Month: February 2014

Guest Post: Please Your Inner Child with Bedroom Decor

Hey gang! I’m super-excited to have my first guest post on home decor! Kathy Joe is a blogger from the UK, and she reached out to me a couple of weeks ago about writing for my blog. She’s a funny gal with some great ideas, so please, enjoy her post!

Guest post by Kathy Joe

A big hello to everyone! People call me Kathy Joe and they also call me as a decor fanatic. The reason is that I have come a long way with my passion to jazz up everything! I am extremely cheerful to be a guest here. Jennifer is a wonderful being for letting me do this. Please come visit me here.

Does your inner child cry out for a funky, welcoming and, let us be brutally honest here, childish bedroom? Do you reluctantly turn away from the soft furnishings and furniture in the children’s section, looking desultorily through the adult offerings with a glum resignation? If this sounds like you it is time to give your bedroom a guerrilla make-over dipping deep into your past likes and fancies! It is possible to make your bedroom look as though it has been created for a younger version of you without guests assuming they have stumbled into a real child’s room – which can be very awkward on a first proper date…

Polka Dots

Get dotty with your curtains! Polka dots are both cheerful and colourful, providing a subtle nod to childhood without being over the top, over-childish or sickeningly twee. Polka dot curtains can be made to measure for your bedroom, which means that you can choose exactly the right colour combinations to suit the rest of your décor.

Polka-dot curtains

Invest in a brightly coloured and gently clattering beaded curtain. Beaded curtains are usually used in place of a door, but they work well near the windows too. Having streams of beads flowing from the pelmet not only looks wonderful and sounds great (do make sure that you choose solid plastic beads as hollow or metal ones will make a dreadful noise with every passing breeze!) but will recall the many happy hours spent running your fingers through boxes of beads and buttons – oh, you know you did it, we all did!

Beaded curtain

Splurging in children’s curtains

Allow mythology a place in your décor scheme, either in the form of small ornaments or in the curtain fabric. While most girls outgrow their love of unrelenting pink by about the age of eight or nine, their love of unicorns and rainbows will last forever! (**Amen! ~Jen**) Splurge on some fabulous rainbow curtains to instantly boost and brighten the bedroom and your mood! For naive and chic children-themed curtains, my ultimate favorite place to grab them is Yorkshire Linen Co.

flutterby_pencil_pleat_curtains

Quirky Curtain Rings

If you are a bit shy of hanging bright and jaunty curtains, or feel that they are too ‘young’ for your bedroom, why not brighten up your regular ‘grown-up’ curtains with some quirky and appealing curtain rings? Buy a couple of packs (you will find them online or at most home décor outlets) and set to work adding a subtle but cheerful touch of youth to your bedroom curtains! For kinky and interesting curtain tie backs, I am a huge fan of Tie Back and Trim.

Letter It All Out

Go back to grade school with some vibrant alphabet curtains! With the immense range of fabrics available today you will be able to choose the fabric carefully to achieve a quirky look rather than a babyish theme. You can even buy plain curtains and letter them yourself, placing the letters in a way that is attractive and appealing to you.

https://d2d00szk9na1qq.cloudfront.net/Product/1e52d75a-0458-4cd0-92dd-792c81f52187/Images/Large_0278299.jpg

via Fabric.com

Funky Tie Backs

Again suitable for those who do not want to make too much of a child-like splash in the bedroom, tiebacks are discreet yet visible, allowing you to indulge in a trip down memory lane without being too obvious about it.

Fun Tie-Backs

Images via and via.

Think back to what made you feel happy and secure as a child, especially as regards to your bedroom and home. You are trying to capture the essence of childhood, secure, happy joie de vivre without retaining any of the immaturity of that time.

Thanks for the great ideas, Kathy Joe!

What youthful decor do you want to incorporate into your bedroom?

Makeover Monday: I Cabi-not Like This Cabinet

We bought our house last summer because it has some really lovely features. The hickory floors were clearly laid by hand with love. The cabinets are solid wood. The baseboards are gorgeous. And the family that rebuilt this home clearly loved it. I mean, they loved it A LOT. Like, a lot.

Our bathroom is a good example. 2 adults and 3 boys shared this room, and the vanity clearly received the tactile admiration of the whole family over and over and over again.

Bathroom vanity makeover
The badness is inspiring even worse puns.

Continue reading “Makeover Monday: I Cabi-not Like This Cabinet”

Diaper bag pack list

Oh Baby! It’s Tough Staying Organized with a Newborn

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve had several friends give birth to their second babe. In addition to making me nostalgic and teary-eyed, it reminded me how tough those early days can be. Back when kiddo was a newbie, I couldn’t remember anything. My brain was lumpy oatmeal. The feed-every-3-hours regime for the first few weeks was brutal, and that level of sleeplessness exceeded anything I’d ever experienced, even in during final exams in college! So once my head cleared, I realized things could be better if I got my sh*t together.

When we needed to leave the house for the inevitable doctor’s appointment, or grocery shopping, or eventually, just to to go out for a walk and get fresh air, I found myself writing the same list of supplies over and over again. And in my insomniacal haze, I often screwed up! And it was time-consuming to keep figuring it out! One time we were out with EIGHT onesies and NO diapers. I suppose we could have fashioned a 5-onesie-diaper in the case of a blowout, but that was not ideal.

The bag packing confusion was further compounded by my husband trying to “help” pack the bag, so we’d both end up shoving the same things in there, and neglecting the same things. Honestly, imperfect packing wasn’t the end of the world. Nobody died, nobody got hurt. Maybe someone would get a peep show if I forgot the nursing cover, or we’d have to rush home with a poop-covered onesie if there wasn’t a fresh one, but the perfectionists in us were ashamed when we didn’t have exactly what we needed when we left the house.

Diaper bag pack list
Eight onesies. No diapers. Big problem.

Continue reading “Oh Baby! It’s Tough Staying Organized with a Newborn”

Desk Makeover: after

Makeover Monday: Refurbish, Don’t Refinish

I found this well-loved desk in Goodwill months ago. I grabbed it for $15, knowing it just needed a little TLC. It’s smaller than a regular desk, perfect for an elementary school-aged student (or a hall table until then…). I loved the shape and the little details (brass keyhole, pull-out writing surface), and wanted to retain some of the original character. So I decided instead of refinishing it like I did with the bench project, I decided to just restore it.

Desk makeover
She was a little rough when I got her.
Before: desk makeover
She had some great features, like a locking drawer and pull-out writing surface, but the wood was stained and dry and DIRTY.

Continue reading “Makeover Monday: Refurbish, Don’t Refinish”