Category Archives: blogs

Fixing Adam’s House (again).

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Posted by Anna at D16 on August 18, 2010 – 9:53 pm
Filed under blogs, friends and family

Remember my friend Adam? You know, the guy who did that amazing bedroom renovation a couple of years ago? Yeah, him. Well, he took a little break from working on his house . . . and a not-so-little break from blogging. A couple of weeks ago, Adam came down to Newburgh from Potsdam for a visit with Evan and I, and I gave him some poking and prodding and encouragement to get going again—with the blogging, yes, but more importantly, with working on his house.

Adam was one of the first people to see our house when we first bought it. He saw it before we’d even moved in! He hadn’t been down since then, though, so he really got the full “before and after” effect with a four-year gap between visits. I’d like to think that seeing our progress was a little inspiring. I know it gave me a little perspective on how much we’ve gotten done by thinking about how different the house was the last time Adam was here.

Anyway, Adam is back to blogging, and I couldn’t be happier for him. He’s all set up with a new layout and logo and his own domain, too! You can find him (and me too, from time to time) at Fixing Adam’s House. Yay!

Three blog(ger)s I love.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on June 11, 2010 – 10:08 am
Filed under blogs, friends and family, inspiration

Leah / The Full Nilson.

Sara / Lost Bird Found.

Tamera / Verhext.

My favorite blogs are almost always the ones with a strong, personal voice behind them. Yes, there are a few exceptional blogs that are so well-curated and edited that they can get away with “showing me other people’s stuff” (Remodelista, Emma’s Designblogg and Hoping for Happy Accidents immediately come to mind), but they are few and far between. I like to feel like there’s a personal connection, even if it’s one-sided.

I’ve been blogging for more than a decade now (going back to before normal people called it “blogging”), and I’ve made some awesome friends along the way. A handful of them have moved in and out of my internet-life in various contexts for years and years now, and I’m so happy that I’ve been able to see them change and grow over time. I met Leah, Sara, and Tamera through LiveJournal eons ago (well, eons in internet-years). All four of us have since transitioned to “freestanding” blogs, but I think we’ve all managed to keep the personal voice behind our blogging that drove us to put snapshots of our lives on the internet in the first place.

Anyway, if you don’t already read these blogs, take a few minutes to check them out. All three are well-written, beautiful to look at, and share pieces of the lives of three women I admire so much. (More than they realize, probably.)

A note about me and blog-reading: There are 62 blogs in my Google Reader*, and that’s pretty much my limit. If a blog isn’t holding my interest anymore (or worse, if it’s actually making me angry on a regular basis) I take it out. If I’m “test-driving” a new-to-me blog, I add it to my Reader so I don’t forget about it. I also use Reader to keep track of blogs that I don’t have on my public blogroll (usually because they are either infrequently updated or unlikely to be of interest to most D16 readers). My goal, though, is to keep my Reader lean enough that I can actually keep up with the volume in a meaningful way.

*Google Reader is the best thing ever when it comes to blog-reading. I’ve been using it for a couple of years, and I can’t imagine being without it. I like to read blogs in their “natural state”, though (as opposed to just viewing the RSS feed with Google’s formatting), so I have a nifty NEXT button (in your Google Reader settings, click on the “Goodies” tab, then scroll down to “Put Reader in a bookmark”) in my bookmarks toolbar. Whenever I have a free minute during the day, I just hit that button and see the next updated blog in my queue. Love.

Okay, your turn: Tell me which blogs you think I should know about that I might not be reading already. (And yes, it’s okay to promote your OWN blog!)

D16 is a finalist in the Homies 2009!

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Posted by Anna at D16 on December 30, 2009 – 10:43 pm
Filed under blogs

We did it! Door Sixteen is officially one of the six finalists in The Homies 2009! Between now and January 6th, you can cast your vote for ONE nominee in the Home Design category.

I must say, Door Sixteen is in some fine company with this nomination. Pam of Retro Renovation, Nicole at Making it Lovely, Holly from Decor8, Sherry and John at Young House Love, and all of the ladies from Remodelista are some of the hardest working bloggers in the field, and many of these blogs are among my favorite daily reads. No matter who wins, it will be a well-deserved honor!

Reminder: The Homies 2009!

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Posted by Anna at D16 on December 28, 2009 – 7:44 pm
Filed under blogs

Just a quick reminder that if you would like to see Door Sixteen in the running for The Homies 2009 and haven’t yet added it to your list of favorite Home Design blogs, you can do so here!

The nomination process will end tomorrow (12/28) at 5:00pm EST.

p.s. You can see my favorites here.

The Homies 2009.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on December 22, 2009 – 6:45 pm
Filed under blogs, greed

It’s the time of year again! Apartment Therapy has opened up nominations for The Homies 2009, and the entire process has improved by leaps and bounds since last year. You can now now create lists of all of your favorite blogs in multiple categories (Home Design, Home Tech, Kids at Home, Green Home, and Home Cooking), and see how they stack up against each other by number of nominations. You can nominate as many blogs as you’d like in any category.

If you’d like to nominate Door Sixteen in the Home Design category, you can do so here!

p.s. Here’s my list of favorites (so far), if you’re curious.

Friday Five at Design Milk.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on November 20, 2009 – 9:34 am
Filed under blogs, guest blog

Today I’m sharing my Friday Five (“Five Swedish blogs that make the Internet more beautiful”) with Jaime at Design Milk!

Twitter.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on April 6, 2009 – 2:03 pm
Filed under blogs

I resisted doing this for as long as I could, but as you may or may not have already noticed, I’m now on Twitter. Feel free to follow along! I can’t promise any content of real interest, but I suppose that’s not the point. Right? It’s really just so we can all watch American Idol together.

How Much For This Bathroom?

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Posted by Anna at D16 on April 3, 2009 – 2:11 pm
Filed under blogs, house

Instead of just posting photos of my renovated bathroom, I decided to do the “big reveal” as part of the How Much For This Room? series at decor8. Holly is one of my favorite bloggers, and it really is an honor to have any part of my home featured on her site. Thank you, Holly!

I love this new series Holly is doing, by the way. Cost is a big, mysterious question when it comes to planning renovatings, especially when we’re told on one hand that a simple renovation of a bathroom or kitchen can easily cost upwards of $20k, and on the other hand we’re led to believe that with a little creativity and some hot glue, you can have a fabulous new room for $300. There IS a middle ground, though, and I think that by REALLY breaking down the true-life costs involved with my bathroom transformation, I can help to demystify the process a bit for anyone considering their own renovation process. (Yes, I even included the nails and screws!)

For more photos, a little interview about the bathroom, the full cost breakdown and MORE, please hop over to decor8!

p.s. Remember what the bathroom used to look like? It really is hard to believe it’s the same room.

Oh, thank you.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on January 3, 2009 – 8:07 pm
Filed under blogs, health


This is an old photo of Bruno, but it illustrates a point—if I want to post about dogs and haircuts, I will!

Okay, so, seriously? You all are amazing. I’ve been passed out on the sofa with a fever and stomach flu for the past 12 hours (you know I’m really sick if I don’t feel like going online!), and now I’m sitting here with tears rolling down my face while I read all of your comments.

Look, let’s just get this out of the way right now: I AM A GIANT CRYBABY. I always have been. I cry over everything. (Earlier today I actually got choked up when I realized Saltines are no longer packaged with those little red bendy closure tabs at the top of the stack. It was devastating to open the box and not see them—why have you done this to us, Nabisco??) I have a very thin skin, it’s true, and I’m not sure I want to change that. It’s what allows me to feel honest compassion for other people. I don’t like myself very much when I “toughen up”.

Maxwell at Apartment Therapy explained to me that it is not possible to remove Door Sixteen from the contest at this point. I understand. However, he did disable the comments and post a very nice explanation of why. I’m okay with this. Next time they run this contest, though, I think it would be wise to have the nominations done in the form of private submission rather than in open comments, and to do the same with the voting.

I want to make it clear that my upset yesterday really was not about a few negative things that were said about this site, but rather about the overall tone of the comments and the assumptions that were being made about every blogger who made the final list. I think the thing that put me over the edge was a comment that Nicole from Making it Lovely (one of my favorite blogs; consistently well-written, beautifully presented, and definitely personal) writes too much about her pregnancy. Combined with the insinuation that the entire contest is nothing more than a publicity grab for all involved, I really started feeling very badly about the whole thing. I don’t think I was wrong to respond to some of the “allegations” that were being thrown around. I am not the kind of person to just let things happen and wait for the bad stuff to pass.

I’ve been blogging since 2002, and I’ve never done it with a veil of anonymity. I attach my real, full name to everything I do online, and I assure you that Internet Anna is the very same person as Real Life Anna. My life is far from being an open book, but I don’t believe in creating alternate personalities or putting on a show for the sake of an audience. It’s just not for me. When people ask me what the “secret” is to having a successful blog, that’s the only advice I can offer—write what you know, and make every post a reflection of who you are and what you’re into, not what you think people want to see. Regardless of what you’re blogging about, keeping your personality and style connected to your blog will attract people to it—that’s how we attract people in real life, too!

I’m going to go back to snuggling with my dogs now. We’re watching Poltergeist on television (Evan went to his parents’ house for a belated Hanukkah gathering, my stomach flu kept me away), and I think I’m ready to eat something small (no, not Fritz!).

Thank you again for everything. I’ll get back to posting about more important things (like dining room chairs and orbital sanders) tomorrow.

Not your Homie.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on January 2, 2009 – 9:08 pm
Filed under blogs, health

Regretfully, I have requested that Door Sixteen be removed from the running in The Homies at Apartment Therapy. Hopefully my request will be honored soon.

What should have been a fun contest has become a forum for commenters to criticize the finalists with a harshness that takes anything positive out of the competition. That’s not how I want to start a new year. There’s no point.

I truly hope that the winner doesn’t wind up on the receiving end of a bunch of nastiness, but I fear that is what will happen.

Thank you to those of you who took the time to vote for me. It is greatly appreciated, and I am endlessly amazed that so many people choose to come here every day to see what I’ve got going on in my house.

The Homies: Best Home Decor Blog 2008.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on December 31, 2008 – 12:02 am
Filed under blogs, greed

All of the nominations have been tallied, and I’m pleased to see that Door Sixteen has made the list of 8 final nominees! It’s a nice list of contenders to be grouped with, so regardless of the outcome, I’m feeling pretty honored right now.

Decorno
Door Sixteen
Desire to Inspire
Making it Lovely
Decor8
This Young House
SF Girl by Bay
Design*Sponge

Of course, I’d still like to win. I promise to use the $100 prize money to do some good scavenging! (And maybe to buy a couple of fancy dog toys. Do it for the puppies!) Go here to vote!

Thank you so much to every one of you who nominated me. Truly!

The Homies 2008.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on December 23, 2008 – 1:35 pm
Filed under blogs, greed

Apartment Therapy is currently accepting nominations for The Homies Awards 2008, and I’m shocked (shocked!) to see some for Door Sixteen already. Now, I’m not one to beg, but it sure would be nice to make it onto the ballot! WINK, COUGH.

(By the way, my vote went to Design Crisis. Love those girls!)

Adam’s bedroom!

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Posted by Anna at D16 on November 10, 2008 – 5:46 pm
Filed under blogs, friends and family, inspiration

Back in June, I started a blog with my good friend Adam to document renovations I was urging him to make on his house. I’m so happy to see that he has finished (well, minus the furnishings) some pretty amazing work on his bedroom, and I have to make mention of it here.

Um, WOW!!! How gorgeous is that blue painted floor? Adam removed layers of carpeting and linoleum, took down the dropped ceiling, restored the door and hardware, repaired the original plaster walls, removed and closed off a badly leaking chimney, and did countless other things in his quest to make a space for himself that is peaceful, clean, and totally Adam. I know it’s been an emotional ride (as renovations often are, and I say that from experience!), but I believe that the results of this transformation will inspire Adam to carry his skills throughout his house to make every inch of it a place to be proud of. (Stay tuned to Adam’s blog to see everything come into place!)

As a reminder of just how far you can come in just over four months of weekends, here’s an glimpse at what Adam’s bedroom looked like before. Isn’t it amazing how much the space changed?

Door Sixteen on Facebook.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on October 10, 2008 – 3:09 pm
Filed under blogs

FYI: You can now add Door Sixteen to your Blog Network on Facebook.

Busy, busy.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on July 11, 2008 – 11:14 pm
Filed under blogs, friends and family, health, inspiration

Just a little inspiration from Orla Kiely‘s bedroom, in honor of the fact that she now has a U.S.-based outpost for her online store. Hooray! (Thanks, Holly!)

I’ve had no time to post updates lately because I’ve incredibly busy. Lots planned for this weekend, too! While I’m busy being busy, how about you take a look at these three new-ish blogs that I love:

→ Chez Larsson Benita has been posting photos and describing all of her organizational and storage techniques, and it’s all so inspirational! She makes me want to move everything out of my house and then move it back in again, fully organized. She also makes me want to buy every clear plastic bin that Muji sells, because they are apparently the keys to a better life.

→ Haus Maus Holly from Decor8 has a new second blog, and she’s using it to document the process of setting up a whole new second home for herself and her husband in Germany. Great stuff! I’d never really thought about how much is involved with an international move, especially when furnishing an entire empty apartment is involved.

→ Verhext Tamera just moved into a new house in Oakland, CA, and it already looks beautiful. She has amazing style, so I’m excited to see how everything comes together.

Speaking of friends…

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Posted by Anna at D16 on June 26, 2008 – 10:09 pm
Filed under blogs, friends and family

I have a another great friend, Adam, who also lives way too far from me—300 miles away, in Potsdam, New York. Adam and I have lived together, worked together, gone to see Siouxsie and Rufus together, laughed together and cried together…but we have never decorated a house together. And it’s about time we tried!

Four years ago, Adam bought a beautiful sandstone house in Potsdam. It was built 1812, and “wreckorated” 160 years later. The situation is dire—Adam is living with things like shag carpet-printed linoleum. (Did you even have any idea that such a thing existed?!) He’s constantly saying that he wants my help in figuring out what to do with his house, so I figured it would be fun to work on his house from a distance, through photos and a blog. Everything is going to be done on a very tight budget and with a whole lot of DIY!

Adam is going to be documenting progress on healing his home over at his new blog, Fixing Adam’s House. I’m going to be posting there as well, mostly with words of encouragement, ideas for decorating, and inspirational photos. Adam will be doing all of the hard work, but he’d love to get feedback as he moves forward.

I guarantee it’s going to be a massive and uplifting transformation, and I hope you’ll join us!

Loobylu!

Comments Off
Posted by Anna at D16 on March 17, 2008 – 8:48 pm
Filed under blogs

I’m not sure how I missed this monumental event, but Loobylu is back up and running! Claire took a year off from blogging (a choice I completely understand), and I missed her writing deeply during her absence. She has been an inspiration to me in many ways for a number of years, and I’m so pleased to see her words, illustrations, and beautiful family again. Yay, Loobylu! Yay, Claire!

Apartment Therapy house tour.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on February 20, 2008 – 10:24 am
Filed under blogs, house

A tour of my house is on Apartment Therapy today, along with an interview and a long list of resources. You can see all of the new photos here, most of them new.

You’ve made my day.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on February 4, 2008 – 1:24 pm
Filed under blogs, friends and family, inspiration

I’m so flattered that Kathryn at Perfectbound has given me a “you’ve made my day” award, because really, isn’t making someone’s day just about the nicest thing you can do? Kathryn and Julie’s blog is so beautiful—such attention to detail! Thank you.

Now I’m supposed to pass along the award to five blogs that have made my day! This kind of thing always makes me nervous because I can be shy sometimes, but this is all just about showing appreciation, right? So I’ll try.

Jen at My Polariod Blog
Jenn at Jenn Ski Studio
Kelly at Hoping for Happy Accidents
Sandra at Smosch
Tina at Swissmiss

Thanks! You’ve made my day!

Here are the obligatory “rules” that follow these sorts of posts…
The ‘you make my day award’ works like this:
1) Write a post with links to 5 blogs that make me think and/or make my day
2) Acknowledge the post of the award giver
3) Tell the award winners that they have won by commenting on their blogs with the news!

The most perfect mug ever, and other things that are making me happy.

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Posted by Anna at D16 on January 25, 2008 – 1:59 pm
Filed under blogs, greed, inspiration

A few days ago I was skimming through the Design House Stockholm website, and I came across these gorgeous “Bono” mugs designed by Catharina Kippel. Instantly overtaken by the perfection of the one with the droplet pattern in particular (I have a bit of an obsession with teardrop shapes), I grabbed the photo, posted it on Flickr, and started to agonize over the likely cost of shipping and VAT to get a set of these delivered to me in New York.

Shortly thereafter, Katie popped in to inform me that Crate & Barrel is selling all four of the Design House Stockholm mugs for a mere $10.95! HOORAY. Needless to say, I’ll be stopping in to C&B tonight to pick up several.

More things that are making me happy today:

I love this kitchen by DAPStockholm (found via designsponge), with its red Arne Jacobsen faucet (part of the Vola line I love) and the Cole & Sons wallpaper (which I really expected to be tiring of by now, but I still love it). It reminds me of another favorite kitchen of mine.

I really do love red in the kitchen! Isn’t it nice how everything starts to tie together after a while?

Also:

+ I’ve really been enjoying Alice’s posts over at Peapods.

+ Camilla posted really beautiful photos of her morning walk yesterday.

+ It’s almost the weekend!