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Title: Ep 29: Your Town is Boring, No Need to Renovate
Hot Topic: Is it Worth Renovating When You Live In a Small Town?
Show Notes: The gang discusses and mocks Preston's process for choosing paint in his studio and then Julia drops the #1 tip for choosing a color. Our reader questions lead to talks on how minimalism and curtains can be at odds in your home.
Theme song Headphones by Preston Pugmire
How to Listen (iPhone):
1. Tap the podcast app on your phone. The icon for it looks like this:
2. Search for "Chris Loves Julia" in the search bar and tap on the podcast title, which is "The Chris Loves Julia Podcast w/Preston Pugmire"
3. On the search results page the top section will list Podcast Episodes. Ignore that for now - first tap on the larger thumbnail (image) under the "Podcasts" section.
4. Once you're on the podcast page, the first thing you want to do is tap the "Subscribe" button. There's no cost to subscribe, and this way you'll receive a notification each week when a new episode goes live.
5. Listen to an episode by first tapping the cloud icon to the right, allowing it to download, then tapping the episode to begin playing.
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Just wanted to give a shout out from another Idahoan! We love Idaho and its fun to listen to you talk about it! :)
Thanks for the pictures of Preston's studio - it's fun to see where you are recording the podcasts! I can only imagine if he hadn't redone the room - my guess is you'd all sit in that old cracked hot tub.
I have a question for the podcast and I'm not quite sure how to phrase it, but here goes. I am loving the look of white paint and would love to use it in a few different spaces in my home. We currently have one white bedroom. I feel like since we've used it once, I'm locked in to that color and need to use it throughout. I noticed you have at least three different shades of white in your home. Help ease me out of the paralysis that I'm in. I get that I can choose different shades based on the individual spaces, but how do I deal with the transition from room to room? (I feel the same way about grays and other neutrals that I want to repeat). Thanks and I value your opinions!
I love the podcast! Your interactions with each other are so authentic and make me laugh every episode. The advice you give is spot on, and I look forward to listening. However, I have one "complaint" -- the audio fades in and out, making it difficult to listen to in the car without repeatedly adjusting the volume up and down, which is maddening. For example, in this episode, when you're discussing reader Angela's question, Preston's voice is almost inaudible, except when he exclaims "Help!!" while he's reading her question. I turn it up to hear Preston, and then Julia's voice in response is SUPER loud. Is this an issue with the recording device -- as if Julia is much closer to the microphone and Preston is further away? Or is it that Preston and Chris have lower voices that just don't record as clearly? Help! This is not the first episode where I've noticed the trouble with the audio. It makes it difficult to listen while driving, which is the only time I have to listen to the podcast. And, seriously, I love the podcast, so if it's something that's easy to fix, I just wanted to let you know about it. Thanks for all you do to inspire us!
Lisa, Im totally on it. Thanks for the feedback.
Here are some thoughts on the average age of shoppers at different stores, from one of your "older readers/listeners (I am 57). When you are in your 20's and 30 you are deep in the process acquiring furniture so you need to shop at stores that have significant furniture stock, like Ikea and then a bit later in life, Crate and Barrel and CB2. Once you are more established in life you are less likely to need the big furniture items, but still will purchase smaller items- for instance decorative and kitchen items and cookware from William Sonoma and Pier One.
As far as the Lowes and Home Depot average age being so much higher than the other stores you mentioned, it could be because younger people are more likely to be renters than owners and would therefore be less likely to need the typical home repair and improvement things that are at these types of stores.
Just my thoughts - I am a scientist and have to analyze everything!
Love that analysis!
I would love to hear more about Preston using Nest as a baby monitor. Does he pay a monthly fee to save recorded data to the their cloud? I'm about to dive into researching this and would find any insight really helpful. Baby #2 on the way soon...
P.S. Awesome episode. Lots of laughing. Especially the line saying wow, you and I just experienced that differently! Keep it coming!
Yo Erica, I dont pay the fee for the cloud storage. You get one month free at first and its super cool but not totally necessary. My main love for it is that i can be out in my studio office and i get a notification when Quincy wakes up from a nap. i dont have to have it constantly in front of my face. we have one camera for each room. I have installed access to the cameras on my wife's phone and on my mom's phone too since she lives next door and watches the kids often.
Also, there is a function where you can talk to the room through the camera. One time I was traveling and taking a red-eye flight. While we were on the runway before takeoff at 12:30 am, i got a notification that Q had woken up and was crying, so i held the phone up to my face and sang him a lullabye and told him it was ok to just lay down. He did. My wife didnt have to get up with him. It was rad.
I totally agree with you on the window treatments. A set of curtains can totally transform a room!! Great episode. :)
http://dahliasanddimes.com/2017/01/23/patching-slapbrush-ceiling-tutorial/
I loved Chris' discussion about the importance of parenting and how our attitudes impact the behaviors/attitudes of our kids. I went back to it last night and had my husband listen to that part because we had just been talking about the way we speak with our kids and how it makes them respond, good or bad, depending on us. Love your podcast guys!
Loved the game this episode! Here's my question - could wedding registries be impacting the data?! I worry about these demographic skews. If the retailer has a wedding registry, it might pull the age down. What do you think?
Hi guys! Finishing up listening to your podcast right now, and just got to the part about whether it's worth fixing up your house if you live in a small town. I totally get the sort of insulting tone that you guys may have felt having received the question, and I think I would take it that way if the question were asked of me. However, the title of this podcast, what drew me to listen in the first place, was this very issue, because I also live in a small town and we struggle with this internal yearning to fix up our home and make improvements, but have decided against doing major projects beyond cosmetic because of the market in our town.
We are in a town that has a small private college, but the town itself is in one of the poorest counties in southern Iowa. There are many beautiful homes, but way more homes that are older, have not been properly maintained, and it has created a bubble of the 'housing market' that limits people's abilities to make improvements, to keep the housing affordable or it will never sell.
Eventually we want to sell and move on, and that's specifically what we had in mind when we bought our specific house, was how easily it would sell when we were ready to relocate. In the beginning, we did have all these grand plans for finishing the basement to have more livable space, but then worried if we added too much more value to our home, it would not be as affordable for this area and wouldn't sell as quickly.
So that's sort of where my mind went when I heard the question that was asked. I totally get it, because I have all these cool ideas of what I want to do, but then think, well what's the point? Our house was fairly updated when we bought it, and beyond a total remodel of the kitchen and bathrooms, and the basement of course (with some structural/foundation issues to address first), but we're thinking it may be easier to sell to limit the projects -- which seems totally backwards, but that's how our housing market bubble is.
I think there's no right answer because everyone's situation is different. Some people may plan to live in their home forever, and so it's totally worth the investment to love where you live. Some people can afford to do more projects, either because their income is higher or because they can do more projects without hiring it out. We are limited because we don't have those skills (yet) -- maybe later on we will. I feel bad that it sounded like you guys felt disparaged for where you live, but I have admired reading about your projects and seeing them take shape throughout your home. And I agree that you should always feel good about where you're living, in whatever way, shape or form you can make that happen. Thanks for all of your advice and sharing your knowledge with us. Just thought I'd share my perspective on this particular topic, since I can relate to the small-town life.
Oh my goodness your hit song made me love you even more!!!
Wow, I really related to the discussion about decorating when you live in a rural area. Not so much how you frame it though? Is it necessary to call where you live 'lame'? Many people don't realize the significance of the expression.
We apologize for the insensitive use of that word. We've changed the name of the podcast.
Merriam-Webster dictionary (since 1828) recognizes two non-slang definitions of the adjective lame. One of those definitions is "lacking needful or desirable substancel". Although to some people, the word lame may carry a negative connotation, it is in fact possible to call where you live lame without being derogatory on any level.
I laughed so hard at this episode. Y'all freakin crack me up. Anywho, I wanted to add my take to the topic of the "decorating a house on the middle of nowhere" question. Honestly, when I heard you read the question the first my mind went immediately to was resale value, not necessarily as a knock on where you live or how many friends you have. Maybe some people that ask that are genuinely wondering if they can get their money back on upgrades/styling their house well in an area where it might not matter as much to the average buyer. But like you guys said I 100% agree that it's always worth it to make your space someplace you love to be.
Such a great question and aspect to the question I didn't even think about when I read the question, but we absolutely thought about when looking for a home. When we bought our home, it was $100K less than the other home values on our street, and $130K less than the house for sale across the street. Of course, it was because our home didn't have a lot of the upgrades the other homes in our neighborhood had, but that's exactly what we were looking for. Although we do plan to be here for a good, long time, it's always important to consider when you're shopping for a house that you may not be in for the long term.
This was also my take on the question--not that there's no sense in decorating b/c your town is boring and no one will come visit, but b/c spending the money might not make sense for resale and/or maybe the people in your area might not have such design-forward ideas as you do, so they wouldn't even appreciate the work you've done (and therefore it wouldn't help your resale value in the future). I would love to hear that topic addressed on your podcast, i.e. how much does resale value play into your design decisions?
Oh, and I also laughed hysterically at this one (as I do when I listen to all your podcasts)--the three of you are so wonderful together! Keep up the great work.
I'm having a hard time finding blinds/shades for my 72"x36" windows and noticed that in the picture you posted, it looks like you might have used two separate shades for the same window? What was the installation like? Anything special or pretty straight forward?
Really straight forward! Just mounted them as usual, only right next to each other.
Thanks!!
I was going to listen to the podcast this morning but realized I needed to save it for my bad commute day tomorrow. Missing the weekly episodes! And I still crank up every time I listen to you three :)
As someone who is contemplating a move from a town of ~150K to a town of 2,500 - this is very timely. As always - I enjoyed your podcast. Keep it up!