I had a delightful conversation with my next guest, Lizzie McGraw. We talk about how she started and developed her popular boutique, Tumbleweed & Dandelion, in Venice Beach, California, and then went on to create interiors for many of her repeat clients. She’s recently come out with a beautiful book called "Creative Style," in which she shares her thought process on design, which prompted my interest in having her on the show. Visit the show notes pages for this episode at www.littleyellowcouch.com/podcast to see some wonderful pictures of Lizzies work and learn more about her design inspiration. Here’s Lizzie.
The Style Matters podcast is now Slow Style Home! Click here for the latest episode.
I had a delightful conversation with my next guest, Lizzie McGraw. We talk about how she started and developed her popular boutique, Tumbleweed & Dandelion, in Venice Beach, California, and then went on to create interiors for many of her repeat clients. She’s recently come out with a beautiful book called "Creative Style," in which she shares her thought process on design, which prompted my interest in having her on the show. Visit the show notes pages for this episode at www.littleyellowcouch.com/podcast to see some wonderful pictures of Lizzies work and learn more about her design inspiration. Here’s Lizzie.
The Style Matters podcast is now Slow Style Home! Click here for the latest episode.
Hello, this is the Style Matters podcast brought to you by Little Yellow Couch. I'm Zandra, your host, creator of the Slow Style approach to uncovering and implementing your signature style, one that represents who you are and actively helps you become who you want to be. This show isn't about hacking the latest trends or coming up with design rules you aren't allowed to break. Instead, my aim is to talk with the most thoughtful designers about their process of creating beauty, how they make their choices, and what makes a room really work, and about the substantive reasons about why developing one style or aesthetic really matters. If you're ready to make your home a meaningful place to be, you are in the right place. I'm so glad you're here. I had a really delightful conversation with my next guest, Lizzie McGraw. We talk about how she started and developed her popular boutique, Tumbleweed and Dandelion in Venice Beach, California, and then went on to create interiors for many of her repeat clients. She's recently come out with a beautiful book called Creative Style, in which she shares her thought process on design, which prompted my interest in having her on the show. Here's Lizzie. Lizzie McGraw, welcome to the Style Matters podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm very excited. Likewise. We're going to just dive right into this beautiful book that you have just put out. There's so many reasons to love this book, but I want to start at the beginning. In the very first chapter, when you talk about creating your shop, Tumbleweed and Dandelion, you say, I always knew I didn't just want to design spaces. I wanted to design my life. And so Tumbleweed and Dandelion was born. Yes. I want to know more about that. What did you mean by that? Expand on that for us. I think, you know what? Well, when I went to college, I went to college for art and my father, who was an architect, was immediately like, okay, so I'm paying you to color and paint all day. I mean, that's what I'm paying for. And I was like, exactly. And if I could have just probably been a crafter and made life in that, I probably would have been crafting things forever. But I knew when I sort of got into this more. I think I was born a designer in some sort, but when I really started to be an adult and develop my life, I remember one time I went into an interview and it was for something sort of creative. It might have been graphic design or something, but the fluorescent lights were like overwhelming me in the room and it was on like the 32nd floor in New York City. And I was like, and I remember the woman saying to me, okay, is there any reason that we shouldn't hire you? And I go, oh my God, you shouldn't hire me. And I think she was so shocked. I go, you know what? I can't do this. I said, I'm so sorry to waste your time. I said, but the fluorescent lights are too much for me. I said, I need to be able to go outside. I said, no, thank you very much and good luck. Wow. I love that story. Thank you. So I think when I really started knowing that I had to really make a life for myself and make a certain amount of money and I just was sort of besides going to design school and doing all that, I just was sort of good at helping people do all these things. And so my first approach was I enjoyed that. But like adding on to that, I knew that it would suit me to just run a shop all day long. That I couldn't just be like from nine until five in the shop. I had to be somebody who was going out to job sites and building things and doing all that. So I really felt like in the course of all that, I was without really knowing what I was doing, even though I had grown up under my father's tutelage, designing a life that allowed me to be a bit shopkeeper, a bit furniture builder, a bit designer, a bit of everything. And it keeps my attention. I probably, you know, I don't know, I probably have one of those ADHD things or something, but yeah, and I guess we'll stay on diagnosed. But like really and truly like I feel so grateful that through all the events and all the years of this life that I've led doing this, somehow creativity has always financially supported me. And I don't take that lightly. Right. You know, I think and I, and I, with the people that I have working for me now, I am always trying to like share with them things that I wish I would have done better than because I think it took me a long time to be a decent businesswoman. Yeah. I always, I always was a good and loyal steward of design and helping everybody with that, but learning how to, you know, ask for what I should be paid and learning how to run my business better came, you know, come slowly. Well, and it's a very different skill set. It's a different, you know, totally. It's a whole other thing. Exactly. So being able to combine those two things has been a journey. Yes. And, and at the core of it, it sounds like your sort of guiding principle has been that you're not separating work from the rest of who you are and the rest of the life that you want. You were integrating the two. You were, in other words, designing a life, not just a job. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Like you said, I mean, it's, it's an amazing life and it's not, I don't want to say that you're lucky because I think you worked very hard to create this, but it is something that not everybody has or does or knows how to do. And so that's, it's wonderful. Well, you know what though, I think, I think I am lucky though. I think, I think you do. I think anybody who does anything successful somewhere in there, there's hard work. Somewhere, you know, nobody's that lucky that it's just, oh, all fun and games. You know, you, like whatever it is you do, you have to pay some attention to like what the rules of the game are. And it, you know, there's many a time. I mean, in 2008, you know, the whole world ended and at the time I was like a sell, like a sole proprietor. Yeah. And in one week, all of my, all of my credit cards canceled, all of my, like I had like a line of credit and it was all gone. And I was like, okay, I literally have the little amount I have in the bank and I still have to like feed and furnish this whole thing. And somehow we did it, you know, and, you know, and, and it's certainly through working, you know, 24 seven, but when, and you know, when you, when people say they work for themselves, you really still always work for the people who are hiring you. Yes, of course. You know, so, so luckily in the world of this, I have been, I have, I have, I have, I have just, I've had such long lasting friendships and clients that, you know, I've done many, many, many houses over and over and over again for and, you know, and I've watched their children grow and now I'm doing their children's houses and, you know, and I love all of that as well. So it's, it's like all of the things I do have such gratitude for it all. Yeah. Yeah. And that comes through loud and clear in the book. I mean, you, you gush about every single client that's featured in this book. And I know it's sincere. I mean, you would be, you've really become friends with these people and it, and it's just, it's just a lot of generosity infused through everything. I want to ask you, yeah, you mentioned already that you, so you have a shop that sells beautiful, gorgeous home goods and we'll get into that and a little bit more later. And then you do your design work and then you also, you and your team also design and, and make certain things that are sold in your shop. We, that's, that's, I mean, that's like a whole other section of the design world. I mean, you, you do, you really have your hand in a lot of things. So what, what do you make in your LA facility and, and why did you decide to do that? You know what? I'm not like, I think from the beginning. LA is a great place to meet artisans and carpenters and whatnot that build and make things. So I've been making my sofas and my tables and all kinds of furniture and bookcases and all sort of bespoke pieces with the same people for 25 years. You know, and we were all like, we were all really young when we started doing this and, and it has evolved into, I mean, anything I can draw. Gabriel can make for me or Jesse can make for me and we, and it's such a wonderful thing to be able to do that. So for many years when people would go to the design shows and all of those things, which have great value in so many ways, I never did any of those things because I was like, well, I just make my own. I just make my own. And I also, I think it was also was when we ever had tough times, I always felt a responsibility to the two shops that I work with that make our larger pieces of furniture. And I was like, their families depend on work, you know, what we sell. So that's co-mingled in so in many ways, you know, but above and beyond that, we have always hand painted like older goods as well as newer goods. We're very about repurposing and reclaiming things. So we do a lot of hand painted furniture. We stencil floors. We also have our own line of candles, which, which evolve in our own line of soaps and, you know, a few other like bits of things like that. And we make our own pillows. We search, you know, wherever I go on travels, I find fabrics and things and whatnot. And, you know, they become pillows that we're selling here. So we do, we do a lot of interesting things like that. And I just love to be able to say that we're sort of have like we're the last bastion of that kind of old world thinking because the world is going so fast. And you know, everything is online and everything is something you can purchase somewhere. But if you travel, which, you know, we're like, you and I are lucky enough to get to do not everybody gets to go on big trips, right? See how things are made in other parts of the world. It's amazing to go to India and see these people handstand off or going to these places. And you want to somehow benefit those places as well. At least I do. Yes. You know, and be able to sell those things here and like a fair trade sort of manner of course, you know, but, but so I think that we sort of do, I don't want to ever look like every other store and the problem with the world. There's no chance of that, but keep going. But the problem with the world growing and being what it is, is that, you know, most stores grow and then they all look alike to some fashion. They all have this way of being, you know, and I were on a very, very successful street, which was not at all successful when we started, right? And I didn't speak. It was not like it was, you know, it was like Times Square in New York City. It was pretty. It was very gritty. Yeah, sure. You know, and, and when we were doing it. I mean, I literally was painting furniture. In fact, I'll digress slightly and tell you when I started the store and we, I really didn't have any money. All my own furniture was the first furniture in the store. And once that sold, I just had to go, you know, rummaging for more street furniture to figure out what to do. But there was a barbecue a few doors down the street and he'd been there for many years and it was Glencrest barbecue and it was great. And he was so lovely, he was such, it was such a dangerous neighborhood at that time. He would see me like painting in the store till 10 o'clock at night and he would cover and he'd go, you lock your door and you call me when you're leaving and I'll walk you to your car. And I'd be like, no, no, Glen. So I would hide from him because I wouldn't want him to stay late. And he would call me and he'd go, I know you're in there. I mean, he was like the most, the most lovely gentleman. You know, we sort of were blessed with little angels watching over us in those days. And with enough people somehow coming down to it at that time was a forgotten street. Right. You know, word of mouth just sort of carrying on that we could do these things for people. So it was a lot of, you know, that was, those were really like, we used to have a friend, this is another funny story, who would drive by after he worked in a restaurant at night and he only became our friend because we would accidentally leave like a mirror or a dresser or something outside, which I can't even, one time we left our radio playing outside. Like I don't know how we were that absent minded. Right. But, and he would put it in his truck and then bring it to us the next day. Oh my gosh. And he ended up becoming like this great friend because he, we were like, oh my God, he rescued more furniture that we left out. You had some people watching out for you, which is so lovely. We absolutely did. And like, I hope that we still do. You tell another funny story about, this is the first location of your store, which was also you were living probably above it, I'm guessing. This is actually when, no, this is, that story is actually when we moved to where we lived. So the story I think is a little, I'm not sure how we wrote it exactly, but yes, we lived in our store for a while. Right. We lived in the store because we had lost our lease in our home and that was like we had to move into it and whatnot. We were open seven days a week and the store is not large and we had two cats and two dogs and we lived, which, which is now like the baby hut room in the store. And we would forget to lock the door and literally I would like, I remember like being in the bathtub and being like, we're not open. And can you just walk the door on the way out? Yes. I mean, it was, it was many of, yes, many a funny, silly, crazy thing. Like, you know, God forbid you overslept. Yeah, right. People are knocking on the door. Where are you? You're still in your bathroom when you haven't had coffee. Yes. No, we were like, it was, it really was a street. That's kind of the fun thing about the history of the street too, because for, in the 30s, it really was a live and work space. So so many artisans like ran their stores and shops and whatnot, you know, and, and then upstairs or I mean, very European. Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, and so I sort of felt like we were just, for many years, this street was an extension of that for sure. I mean, now it is much more corporate, unfortunately, slash it is what it is. Right. You know, so, you know, now we have, there is a change here, but somebody not too long ago, graffiti at the back of our store, but the group, we've left it because they wrote last man standing. And we think that's funny. Yeah, that's great. We're one of the oldest shops. So yeah, I guess, endeavor to persevere, as they say. Exactly. And yeah, I would have kept that as well. So yeah, so really, I mean, this is just this sort of a continuation of that first question I asked you, which is this really incorporating your life into your work and your work into your life. And there's not this separation and it's very, it's so, it's about you and your own growth personally and doing following your curiosity and what you love. And therefore your hand is in everything, you know, you're making things, you're selling things, you're dining things. So it all kind of makes sense and I really believe that actually that's what the homes look like in this book. That's what to me, what they have in common is this sense of lives well lived as opposed to rooms that look designed by someone else for someone. And we're going to get to that in a minute. Hopefully that's true. I think it's very true. I think it's very true. I'd like to talk to you about the home you live in now. Yes. Which is featured in the chapter called A Cottage in California in the book. Yeah. And I know it was in really rough shape when you bought it and you've done a ton of work and you still think of it as a work in progress, which I totally get. I'm the same way. I would never want to live in a home that was done. What would I do? Yeah, of course. Right. Always need a project. Absolutely. But what I really got from that chapter was this idea that you continue to notice things about your home and about yourself and you allow things to evolve. And I think a lot of people, they move in and maybe they get it kind of to a part place that they like and then they just really stop looking at it. They stop noticing and everything kind of stays the same and static for years and years. So let's give some examples of ways in which you've changed up the home that you live in now and why and what do they feel like? You know what? It is always evolving, first of all, but yes, we are like, we are always sort of fiddling with something. Like I have my outdoor area is continually sort of in flux because I have so much of it. We have almost an acre, but it's terraced and so it feels even larger than it is. And so there is a wonderful living space right behind our house. Then you go up a bank of stairs and there is a giant living space. And then there's a whole, it's completely covered by trees is the third yard leading up again a hill to the guest house. Before we continue with the conversation, I want to introduce you to my slow style approach to creating a home you love. Slow style is a step by step framework that puts you at the front and center of your home rather than products, trends and other people's ideas of what beauty looks like. To get started, I've created a new worksheet called dream home action plan. And it's all about adjusting your mindset about what you really want from your home and what you want to experience inside it because I believe everyone deserves to live inside beauty right now, not someday when you can afford all the bells and whistles that you see on lifestyles of the rich and famous. I'm dating myself. Does anyone remember that show? Anyway, this worksheet is the first step to reframing what you want to get out of life and how your home can help you achieve that. It's free and it's available on our website, littleyellowcouch.com. First click on the yellow button right at the top called free guide and then I'll jump in your inbox and we can start a conversation about your dream home. Again, that's littleyellowcouch.com. Okay, let's get back to the episode. So I could never sell my house even if I wanted to because my mother is completely attached to my guest house and she can't be in the guest house. So it, you know, but we are always sort of planning and changing things and upgrading things in some sort of way. Like, you know, I put shiplap on walls that didn't have that and reinstallated things and you know, there's the stuff you see and the stuff you don't see kind of stuff. But we also have sort of maintained these two sort of organic vintage kitchens where I don't know, now I'm playing around with getting a Schmag dishwasher because I just saw one and they're so cute. But I've never had a dishwasher. So I almost like to say that I am like literally like so environmental. I don't even have that. Like we hang our clothes dry if we can. We do all that kind of stuff. Like it's very, we have a very old school sort of way going about us. But you know, I, there's pictures of my home going back a bunch of years and older magazines and whatnot before I vaulted the ceiling. Yeah, great. That's that's one of the changes I wanted to ask you about. Yes, I literally though this is just me being me. I had one of Vicki Gordon who's in the book. Yeah, one of my best friends and oldest clients and a wonderful, wonderful person was coming out to LA and she had an all the years had never seen my house. She hadn't come out here that often. Oh my gosh. He's like, I'm coming to stay in your guest house and I'm literally I want to say maybe it was a month before. And I literally was like quick, get permits, get this or taking the ceiling out. Oh, it was like you're kidding, right? I'm like, no, I was like, I had to vault the ceiling before Vicki came. That was hilarious. I know, but it was a motivation. Like this person's coming. It's time to vault the ceiling. Well, because here's the thing. There's all kinds of things when you say, you know, what would you like, you know, why do you want to do more? What would you do? I also think it's really, and I tell this to all of my clients too. I think everything should be a good experience in your life that you attempt. And when you're going into any sort of home or model or building is stressful, no matter what you help, no matter what else you want to say about it, it is stressful. So in the world that it's stressful, I feel like don't take it on unless you have the time to take it on. Don't take it on unless you have banked some money to put into it. Or you like, you can know you can stick to your budget. And do it with people that make you feel good. You know, and if you're working with people that aren't making you feel happy, then something is wrong. But that also goes for me in my own home because all I really want to do is, you know, I have a chef husband and he's had that small kitchen, which is fine for so long. But I would love to give us more of a big kitchen eating living space. And then if I'm going to do that, I'm probably going to build up and do another bedroom. Okay. But I haven't done it. I mean, I've expanded down the back porch in the back bedroom and I've put in a new wall in the back and do all kinds of things. But I haven't done it because I'm so busy. I don't want to be stressed about that and frazzled while I'm doing other work. I want to do that when I go, okay, I've got a couple months now. I'm going to get this done. I'm not going to be a crazy person about it. Right. I'm going to process as much as possible. Totally. Totally. And you know, so I feel like those are really important things to do. The vaulted ceiling is stressful or is it something you just, you knew you wanted to do for a long time and you just had to pull the trigger. I just had to pull the trigger. And it was, yes, it was stressful and then it was a mighty mess. And then of course I had to like make a new sofa and do like 10 other things, you know, like when you make your own sofas, you can go, I need this in a week. You know, so, but, but honestly that is, you know, in the world of like probably big bangs for your buck, like if you make a ceiling higher, you give so much more breath and space to your space. There is something it is literally and mentally uplifting. You know, it elevates you to have all that. So I do feel like it was worth it for sure. And it's gorgeous. It's really gorgeous. Thank you. You also mentioned in the book, you turned a bedroom into an office, I think, and I loved the reason why. Do you know what I'm referring to in the book? Was it with my house? Yeah. I love it. I love it. I know you've got a lot going on. Let me remind you what you said. Which was something about the light, you noticed something about the light. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I sat in the back bedroom one day working and I was like, oh my goodness, the light is so amazing here. I was like, this has to become an office. Yeah. So yes, then we moved ourselves because I was like, yeah. And honestly, it is really great. And, but it is also now where I want to put French doors on it and build up, have that be off the kitchen. So I'm very, it's not like it's bad where I'm at, but I can also see how great it could be. Right. Right. Yeah. Well, what I love about that example is that that's what I meant about how you really live in your home and you really notice things and you allow things to evolve. I mean, you've been living in that house for a long time and you'd never really been in that bedroom to work before, presumably. Yes. Because you saw the great light, you had the confidence, the freedom, the open-mindedness to say, well, this has to change. This has to be an office, not a bedroom. You know what? If I could give anyone, like people who are delving into doing any of these kind of design things, I would say so easy to do a Google sunlight study, a sun study because really and truly you should build knowing that, okay, I want to see if you can see the sunset or if you can see the sunrise or where your view is going to be at. And like some of the houses, like the birdhouse that I did that's in the book, that whole house, the access of that whole house changed when I came and met them because I said you're facing the wrong way. And literally we ended up building, it's a very European courtyard as you walk into that house and I feel like so many places I go into and there's numerous reasons for them. You know, it's not necessarily a developer's priority to really think about what a person, how a person is going to live in the best way, which is unfortunate because I think in the world that we live in now environmentally, ecologically, everything, we should be thinking in terms of what is the best way for people to live in whatever space you're plopping them in. Because everything from rooftop gardens to all sort of like water repurposing to all kinds of things that are just great ways to live, you really can easily grow your own vegetables and things if you plant things correctly or if you figure it out, you don't really have to have a giant yard. And situating your house, understanding where the light is going to come in what times of day into which rooms, I mean it makes it light, natural light makes such a huge difference, it really can inform design decisions and totally. Yeah, absolutely. Well, that's a great, I never thought about doing the Google sun study, that's so smart. Yeah, yeah. And so I feel like, I just feel like as, as I, I think it's funny that my house has gotten the attention and has gotten because it's the least expensive house in the book, everything else. But at the same time, I feel like, you know what, I feel like our personalities do come out and things. And I guess that that is sort of what comes out there because I sort of, you know, coming home to our house is like a holiday. You know, it's really, it's really built just to be relaxing to like, you know, we have a fire, a beautiful fireplace right outside the back door and in California, you can use that almost all year unless it's crazy hot, you know, right. You know, and it all just, it's all suited towards, it's not, it's not too much to look after. It's not too much of a responsibility. But I have a yard and I feel like that was an important thing to me too because so many people build up utilizing their whole lot. Right. And I'm like, Oh God, it's so nice though to have some outdoor space. And you really utilize it. And of course you are in California where you can, but I mean, you have, I mean, your house is basically twice the size of what it is because you have outdoor rooms. What absolutely. And like, like, like even now we'll have our holiday party and there'll be 30 people and my nothing will be crowded, you know, from the front house to the middle yard to the guest house, people can wander. There'll be three fire pits. You can have chicken coop. It's very authentic. It's transporting in a way. I want to talk about, you mentioned, you know, your house is probably cost the least out of any of the houses in this book. I want to talk about that for a minute because you can tell by looking at some of the architectural details and also the locations of the houses of your clients that there's a lot of wealth going on here. Yes. Yes. And I'm going to try to explain what I'm, I have trouble coming up with words to describe what I'm about to say. So bear with me. That's all good. We all do. Yeah. I don't see when I look at any of these houses, I don't see, oh, a statement piece that screams, I am wealthy and, you know, this is, this is the result of my wealth as I was able to afford this type of chandelier or this artwork or whatever. You know what? I don't think like, and I'm really fortunate because to have an interior designer is not a dollar. So people have to have money to afford to pay me. Right. And that said, I am really fortunate because none of my clients are that way. None of them. And I'm all like one of them who has the most beautiful, beautiful things and I'm working on another house for now, Dan Stern. And that house is, is really works as a guest house for them. And we, when we came in and did that, what was important to him is that it felt like a happy, authentic mid-century modern. He didn't want to build up on it. Yeah. He didn't want to like make it extravagant in any other way. He wanted to capitalize on what it is. Right. And we really did that through going, okay, let's bring in Moroccan rugs. Let's bring in mid-century furniture. But and it would, none of it was too fussy or too busy or anything. We took a closet and we made a little desk nook in there and one of the bedrooms as well. Like we did all those kinds of things. Yeah. I only bought things like I bought like a vintage Seabird, you know, record player that worked for them. I bought things like that that sort of really scream a different place in time, you know. And we always call that the sunset house because that house, speaking of like where the sun goes, it gets the most gorgeous sunset and it looks, it just gets the rim of the ocean. So it's really beautiful. Wow. And you know, like that, that's what we capitalized on there and making it lovely outside and doing all that. And I think that's sort of the way we think with everything we do. We just sort of go, what, how do you people live? You know, I, there's a bunch of houses I've done where people are very social and I always sort of convince them to do a guest house that can serve as the place that they do a lot of socializing in. Okay. Because it's so great. Like you don't, you go, you can go in at night and you can just shut the door and clean the next day if you want. Right, right. And you share a beautiful yard in between those two things, it can be a little bit of both of those things. And I like, I love that way of living. So I always outfit extra houses on properties and whether they're like a, you know, a granny suite or a proper house or whatever, so that they have a multi-purpose to them. Right, right. And you have a guest house on your own property. I do. And I, and I know we, that's where we entertain and that, and it's, and it's, you know, there's a job, a bigger table up there and like, you know, all the amenities we need for all that stuff, you know, the good China's in the guest house. I love that. That's so smart. It's really, it's very, it goes back to that. I want to have a life that has some ease to it. Well, so the houses all are very different in this book. I mean, you know, clearly you pay attention to the different personalities of each of your clients. So therefore, of course, they're all going to look different. But there's this thread running through them that, that is, it's part, it's that this is not one of those glossy design books that where all of the homes are just sort of draw dropping, but also feel like they belong in some imaginary world because they're so out of reach for normal people. Right. So this book, even though I know the clients are wealthy and I know that a lot of the things are so well made. And so therefore they, you know, had, you know, some probably high ticket prices on there, but, but it's more, it's so much more about the people than the stuff. And it's, and it's really, that is totally to your credit that you've been able to pull that out of people and then find the stuff that is going to reflect really who they are and their lives that are well lived, collected over time. All that stuff that I think we actually want in our homes. You know, we get, thank you for that. We get, honestly, we get a lot of people that come into the store and it's a very cottagey looking store and we do a lot of work for like single men and, and they'll be like, and they'll come in and they'll be like, I want this. And I'm like, you know, you don't, I know you don't actually want this. You just, there's a feeling you get from being in here and we'll go see what you actually want. Right. You know, but I feel, yeah, I feel like, you know, your home, you know, you're home, your home should really reflect who it is you are. And in order to do that, I do think there is something to be said for, I was a little concerned when we were putting the book together and so many books and I love all of these books. They all look like the every page is similar. It has a neutral tone to it or it has a busy tone to it or it has a this or it has a that and I embrace all of that. When you look at this book, there's probably a little bit in there for everybody. It's all a little bit different, but it all hopefully is well done for each one that it's supposed to be, you know, so I, I had originally wanted to write a book and hopefully it'll be my second book about all the funny things that happen when you are doing like just the mishaps, the good, the bad, the ugly of design, you know, and very entertaining. Yes. I mean, I literally tell a story all the time, which is I used to have this for years. I had this wonderful painter Merlin and that was really his name Merlin like Merlin painter and we loved him. And one time I sent him to a house and we called to check on him. He was going to paint a bathroom and I said, how's it going? And he goes, it's great. He goes, I'm playing with the cat and I'm like, I don't have a cat. I'm like, okay. And then he goes, he goes, yeah, I don't know why you said though that the bathroom was upstairs. There's only one story in this house and I'm like Merlin, where are you? Oh my God. Where are you? Oh my gosh. He just let him into somebody else's house. They left the door unlocked and he thought he was at the right address and he was like, oh my goodness. And he literally had paint, he had put, painted, not painted, but put the tape up to stripe the bathroom. And I was like, get out of there. Just get out of that house now. Are you? You caught him just in time. His paint person was just about to hit that first line of painter's tape. Exactly. Exactly. So it's like, I think that that whole all is part of like our fun little journey of this. Like I have, one of my clients said to me and I wanted to say, oh my God, that's exactly how I feel. And I was so grateful. He said it to me. He said, you know what? Whatever happens, just tell me the truth. If something can't, if something isn't going to work or if you screwed up or whatever, just tell me. And I was like, oh my God, that is how I truly approach life. And I feel like it's so healthy that instead of me knowing that I was going to get like my head chopped off, he just like listened. You know, right? He was treating you like a human. Exactly. Exactly. Oh my gosh. Well, we barely scratched the surface of this book and that's okay because people need to just go buy it. I want to wrap up with my signature question, Lizzie. Why does style matter? Honestly, I just think it's like, it's symbiotic with like living an unchaotic happy life. I think some people really gravitate towards their maximalists and they really gravitate towards more color and things and that gets their energy going. And some people really need neutrals and whatnot, but whatever it is that you need, I think you have to, you don't have to know how to do it yourself, but you have to know what makes you feel good and what makes you feel your most productive and creative and positive. Like if you're someone that works out, you need to have a dedicated happy space in your space that you can do that. If you're someone who likes to just really watch movies as a getaway, you need that. Like, you know what I mean? I feel like the way we sleep is so under looked at. Like you really should have a bed that you feel good in. I mean, and these all sound like, you know, big people like silly problems, but they're not like they're really like, if you can afford to have. You know, comfort, then you don't have to spend all of your dollars, but you really can do something for yourself that when you get up in the morning, you're happy to be in your kitchen having your coffee, you have your look out your window, you have like there are certain things that feel right to you. You know, and if you don't have that, I mean, and a lot of times we go in and you're right, you said earlier, a lot of times people do stuff and then they stop and then they're done in 10 years have gone by. So that, that's the thing we all kind of get into. It's like, you know, forgetting your diet, forgetting whatever you have to sort of remind yourself. Also, it is so good. It is so, so good to relinquish things that no longer serve you and give them to someone else who may need them. Oh, yes. Oh, my gosh. Right. Just sit over cluttered with things that we have some attachment to. And you know, I used to like, I, I think I've had times where I'm, I am a sentimental collector of certain things, but I also have like led a lot of that go to just forward in life and go, someone else really needs this more than I do. Right. And when you think about it that way and you're not putting it in a landfill or, you know, donating it anonymously and hoping it doesn't go to landfill, you know, it, it, yeah, it, it makes a huge difference. Well, I really like what you said about, you don't have to know how to do it yourself, but you have to know what, what you need. And I think that that, that the, the creation of a home is so much about, is so introspective. It's really about getting to know yourself and what you love. And then like you've done, allowing it to evolve, letting go of things, moving on, trying something new that you hadn't done before. And I, you know, yeah. Yeah. Well, Lizzie, this has been such a great conversation. I'm so happy to have met you. Yeah, it's a great book. Thank you so much for your time today. Oh, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thanks so much for spending time with me today. If you've gotten something out of this episode, please be so kind as to leave a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you're listening from. It really does help this show stay on the air. And also don't forget to grab our free guide, the dream home action plan at littleyellowcouch.com. And also that's where you can find the show notes pages for all of these episodes with photos and links to things that we've been talking about. Have a great week. Bye for now.