What’s With the Name? Each of us has a home. Whether we rent, own, or live with other family members, we get up and go to bed in the same place (most of the time). Most of us are working to make our home and community better, either through remodeling, community involvement, or simply painting a room in the house a more cheerful color.
Each of us envisions the perfect home and community for our family and our neighbors. And we work to get there - one project or cause at a time. Anyone who’s owned a home for more than a few years knows that the list of house and community projects never ends. But that doesn’t stop us from tackling them, because every project moves us One Project Closer to the perfect home, or community, or life. So that’s what the site is about: tips, advice, experiences, products, reviews, giveaways, finances, how-tos, tools, and more that help us build better homes, communities, and lives. Whether we get to the perfect end, well, that’s not really that important, is it?
So Who’s Writing Here? In short: Fred, Kim, Ethan, and Jocie. We’re four best friends living in the same community in the suburbs of Baltimore County, Maryland. We’re married (Fred to Kim, Ethan to Jocie), and have three homes between us. Fred & Kim live in a four bedroom traditional colonial in the back of a cul-de-sac. Ethan & Jocie live in an end unit townhome that backs to the woods on another court. Fred and Kim own another townhome in a nearby community that they rent out. Our community has about 450 homes on 130 acres, and is governed by an active (but not too intrusive) Homeowners’ Association. We’ve a nearby community pool, and are blessed to have a number of other friends living close by.
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Recent posts
Welcome to our third DIY Link-It-Up party, where you can share your best DIY!Submit your project using the link widget below! Next week, we’ll pick the top 4-8 submission on the list and feature them!Stop back Every FRIDAY to MONDAY to Link It Up!DIY Link it Up Features From Last WeekWe had some fabulous entries to our second party last week....read more
Posted 2 days 4 hours ago.
“5 Minutes or Less” will be on on-going series dedicated to quick and fun crafts and DIY projects that you can do in five minutes or less. This segment came to being because in our busy life it was difficult making the time for the involved and time-consuming projects that I love. We would love to feature your ideas too, so don’t forget to take lots of pictures of your next “5 Minutes or Less” DIY and send ‘em our way!This week’s project is making no-slip socks. As you may have read in previous posts, Lucy just turned ONE and is starting to walk. I try to keep soft shoes on her most of the time, but when we’re just around the house, that is sometimes a bit of a chore....read more
Posted 3 days 3 hours ago.
As many of you know, we’re building a library of DIY and expert Project Guides that share step-by-step explanations for a wide range of home improvement projects. As part of building this library, I follow expert contractors to the job site, documenting their steps, tips, techniques, and tools. We’re striving to be the best on the web! If you like what you read, please subscribe to our feed and tell your friends about us!Most of last week, I followed expert general contractor and carpenter Steve Wartman and his crew as they built this great looking backyard shed!...read more
Posted 3 days 4 hours ago.
If you follow us on Facebook, you might have seen a small preview of Lucy’s One Year “Happy Hour” Celebration. (My longer post on the whole party is coming soon!) In keeping with the theme, I made cupcakes with Blue Moon Beer and Red Diamond Merlot for the adults. About a year ago, I saw a recipe for Boxed Wine Cupcakes, and then more recently I saw a from-scratch Recipe for Blue Moon cupcakes on Pinterest. I had to modify these recipes a bit to make them work for me, but they still turned out great!I’m going to give you my versions of those recipes next. But first, check out this beautiful picture taken by my friend, Ruth, of the alcohol-free cupcakes for the birthday girl and her friends, with a one year cupcake topper from our local Hobby Lobby!...read more
Posted 4 days 3 hours ago.
Hello Men Folk. (Ladies, I wrote this for the guys, but would always love your thoughts too! )I’m going to take a not-so-bold leap and assume that since you’re a guy, you aren’t that familiar with Pinterest. Basically, it’s this big social picture-sharing network that lets you “pin” things you like to a personal pin board. The service is dominated by women (we’re guessing 95%+ of users are female). Both Kim and Jocie use it (Jocie most extensively), and some of OPC’s stuff is pinned up there… Even some of our “manly” stuff has made it up, like our workbenches and sawhorses (although they seem out-of-place with all those pictures of hairdos and wedding dresses).You can follow other people on Pinterest, and you can “re-pin” their stuff onto your own board....read more
Posted 5 days 4 hours ago.
Hi everyone! We have a much-anticipated Pro Follow update on the new backyard shed today.But before I begin… I know a lot of you are new to OPC, so I wanted to bring you up to speed on this relatively new feature of our site.What’s a Pro Follow?We’re creating a library of DIY and Expert Project Guides that provide step-by-step explanations of how to tackle a wide range of challenging home improvement projects. One of my jobs at OPC is to follow contractors through the toughest jobs, sharing their tips, techniques, and real life experiences with you.At the end of a Pro Follow, I document the entire job in a single How-To that you can print, reference, and share. Here’s an example. Our entire library of How-To’s is always accessible right from our home page, or on our Project Guides page....read more
Posted 6 days 3 hours ago.
Welcome to our second DIY Link-It-Up party, where you can share your best DIY projects with One Project Closer!Submit your project using the link widget below! Next week, we’ll pick the top 4-8 submission on the list and feature them!Stop back Every FRIDAY to MONDAY to Link It Up!DIY Link it Up Features From Last WeekWe had some fabulous entries to our {very first} party last week. Here’s the best!1. Check out this beautiful sewing-machine base converted to a bathroom sink over at Old House New Folks.2. Salvage Savvy gives us this great bedroom remake for her pretween boy. We might have to revisit our own boys’ bedroom, now!3....read more
Posted 1 week 1 day ago.
This has been a busy week around the home improvement blogs! So many of you have beautiful projects, and we’ve got a great set of DIY features coming this afternoon with our {second} Link it Up DIY party. But one “reveal” this week really caught our eye here at OPC. Lindsay Ballard over at Living with Lindsay gives us the culmination of a year-long master bedroom renovation! Lindsay’s new master bedroom is trendy and stunning. She says:“It may be too bold for some. It may be too busy for others. But for me? It’s just right.”Well, we think it’s neither too bold nor too busy. Lindsay’s done an awesome job with the space!...read more
Posted 1 week 2 days ago.
Over the last week, I’ve finally had time to implement some site design ideas that have been lurking in the back of my mind. As we continue our blog-wide relentless pursuit of a great user experience, I’d love your feedback on these changes. I also welcome your ideas for how to make our site even better (in whatever way that might be). We certainly appreciate all of you who stop by often, and especially those of you who frequently comment. You make our lives happier!The ChangesUp first, a simple change: a new picture of the four of us in the corner of the home page (and every post, in fact.) Unlike many blogs, there are four of us writing here, and we’d love for all of you to connect with all of us!...read more
Posted 1 week 3 days ago.
If you’re just joining us, we’ve been following Steve Wartman and his crew as they build a backyard shed. To catch up, read through day 1 and day 2 where we describe how they built the shed foundation, laid the subfloor, and framed the walls.Hip RoofsToday’s article will focus on framing the roof, and if you remember, Steve’s crew is building a hip roof to match the existing home. Hip roofs are much more interesting than a typical gable roof, and they are also much more complicated. Here’s a quick video describing the challenges of building a hip roof.Hip roof terminology can be a little confusing so I’ve put together this rough diagram showing the different components of a hip roof....read more
Posted 1 week 4 days ago.