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Decorating

Workshop Series – Somewhat Simple Organization Tips

Welcome to the workshop series brought to you by Mustard Seed Creations and Funky Junky Interiors!  A quick reminder: the voting for the  So You Think You Can Decorate competition (Donna and I are both competitors) is open through Friday, so make sure you vote for your two favorite “fabric” entries this week. We’ll continue our furniture refinishing and painting journey together next week, because this week I have a special guest who is going to share some great tips about organization.  After all, what good is a beautiful piece of furniture that you painted yourself if it’s buried under clutter?  Donna is covering lighting this week in her series on photography, so make sure you visit her blog after you read this post. When I “met” Stephanie from Somewhat Simple, I knew we were two peas in a pod.  We share the same love of running an organized household.  I used to clean our

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Decorating

Sheet Music Dresser Tutorial

I purchased this antique dresser at an auction for $6.00 last fall. It was a beautiful bird’s eye maple, so it pained me to have to paint it, but the veneer was chipped and bubbled and beyond my ability to repair. So, I had to come up with a way to cover it. Some free antique sheet music from my grandparent’s attic was the perfect solution.  This project was so fun!  Not only did I relish giving the dresser a new life, but I loved finding interesting and unexpected items from around my house for the “photo shoot.”  A naked lamp shade becomes a cloche for books, ironstone, and coral in addition to a display for old photos.  An antique frame painted white becomes a perfect place to feature an antique christening gown and a family letter from the 1880’s held in place by a starfish. One of the keys to decorating with

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Workshop Series – Decorating With Whites

Welcome to the workshop series brought to you by Mustard Seed Creations and Funky Junky Interiors!  A quick reminder: the voting for the  So You Think You Can Decorate competition is open through Friday, so make sure you vote for your two favorites.  I have an amazing guest poster to introduce today.  She braved all kinds of technical issues to be here tonight, so give her lots of love.    She has a gorgeous style that is all the rage in the blog world and has over 800 followers after only 2 months of blogging, so she’s doing something right.  I’m so excited that she is going to share some of her secrets us.  So, without further delay, here’s the lovely Maria from Dreamy Whites.  My name is Maria from Dreamy Whites. I just started a blog about 2 months ago! I feel very blessed to be apart of your amazing world. I am a

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More Christmas Sales

I can’t believe I forgot to show you one of my best Christmas presents!  A few years ago the diamond fell out of my engagement ring.  We looked everywhere, but never found it.  It was only a quarter of a karat, but its worth was greater to me than any monetary value put on it.  We could not afford to replace it at the time, so I’ve just been wearing 2 wedding bands.  I’ve been looking longingly at rings since I lost my rock, but we’ve never found one that I liked that we could afford.  A couple of weeks ago, we found this beauty on sale.  Hello, bling!  Come to my finger.  I also hit Target yesterday and found some great Christmas decor that was now 75% off.  I loved these glittered leaves and bought every one that was left in the store (about 15.) I ended up paying

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More Bedding, After Christmas Sales and Goodwill Goodies

I have a lot of stuff to pack into this post, so hang on tight and stick with me.  First of all, I wanted to share the quilt I purchased with one of my Wal-Mart gift cards to use in my Master Bedroom Makeover.  I just bought the brown version of this light-weight quilt to go under the white duvet cover I purchased from Kohls yesterday. I bought a test pot of the Sea Salt to try a few swatches of color.  I am still debating.  Thanks for all of the suggestions and advice.  It helped alot and didn’t help at all at the same time, if that’s possible!  I’m still going back and forth, weighing my options. I hit some really great sales on the day after Christmas.  I dragged my mother-in-law out at 7:00 am to fight the crowds for the best stuff.  We were about the only

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Miss Mustardseed’s Christmas Haul

I hope everyone had an awesome Christmas! Mine was great! Although, I will say, it’s not as fun as experiencing Christmas as a kid, but it was fun to get to see my toddlers respond to all of the festivities. My family got me some great gifts, so I thought I would share some of my favorites with you. $150.00 in Hobby Lobby gift cards. Oh yeah….and I just spent $148 of it today. What could I do? It was burning a hole in my pocket. And I am so excited to show you all of the great stuff I bought on my day-after-Christmas shopping excursion. Some decorating books…I’ve been pouring over these the past 24 hours. Great inspiration in these books. As I’ve mentioned, I am a decorating book junkie, so these gave me my fix. Just the cover of this book makes me drool. My mom gave me

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A New Arrangement and an Early Christmas Gift

First of all, a Merry Christmas Eve to all of you! This year is the first that I am more excited about seeing Christmas through my kid’s eyes and and less concerned about what tags have my name on them. My oldest son is almost three and he is all about Christmas. Tomorrow is going to be full of noisy toys, batteries, 30 minutes of trying to get each toy free from the packaging, and lots of “that my fresent!” coming from my eldest, but I am looking forward to all of it! Anyway, I thought I would share a few small things with you. When my mom was here we worked at rearranging some pictures and accessories and this is one of my favorite updates. My living room was on the right track, but a little lacking in the details. My mom grabbed some of my red plates….”Ah, mom,

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A Little Christmas

I’m realizing that Christmas is creeping up and I had better get the last pictures of my Christmas decor and projects posted before they will have to wait until next year. The woman who owns the shop that sells my stuff gave me these ornaments. They were for sale in her shop and I loved them so much, she let me have them for free. This has got to be my very favorite ornament. We bought it when we lived in Germany and it was always the one I would hunt for when we were decorating our tree. I purchased this sweater tree skirt on a 75% off after Christmas sale for $10. I love the puffy white balls on it (and so do my cats, unfortunately.) And here’s my last Christmas project for you. I used to have a Dresden angel from Germany as my tree topper and somehow

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I’m Marian, a painter, writer, and lover of all things creative. From art and antiques to home projects and everyday life, I share my journey in hopes of inspiring you to embrace your own creativity and make beauty in the spaces you live.

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