00:00I'll be back, pup-pup. Good boy. All right, come on, Humbo.
00:15Wow.
00:17Oh, it's looking good.
00:20I know, look at that.
00:22We love it here. My husband and I grew up here. We left for college, we came back, because it's always been home.
00:34Grace, do you want to come?
00:37Oh my, it is really good.
00:40I know.
00:41It was a great childhood, you know, spending your days in the ocean as much as you can.
00:46You've got to collect shells for a sculpture.
00:48The build a life you don't need a vacation from was sort of our, like, motto.
00:54I love that my kids will get to experience what I experienced.
00:58Being able to do that in this house is so integral.
01:01I think they love it as much as we do.
01:18So we live in Nags Head, North Carolina, which is part of the Outer Banks, which is a small, skinny sandbar on the eastern, eastern part of North Carolina.
01:33Our beach house is a two-bed, one-and-a-half bath house.
01:49It's about 940 square feet on the inside, and then we have 340 square feet of covered deck.
01:56I live here with my husband, Louis, and then we have two kids, Felix and Reese, and they are 5 and 7.
02:07The family puppy, Culper.
02:09Felix, breakfast, son.
02:15It's our full-time residence.
02:19You know, it's not a vacation house.
02:21It's not somewhere we live part-time.
02:24We spend our whole life here.
02:26There's little pockets of the Outer Banks that we really, really like to spend time in.
02:31And this street was always one of them.
02:34I mean, we have a state park across the street, and the sound is at the end of the road, and the ocean's right there.
02:39So we're, like, right in the center of that.
02:42We kind of walked into a really good situation at the right time.
02:45We bought a little 1960s house, and it came with an empty lot.
02:50And so that house was only 660 square feet.
02:53It was before we had kids.
02:55So we lived in that while we made plans to build this house.
03:00This was the first time we ever built a house.
03:02So we started just, like, sketching out little plans on graph paper,
03:05just drew, yeah, this, like, tiny little 1,000 square foot house.
03:11I'm very much someone who isn't professionally trained in any manner,
03:15whether it's art or design or construction.
03:18And it's just very much a figure-it-out-as-you-go kind of situation.
03:26We come right into a tiny, tiny little entryway.
03:33When you live in a small house, you're trying to make use of every square inch.
03:39We have the built-in dining bench.
03:42I would say, like, when we drew those first couple house plans out on the graph paper,
03:46it was pretty much, like, how can we make this house really smart?
03:50So, like, doing the eat-in, dine-in bench, backing up to the kitchen,
03:54you're kind of taking one piece of furniture and giving it, like, two purposes.
03:57And then we had a rainy week last summer, and I was like, I'm going to paint this blue.
04:02Then it just kind of evolved into the alt trim.
04:06I love to paint, and I think it's definitely, like, a creative outlet.
04:11So then you walk right into the living room.
04:14I take a lot of pictures.
04:19Like, one of the nicest days at the end of the summer last year,
04:23the kids had gone back to school, and we took them out for a day
04:26because the beach was just, like, perfect.
04:28Oh, thank you.
04:30Beautiful water surfed all day.
04:38Well, the hallway basically goes to everything else that's in the house.
04:43Our bedroom.
04:45I wanted, like, cozy, warm bedroom.
04:48I'm someone who likes to feel at home in a space,
04:51and that, you know, it'll change my mood drastically.
04:54And so creating these spaces where they just feel cozy.
04:57So I built these last year, more of, like, a hack.
05:01But I just got these, like, Rubbermaid closet systems
05:04and then kind of built out an added trim and built them in.
05:08It's such a small bedroom.
05:09Having a mirror in here does kind of help.
05:11It gives it more depth.
05:13I made the frame.
05:14It was kind of just like a picture frame.
05:16And then I traced an edge on it, and then with the jigsaw,
05:20just kind of cut it out.
05:21I do have some squiggles throughout the house.
05:27I like rounded edges.
05:32And then this is the kids' playroom, art room, whatever they need it to be.
05:38I'm gonna try to put it right here.
05:42Yay!
05:43Then I added in the squiggles for fun,
05:46because it is a kids' room.
05:47And the first round, the colors were just a little bit off in a couple places.
05:52But then we did some color correcting,
05:54and the kids came in one day after school,
05:56and they were just like, we love it!
05:57Oh my gosh!
05:58So then I had to keep it.
06:00They're really good about being into whatever project I'm into,
06:03and being like, we love it!
06:05My friend Miles and me, Reese, were having a play date.
06:08Miles built this.
06:09Miles built this.
06:10Miles built this.
06:16This is the kids' bunk room.
06:17We built the bunk beds.
06:19It was a big project.
06:20I think with small spaces, you have to get creative.
06:24I'll throw out a fun idea,
06:26and then he'll kind of like puzzle out the in-between,
06:28and then we'll work together as far as like the actual building of it goes.
06:33I taped three paint brushes together,
06:36and then just like scribbled on the kids' wall,
06:38and then that ended up being like one of my favorite things in one of the rooms.
06:44Paint's paint.
06:45You can always paint over it.
06:46So I try a lot of different things.
06:50It's kind of like picking one room at a time,
06:52and what can we do in this space that would be fun,
06:55and give character to it.
06:59I think a lot of the paint colors have a similar tone to them,
07:02and I think that helps.
07:03You know, they're not one's dusty, muted, and one's super bright in your face.
07:07I think they all kind of are cohesive in that manner.
07:13And then this leads us out to the porch.
07:17Come on, pop up.
07:19Oh, you're a good boy.
07:21When we drew those first couple house plans, we were like, we want a porch.
07:25You know, we love being outside.
07:26We wanted to be able to have a covered porch.
07:28On the porch, we have about 340 square feet, which is crazy.
07:31That's basically a third of the house.
07:33When we built the house originally, it was just like fully open.
07:36And then the longer we lived here, we were like, okay, we need to use this space kind of more year round.
07:43So that then included closing and turning the railings into half walls, and then slowly building out the windows.
07:50They can come up and down.
07:54Take it back up.
07:57And then it just kind of clicks in at the top.
08:01The window clickity system was definitely Lewis's invention.
08:05A lot of the time, like, if Lewis and I are kind of having a moment to decompress and chill on the porch,
08:10the kids will be in the backyard, running around, kind of just being kids.
08:14We put the house more forward because we wanted to have a big yard for kids.
08:25We'd like to be outside.
08:28On any given day, you can find something outside to do.
08:31And that's the aspect of living here that we really love.
08:37You know, I think outside, it is easy to, like, tap into that childhood bit.
08:41It's very much just, like, fun free for all.
09:00The outside shower, I would say we probably use it six to eight times every day in the summer.
09:05One of the benefits of a house at the beach being on stilts is that it gives you this, like, bonus layer downstairs.
09:14So this was a storage room that was just studs and foundation.
09:18It's, like, half workout for Lewis and I, and then half play area for the kids.
09:24Nice!
09:25Nice!
09:34I met Lewis 15 years ago now.
09:37Oh!
09:38Hey! That's not that bad!
09:39Actually looks pretty sweet!
09:41We're water people.
09:42We've always just done what we can to make a life here.
09:45I mean, it does look kind of fun though, right?
09:47You know, our summer days are built out of packing up and going to the beach for, you know, four or six hours.
09:55And we go to work at night.
09:56So, Lewis and I own a restaurant, and it's a pizza restaurant.
09:59And I said pizza.
10:00We are only open at night.
10:01And that is solely so that we can go to the beach during the day as a family.
10:05Smells like pizza.
10:06Come on!
10:07Come on!
10:10Ooh!
10:13Yeah!
10:14Do you remember what we're making?
10:17It's a joy to go into work every day.
10:21We work together at the pizza shop.
10:22And then we work together with renovation stuff.
10:24And I think, in a lot of ways, it's really easy.
10:28She's always the one, like, making sure that I don't stay where I'm at.
10:33She continues to push in a good way in all aspects.
10:38All right.
10:39We'll see it in four minutes.
10:54You're welcome.
10:55Ready, Freddy?
10:56Ready.
11:043, 2, 1, go!
11:0812!
11:09Ahh!
11:11We're the slow folks, remember.
11:18Let me know if you want me to take the doggy, okay?
11:20That's beautiful!
11:22Ahh!
11:25The salty ocean air smell is, like, quintessentially home to me.
11:29to me. They get to live at the beach in this house. They get to be outside. They
11:36get to do the childhood things that I think a lot of us want for kids. Oh gosh
11:42it's a it's a home. It's like somewhere where our kids have always felt safe and
11:48been happy. You got a single swooping in for some pizza. Honestly that's one of
11:53the biggest reasons like why I wanted to stay here and have a family and have the
11:58boys. See where the sun's setting? It's getting even more bright orange. It's really
12:05exciting to see them have that opportunity. Look at the birds out there. You could
12:10probably walk out to them. It can't get any better. He's so happy. Look at him. He's
12:17like I'm free.
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