Hmmmm, it’s been so long since I published a post, I’m not even sure how to start! š I’m also not even sure anyone is still out thereādo people still read blogs? I hope so, because creating this way feels like chicken soup for the soul now that I’ve gotten back into the habit of writing again. (More about that at the end of this post!)
Anywho, if there does happen to be somebody on the other side of this screen, hello! How have you been, reader-friend? Are you enjoying the first signs of Spring? We’re keeping as busy as ever over here on the farm.
Wait.
Did I tell you we moved to a farm? Well, it’s more of a farmette really, but it’s got almost six, sprawling acres and the (nearly) half-century-old house needs just enough TLC to feel absolutely thrilling!
The Lettered Colonial
It’s Colonial in style and the tree-lined gravel drive, which circles around in front of it, had us swooning from the second our tires crunched onto it. And although we had never cared for so many trees and so much land before, the house instantly felt like home, so we decided to give it a go.
It was designed and built for the Stanton family way back when and, rumor has it, Mrs. Stanton taught children from all over the county how to swim in the pool in the backyard. Which brings me to one of our first, big home pool improvement-related project. About a year after we moved in, the liner kicked the bucket and we replaced it with the Grey Mosaic liner by Latham Pools.
Old liner, new liner. It took 3 days to re-fill it!
It came highly recommended by my friend April, and had everything we were hoping for: no border around the top edge (folks think it’s real tile every time!) and tranquil, muted tones above and below the water line.
Moody blues
The McEwen family bought it from the Stantons in 1990 and lived here until they sold it to us in August of 2021. We were tickled to learn that they had (internationally) adopted one of their children too, and it was their multigenerational family that had started transforming the former two-car garage into an in-law suite.
We’re still in the process of personalizing that area for Jim and Katie (anybody else had a HECK of a time getting carpenters & contractors to show up? š„“) but fingers crossed, Kevin and I can fumble our way through what’s left to finish. Countertops, a range hood, a few custom cabinets, some custom bookshelves, some open shelving, and the crown & base moulding will round out her cottage-style kitchen.
Katie’s (discontinued) Petite Fleur wallpaper and luxury vinyl parquet flooring
Ā We actually tackled the desk countertop in there this week. We just wrapped some MDF in soapstone-patterned vinyl and we are all so happy with how it turned out! According to the shop I bought it from, the vinyl is waterproof, scratch, tear, and heat resistant, environmentally safe, and can be removed with no sticky residue. It also has a grid on the back to make for an easy application and they included a small tool to get all the bubbles out which worked really great.
Peel and stick soapstone– who knew!?
My Uncle Kevin (a cabinet maker in Minnesota) is actually shipping us one of the base cabinets we need to finish up the sink side of the room this weekend, so I’ll be sure to share a post specifically about their kitchen with more before and after photos in May.
Katie, who recently turned 87-years-young, hasn’t let her unfinished kitchen stop her from partaking in one of her favorite pastimes though. When she isn’t out and about, or relaxing in her chair in the room next door, she can usually be found baking or cooking. Last week, she was inspired to make vegetable soup, and I had to chuckle when I found her standing at her stove boiling meat off the ham she’s had in her freezer since Thanksgiving. (More about exactly why that is so funny at the end of this post! š)
I asked her about what else she uses in her soup and she said “Oh! It’s just whatever you want to throw together!” Here’s what Katie had on hand:
1 leftover ham bone
2 cans mixed vegetables
1 bag frozen vegetables
1 chopped onion
2 sliced carrots
5 diced potatoes
1 can of corn
2 cans diced tomatoes
salt and pepper to taste
She started by boiling the ham bone in enough water to loosen the leftover ham meat. Once she had cut it all off, she reduced the heat and began to add the vegetables. She let it cook until the potatoes, carrots and frozen mixed vegetables were done and she and Jim have been enjoying it ever since. Here’s a photo of the recipe she used to make her yummy cornbread too:
She doesn’t add the two tablespoons of flour (when I asked her why, she said “I wasn’t raised on cornbread with flour in it, so I’ve never made it that way as adult either“), and she made a note that if you don’t have any buttermilk on hand, you can add one tablespoon of vinegar to plain milk and to create your own. You may have also noticed that the recipe in her little cookbook didn’t have the cook time listed, so she found that info in another cornbread recipe on the same page and added it by hand. š„°
Another area of the house that we started working on right away was the foyer. We swapped the old, gray carpeting for and I’ve been having fun adding to the floral-themed gallery wall ever since.
Before
In-Progress
We also just finished redecorating Kevin’s home studio and, boy, has it been fun to see him come alive in that space! Here’s a photo of the room before we moved in:
Before
After
Here are links to some of the things we used in case you’re curious or on the hunt for something similiar:
I haven’t quite finished the gallery wall above his desk, but here’s a link to the one we went with:
He loves that it has hooks on one end for his cables and headphones and a storage pocket on the other end for paperwork, mail, etc. Such a great find for under a hundred bucks! We’re going to add a piece of this fabric across the back so that the cables don’t show too.
He’s developed a fervent passion for writing and wakes up early every day to continue crafting his weekly newsletter, which he sends out (for free) every Tuesday morning. It’s called Onward and in it, he shares insights, ideas, and illustrations on happiness, creativity, purpose, and the psychology of well-being. Here’s a photo of some he recently published:
Click the link below if you’d like to hear from him every Tuesday. I promise it will always be one of the highlights of your week!
And speaking of writing, after two long years of thinking, researching, typing, planning, photographing, editing, re-editing, and editing LOTS more, I’m beyond happy to announce that my real-deal, bonafide beacon of a book is finally done! It’s called Coming Home and it’ll be released wherever books are sold on November 21, 2023.
Photo by the incomparable Kyle Campbell @SuddenJourneys
And by excited, of course, I also mean terrified. š
I keep thinking of something one of my favorite writers said. Apparently, a mysterious illness, complete with 2-week fever, landed him in the hospital ten times before the release of his first book (when, all of a sudden, he instantly felt better) and I’d be lying if I said I haven’t thought about how sharing vulnerably, without a delete button, might take a toll on my health this Fall too. š¬
That said, I am super proud of what I’ve tucked inside Coming Home and I really do wish I had had a book like this before my garden-variety anxiety spiraled into disordered panic back in 2018. It’s not only filled with soul-suffusing stories, curative quotes, and restorative family recipes, but also with helpful research, practical advice, hope-full poems, inspiring imagery and hand-drawn artwork. I had a blast creating all the doodles and snapping many of the photos. (Kevin contributed a handful of essays and snapped some of the photos too!) And you wouldn’t believe how much fun I had tracking down certain pictures taken by folks I’ve never met. One adventure took me all the way to a tiny village in England and I can hardly wait to share about how I found the person who captured the photo that inspired one particular chapter. It was quite extraordinary and, it turns out, he is too. We chatted for nearly an hour on Facebook Audio the other day and I kept pinching myself during our call to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. š
All that to say, Coming Home is not your average memoir, self-help, personal growth, coffee table book, cook book, or gift book. It’s a combination of ALL of those genres and I will be forever grateful to my imaginative literary agent, enthusiastic acquisitions editor, and uber-patient publisher & designers for allowing me to create such a unique and big-hearted book about feeling lost sometimes, and how to keep coming home.
Anywho, Coming Home is available for pre-order on Amazon NOW, and your pre-order today will ensure that it ships to you at the lowest price between now and release day in November. (They’ll refund you for the difference.) And here’s something interesting: because other booksellers use Amazon’s pre-sale numbers to determine how many copies they want to order, pre-orders also play a huge part in how excited they’ll be to come alongside an author when the book is actually released. In other words, THANK YOU SO MUCH if you join me in pre-ordering a copy. Your early support and enthusiasm will make such a difference in the long run, and because it was such a labor or love, I am so, so grateful! š
Oh, and if you do happen to order a copy, you’ll find a story about Katie tucked inside too. The chapter is called “An Invitation” and, in it, I say something like “I bet she could stretch a Thanksgiving ham all the way to Easter”- LOL! She certainly made that sentence spring to life this month! š
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So, there ya have it. And by “ya”, I mean, if there really is someone sitting on the other side of this screen. (I hope you’ll leave me a comment below if you are!) Either way, it’s good to be back, sharing in a way that feels like a little more old-fashioned than “insta”. Feels like fresh air. Feels like coming home.
PS- Kindreds spirits: if you’re on the hunt for a beautiful journal or super fun series of books, I’ve been thoroughly enjoying these: Woodland Journal and Ladybug Farm Series.
So glad to see a blog post! Iāve followed you since you made a PB-inspired mirror in the (really old) Lettered Cottage. Please keep us updated via the blog (not a huge instagram person).
Hi Matilda!
What a lovely name you have! Thanks for popping in to say hello. I haven’t thought about that PB-inspired mirror in so long! I wonder what I did with that old thing??
Love reading your blog!! I thoroughly enjoyed it!! Thanks for sharing the soup recipe. I love your style and your awesome home!! So glad you are back!
I am happy youāre back. Keep shining your light into the dark world.
I love your multi-generational house and all the projects and life you share.
Thank you, DK! I definitely look forward to connecting with you here more often and I’m so grateful for your kind words today!
glad to see you back. i always love your posts and get inspiration from them. lovely new home but i miss the cottage you started with. warm and cozy and my style. congratulations on your book.
Aw, thank you Mary! And don’t you worry, along with Katie’s warm and cottage-style kitchen, I’ve got LOTS of rooms to cozy up over the next however-many years. I look forward to sharing more fun with you projects in May!
I’m happy to see you back and just pre-ordered your book! I know, as a blogger myself, that sometimes life throws you curveballs and it isn’t easy to create content. Keep it up and can’t wait to see what you do with your new house!
Hi Diane!
Life can be curvy indeed! So glad to reconnect with you today and I look forward to checking out your blog!
Layla,
I am so extremely excited to buy your book. It looks so beautiful! Thank you for sharing your journey. I have followed you for a while and your strength and courage with facing hard things was and is an encouragement for me. I pray that your book will be a blessing to others.
Thank you for your excitement, Christina! I could feel it right through the screen! I appreciate your prayer that Coming Home would be a blessing to readers. I’ve been praying that same thing too!
You are a true inspiration. I love reading posts from you and Kevin. Thank you for sharing with us all. I have preordered my book and cannot wait to read it. š
Brandey, that was so kind to say! Kevin and I are both smiling over here reading your comment. Thank you!!
So nice to see you pop into my inbox again! Can’t wait for your book.
Thank you, KC! I appreciate your encouragement and I hope you love Coming Home too!
Glad youāre writing again! And Iāve been waiting to see Kevinās desk, since you first mentioned itā¦thanks for happily ending the suspense! His room is music-worthy : )
MOM! My eyes instantly filled with happy tears when I saw your name pop up! Thank you for leaving me such a kind comment to find and I’ll be sure to share more about his (awesome!) desk as soon as we’ve got that fabric tacked in place!
Layla,
I was absolutely thrilled to receive your blog post in my inbox this morning and couldn’t place my pre-order for your beautiful book fast enough! Loved your update and can’t wait to hear how Steevenson is doing!
Awwww, thank you Tiffany! And Steevenson is doing well. He got all As and one B on his most recent report card and spends much of his free time learning how to filet fish- LOL. I think culinary school may be in his future!
So happy to read your post. Glad you are feeling inspired to share here again! Like many others I’ve not read as many blog posts as I used to, but it is so refreshing. Keep it up!
I agree, Kacy! After so many years of absorbing content in the form of a video or single photo/caption, it feels refreshing about reading “letter from a friend” style these days!
You find so much joy in the everyday, Layla, that you inspire me to do the same! You are a gifted writer and storyteller, so it’s wonderful to read these longer posts on the blog. Thank you, and God bless your family!
Sandy, that was such a kind comment…thank you! I love to share stories and pictures, and I look forward to connecting with you here again soon!
Layla! I love that youāre back in this space. I keep thinking I want to resurrect my blog as well. Maybe itās time.
Iām headed off to pre-order your book because I need to find a way āhomeā after almost dying last year and the resulting fear and anxiety. Perfect timing friend!
Kristi!!!!!
It was SO good to see your face and comment pop up here and I am SO glad you’re doing okay after what sounds like a terrifying ordeal! š I really do hope you resurrect your blog. I clicked through and saw the dandelions (Steevenson’s favorite!) and I hope you’ll share there again soon too!
So glad you are back! I missed you tonsš
Thank you so much, Wendy!! I appreciate your kind comment so much!
PS- My nephew’s first name is Benton! š
How fun to hear from you again! I have not added Instagram to my life, so you’ve just been gone. Excited to see and read your book!
Welcome back! I have always enjoyed your blog. All the very best to you and your family!
So good to see that you’re back! I’m looking foreward to your future posts and your book! How exciting for you!
O hope that your book have translation for portuguese, for I can read ir.
Good luck with the sales.
Layla! So wonderful to see your beautiful face again! I so enjoy your writing style and am very much looking forward to your book. I always enjoyed your Target shopping trips back in the day. And, Iām sure I would be amazed to learn how old Stevenson is now! I think you had just moved, or had just purchased a new home the last time I was reading much from you, so, how exciting to see that you moved again! I could be wrong about the house situation. Anyway, it will be fun to see everything you do to make it your own lovely home. So glad to hear from you again. Like reacquainting with an old friend (though I would be a Mom friend, not really a girlfriend!) What a bright spot in my day to your smiling face in my mailbox this morning!
Sorry, thatās Gale, not Galr!
There are people out here waiting for your blog! Thanks for this post. I, too, am a pool gal. I call my pool a ācat boxā pool as it is a fiberglass pan set in my sandy Palm Springs backyard. Many thanks for your belated post. Hope more will follow.
Iāve been a long time follower and so happy to see a blog post again. Love what you have done so far in your new to you home and canāt wait to see the library wall come to life. Congrats on your book!
So nice to find you in my inbox. The house and book both look lovely!
Everything looks amazing. and YES, I still read blogs and I also write one.
Layla! I’ve missed you AND The Lettered Cottage! So happy to see you coming back by limited engagement (ha!) with some updates! I’m not an Instagram girl and our university has disabled it on campus so we can’t even look at that. I’ve lost track of you for far too long! Keep those posts coming! I was a faithful follower back in the day and I’ll continue to be one now! – Karen
Hi Layla! What fun to read a blog post again! Iāve followed you since 2 houses ago! Itās been fun watching your journey through life! Iāve really enjoyed you sharing Katie as well! She just is so joyful!! Iām excited to see your library walkway emerge from that unused space! What fun! Congrats on the book! It must feel so so good to have set that goal and actually see it through to completion! I do love how real you are and how you share the good with the bad. It makes me feel more normal knowing everyone has good days and bad!
Glad to see you back, Layla. I actually looked you up on Instagram the other day, because I realized it had been forever since a blog post had come into my inbox from you! Beautiful property you guys bought!
Welcome back dear friend (that I’ve never met in person!). Seeing that email in my inbox was a TREAT! Excited to see what you’ve been up to and hear all about your new home. Blessings dear fried. Thanks for coming home!!
I cannot tell you how happy I was to have your post pop up in my email! You were the first blog I followed when I discovered blogs. Iāve purposely chosen not to have ant social media so it makes me extremely happy to hear youāre going to blog again!
Layla, I LOVE it!! I can āhear your voiceā in every word you wrote in this blog post. I pre-ordered the book the day it became available. Iām so looking forward to diving in.
Hey Layla! I am here! Congratulations on your new book – I look forward to purchasing and reading it! Your house looks lovely and I am so happy that y’all are happy there! Best of luck come November when your book is released! š
Layla, I am glad to know that you will be blogging again. I always loved your creativity and honesty. You were open with your insecurities and imperfections and that made me feel like we could be close friends. On occasion I have thought of you and your little family wondering what your life was like. I cannot wait to read your book. Sending my affections.
So happy to see you blogging, again. Started following you as you were redoing the Prattville house. Look forward to your book!! Fellow Alabama girl here. You are rocking your way thru anxiety. Helping so many people by sharing. Blessings to you and your family.
Yay! Hello again! I’ve missed you! Wonderful to be able to get caught up on what you and Kevin (and family) have been doing. Love the farmette, thrilled to see your book coming out this year, and have subscribed to Kevin’s posts. Welcome back – I remain one of your devoted “other side of the screen” fans. Ya’ll are an inspiring couple.
So happy you are back Layla!! I cannot wait to get my hands on your book. Love Kevin’s weekly column as well. Hope you and family are well and enjoying your farmette.
Seeing your blog pop into my inbox definitely made me smile! Iām so glad to see yāall doing so wellā¦.my friend that Iāve never met, and now Iāll be following Kevinās weekly newsletter! All my best you, Kevin, his folks and Steevenson. Following the adoption journey with yāall was fascinating, heartwarming and at times, heartbreaking. You inspired me with so many projects and posts so I just wanted to say WELCOME BACK and thank you! Canāt wait to read you new book!
So glad to hear from you again. Please keep me on your blog list. So glad to see that you have a new place to “work on”. Can’t wait for updates on the family. Everything looks lovely. Great job, guys.
Welcome HOME!! I’m so happy to read your blog this morning ! I hope there will be many more! I sure do miss the blogs “of old”. Instagram is just not the same as those wonderful blogs.
What a pleasant surprise to find your blog on my screen this morning! I have missed following your story. The move was news…and I hooe to see more of it soon. Love your solutions that don’t require tons of money…and use things regular folds can do!
Wlcome back! Cannot wait to see more!
Layla,
What a bright spot on a gloomy spring day, your post had me smiling from ear to ear. It’s been far to long between post. Looking forward to more post.
Yay! Youāre back!
Hello and am I ever happy that you are back! Your blog was one of the first that I started following, way back when š I loved your blog and very happy that I will be able find a blog post in my email every so often along with following you on instagram!
Welcome back to blogging, Iām so glad to be one of your reader-friends! Canāt wait to read Coming Home.
Welcome back! Glad to see I’m not the only one that still loves a great blog post to start the day! Looking forward to your book!
So good to hear from you again! It sounds like you have been very busy with lots of projects. The areas in your home that you showed are beautiful as always! I love your style. Congratulations on the book. I look forward to to its release.
So happy to see you in my inbox! You crossed my mind earlier this week. Howās that for timing? Your story and your sweet little family have always had a place in my heart. Best wishes for your upcoming book launch – youāve got this! P.S. Iām a fan the Ladybug Farm series, too
I was thrilled to receive your blog post! I have been a LONG TIME follower and have watched your sweet family grow. I sent you the vintage maps of Haiti when you adopted your precious son. I’m looking forward to your upcoming book and more blog posts! XOXO- Philicia
I’m so glad you’re back on the blog!! I love reading more in depth (and at my own pace, lol) than Insta stories. And I, too, have followed you for many years and am so glad about the space you’re in now and that you are writing here again (also love you showing up in my email!). xoxo
Layla, when I saw your name pop up, I broke into a huge smile! I have missed you and am so delighted to have you back. So happy for you on your book, and will be looking forward to its publication. Thank you so much for the wonderful update. I canāt wait for the next one!
So glad to see your blog postā¦you are such a good writer. I am also inspired with all you doā¦.you and your family are such a blessingā¤ļø. All the best and Godās favor with your new book!!
Layla, of course āweāreā still here – your fans!! I do follow you on Instagram but I was so excited to see an email from
The Lettered Cottage. Can hardly wait for all the updates from you and your sweet familyšā¤ļø
It’s so good to see you in my inbox!! Lovely to see you sharing your style, creativity, family, struggles, humor and joy here again! It’s always a delight to hear from you (in all forms!)! Congratulations again on your new home and the completion of “Coming Home”!