Monthly Archives: February 2012
Someone Else’s House… Salvaged Desk in the Sun-filled Front Room
I’ve introduced you to my dear friend’s home, namely her front sitting room. So far in this collage of building a beautiful inviting space, I’ve shown you Read on…
Someone Else’s House…A Sun-filled Front Sitting Room…Pair of Chairs
As you enter the front door, beyond the front entry hall, this gorgeous sun-filled sitting room begs you to come in and stay. Read on…
Monday’s Simple Cleverness…Humidity Tray for Houseplants
Let me just start by saying that even though I love plants, including orchids, I am by no stretch of the imagination, any sort of a plant expert. I just know what has worked for me.
Here’s a bit of simple cleverness I read somewhere years ago that has helped my orchids be happy…create a Read on…
Someone Else’s House…A Sun-filled Front Sitting Room…Inspiration Piece: Sofa
I’m featuring an exquisite home in the next several weeks in our “Someone Else’s House” category.
I’m going to do these posts a little different, and see how you like it…the whole room pics won’t be featured until the end of this tour. For fun, I’m going to just show you one element at a time in a collage format, building it piece by piece, just as you’d actually construct a room.
I’m starting with the sofa, because it was the kicking off or inspiration Read on…
Dining Room Stepback Cupboard
We’re getting closer to the dining table in the Dining Room Tour of “Our House”, the delay has been because the table is still full of lighting and plumbing fixtures for “The Little Brick Cottage”, but I hope the cottage will be ready for these items real soon. When it is, I promise, I’ll show you our dining table in this room too.
But today, I’m going to show you this tall French styled cupboard I bought from Ballard Designs on clearance!
The style and size of this stepback cupboard seemed perfect for this corner, and black is the main accent color in our dining room, so when I saw this in Ballard’s ‘estate sale’ for Read on…
Tutorial: Living Room Window Treatments…
In “Our House” I’ve been working on lightening up the living room color scheme. I showed you how I changed the covering on the Pottery Barn bench ottoman and now it’s time to show you how I made the window treatments.
I purchased the fabric from Ballard Designs, it’s a printed linen type, (not sure if it’s actually linen, or just looks and feels like it).
For the style, I wanted a playful, sort of French styled window treatment.
So the valances I designed to make, have pleats with a fabric covered button detail, as well as two coordinating types of trim. The trim detail worked out to be a good way to bring just a hint of darker color up on the windows. Even though I’m ‘lightening’ it up in the living room, dark elements will remain, so I must meld the light with dark accents to make it look like a plan.
Here are the steps I did in making these valances: Read on…
Living Room: Lightening it up with new Window Treatments
As I addressed the living room at “Our House” in my quest to lighten it up, I knew that the window treatments were going to have to be changed. This is what they looked like:
I made these valances a few years ago, when I had more reds and greens in the room, with a lot more black accents. Fortunately, when I made these, instead of permanently mounting them to a board, I attached them to Read on…
Little Brick Cottage…Windows
I wasn’t planning on installing new windows in “The Little Brick Cottage” right away, I knew the old windows were just that, old, with single-pane glass, but they did have aluminum storms that had been installed probably around 40 years ago…so I thought they’d be ok.
Until, I took the drapes down and Read on…
Monday’s Simple Cleverness… Shedding a Little (more) Light
I love, love, love track lighting! When you change things around in the house as much as I do, the ability to move around light fixtures that easily is an amazing ability.
One little, but very wonderful, track light fixture I have found is this chandelier adapter. At Menards they’re around $7 or $8.
You can transform almost any chandelier into Read on…
Lightening up in the Living Room
In my quest to lighten it up a bit in the living room at “Our House”, I’ve needed to decide what I want to change and what I want to keep. This is the living room before I started. (And obviously before the Valentines mantel was completed, or the cord covers were up!)
My notes on the pictures tell the story of what I considered and decided on in order to bring a lighter feel into the space. Read on…
