaves on evergreen shrubs around 2m tall. With new growth that is flushed with burgundy before maturing to dark green come the autumn, the red and purple shades return with the first frosts to protect the leaves from the cold. Once warm weather returns, as if by magic, the green hues spring back in the leaves as if nothing had happened. Unlike most deciduous plants, the lack of leaf fall means that this cool-weather colour is retained for months rather than just a few weeks, greatly prolonging the show. Add to this the delicate sprays of white flowers come the summer, and the fact that they will never need pruning, and you have a pretty much perfect plant.

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* This article was originally published here