About Gina {The Shabby Creek Cottage}

Hi, I'm Gina...  Welcome to The Shabby Creek Cottage! We began our journey of remodeling my childhood home in early 2009. We lived here for nearly 5 years before we finally got down to ripping out walls and installing floors. It's been quite a journey, but it's long from over!   My husband, Mr. SCC, and I have two girls, Lala and Bre. We enjoy our creekside life in our shabby little cottage. Our home is a calm, sweet place to be, wellll... unless there are skill saws buzzing during construction! We take on all of our projects with our own labor saving all the costs, but have the luxury of a custom home on a fraction of the budget.   If we don't know a skill, we learn it. If we can't find what we like, we build it. We share all those adventures, straight from our  double wide mobile home - so if I can do it, you can, too!   Between construction jobs, you can find me working away filling up my online shop with lovely new treats, or reading a book between episodes of NCIS. Occasionally, I might even venture away from the creek to get my fix at Ikea or outlet shopping!

I've been blessed to see my work grace the pages of some pretty amazing books & magazines - like Mom Blogging for Dummies, Brides Magazine, Casa Romantica, Romantic Homes, Nashville Bride, Somerset HOME, Somerset Homes, and Better Homes & Gardens. I've also had the honor to be featured on amazing websites such as Ladies' Home Journal, The Huffington Post and The Graphics Fairy. Who knew this crazy remodeling adventure would take me on the ride of a lifetime?
Want to see more of my home? You can find a few of our finished rooms on Tour the Cottage. 
Want to learn how to recreate some of my ideas? Check out my Project Gallery.
Want to see where I share my favorite recipes? Find them all in on my Recipe Page. FAQs  What kind of home do you live in?  We live in a 1993 Clayton Homes Manufactured Double Wide.  It's not very large, about 1600 sq. ft., but it's big enough to hold all our crazy adventures. How did you do your floors? Are they holding up? I came up with the crazy ideas of screwing 1x8 pine directly to our subfloors in 4 ft. lengths - then we stained them with MinWax Jacobean stain and sealed them with a satin poly. They've held up amazingly well for over 2 years. It's still one of my favorite parts of our home! Some folks worry about cupping, but we've not had any major issues with that. How do you run a blog AND a shop? I have an amazing (and seriously cool) assistant, Mariah, that helps me with my day to day studio work by packing orders & keeping me organized. My virtual assistant, Jessica, helps keep me on top of what's going on online. Mr. SCC is my main help - he's responsible for all the major builds you see here on the blog. He came from a long line of DIY folks (his grandfather was a no-power tools carpenter!) We just keep on keepin' on, because we love what we do! Did you really quit your day job in a year? Yes, I did! It was very fast, especially since I didn't start this blog to make money, it was a hobby. After about a year of blogging (6 mos. of running a shop), I couldn't keep up with my orders, blogging, and the pressures of a full time day job. I loved working as a journalist, but DIY is my passion. I'm blessed to be doing it full time! {I've stepped away from the shop for now, though.} Do you have a question? Contact me any time at  gina@theshabbycreekcottage.com I'd love to hear from you!