Port-a-Bach

I spent a lot of my childhood building forts and cubbies and little homes, and I now watch my girls doing the same. The joy of having your own little space to decorate and hang out in is magical. Obviously I still find joy in decorating spaces, and I've never outgrown my fascination with small spaces. I absolutely loved the recent TV programme and book, George Clarke's Amazing Spaces - seeing people's creativity and how cleverly they transformed various tiny spaces into something... well, amazing!

George's own caravan transformation was my favourite. He took an old caravan similar to the one he'd spent his childhood in and turned it into the most incredible holiday home. The walls opened up and the side folded down into a deck. There are so many clever space-saving features in the interior too - I highly recommend the book.

After spending the last couple of weeks working at home with my three energetic girls also at home, I have been hankering for an office tucked quietly away at the bottom of the garden, or anywhere that allows me my own space. I've been dreaming of a cute little caravan, or a cool re-purposed shipping container, and on my internet travels I came across this super cool Port-a-Bach.

Designed and built by Wellington architecture and design company, Atelierworkshop, it's created from a shipping container, and folds up to a fully enclosed exterior steel shell, making it extremely secure. Unfold it to create a brilliant living space that comfortably sleeps two adults and two children.

Atalierworkshop's Port-a-Bach is not in production but they do accept commissions to design customised container building solutions. To find out more visit their website.

Maybe one day soon I'll get my own clever, tiny space at the bottom of the garden!

Frank Stationery

I have an amazing and inspirational online shop to introduce you to... Frank Stationery not only has an awesome range of products, but for every piece of stationery sold, they give the same item away to a child in need. That's a win-win!

Frank founders, Jason and Jess, have travelled the world together, and seen first-hand the level of poverty in many countries. After arriving back in New Zealand they started to explore the needs of our youth and discovered that many Kiwi kids lack basic school resources. Passionate about creativity and business, Jason and Jess founded Frank with the intention of providing stationery to those in need.

The Frank range is super cool, your kids will love it. I'm sure they'll be excited about learning and creating with these products - notebooks, pens, pencils, a ruler and eraser, backpacks and gift packs. With the start of the new school year just around the corner, we parents will need to get our kids' stationery packs organised. We can buy from the Frank range with the knowledge that we'll be buying excellent quality, and helping another child too. And we won't have to spend hours covering the books with the Frank range of notebooks - they're way too cool to cover up.

I love this buy-one-give-one concept. An education will open up the world to a child, and Jason and Jess want to help enable our kids to complete their education, and set them up for a great future. Go and check out the website for yourself and you too can help.

Our Bathroom Renovation

I've had an overwhelming response to my first annual reader survey. As well as extremely helpful stats, I've been getting some truly lovely comments from you guys - thank you so much, you don't know how much it means! There's still time to fill in the 10 simple questions if you haven't already. You have until 5pm next Wednesday 22nd, and by taking the survey you go into the draw to win a stunning Kantha quilt.

Many of you have said that you want to see more of my own designs, and my home, so today I'm going to share our recent bathroom reno with you. We have a tiny, almost square bathroom, that we share between the five of us. Eventually Mark & I will build an en-suite for us, but until then we share with our girls.

Our old bathroom was awful, I used to get in and out of there as quickly as possible. There was a lot of peach-coloured moulded plastic, and bad wood cladding. Behind the door a bath took up half the bathroom, and on the other side of the room was a small vanity and large, ugly shower cubicle. It was a fantastic feeling to rip it all out and start again!

The aim was to make the small room feel as spacious as possible while still being completely functional. After much deliberation we made the choice to not put a bath back in. I couldn't have done without a bath when my girls were tiny, but they all prefer to shower now. The bath was just a large space waster that I spent a lot of time cleaning dust out of! We could've put a shower over a bath, but we don't plan, or want to move anytime soon, so we made the decision to build for us, and not for possible future owners.

So where the bath used to be we were to build a walk-in open shower. A large pane of glass would shield the dry side of the room from the wet side. The floor plan above was one we put together before we started, and is pretty much what we finished up with, although the glass is wider than I've drawn it on the plan.

I wanted to have a floating vanity to give the illusion of more space, and we put a beautiful round basin on top with a gooseneck mixer. I love the curves against all those straight lines. The amazing team at Rabbitte Joinery made the vanity for us complete with two soft close draws underneath for storage.

We spent a long (and I mean, a looong) time choosing tiles. We were going to make a feature of the walk-in shower and tile that side in turquoise blue. But the only ones we liked were hand glazed and would've totally blown our budget. There were a lot of choices in between, but in the end we decided to keep a clean, neutral base which I could then add layers to. I would've loved Carrera marble tiles on the floor but Mark is not a marble fan. Instead we chose large grey concrete tiles, which I love, and they're really practical with kids.

Because of the lack of space there was only one place for our heated towel rail, but it's perfect under the window. When you've finished your shower you just reach down, turn off the water and grab your toasty, warm towel. And it's far enough away from the shower head to not get wet.

We didn't want a hand-held shower head with the long hose, we wanted to keep it clean and unfussy. But we did go for the mack-daddy of shower heads, and it was totally worth it! It's like standing under a softly massaging waterfall :)

When the base of the room was all finished, then I started on my top layer. Gorgeous line drawn waves on a wallpaper by Abigail Edwards was put on the wall next to the vanity, which you see when you first enter the room. It also went above the mirror which spans the entire width of one wall - another feature to help make the room look bigger.

The vanity couldn't run the full width of the wall, as you wouldn't be able to open the door. But the space at the end was the perfect size for a Sidekick Low Stool from Paper Plane. It looks amazing on it's own, but it's very handy for throwing your clothes on top of too.

I wanted the basin off-set so that I could have a large available bench space. Eventually the girls will use this for makeup etc, but for now I can pop some flowers and a candle there. I'm always changing the top - the soap's consistent, but otherwise you never quite know what you'll find. You may've seen a few variations if you follow me on Instagram.

We had recessed ceiling lights put in, but one of my favourite things in the bathroom is our wall sconce above the mirror by onefortythree. The touch of wood warms up the blue wallpaper, and the lines echo those found in the waves.

I couldn't resist including my trade mark hot pink somewhere. Towels from Small Acorns and Country Road add more colour and pattern. Heeding Coco Chanel's advice to "look in the mirror and take one thing off"... I got a gorgeous photo framed of 4 yr old Mia in the bath, which was to hang on the wall to the right of the vanity. But because it was reflected in the mirror, there was just too much going on. It now hangs on the wall outside the bathroom.

If you made it all the way to here, well done! That was a small book I just wrote. A quick thanks to all the workers who I haven't already mentioned: Mark and my father 'n law, Pete - the builders apprentices; Brian - the builder; Paul - the plumber and tiler; Davyd - the sparky; Mike - the wallpaperer; amd Metro Glass for the glass pane and huge mirror. We absolutely love our new bathroom. The only thing wrong with it is that I now spend way too much time in there! Feel free to ask me any questions.