» Decorating Ideas

Fancy Shmancy DIY Makeup Brush Holder

Sarah — Mon, 24 May 2010 09:00:00 +0000

I’m all moved in (finally) and am working on getting my room to be ‘just right’ for me to live and work in during the summer. I realized while unpacking that I have a ton of stuff and mostly too many decorating accessories like glass bottles, vases, frames, etc. I packed a lot of them away so I can pick and choose what to use depending on my mood and where I am living. I had packed up my favorite blue pedestal bowl but decided it needs to be kept out no matter what because I love it so much. I made myself find a use for it in my room. Here is what I came up with – a fancy shmancy makeup brush holder.

Here is what I started with:

Makeup brushes, the blue pedestal bowl (isn’t it gorgeous?), colored glass vase gems, a small glass container, and white vase filler. I filled the glass container with some of the vase filler. I normally stop here and put my brushes in this standing up, but I wanted to make it fancier (and shmancier)!

I then put the glass container in the center of the pedestal bowl and poured the remaining vase filler around it.

It looked a little bare, so I used some colored glass gems I had been using in something else and scattered them on top of the vase filler. Voila! A very fancy temporary fix that makes getting ready much more fun!

Here it is in action:

I keep it on my vanity. It’s perfect!

I am so happy I get to use one of my favorite accessories on a daily basis! I also love how glamorous and quirky it looks. Have you ever recreated a piece and used it in a way it was not originally intended to be used for?

I Love Lamp…Er, I Mean Ladder

Sarah — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 09:00:00 +0000

We all have things we have treasured and adored since we were children. My childhood came at a time when there was an explosion of Disney cartoon movies of classic stories like Cinderella and Snow White. One of my longstanding obsessions, and one I think many people find themselves obsessed with or mildly addicted to from time to time are ladders. I don’t mean ladders like carpenters use, but sliding ladders like the one Belle used in the library where she spent lots of her time in the great Disney classic, Beauty and the Beast. I have been smitten with them ever since seeing them in the movie. They are not the most practical items for indoor decorating, especially in a home full of children, so I have a feeling this post of inspiration pictures is as close as I am going to get to having a sliding ladder of my own, unless I open up a bookstore which is one of my dreams to do.

I do not discriminate against indoor ladders, which you will see by the photos below – I love them in all sorts of rooms from the traditional library, to kitchens, and even in bathrooms! I hope you find as much joy in these photos as I do!

Houzz

House Beautiful

Little Green Notebook

Peter Pennoyer Architects

House Beautiful

This Old House

Architectural Digest

Source Unknown

Fabulous, right? I can see why they would be helpful when reaching for items on high shelves, but I have a feeling I’m going to be a family with a little stool floating around the kitchen to reach the top shelf since ladders can be dangerous, and even regular height cabinets cannot be reached by me easily since I am short.

If you could put a sliding ladder in one room of your house, which would it be and why?

Showcasing a Bed with Fabric

Sarah — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 09:00:00 +0000

Now that I’m home for spring break, I have time to really look at my room and see what more can be done to make it better. I have big things in mind for it to plan for the summer when I have more time, but for now I’m getting the inspiration juices flowing. I’m thinking of really showcasing the bed by putting some fabric from floor to ceiling behind the bed. As you can see in the photo below, the room is lacking the finishing touches, so this will be my first step to creating a more finished room.

I have lots of other ideas, but I just want everyone to have a small taste of what I’m thinking of to last until the summer. I don’t think I can wait that long!

Kelley Interior Design

Better Homes and Gardens

Although many of these rooms look like they were quiet expensive to decorate, I have many ideas of ways to recreate the fabric showcasing the bed on a college student’s budget while keeping the high-end look. I can’t wait to tackle this project in a couple months!

Mixing Up Your Bedroom With Sheets

Sarah — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:32:26 +0000

I have been thinking a lot about how I am going to decorate my apartment next year when I am living on my own in a studio. I really want something new and fresh, but I also want something that will last me a few years without me tiring of it. I am also looking for something I can use in my room at my parent’s house if I ever want to switch things up a bit. I love redesigning rooms, so I have found the key to my room designs has to center around the ease at which I can affordably change the room with just a few switcheroos. For a bedroom, I have decided the best way to do this is to stick with very neutral bedding and a basic color scheme, maybe with one main color other than neutrals, and switching the room’s feel by buying a few sets of inexpensive sheets and changing them whenever I need something new.

I have designed a room to explain what I mean.

I went with a very neutral but still fancy bed with a tufted headboard, a white nightstand, a white comforter, a gray rug, a neutral striped bench, and some concave mirrors for above the dresser. The only pops of color are the blue lamp, the blue dresser, and the art which has a few colors to draw upon. This bedroom could easily be recreated DIY-style by making the headboard, finding a nightstand and dresser and painting them, buying inexpensive white bedding and a neutral rug as well as some kind of seating.

The fun of this room is the ability to mix it up with the sheets listed along the top of the image. Each one makes the room look a little different. The way this adds to the room is by letting the sheets show when making the bed by folding them over the comforter, or even folding the comforter down farther than normal and letting the sheets take center stage.

Floral – A more feminine but still sophisticated look.
Gray Stripes – A masculine look that is still a bit fun but very sophisticated. It goes with the stripes on the bench.
Damask – Very elegant but fun because of its blue color.
Green Stripes – A summery, playful look with a cabana green and thick bold stripes.
Dots – Some adults love polka dots, but this room could also be easily recreated into a more elegant children’s room with polka dot sheets as well.

Some other ways I thought of to mix this room up from time to time is by switching out the art. The art I used is from Vintage Printable which is completely free, so changing the art is very easy because all you need to do is print it! Also, I limited the amount of accessories in the room so that you could imagine a person taking different accessories from around the house to mix things up from time to time. Adding some throw pillows and a blanket of different colors can also bring in more color, which I posted about a while back.. The possibilities are endless!

What do you do to mix things up in your bedroom decorating? Or, perhaps you are not like me and you actually like your decorating months and years after “completing” a room?

You Can’t Always Get What You Want

Sarah — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:00:00 +0000

…but if you try sometimes you might find something really similar in your price range!

I have been drooling over this this Naudia chair ever since I spotted it and used it in a purple and gold Christmas inspiration board a few months ago. This weekend I saw the chair in person and fell even more in love with it.

It’s actually not a bad price at just $119.88, but I don’t have a practical use for it and there’s no way I will dish out a hundred smackaroos on a decorative chair right now. I decided to reevaluate what I really like about the chair. I found the main things that attracted me to it are its purple color, floral pattern, and feminine aesthetic. I began to wonder if I could find these qualities in something else that might be more useful to me and in my price range.

A little rummaging through TJ Maxx and I found just the thing.

It has the purple, the floral pattern, and it’s definitely feminine! I have enough space in my jewelry box for now but this will give me room to expand and in the meantime I could use it as a makeshift charging station, a place to hold ponytail holders and other hair doo-dads, or as a little office supplies storage kit. Score, I thought, until I realized I still need to know if it was in my price range… Red tags are my friends! A whopping seven dollars and fifty cents was all I needed to make this beauty mine. As much as I love red tags and the shavings they save me off of each and every hard-earned dollar, I become a tad paranoid when I see them. I looked the box up and down for a few minutes, scrutinizing every square inch of it, but there was nothing wrong! I couldn’t believe my luck. I clutched it under my arm like a pro football player, extended my other arm, and sprinted to the front of the store to check out. Now it’s sitting on my desk waiting to be loved.

Isn’t it great what a little brain power can do? I went from loving but secretly hating a beautiful chair because I had no use for it and it was out of my price range to buying something much more useful for less than ten percent of the cost but one hundred percent of the beauty. Can anyone really go wrong buying things this way? I will need to keep my modified Rolling Stones mentality playing in my head at all times when I go shopping (in reference to the title of this post). I feel I can save money this way while also finding products I love by figuring out what it is I like about the things I can’t afford and finding those qualities in more reasonably priced (read: cheap and on clearance) items. Happy shopping!