I did many of the same things (tiny house, clubs), except that as soon as she hit level 2 and upgraded the toilet, I left home and took the club with me. For the most part, I upgraded public lots - but a few times, she upgraded things in club members' houses so that they wouldn't complain. I also bought a laptop and took that with me in case I ran out of upgrade parts.
* Apartments are glitching out for me at the moment. Otherwise I think doing the second upgrade on the Feng's triangle bath (had either of them appeared in the group pool) might have been quicker than a talking toilet upgrade in Stargazer Lounge for the Uptown neighbourhood
For apartments, I have to go to the lot, toggle the walls down, toggle the walls all the way up, knock, go in, and only then do they work. Otherwise, the doors just aren't there. But I ended up doing toilet upgrades in San Myshuno and fabricator upgrades in Evergreen Harbor.
* Was setting being friendly as a club activity a bad idea? Sometimes her clubmates talked to her while she was upgrading and this might have slowed her down a little.
"Be Friendly," "Be Funny" are my typical club activities. (oh, and "clean" if I'm going to hang out on the home lot)
Having more packs definitely helped, still a lot of the upgrades are hard to find in the wild. I think I would have done better if I'd timed the upgrades, had a better plan, and not forgotten upgrades that I'd intended to do.