Living Room Reveal

Our living room has come a long way from of move in day. We've cleaned, painted and decorated, turning our living into a chic place to land.

Here's a reminder how our living room looked a few days after we moved in.

Our living room today

There's a few items I want to add to make our living feel more 'finished' - find an area rug, restain our hardwood floors a deep walnut, add a photo gallery wall, find more artwork. For now I'm in love with how fresh and invinting the room now feels. I like how the yellow and blue colors pop off each other in a unexpected way.

{ I took this photos in the evening time, right before the sun went down, so yes I used the dreaded FLASH }

EDIT: The lighter wall colors are actually cream not yellow! I'll take better picutres soon

Dining in Style

Right now my dining room is the furthest you can get to dining in style, any style for that matter. Our dining room & kitchen is an open kitchen style all in one TINY room. If our house was bigger I would consider the space to be a breakfast nook. Alas the tiny space is our dining room. I often wonder what the builders 1956 were thinking building a home with such a tiny dining room. My guess, most people who bought their home in my area in the 1950’s must have used TV trays – so not me.

Even though our kitchen and dining are combined into one room and I want the dining room to feel like its own amazing space that flows into the kitchen seamlessly. I want to be able to entertain family and friends. Eat waffles on Saturday morning, and then host a Fab dinner party that night in our dining room/kitchen. Right now our the room looks purpose; its main objective right now is the dreaded dumping ground: groceries, my purse, mail.

Here are a few dining rooms that inspire me.

I love dining rooms with dark tables and parsons chairs and intesting light fixtures. I'd love to have a fireplace in my dining room! { our a fireplace in my home for that matter, yup we are oneof the few homes built in the 50's with no fireplace }

I like the idea of mixing chairs and having the light fixture be the focal point in the room, swoon

I love the artwork and high ceiling in this space + I'm loving the super large vases on the table....hmm they would also look nice on a dining room floor.

{ images for bhg.com }

Here's my how I plan to have my family dining in style soon (and on a budget)

My Objective

• Sand and restain dining room table a dark color, our current dining room is simular to Pottery Barn version above.
• Sand and paint buffet a semi gloss white. I like the one above, but ours will do for now
• Find the perfect drum shade ligth fixture of our dining room, at a good price
• Paint our walls Woodrow Wilson Putty - they color is more grey then biege
• Buy 4 parsons chairs from Ikea
• Find oval of round Mirror for dining room - maybe paint white?
• Gather frames for gallery of photos on wall
• Find a simluar style rug in our price range
• Find affordable laminate flooring for our kitchen & dining room
• Curtains, simple Ikea curtains

Curb Appeal Redo: Quick Fix

Here's some quick fixes we did to our the front of our house to create some Curb Appeal. To make our windows pop from the street, we added black shutters.

Next up was changing our basic light fixture to a chic black one

We changed our mail box soon after we moved in, we painted the bottom portion black to go with our accent colors more. We also changed our basic house numbers to sleek brushed nickel.

Curb Appeal Redo: Making Flowers Grow

I love flowers. I couldn't wait to add some to our front year for added curb appeal. For a simple fix I thought hanging flower pots over our front porch would add color and drama. I found simple chic charcoal ceramic planters from Ikea for $14.99 a pop.


Even before I found the perfect flowers for the pots, I was already in LOVE with how they looked.

Just a few weeks after I planted the flowers

The pretty potted plants today, I used 'Mircle-Gro Plant Food' once a week and it made a big differance. I'm not big on measuring plant food, so I brought the Mircle-Gro Singles packet. It's so easy to use; I just poured the packet into the watering can and watered the plants.

Even from a distance they make an impact when walking up to our front door.