A Clear House A Clear Mind

As the chaos within our daily lives increases, work becomes more demanding and family pressures grow we all look for a place where we can get some much needed rest and relaxation and have an environment where we can escape everyday life and be completely ourselves in a place that we have created. The home provides the perfect opportunity to recover from a stressful day and one of the best features of a home is the ability to leave behind any nagging issues as soon as we have crossed the threshold.

The set up and design of our homes is typically reflective of personal taste and the spaces that we crave to ensure we have a restful and tranquil home that offers us our own little slice of personal heaven.

It is not simply the design elements that control the atmosphere within the home but also the way it is kept and maintained can have an impact on the way you feel when you are in the house. A home that is unorganised, chaotic and untidy will leave you feeling in much the same way. It is near to impossible to relax in an environment that is not soothing and if you are constantly surrounded by clutter and rooms full of a large amount of items then you too will feel overwhelmed and will lose the one place that offers you sanctuary.

It is so easy for us all to have areas within the home that are cluttered, with the rate we make purchases, the items we insist on owning and the way in which we have to position our homes due to space restrictions etc. clutter is common place.  It is all too important to have a home that we can feel relaxed within and can come home to and not feel bogged down by the way it looks and the way it makes us feel and the first way to turn this around is to make an effort to rid your home and yourself of the clutter that dominates rooms, floors and work spaces.

The De-Cluttering Begins…

There are multiple benefits to clearing up the spaces within your home, other than just the need to clear the home to clear your mind…

• Spaces will look significantly bigger and you will be surprised at the amount of room you actually have
• Rooms will be used appropriately
• After a chaotic day you will be able to come home to a restful environment
• A welcoming home will ease the stresses and strains of everyday life
• Clutter is usually a build up of items, sifting it through it will enable you to discover little treasures you didn’t know that you had
• You may be able to sell some items that you no longer use which will bring a much needed cash injection into the home
• You do not have to throw away any items just because you are not currently using them, storage Santa Monica can house the clutter until you are ready to incorporate any items back into the home

There is no reason to live in a home that appears to be overwhelmed with household items, paperwork and the little things that we seem to collect overtime. De-cluttering is a simple task that will transform the home, its look, feel and atmosphere and this will instantly alter the way you feel when you are in the house frantically trying to forget the chaos of the day that has passed.

Do It Yourself: the Perfect Finishing Touches

Making a house a home is all about adding the personal touches, the little things that show off what makes you, well, you. Anyone can go out and buy all kinds of things for a new house or as part of decorating a room in your current home to give it a new lease of life, but that still doesn’t necessarily show off your own personal taste and passion.

A lot of homeowners will bring in interior designers, if they have the disposable income, to help them turn their tired rooms into something much more vibrant through a new pair of curtains, maybe some different furniture, some elaborate lighting or some subtle touches here or there that might not jump out at you but really make an impact in the room itself.

DIY is another great way of adding a personal touch to your home. It’s a common misconception that personalizing your home is about putting up pictures of yourself, your family, or splattering bits of memorabilia around. In fact, it can be as simple as putting up a few shelves on an empty wall and filling them with books, maybe feature vases or lamps, or maybe just creating something a bit unusual using a bit of creativity, some timber and a few screws.

One great method of adding a personal touch is through some kind of metallic design. If you have a family Coat of Arms for instance, you could have this created through a process known as cold heading process and turned into a piece of art on your wall, maybe inside the front door or in the hall. Cold forming, for those unaware, is a process whereby metals are shaped without removing any of the material itself, thereby helping to maintain its strength and stability helping to create a really clean and stylish piece of metal.

Alternatively, if you want to stick with the artwork theme, then a family portrait is a great option. Either having it done by a professional artist using paint and a canvas, (although this is time consuming so you might want to consider this option if you have small children who get bored easily), or transforming a particular family photo onto a piece of canvas and mounting it to the wall can not just give you a real “family home” feel, but also enables you to add a touch of colour and style to your walls rather than traditional photographs in frames.

Approaching

  An ant and flower

The Weekend in Black and White

The Benefits of Having a Garden Office

Working from home is becoming more common in the UK. Employers are realising they don’t need to have everybody in the office at the same time. If you don’t have a separate place to work at home, a garden office is the answer. These offices provide so many benefits, in terms of well-being efficiency, and cost. Here are some of the main reasons why you should seriously consider thinking about investing in such an office.

Cost Considerations

It can cost over £10,000 to install a good office in your garden. This is a significant cost and cost many people will feel wary about. If you consider the costs of commuting to work each day, though, things change. In London, workers often spend around £2,000 to £4,000 a year on commuting. In just a few years, the cost of not commuting will make sure the office pays for itself.

In the long-term, you’ll actually be making a profit.

Work and Personal Life

Work life and personal life are difficult to separate for many people. One of the reasons for this is because in a home-based environment the office might double as the living room. It’s hard to resist the pull of the TV remote. And this applies even if you’ve managed to dedicate a room to work.

The office in the garden is different. It’s detached from the property and it requires effort for you to shirk from your work to go do something else. It keeps work and personal lives completely separate.

Well-Being

Surveys have shown people who work from home are generally much happier than those who commute to a place of work. Whilst there are exceptions to every rule, it’s easy to see why this is.

At home, you don’t have to start work at a certain time. You can afford to start later or get a head start on your work as there’s no commute. If you consider how the average commute takes an hour you’re saving a lot of time.

And then there’s the commute after work. You don’t get paid for this travelling time. This is an hour of your free time you’re giving up to go to work. A garden office allows you to simple get up and walk back to the house. This takes no longer than sixty seconds.

Your Way

You have little to no control of your workplace because you don’t own the building. All offices on your property are yours to do what you want with. You can chop and change it according to your whims. This increases your productivity as you’re happy with where you work.

Stress Free

Most people who commute to work find themselves grumbling over the weather, the time, and other people. It’s a stressful experience which you aren’t getting paid for. If you don’t have to leave your property to go to work there’s no reason why you should be stressed. This promotes healthy living and makes you actually want to go to work each day.

Tim Miller recommends that if you work from your home that you consider setting up a garden office.