Thursday, July 23, 2015

Style Board


These shots are taken directly from the house listing on Zillow.com (and as such are not mine!). This living room is large and long (24' x 11') with a pass through window to the kitchen and a cute wood burning stove.
Rather than try to arrange furniture for the room as a whole, I split it into two zones since the room is so large. First, a larger seating area focused on the pass through to the kitchen and the TV on the opposite wall. This house is a bungalow, so there won't be a separate den just for TV watching. I'll ground it on a separate area rug with a sofa and matching chair. The second area will be facing the wood burning stove with two matching slipper chairs and a bookcase (or two if there's room!).




1. Threshold for Target Leaf Pillow in Silver and Gold $17.99 Target.com   2. Gurli Cushion Cover in Red $4 (insert $2.99 to $5.99) Ikea.com   3. Safaviah Adirondak Red/Black Rug 8'x10' $142.79 Overstock.com   4. Ingerlise Curtains in White and Beige $19.99 per pair Ikea.com   5. Stocksund Armchair in Nolhaga Light Beige with black wood legs $349 Ikea.com   6. Wall color: Castle Path Behr.com   7. Coffee table by Altra Furniture in Brown $116.99 Target.com   8. 3-piece Hat Trick Vase in White $14.95 CB2.com   9. Nornas Sideborad (used here as a TV stand) $179 Ikea.com   10. Skyline Custom Upholstered Tufted Square Ottoman in Linen Navy $320 Target.com   11. Stocksund Sofa in Nolhaga Light Beige with black legs $599 Ikea.com
Here I'm torn. I really couldn't decide between using a large ottoman or the coffee table in front of the couch. Thoughts?

Top row from left to right: 1. Nornas Bookcase $159 Ikea.com   2. Persian Star Beaded Toss Pillow in Gold 14"x24" $35.99 Target.com   3. Branas Basket in Rattan $14.99 Ikea.com   4. Wall color: Castle Path Behr.com   Bottom row from left to right:  5. Ingerlise Curtains in Ivory and Beige $19.99 per pair Ikea.com   6. Threshold for Target Matte Metal Accent Table in black $50.99 Target.com   7. Threshold for Target Slipper Chair in Red Floral $84.98 Target.com
Although I like the look of the natural pine on the tv stand and bookcase, I think I'd stain them to match the coffee table. If I went with the ottoman instead though, I think I would leave them as is. All in all, everything on these two style boars comes out to less than $2500 (paint and curtain hardware not included).

So what do we think? I bet this room would feel much cozier, and I'm loving the gold accents to add just a bit of sophistication!

-Nicole

Friday, June 19, 2015

Mantra Printable

I'm going to start tinkering with typography prints to incorporate into my decor and to help fill out the gallery wall I'd like to have going up the stairs. The first design is a mantra I'm keeping in mind as I get back into my yoga practice. It's now available in my Etsy shop as a download if you'd like to use this in your own home, office, or meditation space.


-Nicole

Thursday, June 18, 2015

Curtains and learning to Sew

Ever since we bought Woodward Point nearly 3 years ago, I've had basic (read: cheaptastic Walmart) white curtains hanging on my living room windows. I strongly dislike them and they are wrinkled all the time. I want something that I can wash, dry and hang up, because seriously: who has time to iron their curtains? They work for privacy, but they're crap at blocking any light, which makes watching Game of Thrones and other darkly colored shows or video games incredibly difficult to see, and since two of the three walls in my living room have windows there isn't anywhere to put the TV that's naturally glare-proof.

Blackout curtains are the obvious answer, but $20 or more per panel is not really budget friendly for us right now, and I've found few printed panels that I have really really liked at Target or Ikea. The other obvious option is to make blackout curtains. The downsides there are that fabric can quickly get pricey as you need several yards, and that I don't know how to sew.

Mum to the rescue though! She's passing on her old Singer (early 90's maybe) sewing machine to me, all serviced and ready to go. I found some white paisley curtains at TJMaxx (seriously I love that place, love!) that would be great if they were lined. I don't need these to be voluminous curtains, so according to her we can split each panel in half since the windows are not particularly wide. Which means I only needed 2 packages (four panels in total) to cover all three windows.

She is coming up on Saturday to show me how to use the sewing machine and pretty much hold my hand through splitting and lining the curtains. I'm going to pick up some inexpensive black rods and clip rings tonight (under $12 a window for hardware seems pretty manageable). I also need to stop at Joann's and pick up curtain liner. I found this one on sale for under $4 a yard, and it's still blackout liner, so I'm very excited!

Eventually I'll want curtain holdbacks of some kind, but I'm on the fence about what style to go with, so I'm going to be patient for now. I need to keep reminding myself that well-decorated homes take loads of time and are always a work in progress.

Please keep your fingers crossed that I don't ruin these curtains!

-Nicole

Saturday, May 30, 2015

Early Woodward Point Pics

These are pictures from when we just moved in (June or early July 2012). This gives you a good idea of where we started: lots of wood, white walls, and hand me down furniture.

The early days of Woodward Point:

Kitchen upon move in (June 2012), now Banana Cream by SW
Dining Room, sorry it's blurry.
I've since swapped out the dining room table for this one (BHG table), and these chairs. I also added an area rug from Target so the table isn't just floating in this sea of wood.

Boyfriend's office on the 2nd floor. We've moved the desk under the cubbies, and moved the loveseat to the other short wall.
Sauna, am I right?! 2nd Floor Half bath
Living room. We've changed the layout and the furniture.

My desk! Not much has changed here.
Master bedroom. Way too much white.

Master bedroom. We've added a rocking chair from my grandparent's home to this corner.

Starting at Home

Many of my posts will feature my home, Woodward Point, in some way (at least for the time being). We bought it just under 3 years ago, and we love it. LOVE in big old capital letters. Eventually I will get to doing a full photo tour, I promise, especially since there are some family members who haven't seen it yet (large extended family, and some of us are pretty spread out).

When we bought out our it was listed as a multi-family home, sort of. Woodward Point is a 3 story colonial, basically in the heart of town. Downtown is a 5 minute walk, tops, but you'd hardly know it if you stood in my backyard. It's perfect -- Starbucks and the grocery store are under 10 minutes away, and the hospital is within walking distance, which is great, because I'm incredibly clumsy. Our backyard is already fenced in, so Lyra can run around to her heart's content. Inside, the first floor is set up sort of like a studio apartment with a combination living room/bedroom, a large kitchen/dining room (with a built in desk), and a good sized bathroom with a nice walk in shower. All of it was basically new when we bought the house, and the floors (hardwood), cabinets, and counters look great. SCORE!

Since then all we've done to the first floor is paint it a grey/taupe sort of color (similar). The kitchen will be painted teal (Bali Bliss by Behr), and I have no idea what color to paint the bathroom, but otherwise it's pretty good to go. Right now we are using the first floor as a studio, and one of our best friends (D) lives there.

Upstairs, the 2nd and 3rd floor it set up as it's own living space: 2 bedrooms, 1 and a half baths, kitchen, etc. Boyfriend, Lyra, and I live up here, and it's perfect for the three of us. When we moved in, every wall was white. Every. Single. Wall. (except the guest room, which is a weird green color that was also on the ceiling in the living room).

I love neutrals. I do. I think they are great, and I love my white sofa. But I was dying with white walls everywhere. It was too much, not quite clinical feeling, but between the white walls, ceilings and trim along with the off-white berber carpet, I felt like I was in a cloud. It's worst in the master bedroom, where our bedding is also white, and we have vaulted ceilings. It feels cloudlike, and not in a way that I love.

So far, we've painted the living room (Rainwashed by Sherwin Williams) which is delightfully blue/green depending on the light. It's very much a sea glass color, and works well with our "birch effect" Ikea furniture, and our white Ektorp sofa. The ceiling was quickly painted white, and we swapped out the ceiling fan for one with a light, also in white to blend in better (similar).

The dining room is tan (Baguette also by SW), and this color goes upstairs and through the 3rd floor hallway. On the 3rd floor, there's a chair rail in the hallway, and the bottom half is painted a medium brown (Cardboard by SW). The kitchen is currently a pale yellow (Banana Cream by SW) which works well (for now) with the oak cabinets. Eventually the plan is to overhaul the kitchen with white cabinets (probably Ikea) and paint the walls a brighter yellow, maybe something like this. The half bath is all tongue and groove wood. Some of our guests have loved it, and told me if I even think of painting it they will find me and commit me to a mental hospital. I go in there and feel like I'm in a sauna. The lighting is awful, and it makes putting on makeup very challenging, as everything has a more yellow tone to it.

NONE of the rooms upstairs (minus the hallway) have been painted. I need desgin feedback big time. Unless Boyfriend hates something, he refuses to give design input, other than to say that the white walls are fine.

Overall, I'd love Woodward Point to have a beachy sort of feel. I don't think I want rope accents all over, or a collection of sand dollars and starfish, but I love ocean colors and want my home to feel like I'm vacationing on the Cape (Cape Cod, for non-New Englanders) all the time.

Welcome to Woodward Point

This may or may not be one of those turning points in life. For the moment, I'm going to run with the idea and see where it goes. Feel free to stick with me, cheer me on, or leave me for someone else as you wish (but I hope you'll stay!).

Me? I'm currently 26 and living in southeastern Massachusetts. 27 is creeping up on me, and my boyfriend just turned 30 (a very big number in my mind still), so the last few weeks and even the last year or so have been "OH gosh! What the **** am I doing with my life?!"

For the present, I'm a desk monkey for a residential mental health facility (teen boys with some serious psych/behavioral issues) processing internal reports and oodles of DCF (for various states) paperwork. I also have a MA real estate license, and have been trying to work my way into the business. Real estate has been tough, sadly. Business has picked up in the area, which is AMAZING, but I lack the name recognition and/or experience for word of mouth referrals, and it seems no one walks into a real estate office saying "Please help me buy/sell a house!"

I've spent years following DIY, home decor, and lifestyle blogs, and I'm definitely a Pinterest addict (feel free to follow along). I've waffled for a while about starting my own blog. I'm finally going to dip my toes in and see what happens.

Most likely, this will be a mix of DIY (I have a dresser that desperately needs new hardware and paint), idea boards for my own home and for others in the area, and "Hooray I made X and didn't blow up my kitchen!" stories. My dog Lyra, GSD/Collie/Beagle mix and afraid of EVERYTHING, will likely be sprinkled in, because she is super adorable (even if she runs from the room when I turn on the ceiling fan and always manages to lick my glasses the minute I clean them).

Here goes nothing.

Welcome to Woodward Point!