The Lazy Genius Podcast - Bonus: How to Decorate for the Holidays with The Nester

Episode Date: November 10, 2022

Today, I’m so excited to welcome Myquillyn Smith, aka The Nester, to the show to talk to us about decorating our homes! She is so good at helping people have the greatest amount of style with the least amount of stuff based on what matters. This conversation is a fantastic reminder of how to see the next few weeks in such a way that your home feels cozy and wintery and you. Helpful Companion Links Find Myquillyn on Instagram and online Cozy Minimalist Home Welcome Home The Cozy Community (open just for Lazy Geniuses through Monday, November 14th!) My Winter Sun playlist Check out my books The Lazy Genius Kitchen and The Lazy Genius Way No transcript for this episode as it’s an interview, thanks for understanding. Love you, mean it. The links above are commissionable, meaning that if you click through and make a purchase I may make a small percentage at no extra cost to you. This podcast is hosted by Kendra Adachi and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey there, you're listening to The Lazy Genius Podcast. I'm Kendra Adachi and I'm here to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today is a very special bonus episode, How to Decorate for the Holidays. I am joined by my absolute favorite lazy genius when it comes to decorating your home, Mike Willan Smith, aka The Nestor. The Nestor is the author of three books, The Nesting Place, Cozy Minimalist Home, and Welcome Home, all books I absolutely I give cozy minimalist home as gifts to people all the time. Mike Willen is so good at helping people be a cozy minimalist, which is having the greatest amount of style with the least amount of stuff, all based on what style you love and how much or little stuff you want to have. There is so much permission in her work, but also a ton of practicality, like heaps and heaps. She teaches you to create a home and decorate it and all the things.

My home feels good and like me and actually really really. pretty because of Michaelan's influence over the last few years. So today we are going to talk about decorating, but specifically for this season and not just for the holiday, for both. Even if you're familiar with Anester and her ideas, I think this episode is a fantastic reminder of how to see the next few weeks in such a way that your home feels cozy and wintry and eventually Christmasy if you want it to without going in the wrong order. She is the queen of going in the right order, which is a very important lazy genius principle. The audio was a little wonky in some part. The audio was a little wonky in some So thank you for listening to audio that's going to sound different than mine does right now.

But it's not weird or loud or unlistenable. It's just different. So thanks for letting it be different. Here is my conversation with The Nestor. What is a cozy minimalist and how, because it's November right now, how does being a cozy minimalist apply to the seasons? So in the shortest amount of words possible, a cozy minimalist is someone who wants to get the most amount of style with the least amount of stuff. And the beautiful thing with that is we all get

to decide our own style and we all get to decide how much stuff it requires to get that style. So no one's counting their items and saying, well, if you have over 100, that's too much. So it's, it's all still up to you. But it's keeping in mind the goal of enough, which I don't think we talk about enough. So when that applies to the seasons, you know, I think there are many, many, many of us who really like for our home to kind of recognize what season it is. I think we've all walked into a home in July and it's like really heavy and they have furs everywhere. And it's like the house thinks it's December and you suddenly feel hot. That's not what we would love to have for our house, but we also don't want to buy all new furniture and all new art and paint the walls

different every season. And so most of us are looking for like this, what is the happy medium where our home can kind of feel like it's in touch with the seasons and kind of gets it. But at the same time, it's there to serve us and it's, you know, super functional and it looks awesome and we kind of don't have to think about it. You know, I've yet to run into anyone who's like, I want to get my home looking really beautiful so I can impress all of my neighbors and my mother-in-law. It's not what we're looking for at all. We want a really great functional home that we're confident in that we can partner with so we can use it to the fullest.

I'm all about that. One of the things I love is that you are truly encapsulating so many lazy genius postures because you're not telling us you can only have this many items or this is the style you should have or this is the type of couch you should buy or whatever. You are transcending style and rules and all of these things that we think are supposed to matter. And instead you're like, no, no, no, no, we're going to get a new language and a new framework. I'm going to give you the order that you can go in to think about your home. But it's based on what matters to you.

It's what's cozy for you. It's what hits your style and how much you need for that. So it's so like freeing and amazing. That's why I love giving your book away is a gift because I think that people, it's kind of like, it's kind of like how people see the lazy genius kitchen. They think it's for a certain kind of person who cooks a certain kind of way and lives a certain kind of life. I'm like, no, no, no.

It's for anybody with the kitchen. Like literally anybody with the kitchen. And your book is literally for anybody who lives somewhere. It's for everybody. It's for everybody. So I love that so much. Okay. So you're talking about how we don't want to.

I love the idea of walking into someone's home in July and it be covered in first. I don't know why that's. Maybe that's a bit extreme. It's so hot in here. Why is this so hot here? But I know what you're mean because when you walk into my house in July, our dining room has just for three months of the year, this big clothing rack that's covered in drying swimsuits and towels because we go to the pool all the time. It's not decoration, but it's the feeling of the season. It's like, oh, it's summer in here.

Like, this goes here in the summer. So I think that there is a lot of permission that you give to people to, like you said, to work with your home, to be in partnership with your home and let it serve you in whatever season of life or season of the calendar that you're in. So I would love for you to share like some of the kind of frameworks that we might have around maybe some direction. We both love house rules. We both talk about house rules in slightly different ways.

But I would love for you to share some direction and maybe some house rules that are generally applicable to us. When we're not wanting to buy new furniture and paint all the walls so it feels like July or November, what can we do to kind of give ourselves a bit of a framework and bring seasons into our home? Absolutely. Well, you first have to change your mindset. And this is the main part. because as a person who I love beautiful things, Kendra, I want all the beautiful things in my house. I want to buy them all. I want to set them all out and pet them all and decorate with them all.

So I am Chachke's biggest fan. However, when you have too much of even beautiful things, they just get in your way. And I was finding that I began dreading getting out my Christmas decor because it was like bins and bins and bins and bins of dusty things. And it felt like I had to get all out really quickly on a Saturday, on, you know, right after Thanksgiving, put it all out, and then three weeks later, well, four weeks later, you're packing it all up again and investing in all of this stuff that lives in a plastic bin for 11 months out of the year. And I just wondered if there was a better way. And so I feel like a cozy minimalist approaches the seasons like a creator instead of a consumer. And for most of my life,

I approached seasonal decor or thinking of how my home can feel seasonal by going to Hobby Lobby and loading up my cart with stuff from the winter decorating aisle, the Christmas decor aisle. And so instead, if we just stop and say that there's nothing wrong with that. I still have all kinds of stuff from Hobby Lobby. But if we back up and just say, if we want to approach the season like a creative, what does that mean? And I think it's very helpful if we take our cues from nature. You know, any of us, no matter where we lived, I've lived in Florida, I've lived in Michigan, I live in North Carolina now, you can almost always go outside and know what season you're in.

Even if you're in Florida, it doesn't matter. It's not about like you're going to have snow on the ground in winter. It's just creation has a natural rhythm that surrounds us. And the way we experience that is through our five senses. And if we can get into the idea of applying that to our home, instead of just doing what I used to do, which was only thinking about the sight, the sense of sight, like only visual. But instead, if we can think about, oh, in creation, I experience fall because I can smell the bonfire. And I experience winter because it gets dark really early.

And so there are all of these visual cues. There are all these cues that affect our senses that if we pay attention to those, we can apply them to our home in a way that kind of feels natural and requires less decor. But it's still kind of fun because you can get, instead of seasonal decor or like holiday decor, if you first think about seasonal supplies that cater to your five senses. And so that's that's the mindset change. It's like thinking about, okay, it's winter. How can I apply? Like, what do I experience in winter with my five senses? What do I want to be surrounded by like when it comes to the sense of smell?

What do I want to smell? What smells like winter to me? What tastes like winter to me? Well, that means I should be cooking foods that taste like winter. And there's no right or wrong. Again, it doesn't mean you have to make chili. Whatever is in your family, in your heritage, whatever feels wintery, not only do I hope that you're cooking those,

but I find that a lot of us are like, well, I like to bake cookies and I like to bake bread in the winter and we don't have a serrated knife and we don't have a breadboard, but we have 49 wreaths for our window. Oh, that's such a real example. It's such a real example.

It is the principle that we both use in different ways in our lives. It's the lazy genius principle of essentializing where it's like, no, no, guys, what matters to you? You need to get rid of what's in the way. There are almost certainly things that are in the way of that. And then you also need to make sure that you have what you need. You know, we think, we keep filling the hole of like, we think that this is what our home is supposed to look like and feel like. And we keep, like you're saying, filling it with things. We keep

buying more things. But those things aren't bringing us into this place of what is like a really rooted sort of organic experience of the season we're in because like you're saying, it's very personal. That can't be like we can go, like you said, we can go to Hobby Lobby. We can go to home goods. Like it's fun to go and look for things that, you know, maybe match the season. But if you're going in without your own language of what that means to you, you're just going to buy what's in front of you and then stick it on whatever surfaces in your house. And then you're like, well, now I just have a lot of stuff. Like it doesn't feel like the way you want it to. And then you're right. You still don't have the knife to cut the bread that makes your house smell like winter.

So it's like you have to get rid of what's in the way. But you also have to make sure that you have what you need. Yes. So I am going to answer your question. I do have three general house rules. Just super general. Third more about seasonal decor that apply to everyone. Do you want me to do that? Do you want me to give my three and you can give some? I can't wait for you to give your three. Please give your three. Okay. Well, there's so many. I couldn't even narrow it down. I just did like the first three. Okay, number one is to welcome winter with seasonal supplies first, then decorate for Christmas. So see the difference? Like, if you decorate, if you welcome with seasonal supplies, you're working through those five senses. What do I want to smell? What I want to hear in my house? What do I want

to feel? Oh, I want cozy blankets. Oh, does everyone have house slippers? Do you switch out to flannel sheets? I do in the winter. So things like that. Does my fireplace have the things. that it needs. So I have one of those pokers and the big gigantic scissors for my fireplace, all those fun things that actually allow our home to feel like the season, but instead we're too busy buying, you know, plastic decor, which I still like plastic decor. I still have some. So in general, I feel like when your house is ready for the season, it's so much closer to being ready for the holidays within that season. You just have to add a couple things. Okay, so that was that was one of mine. We'll be right back.

Aw isn't something we need to travel for. It's something waiting for us in everyday life, whether in a city street or a moment with a work of art. I'm Dr. Keltner, host of the Science of Happiness podcast. Join me for Cities of Aw, a special series on how our public spaces can spark awe, wonder, and enhance the quality of public life. You can find us wherever you listen to your podcasts. One of mine is you can just have a tree. And I think the reason that my sort of Christmas decorations settle into just being a tree is because you have taught me how to winterize my home. So I feel like my home is winter. I have, I only in the fall and winter do I burn woodwit candles that crackle.

So I burn those. We play the, we don't have a fireplace. And so he put on the TV, the fireplace, show on Netflix all the time. Yep. Like all the time. And I move the blankets from the blanket basket. They're always in the blanket basket. I drape a couple more over things so they're like easier to get to because you need them

more. You know, we turn off our like we lower our lighting a little sooner that like you said because it's getting darker. So we have these things that are happening in the house where it really does feel like winter. And so then for me, I'm not saying that everybody should, this is my

personal house roll. It's great if you want to like decorate and it feel Christmassy in many, many rooms in your house. For me, it's stressful to decorate for Christmas if I'm doing lots of different things because then what happens is when it's time to take it down. It's like I'm redecorating everything again. I have to put everything back. I have to figure out where did this go. I had this shelf decorated so pretty and now I don't remember what to do. And that was like lightning at a bottle that one time where I styled it right. So it can get a little frustrating. and it's like I'm giving myself chores. Whereas, instead, it's okay for me to just have a tree. I move a chair. We set up the tree. It feels very much like Christmas because the home already feels

like winter. I think just having the permission to like really kind of stay small if that matters to you in your decorating. And I used to feel bad for my kids, you know, like, oh, we don't have, a tree in the room. We don't have lights everywhere. We don't have the reindeer's and all the things. and I'm like, I don't think they care. Like, I really don't think they care because they generally tell me when they're annoyed by things and they have never told me that before. So anyway, so that is, that is mine that kind of dovetails with that, is that it's okay to just have a tree for Christmas, but I think it feels more alive and like complete

in your decorating if your home already feels like winter. Yes. Well, we both basically said the same exact thing. And the difference is when you are just getting your tree, your home still feels winterized for three months. You're not just decorating for like 29 days. You have cozy fall things and wonderful blankets and warmth and candles and all of those out through February, maybe March. Want to do number two? Do number two. Okay. My number two is when I'm working through the five senses and like I'm going to winterize my home, the sense of sight comes last.

So I don't get like the visual things that I want that feel wintery, which for me is usually like mercury glass. Because, you know, in the winter, like you said, it gets darker earlier. Like we experience a lot of darkness in the winter. And I don't think we need to fight that. Like my house is not black. I have lights on. But I let it, I allow it to be darker. But I want like that sparkly candlelight.

But I work through the other senses first because when you think about when you walk in a house, the first thing you notice is the smell. You also notice what music is playing. And so there are so many other things that you notice before the visual. And what happens is, especially for a girl like me who loves all those pretty things, if I can work through the other senses first and layer on a scent and layer on, you know, something that we're tasting and layer on something that we're feeling and hearing, I find that I need less of the visual. Yeah.

That's so good. It's, this is another reason why you're so smart is that you apply. the lazy genius principle of going in the right order, better than anybody I think I know. Like there is just this, this understanding, this clarity, especially when our home is so, our home can be so overwhelming and we don't know where to start. And you are so, so good at helping us know where to start.

And you've said this before. I think you even wrote that in Welcome Home, your book about actually decorating and like making your home seasonal from season to season. And you've said this before. And I'm hearing it in a new way for the first time of like, don't start with what you see. Start with the other senses. And you're right. It's like if you go in that order, then you're not filling in unnecessary gaps. And then your home actually feels like a home. It doesn't feel like a store aisle. It doesn't feel like it needs to be in a magazine. It's like not that you can't be beautiful, but it feels like your home. If you go in the right order, it feels like your home. So I love that. So don't start with your. Don't start with what you see. I don't feel like there are many home decorating people who say that.

Don't start with what you see, which is why you're so great. This is why you're so great. This is one thing that I learned from you. This is another personal sort of decorating for the holidays rule that you've taught me, which is one big thing is so much better than lots of small things. I learned that from you years ago, and we have twinkle lights, like Christmas lights, on our porch throughout the entire year. because I got tired of taking them up, like putting them up and down.

So we got white ones that matched the ports. You can't really see them. I used to have the green ones and it really looked like we were just like negligent. And so we got like. But they also like twinkly lights work in any season. Like it's so fun, but we don't turn them on really in the summer because it's dark until night or light until 930. Like it doesn't matter. So those lights are always up.

But we have, I have this sign. And it is this, it's like nine or 10 feet tall. It's just this old scrap of wood that probably 10 years ago, I just like casually, carelessly painted white and then hand wrote in big red letters the word joy. And that just leans next door, front door, every single year. That's the only decoration that I do. And we just turn the lights on. And I would, for a while, I was like, well, we need to put up, you know, we need to put

up lights around all the windows. And maybe we need to have like a little vignette by the door. But those small things just disappear. And they lose their impact. And so that is one of the things that I've learned from you that I take into my seasonal home is one big thing is so much better than a lot of little things. That is great. Signature piece. The house with the joy sign. I love that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. You got any more? I do. I have one more. And that is to, you know, we all do this. We talk about this, but creating a playlist for each season. And just a reminder, Christmas is not a season.

is a holiday, a celebration. And so it's helpful to have a winter playlist that you don't hate listening to on, you know, January 29th. What are you going to listen to then? And so I make sure that I still have an honor that entire winter season by having something that I like to listen to when I'm driving or, you know, when we're having friends over or what have you. I just feel like I experience so much freedom from what you teach over many, many years. And it's, it's something that, it's like a skill set that you're developing in us that we learn season to season. It's a muscle memory. It's like we, we are more confident in only having a tree or we are more confident in saying like, yes, having blankets and this particular candle and like having cider on the stove or whatever

it is, like those things actually do create a space that we're wanting to rather than the pull to go to the store and buy the new thing. Like you just create so much freedom and like it's such a resource that we're learning, the skill that we're learning. And so I wanted to just let everybody know that if you are feeling this way, not just about like the seasons, but actually about your actual house, like your actual rooms and what is in them and how they're put together. Michael Lynn has something called the cozy community that she is opening up like super special for you guys listening for a really short time. So I would love for you to tell us, can you tell us a little bit about what the cozy community is and what people can why people are going to want to be

so obsessed and being being part of it. It's so great. Oh, you know, it's a private community. Do you remember, Kendra, you might not be old enough. Do you remember Rate My Space? I loved Rate My Space. Oh, you're awful. Okay, I didn't rate my space. I loved it because that was before I'd learn from you. And that was when my like very strong linear Eniogram One judgmental side was there. And I was like, yes, we're going to rate these spaces. Yeah, we are. Oh, you were the one. It's like the opposite of rate my space because rate my space was terrifying. You had to be so brave to upload a photo of your family room that had been like professionally designed and then people would rip it to shreds. So the cozy community is like the exact opposite of that. It is a private community where you can ask

decorating questions and get advice from me and other cozy minimalists in a place where you can upload a photo of your family room with socks on the floor and the dog on the sofa and that is normal. So we have like 4,000 members. I teach in it every single Tuesday, three times a year we work on a room together. There's five cozy minimalist steps to work on a room. You have to work on them in the right order or else you're going to be miserable. So if you're miserable, decorating your home, it's because you're working out of order. So there's a right order, and it makes every decision easier as you go. It's like enlightening to do. But then when we're not working on a room, we talk about seasonal decor, we talk about hosting, we do deep dives into like

lamps. We talk about the parts of lamps, Kendra. There's a finial. There's a lamp base. There are lamp harps. There are lamp shades. There are different names for different shapes of lamp shades. Like I can talk about lamps for an hour. We talk about lamps. This is why the internet is so great is because we can be like, you know what? I'm going to make a job for myself. And that job is going to be, I'm going to get to talk to people

about lamps. Because I love lamps. Like I've seen your, you have been, you have been a lamp expert for many, many years. Your lamps are superb, superb lamps. Lamps will change your life. And no one believes me. If someone was like, you need to go into

your next door neighbor's house and blind. bring three things to decorate with, I would bring a big rug, a couple of lamps and, you know, 96 inch long drapes. That's what we're all missing and we're all doing that wrong. So it's really a group with like a bunch of bossy big sisters where you can get encouraging help for your home at whatever level you need. If you just want to sit back and like watch and roll your eyes at us or you can upload a photo every day and get advice. It's really a wonderful, I call it the most encouraging place on the internet. And we have like, you can join monthly for $10. You can join annually for $100. And then we have classes that I give for free. If you're an annual

member, you get all, you get all my seasonal classes. We call it the season pass. We have a class called House Rules. So it's like 10 universal decorating truths. I have a surface styling class. It's bonkers about decorating. But a person who is an imperfectionist and a posy minimalist, you know, real down to earth. Yeah, yeah. So you guys, I just, I, I feel like, I feel like sometimes when I have my friends on, because y'all were friends. Michael and I have gone on trips together. Like, my favorite, my favorite thing, can I tell them about when we went to who? Yeah, I mean, I don't even know what you're going to say, but she doesn't care. She doesn't care at all. We went to London, right? We went to London a few years ago. And two things. Number one is

when we walked into our rental house that were like, it was like a, it was like a home, like a family home. So it was a master bedroom. And like I was in one of the kids' bedrooms because there were sailboats on the wall. But I had like a beautiful view of, you know, the London skyscape or whatever. But the room that Michael and got, we were all like, oh, this is Michael's room. You walk in. And it was like, I mean, it was like Marie Antoinette lived in there. There was a clawfoot tub like in the middle of the actual room.

And she's like, well, you guys have fun in London. I'll see you later. I'll never leaving. And one day on the day. that we went to see a play at Shakespeare's Globe Theater. It was like, I think my favorite day of the whole trip, and you were like, I'm going to stay and take a bath, you guys. You guys go and fun.

I'm going to stay in this room. It was my favorite thing ever. Listen, I'm true to myself. And y'all, y'all gave me that room. I did not take it. Oh, no, you didn't. But I was so happy. I was so happy.

And I used that room up. I took multiple baths. a day, laid in the bed, set in every chair. It was well used. And to this day, it's like one of the kindest things. Anyone, I feel so known on that trip for you guys letting me have, it was like the master bedroom of this London flat. Amazing. It was. It was just, oh, it was the best thing. But all, all of that to say, we've been friends for a really long time. And, and sometimes I feel like people might not believe me when I'm like, you guys. No, no, no, no. know, this friend of mine really knows her stuff. And I'm telling, but I want you to hear me with my,

with my face. I don't listen to anyone else who talks about the home. Not that there are not other people who are valuable, but I believe strongly. And if there is someone who is a voice in a specific area that is speaking in this like free, be a genius about what matters to you and lazy about what doesn't to you, like gives you freedom to do things your own way, but to elevate your like personhood in the home that you live in and like the way of the way that you want to live your life like I just want to shout those people from the rooftops and like all of the genuine enthusiasm I have and I have that for you like you are so good at this. You are so, so, so good at your job. And my house would not feel the way it does without you. Like without question. There is no question. So you guys, if you want to learn from like

literally the only person, you're like, okay, we're good. This is who I need to learn from. It's Michael and. And so you can do that. by joining the cozy community. We'll put links to everything, but you can join the cozy community. That is a limited time. So jump on that if you want to do that. You can,

I would highly, highly recommend getting her books. Well, you have several. But the two, there's like super, super relevant to what we've been saying that I reference all the time,

are cozy minimalist home and welcome home. And welcome home is the book about making your home. What's the tagline? What's the subtitle for that one? About seasons? A cozy minimalist guide to find a good.

find it. I'm decorating and hosting all year round. There it is. There it is. I see it's on my shelf like a cross for me, but I don't see. I don't see this fine. Like it's welcome home. It's about seasons.

It's good. So anyway, and they're beautiful books. Like, and they're, there are photos of your home, which is so fun too to like kind of see how your own style comes through and you demonstrate that. Yeah. It's a real imperfect place.

Thank you for all your kind words. That's, that means the world. And you're right. Lazy genius and cozy minimalist. I feel like they're like BFF. Oh, they are so, they go on vacation together. Like they speak the same language.

They don't worry about who's going to cook what dinner. Like, they're on it. Like, it makes so much sense that they're together. So it's so fun. Well, I'm excited for people to have, like, just those star small tools that we just gave you. Just a couple of things. I'm sure there's at least one thing that kind of, like, sparked a little sparkle in the process of like, okay, let's winterize. Let's decorate and not be so stressed out about it.

because we want to enjoy our spaces and our people in them. We don't want to be consumed with, like, how this shelf looks or, like, how many, I don't know, red berries we have in our house. Like, it's okay. Just enjoy your, enjoy your life. Enjoy your life, everybody. That's right. Enjoy your life.

I just love the nester. I love how the nester helps us enjoy our life more. Her message, the teaching, all of it. So we'll have links to all of it. the things in the show notes to her books, to the cozy community, to my favorite winter playlist. And I hope that you feel inspired to create a cozy, wintry home based on what matters to you. Thank you so much for listening. And until next time, be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't.

I'm Kendra. I'll see on Monday. Have you ever felt like you were living just a B or B plus life? It's so dangerous to live that more dangerous. a B minus or a C plus life because when you're living a B or B plus life, you don't change it. You think it's good enough. Is it? I'm Susie Welch. I host a podcast called Becoming You. People think, okay, an A plus life is not available to me, but there is a way. We are all in the process of becoming ourselves. Listen to Becoming You wherever you get your podcasts.