Functional Cozy Minimalist Entryway Updates

I wanted to share the entryway updates that we've made to make it more functional, minimalist but still cozy.  This self quarantine has me decluttering the house some more, adding and subtracting things to make the rooms more functional for our family and then decorating rooms to add the cozy, lived in feeling that we love. 

I'm going to start with the last thing that we did.  We added this cute, cubby shelf in the entryway, to display some of my animal collections.  My mom bought this shelf for me at a tag sale for .50 cents a few years ago.  I originally added casters on the bottom and drawer pulls on the side and used it to store my shoes under the bed.  It's been sitting in the basement unused since we moved into this house 5 years ago.  Over the weekend the girls and I took it apart, sanded it, stained the back piece, sealed it and put it back together.  My husband hung it up for me and now it hangs proudly in the entryway.  I love that I get to display some of the trinkets that I've collected over the years, instead of having them scattered around the house.  

The girls also helped me refinish the large piece of driftwood that we now use to hang our jackets and bags.  My husband and I found this piece of driftwood one day while talking a walk on the beach in Sag Harbor, NY.  At the time I didn't know what I was going to do with it but it was so beautiful, I just wanted to take it home with us.  The girls and I sanded it, stained it black, sealed it and my husband attached these beautiful, sturdy hooks that we purchased at Target.  

Before he hung it on the wall, we all signed the back of it. I just love the stories behind the unique pieces that we have.  It is the most vital piece in our entryway because it adds so much functionality, it gets used everyday by all of us.  We do not have a coat closet nearby.   

The chair is a $15 thrift store find from before we moved in.  I purchased it when we went under contract.  I painted in black and distressed the crap out of it to make it look like it'd been painted for years.  The seat cushion was very thin, so I added a new cushion, batting, and the taupe vinyl fabric for easy clean ups.  It can be used to put shoes on by the entryway but we really use it as extra guest seating when we have a get together.  


The plant is real.  I love plants and I love having them all around the house.  I wish I could clone this plant 6 or 7 times because it makes everything look good, and I'd put one in every corner.  The plant was in bad shape and in a broken grow pot when I found it at Lowes and the gardening associate gave me discount on it without me even asking, so that was exciting.  I purchased a new grow pot under $5 bucks and then we put it inside of this gorgeous ceramic pot that my mom gave me a couple years ago.  It was hiding in my shed waiting for the perfect plant.       
   

I almost forgot to mention that we hung this cute vintage brass key holder thing for our keys.  There's not much else to say about it.

All in all, this room is a lot more functional now, it also is a lot more minimal than it's ever been and I love that we didn't have to spend a lot of money to make it functional and cozy.  I loved having the girls help with these small re-purposing projects, it makes all these pieces more special.  They love it too because they get to use power tools.  At some point we'll repaint this room and hopefully finally get to paint the trims and doors, which is something we just haven't gotten around to.       

Sofa Makeover For The Home Office Part Two

I'm back today with Part two of the home office sofa makeover (read part one here).  I gotta be honest, I didn't think I was going to finish it so quickly.  I knew I could but I was hesitating so much because I was not looking forward to stapling a million staples with my hand held upholstery stapler.  Came Valentines day and my husband went all hero to the rescue on me.  He bought me a few tools that I've been in dire need of.  One of them was a pneumatic stapler with a 20 gallon air compressor among other tools and lovey dovey stuff like flowers etc... Yes he kinda, no, more like, he completely outdid himself.  I love that man!  Anyhow back to the couch.  And just a reminder or if you didn't see it before, here's the UGLY before that I shared back in January.

What'd I tell you?  UGLY!

This baby went by smoothly.  The air stapler was a huge help.  I started the project in the very end of January.  I sanded the body and stained it but the stain was a little blotchy.  I knew if I was going to tackle this project it had to be done right because I don't plan on doing it again any time soon.  So I took a break and didn't touch it at all in the month of February.  A few days into March I was going to have a get together for some of our family members and my house was a finished and unfinished furniture projects mess.  I had not one but two finished dressers in the entryway/home office plus the couch on it's side and the cushions were on top of our dining table.  I knew I wanted to get everything out of the way before the get together and have additional seating in the home office where the guys always have their drinks and play Domino.  So I got my butt to work.

I sanded the frame again and stained it one day and the very next day I did all the upholstery in a few hours.  I bought new 1 inch batting to add more cushion to the couch and then I did the fabric.  I wanted the ikat prints to be somewhat symmetrical so it took some measuring and centering before doing all the cutting but it wasn't  too hard.  Also I did not want to sew, so I folded all the corners as neatly as I could and pulled the fabric nice and taught until it looked good to me and stapled.  BAM, BAM, BAM, BAM......  The back is a whole different story that I don't want to go into today.  Lastly I sealed the frame with my favorite water based poly as usual.  Look at that wood grain, uh, la, la...

The next day was our get together and we had to attach the cushions back to the frame.  Holly crappola that was a pain in the tush!!!  It took us an hour and a half because the back cushions did not want to go back on.  A lot of sweating and swearing to get them back on but somehow we made it happen.   I'm just happy that I finished and it looks great!  I LOVE the fabric and my husband loves it too so I am a very happy camper.  You know what else my husband loves about this project, that it didn't cost a small fortune ;-)

Oh yes and what do you think of one of my latest Goodwill finds?  This lamp!

I bought this clear globe LED light bulb for it, that thing almost cost more than what I paid for the lamp itself.  I don't know about you but I think it looks pretty cool.   It opens up too for storage, it's pretty neat.  This room is still getting tweaked so once I'm done I'll share the whole space.  I think it's coming together really nice and we like it a lot better now than the first time around.

Here a little before and after, what a difference some stain and fabric can do.      

Thrifty Finds

I just wanted to pop in an show you my latest thrifty finds.  While shopping around at Goodwill a few days a go, I scored some pretty cool stuff for cheeeeeap!  I actually popped in there real quick to see if I could find a mirror for the bathroom that we are working on.

Lets start off with these cool bamboo looking handles. They probably used to be from some tacky purse right?  Well, last week Dana talked about Bolga Baskets and when I saw this pair for a buck I had to bring'em home with me for a little Bolga DIY project.

Next up is this green and gold, metal, Mid Century triple plant stand.  If you remember back when I shared an Ikea wish list there was a triple plant stand that I wanted to purchase.  Lucky for me, last time we went there it wasn't available.  So naturally when I saw this triple plant stand for only $6, I went and grabbed a cart to stick this baby into.

I left the best for last.  I mentioned going into Goodwill to see if I could find a mirror for the bathroom, right!  This thing was meant to be.  It was the perfect dimensions and hello its freggin rattan looking.  I say looking because it's actually some plastic-ish material it's also painted to look like rattan.  The tag read $10 which was already to good to be true, giving that it was the perfect size and style.  I ended up paying only $5 because it was 50% off yellow tags and guess what color tag this puppy had?  Yup, you guessed it!  Can you believe it?  I spent less than $15 on these three items.
Given that our bathroom has turned out to be a complete mess of a mini makeover, more on that later,  I'd say this was one lucky shopping trip.  Well now I gots to go clean up all this stuff.            

  

 

Plans For The Dining Room

We have a couple new of plans for the dining room.  When we first moved in, we painted the room in a nice, bright, very light grey and refinished the floors.  We wanted it to feel light and fresh.  Then we hung some floating shelves to display some of my favorite things, added window treatments, plopped our furniture there and called it "good for now!"  You can see what the room looked like here!  Fast forward a year later, we've had time to figure out what works, what doesn't and put a plan together.  I made a little mood board to help visualize what we want for the space.

•  I know the space is small and small rooms call for round tables.  But some rules were meant to be broken, for the sake of happy living.  I shared in our first dining room post that we wanted to possibly build our old modern farmhouse dining table again.  Instead, I went crazy over a Parsons table I found on Craigslist and we bought it!
• I'm contemplating on keeping two of the Windsor chairs to use as captain chairs and painting them black.
• The two light wood chairs, we saw them at Ikea and fell in love with them but they were out of stock, so once they are back in stock we will be picking those babies up. 
• We still aren't sure if we want to buy four of the Ikea chairs or build a bench on the other side, so we are keeping an open mind about that.  
• The light fixture is only there for reference, it's the closest I could find to ours, which we are keeping.  

Tomorrow I will share the pictures of the new dining table and a list of things we will be addressing in the dining room refresh.  For more details on our dining room you can check out the "Our Home" tab and these other posts  * Dine with us * Dining room new hutch * Build a modern farmhouse table * Thrift Shopping and Shelfie Styling *

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Ikea Kitchen Wish List

With the kitchen cabinet makeover moving in full swing, a little Ikea shopping trip is in order.  I made a mood board for my Ikea kitchen wish list of all the goodies we want to grab on our next visit. We are lucky enough to have an Ikea about one hour away but I still like to make a list so that we don't have to make multiple trips in a short period of time.

The first thing that I need to address in the kitchen is organization.  We have been living in this house for about a year and there's a great deal of disorganization. When things are unorganized, they just don't function well, and it drives me bonkers!  Which is why this whole kitchen cabinet makeover fiasco started in the first place, you can read more about that in this post.  I also want to take this as an opportunity to replace some of the kitchen's most daily used items that have seen better days and top it off with some pretty accessories!

Ikea Kitchen Wish list

1. These Stodja Flatware trays will sit perfectly inside the kitchen cabinet drawers and will be perfect to keep things organized.  I have a smaller sized one already that I use to organize eating utensils so I will only need 3 of them.
2. I will grab a few of these Variera Boxes in different sizes to store snacks inside the top kitchen cabinets. We do not have a pantry so we make do with our kitchen cabinets to store food.  We've actually never had a pantry in any of our homes so we are used to storing things in the kitchen cabinets.  If you have a pantry consider yourself spoiled lucky!
3. I've always loved the idea of making food storage look super organized and stylish (who said food storage couldn't be stylish?) and I think I can achieve that with these inexpensive Ikea 365+ dry food jars with lids in different sizes.
4. Who doesn't love Ikea's Ranarp line of lighting?  I've wanted one since the first day I saw them but couldn't think of a space that I needed one for.  The Ranarp pendant lamp will look awesome against the dark woven shades.  
5. We have a few Fargrik coffee mugs already in teal and green that we've acquired over the years, but I love the black ones and at just $.99 ea I think I will give myself permission to to replace all 6 of our mismatched ones.
6. Most of our clear glass drinking cups have deceased so this Ikea 365+ clear glass set will be replacing them.
7. Our current Fargrik 18 piece dinnerware set (we have this set in green)  have served us well but they have seen better days.  They are very heavy duty which is why I love them.  They have taken 6+ feet tumbles  and haven't broken but they have chipped around the edges so I will just be replacing the set with another one of the same in white. 
8. I am vertically challenged so I require a step stool to reach the top shelf of the kitchen cabinets, I've had a cheap, metal and plastic one for years.  It's time for an upgrade! The Bekvam is solid beech wood and just $14.99.  
9. My dish detergent dispenser is a plastic hand soap one that I've been refilling and reusing and the cap is broken, so that's another kitchen accessory that needs replacing, this white Bestaende detergent dispenser should do the trick!
10. I need an extra colander for the sink this small Boholmen colander fits the bill.  It's all about the little things that make life easier.  I only have one big colander and sometimes I need more than one for a dish I'm cooking, so I have to drain it, empty the contents into another container, wash it to use it again (It's annoying).
11. I also need some new dish towels these Ikea 365+ dish towel set will look handsome in the kitchen. 
12. I am a bit of a sentimental person so while online window shopping at Ikea I saw this Iris oven mitt and the pot holders  I want to buy these solely based on the fact that my aunt's (who recently passed away) name, my daughter's middle name and my kids great grandmother's name (who also passed away) is Iris.
13. I'm loving his new Satsumas plant stand for the corner right next to the dishwasher.  It looks kind of mid century modern and I love the wood with the white combination.
14. And because every trip to Ikea cannot end with out me bringing home a new plant I want to buy another one of the Crassula potted plant since one of mines died last week :'-(

Our next trip to Ikea will be in spring, thankfully it's just around the corner, I can't wait!  

I will be sharing a post this week of the kitchen cabinet makeover so keep an eye out for that!  For more kitchen posts click here! 

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Charish Your Coffee Table

Although the title of this post "Charish Your Coffee Table" makes it seem like this is a sponsored post I promise you, that it is not sponsored, all opinions are my own.  Last week I recieved an email from the Community Manager at Charish asking if I was interested in writing a post for my blog about how I would style a coffee table using one of their coffee tables as inspiration.  Since my blog is centered mostly around home decorating and furniture I thought it would be a great post to write so, why not?  For those of you who are not familiar with Charish they are an exclusive, curator approved, online marketplace for vintage furniture and home decor items.  Without further ado here is the coffee table that I curated...

They sent me a zipped file containing a few options of their coffee tables for me to chose from and all the coffee table essentials were left up to me to chose from any home decor site of my liking.  This lovely faux bamboo, brass and glass coffee table quickly grabbed my attention.  I browsed through their website for inspiration and I loved so many of their items.  So to make this even more fun for myself, I decided that I was only going to use items that I liked from their site.  Keep in mind that I curated all these items for this coffee table based on looks and functions not on price.  They are only for inspiration on what I would chose if money was not a matter.

1. I am a fool for anything bamboo and brass and this coffee table is the best of both worlds.  The skinny but still sexy legs keeps it from looking heavy.  The glass top reflects light, and it is see through which makes it ideal for smaller spaces.  
2. The pair of rustic wood and glass hurricanes are a nice contrast to the coffee tables metal, slim profile.  They are great for mood lighting in the evening or to infuse your home with relaxing scents. 
3. The brass turtle box is a nice accent piece for the coffee table and it also offers storage.  I have a similar one on my coffee table, from Nate Berkus's line for Target.
4. Every coffee table needs some type of greenery, flowers, plants, leafy stems in a bud vase, there's lots of options.  I have some pretty succulents on mine, so I chose one in a terracotta pot for this coffee table.
5. Because succulents are prettier in pairs I also chose to add a second one in a beautiful marble vessel.
6. A stack of beautiful interior design coffee table books are an essential on mines.  There's a reason why they call them coffee table books.       
7. A beautiful, woven, textured basket on the bottom is a perfect place to store your remotes while keeping them nearby for easy access.  

Personally I like to keep it simple and functional but still eye pleasing!  I do not like to have too many items on my coffee table.  Too many items can make a space look visually cluttered even when they are not messy.  I like to leave enough space on my coffee table to place a drink or an appetizer dish.  Some people could probably do with a lot less and others love to fill every inch of table top and that is fine.  Your coffee table should reflect your style and how you decorate it, is personal to you, so have fun with it and do what speaks to you.

*I would love to hear what are your coffee table essentials?  Do you like fresh flowers on yours or is a freshly made pizza more your style?

1. Faux bamboo brass coffee table/ 2. rustic wood and glass hurricanes/ 3. brass turtle box/ 4. terracotta plant with succulent/ 5. marble vessel with succulent/ 6. MCM design books/ 7. design bowl/ 

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Thrift Shopping and Shelfie Styling

I went for a quick thrift shopping trip the other day and I scored some cute little brass swans.  I don't know you but when I buy any home decor item, new or used I don't care, I just want to run home, clean and rearrange stuff in the room where I'm going to display my new found treasures.  That is exactly what happened once I walked through the door, I got the urge for shelfie styling or in this case restyling!

These poor little swans swam straight into my hands and I decided I should adopt them.  The bowl one was not part of the set but it reminded me of Nate's Gold Bird Dish, that I love of course and it was only $2.  The other two swans were $5 for both.  I was so giddy when I walked out of there with my newly adopted family of swans.  I couldn't wait to show them their new home.  

When I got home I gave them a quick scrub down with some Lysol scrubby wipes.  I wanted to display them on the floating shelves in the dinning room so I got to work.  I emptied them out, and wiped them down too and I also took down the black mirror.    

Key features for my shelfie styling look

• Narrow down items to avoid it from looking too cluttered
• Create movement with different colors, textures, and heights 
• Choose a color palette, I went neutral with white, wood tones and gold 
• Different textures and materials, I used wood, brass, ceramic and glass
• Alternate heights to keep the eye moving
• Use odd numbers, count groups of like items as 1, ex. 6 wood cups = 1 item 
• Add greenery

I switched out the black mirror for the rattan one.  The colors and texture go much better with the items on the shelf.  My sister loved the black mirror so I gave it to her and she hung it over her entryway table in her apartment.  I'm happy that it found a new home.

The swans finally made it to there new home and they love it here!  I wasn't too happy with the way the floating shelves looked before and I wasn't feeling the black mirror either but after a few tweeks, I'm loving how everything ties in now.  Funny how a little thrift shopping inspired me to do a whole shelfie styling makeover.  Don't you just love when that happens?

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Adding New House Plants

If you read my 2016 Goals or Clearance Junkie post you might remember me pointing out that one of my home goals is adding new house plants to every room in the house.  I love plants and I have a few of them around the house but I haven't always been the best plant caretaker.  I went through a phase when every last one of my plants died on me.  I had completely given up, I was sure that I was doomed with a permanent black thumb.

A few years ago I finally got up the courage to bring a ZZ plant home from a trip to Ikea.  It was supposed to be a low maintenance plant so I thought I would give it a try.  Years later I am happy to announce my ZZ is still alive and it's big!  This plant is the least picky plant ever.  It made me comfortable to slowly start adding new house plants into my home again and now I can't get enough of them.  I try my best to stick to medium to low maintenance plants and it has been working for me.

Plants are great for the homes interior.  They help improve your homes air quality by freshening it up and removing harmful pollutants.  They add beauty, and color which makes them great to decorate with.  There are so many choices to dress them up in pretty planters, they come in different materials, sizes, colors and textures.  It's a great way to bring some nature into your home as well.

This year I already added a few new guys, so without further ado...

The first one is this beautiful spiky Aloe plant.  I bought this one at Ikea.  I think Ikea is a great source for plants.  I have bought quite a few plants from them and none of them have died, knock on wood!

On a trip to Lowes last week, me and my six year old daughter got side tracked by the plants isles and she asked if I could buy her a plant, #proudmommymoment how could I resist?   We took home two Snake plants one for their bedroom and another one for ours.  We got home and quickly re-potted them into some black planters I bought a couple months ago.

Another trip to Lowes for a return brought home this beauty.  I had never seen one of these before but I read the tag and learned it is called Philodendron Silver.  I could not resist it's beauty so into the shopping cart she went and now she is here enchanting our home with its presence.  I can't wait to re-pot it!

Then I was at the grocery store and over by the register there was a shelf full of plants with a $1.99 sign on it and you know I was there!  I quickly spotted two that were on my wish list and into my grocery cart they went too.

I'm so excited to have already added 6 new plants to our home this year and we aren't even half way through January.  If I continue at this pace the house might look like a jungle by the end of the year but that isn't the look I'm going for, so I might have to slow down a bit.  Now all that is left is to re-pot them into their new pots for and sprinkle them around the house.

A Beautiful Mess

I have always wanted to have a few hanging planters so I looked for inspiration online and I pinned some pretty DIY macrame.  I am going try my hand at making my own and see what happens.  

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New Bedroom Nightstands

I'm very excited to share today that I found a pair of nightstands for our bedroom.  Yes, I get overly excited about furniture but did I say they are Awesome with capital A nightstands! Give it up for these babies! Um huh!

On this bedroom post where I talked about what I was dreaming for the bedroom I mentioned wanting to get new nightstands.  I really like the idea of building floating nightstands but when I came across these babies on good ole Craigslist I couldn't pass them up.  It was love at first sight, I know some of you might be thinking, is she blind?  Those things are a yucky, mucky, beigey, yellowy, pukey color!  But those of you that know about furniture and potential, stop drooling, they are mine, I found them first!  

Let me explain why they are so fabulous!  Just look at how stylish they are, they are Hollywood Regency, I mean come on the name alone says it!  I love all the amazing detail, who doesn't loooove faux bamboo?  And the brass details on the corners and back plates on the pulls, the canning and trim on the doors, those sexy little legs.    

They are much bigger than the standby pieces we have now.  They almost line up with the top of the mattress which makes them perfect for bedside tables.  They have concealed storage which is always a plus.  Who doesn't want to hide all there unsightly junk?  And not to mention they are great quality, vintage, wooden babies.  

Obviously the finish is all wrong and I have to give them a serious paint makeover, but that's the fun part!  One of them is missing a pull which is going to be a pain in the butt to track down.  I know, I've already tried with no luck.  If anyone knows where I could find a match for these pulls please drop me a line on the comments I would sooo appreciate it.    

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