To me, making a house into a home is a big deal.
Do we need to spend a fortune on it? Nope. I just feel like it's important to create an environment conducive to creating a family. To me, that is sacred.
I want the home I raise my children in to elicit feelings in them like my little sister has for the home we grew up in. The rest of us adore that old house too because of the sacred memories that seep right out of it's walls. (But my sister is the one who actually wrote about it...I linked to her thoughts a while ago here.)
Does the way the home is decorated make a difference? Not really. I mean, I think you could bring in that wonderful feeling of "family" in any kind of home, outdated or updated or whatever it may be. I do think that what we choose to put on the walls makes a difference (see why here). And to me, having things organized and beautiful in their own way brings in such a good spirit.
So, that's my little preface to introduce our little house "spruce-up" project I talked Dave into last year because of all that jazz I outlined above.
It all began with this:
...the gorgeous piano Dave's brother and his wife very graciously let us borrow while they built their house had to be returned. Drat. I had grown pretty attached to that thing. (Thanks again, guys, for letting us use it!)
Now that the living room would need to change a bit to accommodate a new piano, why not spruce it up while we were at it? It had been a while since we adorned the walls in there with dark red paint. I was ready for bright and light.
I was done with the red. 
So we pulled everything out. (I say "we" liberally because Dave wasn't involved much more than to be bothered that this whole thing has taken me SOOOOO long...notice the Easter wreath on the door in that first picture? Yeah, well, that was last Easter. The 2009 Easter. He has a reason to have been frustrated. But hey, it's pretty much over so hallelujah! for both of us.)
I sold everything on Craig's List or gave it away and we painted the room the color of a "silver fox" (according to Dunn Edwards).
I say "we" here because my friend Denise helped me SO much with all this. She has got the greatest eye and the greatest ideas. Plus she thinks so much like I do. Click here to see her decorating blog.
Tried this rug in here...a little too bold (I wanted to incorporate my new colors: orange, green and a hint of blue, but this was a little much).
Got new floor (I love slate) and a new couch (from clubhousefurniture dot com):
Oh, and got our family picture stretched on canvas by this local guy here at Trotter Galleries. I thought he did an awesome job.
Framed our family picture and got this book shelf made by another local guy here:
Oh and that light above the family picture, love that. That was on super sale from Pottery Barn and I think it helps complete the room.
So there you go. Still waiting on the chair that goes in that corner to the right but hey, it's a heck of a lot more done than the "torn apart" thing we had going on forever.
And I really love it.
The only problem is that this opened a can of worms: I loved having something different so much that I decided we needed to get rid of the red throw pillows on the couches in the family room. And that led to a bunch of other stuff in there. Then the dining room needed help. And then the entry way didn't go with it all either. So...we made a few other changes too. More on that later...
Have a great day!
Labels: our house
Oh, and got our family picture stretched on canvas by this local guy here at Trotter Galleries. I thought he did an awesome job.
Oh and that light above the family picture, love that. That was on super sale from Pottery Barn and I think it helps complete the room.