Laundry Room Inspirations

A few days ago I told you about my decorating goals for 2013. My first goal is to make my laundry room more pretty and organized. When I start a project like this I like to get some inspiration from pictures. Now with the internet, we have so many sources besides just books and magazines. Some of my favorites are Houzz.com, Pinterest, Better Homes and Gardens, Coastal and Sountern Living, HGTV and of course, other bloggers websites. I have collected a few of my favorites here in this post. If you have a laundry room like mine, in need of a little help, these pictures might inspire you to add a little something to yours too.
Inspiration 1 ~

sweetpickinsfurniture.com

I love the colors here. It's not a huge room but has tons of style. The baskets and rugs really warm up what could be a cold room with a lot of hard elements. Who doesn't need a ladder, so why not have a cute one that you can hang for easy access?


sweetpickinsfurniture.com

Small touches like the laundry sign on the door and the beautiful accessories make the place where you do laundry a special space. I love having a chandelier as opposed to a flourescent light fixture. Don't you love that they built their own wooden stand for the washer and dryer? Very Creative!  For more details on this lovely laundry room visit sweetpickinsfurniture.com.



Inspiration ~ 2

myhydrangeahome.bolgspot.com

 I love the idea of wood countertops. As I mentioned before, a laundry room can be cold so adding warm elements like wood and fabric go a long way in warming up the space. I love the ruffled fabric used to hide what's in the shelves behind. Taking off some cabinet doors and adding the fabric adds interest. The use of wood cabinet pulls to match the cabinet is genius and ties everything together well.



myhydrangeahome.blogspot.com

Again, hanging usefull items like this ironing board is a great idea and a space saver. Pretty items like flowers make laundry less of a chore. Visit myhydrangeahome.blogspot.com for more information on this laundry room.

Some more pretties ~

HGTV.com

I love the touch of red.

HGTV.com

I wish I could hide my washer and dryer like this but I don't have the room for the doors to swing back. I love that even though this is so neutral it's still very warm.

Aren't these lovely laundry rooms? I can't wait for mine to be pretty!

I have one more inspiration picture that's a little strange. I was watching Practical Magic last night ( I also get inspiration from movie sets) and I loved the feel of the retail store in the movie so I think I'm going with warm whites and pear greens for my color scheme.

I love anything that has beautiful storage. Don't you?

Well off to my second step of the redo and that's the purge. Making piles of keep, throw away and donate.
Wish me luck... back soon with the progress.

Tray Transformation

Since I moved everything around for Christmas my coffee table became very bare. I had been looking for a large tray but everything I found that I liked was so expensive. Then one day I was in Home Goods shopping for someone else when I found it, a large tray for only $29.99. YES!!! Now it didn't look like this originally so I'm going to show you how I did it and what it looked like before...

It was a very bright red. I liked the idea of red so I toned it down with some brown mixed in and then rubbed a walnut stain over it to darken it even more...

after the stain treatment

adding the stencil with the same dark walnut stain

I brushed a little turquiose on top.

The almost completed tray. I just need to add the handles on each end...

Now I know what you're thinking..."That doesn't look anything like the cream tray in the first picture."You're right. I decided that the red was too dark for the dark coffee table so I started all over again. Yep, that's how I roll. This is the great thing about paint. You can't screw it up. Just repaint it. It's as easy as that.

I added the handles, painted my trim color, Monarch Sawyer's fence (don't you love that name for a paint) lightly rubbed on the walnut stain to get in the grooves and cracks, and started over with the stencil.

For this two tone effect, I stenciled first with the dark stain and them moved the stencil over slightly adding the white to give a shadow effect.

So, unintentionally, I came up with a blog post about how you can transform a piece 2 ways for 2 different looks and maybe proved a point that if you don't like the color of something at first, you can change it easily.

A lot of what I do, not only in painting, but in decorating and blogging as well is trial and error. So don't be afraid to try something new. The worst thing you can do is screw it up and have to start over. Twice the fun!!!



The (really this time) completed project ~

shared with ~

Jenniferrizzo.com

2012 Decorating Review

Looking back on 2012, I am so glad that I started this blog. It was a strange thing for me to do considering the fact that I just recently discovered what a blog was but it has allowed me to express my love of decorating while still being able to stay home with my kids and have a flexible schedule. It is definitely not a money maker, or at least it hasn't been so far, but that was never my intention for the blog anyway.  I enjoy sharing information and having an outlet for my passion in decorating and it has been a bonus to realize the sense of community with other bloggers. I really enjoy connecting with others that I don't even know that share my passion.

I am still learning a lot about the technical side of blogging, HTML, linky parties, buttons, etc. I have learned a lot of new vocabulary and still have a lot to learn but I hope you'll stick with me this next year because I still have more to share with you.

I wanted to show a recap of the last three months in case you missed something that you might be interested in. I don't always share all of my blog posts on facebook, (I know some of my friends follow me there.) so if you'd like to never miss a post again, you can subscribe by email or better yet, join through google friends on my sidebar. I love having new friends!!! Here are some of my favorites of the year and some of the more popular posts.

Some of my favorite DIY's:



The DIY table runner made out of drop cloth with painted stencils.





The chalkboard wall with molding.

 


DIY bulletin board with burlap, rope and brass tacks.

  


The decoupaged dresser with coastal maps and boat cleats.

My Favorite ideas:

Removing the door from a medicine cabinet to create a niche.

 




Adding hooks to a shutter for outdoor towel storage and drying.

 



Adding fabric to the back of an armoire to hide a hole and to add interest.



My Recipes:

Apple crisp

Rum Balls

My Projects:



Painted Trunks

Shutter headboard



Outdoor pillows with name and address.

Indoor hooks for backpacks and jackets

Photos up the staircase

Bookshelf bar



A Holiday Decorating Recap:

I only got around to a couple of rooms on my home tour this past year but I plan on revealing the rest in bits this coming year after a little tweaking. If you've been following me so far you know that no room in my house is ever completely done. I have also set some goals for myself in this upcoming year that you can check out in my previous post. I might be regretting it later but hopefully I can come up with some creative and cheap solutions to some common problem areas in the house.

I hope you have enjoyed the blog so far and that you continue to read and maybe even get inspired to do some projects in your own house. I would love to hear about them so please feel free to comment anytime. Happy New Year to you all !!!!

Shared with ~

Jenniferrizzo.com

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

As we approach a new year, it is customary to reflect on the past year and to set goals for the new year. This week I will post a recap of my favorite projects and posts for the year. (well, last three months anyway) but  today I am setting some decorating goals for myself in the new year. I am writing this down and telling all of you so I will be held accountable and forced to do it.

Everyone has them. Rooms that we avoid at all costs. I have spent the last few months showing all of you the pretty rooms and the mostly completed projects. Now I am focusing on the not -so -fun rooms that we all have.  Today you can see the real life...

Room 1 ~The Laundry Room...yes, I'm lucky to have one but it seems to be the catch-all room and is always a mess. I have plenty of cabinets but can't seem to keep anything in them. To make matters worse, you have to walk through it from our garage so that is the first room that everyone sees when they come in to the house. It is embarrassing because guests want to park in the driveway because of all of the steps up to the front entry so everyone sees the constant mess.

The two ugliest things in the room would be the fluorescent light fixture and the washer and dryer. We'll see what I come up with for that...

I seem to have a lot of storage but it's never enough. I'll have to be creative and I'll have to figure out what HAS TO stay in there and what can be moved somewhere else.
Goals for the laundry room:
1. Paint the dirty walls!
2. Hardware for the cabinets
3. Address the ugly light fixture
4. Hide or minimize the washer and dryer
5. Organize storage to keep things off of counters and floor
6. find cute laundry baskets

Room 2 ~ The Pantry ~ another organizing nightmare. Do you see a trend here?

I have found that guests see my pantry a lot. I'm always going in there for something or they are looking for the trash so why not make it as pretty as the kitchen?


Goals for the pantry
1. Containers for keeping "like" things together
2. better looking trash cans (mark one for recycle)
3. use the door for storage too in some way
4. maybe hang baskets from ceiling?
5. paint/ wallpaper or both
6. address ugly light fixture....again

Why don't builders take shelves all the way up to the ceiling and insist on using the ugliest light fixtures? Oh, the poor bugs that have lost their lives in this thing. Ewww.

Last but not least ~ Room 3~ The Workout/ Dog room

This is the room where the door stays shut when people come over. It is practical but also a hot mess.

The good side of the room.

The bad side of the room. My lab likes to eat molding. YAY me.

The ugly side of the room. Yes, that is the stuffing pulled out of the cushion... again.

Goals for the room....GIVE UP! No, I'm just kidding.
1. new molding
2. rug
3. some way to camouflage dog beds
4. something on walls
5. rearrange?
6. new cushion for Spencer...again

So, that's it. This is like weight watchers for decorating. I need your help to hold me to my goals. What's funny is that I've had friends call me a stepford wife before because of my neatness. Now the truth is out. I know I can't be the only one with these problems. If you'd like to share similar situations in your house, please feel free to comment. Hopefully, I can come up with some creative and cheap solutions to all of these issues. I'll keep you posted!