My dad is an amazing photographer, and thanks to him there are decades' worth of gorgeous, priceless photos of my extended family.. but only a few of him. I seem to be repeating that pattern: I'm thrilled with the hundreds of shots I get of our holiday celebrations and vacations, but you would never know I'd actually attended the festivities. How do you thoroughly document your home life? 

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I love bedrooms that are well-styled, but I also love the clean simplicity of a bed that looks like it's seriously meant for sleeping in, with cloud-like crisp white bedding and a few downy pillows. 

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In a little studio apartment like mine, it seems absurd to waste perfectly good shelf space on frivolities and fripperies, and yet that's exactly what I've done...and it makes me happy every day. 

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When a friend told me he was considering planting two trees to celebrate the birth of his friends' new baby twins, I must admit I swooned. Birth-trees! Such a sweet idea, but there are a few things to consider...

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There was the time I decided to make my own mosaic mirror, and broke enough mirrors to guarantee bad luck for life. Or the time I decided to tackle the small task of repainting my bathroom and ended up peeling off the bubbling, existing paint in huge sheets for days before I could even get started.

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 Last night I was lucky enough to attend a remarkable event — a warm, festive, stimulating gathering in which a family opened their home to over 60 people, some friends, some friends-of-friends, and some several more steps removed (like me). The friend I went with said something like, "With everything going on in the world, this openness and trust is all the more amazing. And encouraging." 

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One of our favorite annual architecture awards is the AIA Chicago Small Project Awards. It's an opportunity for small firms to recieve recognition for work that might otherwise be shadowed by larger offices. The AIA awards innovation, low budgets and small firms — this year there were 15 winners, ranging from a table on two wheels to a studio renovation in the Hancock building.

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High Fidelity keeps coming up in conversation, and it's made me think of this exchange between Rob and Laura: "And then I come home, and there´s no lingerie and..." "I have lingerie." "Yes, you do. You have great lingerie, but you also have the cotton underwear that´s been washed a thousand times, and it´s hanging on the thing.." I'd like to avoid that exchange.

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Some people always have Saturday and Sunday to look forward to: The Weekend. But for many of us, weekends occur haphazardly and sporadically, with "my Saturday" falling on a Tuesday and "my Sunday" not appearing until the next Thursday. How do you mark your weekend, when it's not clearly marked on the calendar?

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