by Jen | Sep 11, 2013 | House Tours, Inspired Style, Interior Decorating
I’m a house tweaker. That is really exactly what I do. I prefer it vs starting from scratch. Handy dandy Google defines tweaking as: Improve (a mechanism or system) by making fine adjustments to it.
I kind of want to make up a song about me. “I’m a house tweakerrrr…yeah yeah…I’m a house tweaker”. Anywho.
I did some tweaking to my own house.
Fireplace felt bare. (Click here to see before.) And I was intrigued by how Starbucks always makes their chalkboard signs look so nice…turns out they use chalkboard markers. So I went to handy dandy Michaels’s and bought some.
Here’s what I made:
Can you find the cat?
Then I washed my dining room tablecloth. It was a tad damp so I laid it out on the foot of my guest bed and did a double-take. That looked pretty good. A 108″ tablecloth from TJMaxx that cost $16 was the perfect size to lay on a queen size bed as a coverlet. I mean, who uses a coverlet? It’s just for show. It’s just for color. It’s just for interest. It’s just for texture. It’s just to make your bed look like a Pottery Barn photo shoot. So for $16 vs spending a lot more on an actual queen sized blanket I have a pretty nice looking bed, if I do say so myself. Tweaked.
Have you tweaked anything lately?
by Jen | Sep 10, 2013 | Art, Fun Style, Interior Decorating
http://youtu.be/dG6A71py9nE
If you are from Detroit and you are a product of the 70’s and 80’s then you know this song. It’s. Classic.
It’s a commercial for the Detroit Institute of Arts. They’ve got art, but do you?
I don’t mean Museum Quality Collector ART. I just mean some scraps of paper mounted on your wall that speak to you. Something that lifts your soul. Something that reminds you of a faraway place or time. Or maybe it doesn’t remind you of a darn thing and that’s why you like it. But you gotta like it. And you gotta have art.
Art is what separates our homes from furniture show rooms. Art is what makes a home look collected over time. Art is what gives our rooms personality.
Remember Ode to a Green Purse? Or Making Art Out of Objects You Love? (I know, who can forget those oldie but goodies.) Art can be ANYTHING as long as YOU like it and it makes YOU feel good to look at it.
So are your walls still blank? Do you have framed pictures you hate shoved in the closet? Rip those bad boys apart and use the frames for something else. Hate the frames? Buy some spray paint. C’mon I’m giving you NO excuses on this.
Have you visited Etsy?? Etsy.com is a handmade marketplace online. To use Etsy’s words…”Etsy is the world’s most vibrant marketplace. Etsy celebrates individual creativity in design and craftsmanship by connecting unique people, stories, and items in a playful and meaningful way. Etsy provides a marketplace for crafters, artists, and collectors to sell their handmade creations, vintage goods and crafting supplies.” You can look for just about anything handmade and you will find it on Etsy.com.
Here are some examples–most of these pieces are available now and almost all that I chose as examples are under $50
Remember those frames full of the ugly art in your closet? Measure the frames first and then order something unframed that will fit into the old frames. I always make sure I can find a store bought frame…meaning I can go to Michael’s and buy the frame off of the shelf and THEN I buy the art. NEVER get art and then get it custom framed. Unless you have a lot of money. Then go ahead.
Aside from Etsy.com there are a gazillion other places online to find inexpensive gorgeous art. My friend from Jenny on the Spot got me hooked on Whatever… aka megduerksen.bigcartel.com. The Globes print is calling to me. Jenny does a spot on (get it? Jenny on the Spot?), anyway, Jenny does a spot on (still laughing about this) blog post which you can check out here. Please do. And check out Jenny’s blog–she’s as fun as Meg’s art.
And just because I alllllllllways like to come full circle on my posts…Remember The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) from above? Well, maybe you heard that Detroit is bankrupt? And maybe you heard about the poor DIA being sacrificed of its art to pay this debt!? Well when Winston Churchill was asked to cut arts funding in favor of the war effort he simply replied, “Then what are we fighting for?”
Save the Art! (Do that! Click on it!)
And save your house from looking like a furniture store.
by Jen | Sep 9, 2013 | Fun Style, Happiness at Home, House Tours, Interior Decorating, Life Reflections
Pockets of Sunshine in the Mud Room.
My Favorite Watercolors.
Hallway love.
His name is Leo (the lion).
Can you find the Starbucks?
Cat.
Some snapshots from my day.
Jen
by Jen | Sep 3, 2013 | Organizing
This makes me laugh, albeit slightly frenzied and franticly, but laugh nonetheless. When we moved we added up that our total household goods weighed just under 20,000 pounds. Now granted that does include tables, couches, grills, lawn equipment, beds, clothes, toys, etc… and we are a family of four, but still. The UK bus puts it into perspective. AND it all had to be UNPACKED.
UNPACKED.
We won’t talk about packing. I can’t. Not yet. It’s too fresh.
But unpacking. It all has to go somewhere, and the floor is not an option. Staying in the boxes doesn’t work. Sure the packers labelled the box “Garage”…and surely what was packed from the garage can’t be that crucial, until you open the box and realize there is only ONE thing in it from the actual garage and the remainder of it consists of your couch cushions from the living room. It’s all such a mess. Don’t even get me started on the toilet brush, plunger, and my children’s toothbrushes that were all packed together, as in touching, in a box labelled Master Bedroom. (I have to do this again in 10 more months.)
Remember the Nike ad…Just Do It? Purge it. Just do it. I know there are books and tv shows and people out there dedicated to this tricky business of helping people deal with their stuff. Let me just oversimplify the whole process.
Purge it.
Put like things together….everywhere. Go ahead, make a mess.
Purge again.
Then put the like items back in ONE place that makes sense. If you can’t fit them all into the space on the first try—You need to purge again. I know this sounds like a “Duh” statement but this is where I got into trouble. I am the master at utilizing vertical space. I fill empty space with shelves and then add those portable wire helper shelves. I swap containers for different shapes and sizes so they are more conducive to fitting into the puzzle I am putting together. I can pack a car like nobody’s business too. But here’s the thing, when it’s time to pull all those things out it is like disentangling 20 large clowns out of a Volkswagon beetle. So at the end of the day I was left staring at a whole lot of clowns disguised as one too many small appliances.
This post is not titled “How to Fill Small Spaces”–it’s a cautionary tale. It’s a story about how I was delusional about how much stuff we really had.
The only thing that saved me is the following. Before my shipment of stuff arrived from the moving company I went through every cupboard, closet, drawer and thought ahead to every storage item I owned to assign where all the “stuff” was going to go.
Linens. Crafts. Extra Batteries. Mop. Vacuum. Mixing Bowls. China. Books. Office Supplies. Shoes. Coats. Keys. Photo Albums. Christmas Decorations. Extra Toiletries. Seasonal Clothes. Toys. Wrapping Paper. Phone Book/Local Numbers/Local Area Things To Do.
Notice not one category includes decorative items—because who cares at this point. That’s the icing on the cake and first we need to make the cake.
I used post it notes and had a master list of every room with what “nuts and bolts” were going to go into it. AND this time when I unpacked and the the mugs didn’t fit into their designated space I purged AGAIN instead of getting another helper shelf and performing a circus act to make them fit.
We are moving again. This time maybe with a single level UK bus vs a double decker.
