Foyer Reveal

My foyer is finished and I can't wait to share it with you. In the scheme of things, this room has come together rather quickly.  I hope you enjoy the pictures of my new space!

View looking down from my balcony.

Before

Unfortunately I did not have the budget to replace this ugly chandy!  A new one  is definitely on my wish list!  But until then....I guess I will have to keep looking past it.

I love the new wall color! I painted the walls Wheat Bread by Behr.  I have used this color in a couple other rooms, and I love the way it plays gray to beige.  It is the perfect GREIGE.  Before all of my trim blended into the walls, but now the trim pops!

From this view the room still looks really bare, I guess that means I will need to continue to reveal this room at a later date.

I brought back in the dresser and mirror.  They fit well in the space, and with my tight budget of $1200, I needed to reuse, and re- purpose a couple items. I am still looking for a pair of matching lamps to put on the dresser, I live in a little town with few shopping options, sometimes I find it is best to be patient and wait for the perfect find, and not force the first thing I find to work.

Before

I normally have white orchids in this over sized silver punch bowl, but my hubby came home with 3 beautiful purple orchids, he is just so sweet, how could I take them back because they don't match my new carpet?! Sometimes good design has to take a back seat to a sweet hubby!

I bought this beautiful silver-plated punch bowl at an estate store about a year ago for $85!  I loved it from the moment I saw it.  The inside of the bowl is scratched up, so eventually I will need to have it re- silvered but for now it makes the most gorgeous planter! 


I have a confession to make, things don't stay in one place too long in my house.  I wrote this blog post a couple weeks ago, and tonight my guy surprised me with three beautiful "Dreamsicle" orchids.  They look fantastic in the foyer with my rug.  I snapped this pic. with my iPhone, at night...sorry! It was just too good not to share.  As you can see the arrangement still needs a little work!

As a funny little side, while I was working on arranging these beauties Grandma was eating a cutie orange, it took me a moment to realize that although the orchids look like a dreamsicle, they don't smell like a dreamsicle.  I might hide a bowl of peeled oranges under the dresser just to mess with guests!  Heehee! It really is the little things in life isn't it.

We purchased this rug in Farmville VA, at Greenfront furniture.  Greenfront is quite an experience.  They are known to have the largest selection of Persian rugs in the United States and at the best price.  Imagine rooms full of  thousands of rugs.  It can be a bit overwhelming.  It is hard enough to find a rug that I like, but I am trying to let my husband be a part of our design decisions.  Sometimes I really struggle with this.  I have an idea of what I want a space to look like, I have planned and thought about my choices for days.  Then I tell him, and sometimes my vision and his do not line up.  He can be my most difficult client! :) But with that said, this is his home too, and he needs to feel comfortable in our space, so when his preference and mine don't line up, that is okay, I need to just keep on readjusting the plan. We chose a rug with the main background color as coral, so the foyer would flow into the livingroom.  Here is a picture of my formal living room that was taken over the holidays.

Can you see the coral in my livingroom rug? Walls are Pale Smoke, another Bejamin Moore color; and a favorite of Kandi and mine.  She recently painted her playroom in the same color.  Playroom Reveal

I pulled this settee in from another room.  I have always loved this piece of furniture but I just did not have the right place for it until now. I am really struggling with its new skirt.  If you are a frequent reader of our blog, you know that some of our projects work-out, and some need to be thrown out.  I think this skirt is headed for the door!  Let me show you what it is covering.

Isn't this fabric horrible!  Talk about 1970s!  I made the skirt because as the new cushion shifts around on the bench, the deck and all it's 1970's glory peaks out for an unwanted visit.

Here is the bench with out the skirt.  I am sorry about the quality of the photo I took this picture at night. I made a new cover for the cushion, and I think it might be time to take this little lady off to my upholstery shop to have the deck updated so I can rid myself of the 1970s once and for all.

It was a sunny afternoon, so I snapped a quick pic of the settee. 

A few new throw pillows.

I love this pillow.  I made it from a vintage monogrammed hand towel.  I especially like the little ruffles!  I think Kandi would approve.  She has a thing for ruffles. If you are new to our blog check out her post Roses and Ruffles Pillow.

 

Finally a little art for my walls.  I don't think one can ever go wrong with a pair of vintage bird prints. As you saw in an earlier picture, this space will not be fully complete until the rest of my walls have some jewelery too.  I look forward to sharing this space with you as I continue to add and change it in the future.  Thanks for coming on this journey with me. Now that this project is finished hopefully I can focus on My Little Man's Makeover!

Rebekah

Budget Breakdown:
Painter: $775 (Remember my ceilings are 21 feet off the floor, and I had them painted in Benjamin Moore's Cloud Cover)Price included all materials.
Rug:$475
All other items were repurposed!  So my grand total $1250.  Not bad!

This is where I linked up....

http://savvysouthernstyle.blogspot.com/

A Muddy Update

Thursday was a magical day in my kingdom, both of my children went back to school!  And I was finally able to start work on my mudroom.  I have been dreaming of a more efficient and beautiful space but I don't have a big budget, only $200.  I am fortunate that I have a couple of pieces that I can repurpose for this project.  I already  have a wall of hooks, a  bench, and a rug that will  be used in this space.  I would love to replace my rug, but I am afraid that is just not in my budget.  But if it was here are a couple of rugs that have caught my attention.....

Garnet Hill Bogart Flat Weave

 West Elm, Andalusia Dhurrie

Garnet Hill  

I love the overall look of this last space!  I wish I was bold enough to paint my doors.....maybe....

Here are a couple pictures that have the feel I am after.....



I am going to leave you with one last picture...

  I purchaced this china cabinet for a whooping $100 at my local estate store.  I think that it will meet all of my storage needs.  It was built in the 50's so it is solid wood constuction with dove tailed drawers.  But boy is it ugly!  When looking for a second hand piece of furniture, look at the quality of constuction, and its lines.  In my case I wanted a sturdy piece that would hold up to two boys opening and closing doors and drawers.  This cabinet is going to be perfect. 
  I only have $100 left, and I will give you a hint to where that money is going.....Paint Paint and More Paint!

Rebekah

3 Money Saving Projects and a Basement Update

It has been a little more than a week and my basement reno is still not quite finished.  It kind of took on a life of its own and what was going to be a little face lift turned more into a major over-haul.  There were a few snafus that slowed me down... starting with the fact the color I bought [2 gallons of] was horrid and even worse the polyurethane I bought to go on my cabinets turned them from a beautiful white to full on banana yellow!!  Please learn from my mistake...ONLY USE AN ACRYLIC BASED POLY WHEN PAINTING OVER WHITE.  More on this topic and how I remedied it in a later post!  Then, of course my husband came home and got involved and we now have beautiful new floors down here and I won't complain about that at all!!  Thankfully the basement is about 99% complete now and I am only lacking a couple baskets to feel good enough about it to post it on the blog.

Today, I am going to show you 3 projects I did down here that saved me tons of money!  Who doesn't like that?

1.  Spray painted refrigerator.

What?  That's right!  I spray painted our little under bar fridge that was bought in 1980 and had the brown wood grain color to prove it!

I figured I didn't have anything to lose and if turned out horrid I would just go buy another one.  I taped up the handles, primed with Kilz, and then hit it with Krylon Fusion spray paint in Metallic Shimmer (2 coats). Easy as pie and less than an hour project including dry times!  I think it was 100% worth it and no one had any idea it was spray painted.   We are talking $5 rather than going to spend $150 on a new one!  Good stuff!

2.  Repurposed Goodwill Lamp and Walmart Shade. 

This was $5!!!!  Yes!!  They actually had a few to chose from but I wanted one that could take up a good bit of visual space on a big side table.  I was drawn to this lamp from Ballard Design, but the $169 price tag seemed completely unrealistic to me!

Pretty huh!  Here is a link if you don't feel like doing it yourself.

For the lamp base I first checked to make sure it worked before I did any work to it!  Wrap up the hardware with painters tape and next give it a quick wipe down a a coat of Kilz primer.  I would normally spray paint the whole thing but I didn't have any bright white and was sitting beside a big can of Super White Benjamin Moore trim paint.  I did two coats of that and then hit it with a coat of Rustoleum High Lustre Lacquer. 

The shade was just a little trickier but not much!  I found a $14.99 drum shade at Walmart.  I had a scrap of fabric left over from pillow making and used the plastic protective covering from the lamp shade as a template, traced it onto my fabric, and cut that out leaving an extra 1/4 inch or so around all the edges.  Next, just pin the fabric onto the shade, cut off any excess, and slowly glue (I used hot glue) the top edges all the way around. Lastly cut two lengths of matching ribbon to hide your raw edges and glue those down.  It turned out pretty close to perfect... close enough for me anyway!  One thing I learned is to line up the seams of your new cover with the existing seem on the lampshade.  Otherwise, when the lamp is on you will see both seams. 

I'm kind of in love with it and my total price including the $14.99 Walmart lamp shade was still under $30.  A far cry from the $169 price tag on the Ballard Design gourd lamp!!

3.  Gallery Wall. 
I have been pinning tons of gallery walls on Pinterest!  But, to price all new frames, mats, etc was gonna be a little ridiculous.  So, I gathered up tons of existing frames and a few other pictures and mirrors from around my house and got out... you guessed it... the spray paint!  I wanted to stick to the green, black and white so all I did was lay out my design and decide which frames to paint!  I even painted some mats and it worked beautifully!  Hopefully the glass pops out of your frames (some of mine didn't) which makes it very easy work.  Spray prime, spray paint, hang.  Easy as that!  I am left with a cohesive gallery wall that I think highlights the pictures which is exactly what I wanted!

There you go... 3 incredibly easy money saving projects that absolutely anyone can do!
Full room reveal this week sometime!

Kandi