A Mother’s Guide To Home DIY
DIY is often seen as “a man’s job”, but this is the twenty-first century. You don’t want to keep those dull old stereotypes alive, do you? If you walk around your house in a trance-like state and dream of how you’d make everything look different, were you to find the time or the tools to do so, then maybe it’s time to stop dreaming and start doing. Anybody can do DIY if they have the patience and willingness to give up a small portion of their weekends towards learning the tricks of the trade and getting stuck in with some grafting.
You may feel as if your priority as a mother has to involve looking after your kids and other adult responsibilities, perhaps at work or home, but home DIY should be included in that list. The state of your house does have an impact on your family, and improving the place could improve the lives of your children as well as you. If you’re wondering where on earth to get started when it comes to interior design and reinventing the aesthetic of your house then here are some tips to get things cooking.
Start with a blank canvas.
You have tall ideas about what to do with the space in your house, but it’s hard to make sense of them when you’re faced with endless toys, clothes and general clutter in every room of the house. Before you get underway with any DIY tasks, you need to clean and tidy the house from top to bottom. You need to open up some space so that you can start working. If you have a vision then you need to run with it.
Once everything is clean and tidy, take a sledge hammer to those old kitchen cabinets or perhaps even the wall that you want to knock through to create a larger room (you might want to get a professional opinion on whether you’d be affecting the house’s structure by doing so). You don’t have to do DIY by yourself, of course, but there’s no reason that you have to get somebody else to do everything. Besides, it’s fun to get stuck in by yourself. You’ll want to finish off by repainting the house in a white or other light-colored coat of paint as natural light will reflect off the walls and brighten each room. Moreover, you’ll be renewing your house and working as if on a brand new property.
A dose of minimalism.
At the end of the day, this is your project. You’ll already have an idea of how extensive or non-extensive this home DIY project is going to be, and you won’t let anyone step on your toes. Perhaps you want to keep a lot of the old furniture around your house because it has sentimental value or it creates a nice, rustic, retro feel to your home. There’s no saying you have to get rid of certain things because they look bad, but you can mingle some newer minimalistic furnishings in amongst your household.
A contemporary sofa, modern kitchen appliances, games consoles, and other items from the modern day world can blend in with an old design if it’s done tactfully and the general color scheme remains the same. It’s important to refresh your home’s look ever so slightly to avoid feeling as if you’re living in a run-down house, of course. There’s a difference between keeping the culture or character of a home and simply having old, worn-out things.
Focus on the bathroom.
How often do you relax in the bath? If you had to hesitate then the answer is “not often enough”. As a mother, you deserve a little relaxation time, and your bathroom should definitely be a place to which you can retreat after a long day at work or taking care of the kids to take a nice, long soak in the bath. A little redecoration in the bathroom area is essential to turn this place into a relaxing pad. You might want to get rid of those old tiles or re-grout them, at the very least. A fresh paint job, a deep clean, and other mini DIY projects could all create a much nicer bathroom.
Get the kids involved.
One of the most beautiful things about being a mother is that you already have your own free workforce on hand at all times. Better yet, your children will love to get stuck in with home DIY if it’s turned into a fun project with their mother. You could set your kids to work by honing in on their wondrous, youthful creativity and getting them to create cute little candle lampshades or fabric covers for the handles on drawers. You likely don’t want to give your children big or risky jobs such as putting up a new shelf, but that doesn’t mean your little ones can’t make a big difference to your house through partaking in mini projects. If they’re a bit older, of course, then feel free to set them onto the more difficult tasks.
