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All Things Home

All Things Home

decorating dilemma | joy’s family room

I got a text a few nights ago. “Hey there! OK, decorating question…we have a big two-story family room with plenty of natural light. Everything is brown now and I want to lighten it up with some greige paint. But I have oak trim that my husband won’t let me paint. Do you have a favorite greige color that would go with oak? Trying to think who in my life knows paint… Oh, right….I know a professional paint enthusiast!!!” This led to a lengthy virtual makeover through texts, pins and links.  I mean, how can I just pick a wall color and leave it at that?! This ended up being a perfect space for me to share as a decorating dilemma post. Here is the color palette and some ideas I put together for Joy’s space… Here is the family room as it is now… I love that there are

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All Things Home

updated tips for shopping craigslist

If you’ve read my blog for any amount of time, you’ve probably caught on that craigslist is one of my favorite places to shop for furniture.  I’m often asked about it, so I thought I would share some updated tips along with my craigslist strategy and how I sort through the trash and treasures. First of all, I know I’m in a “good area” for finding furniture and antiques.  I live in south central PA and it’s not a very transient area.  Families live here for generations.  They don’t move, they add on.  We’ve lived in our town for almost ten years and I still feel like we’re relatively new. This is also a rural area and an old one, which means lots of old houses and barns.  All of those things combined means that there are attics, basements, spare rooms, and outbuildings filled with old things that eventually end up in

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All Things Home

cleaning cart turned garden cart

Remember the cleaning cart turned kitchen cart?  I found a pair of industrial cleaning carts on craigslist for a great price, so I decided to purchase both and turn one into a kitchen cart and give the other one a makeover to use as a garden cart. In case you missed the details of the kitchen cart transformation, you can find them HERE. Well, this is just another take on how these multi-functional furniture pieces can be used.   (I have two of them.)  Many of you gave great suggestions…a craft cart, laundry cart, toy storage, etc.  There are lots of possibilities. In this post, I’m showing it as a garden cart… I’m imagining it on a covered porch or in a potting shed. On one side of the garden cart, I put a pair of rain boots, broom & dustpan, and a wire basket.  It would also be a

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All Things Home

all the pretty things

There have been so many things coming into the studio lately that it’s been impossible for me to photograph each one, so I thought I would go around the “Lucketts staging area” and snap a few pictures. I found this old lineberry cart on Craigslist, of all places!  We just cleaned it up and applied a coat of Hemp Oil to bring out the richness of the wood. You can also see some of the beautiful baskets I’ve been collecting here and there. A reader sold me her collection of vintage bakeware… …and I finally found an old chicken feeder to use for displaying random plates and lids. I also acquired an awesome blue scale… …a rolling wire rack, chippy painted basket, a little wooden stool… …lots of glass cloches in varying sizes… …this cool antique fan… …wooden spindles, buckets, rolling carts and stoneware bowls… …rolling pins, mashers, wooden spoons,

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All Things Home

the green double wash basin

I know my fellow antique hunters will understand when I say “you know it when you find it.” I’ve been hunting for a double wash basin for about a year and, while I have found several of them, I never found one that was just right. Just the right price, just the right color, right shape, right everything. Well, I spotted this one and I felt that rush that happens when “you know it.” It’s just the prettiest shade of green and I love the detail on the front of the basins, the angle of the legs, the little casters… I even like the little spigots! …and, of course, the zinc basins. I decided to roll the wash basin across our parking lot to have a little photo shoot in front of the old mill that is basically condemned, but makes an awesome backdrop for me!   All of the accessories on

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All Things Home

decorating dilemma update | sarah’s fireside room

Do you remember Sarah’s fireplace room?  We talked about it originally back in August and then I gave you an update on her progress in December.  Last week, she checked in with me again to share their progress. Like most real, non-TV makeovers, Sarah is working on the makeover project-by-project, slowly over time, as life and budget allows.  In her e-mail to me, she shared this, “…sometimes I feel like everyone else is flying past us. We do everything ourselves and usually get our materials second hand. I read a couple of weeks ago that it took you seven years to get your kitchen the way it is and I got teary eyed. I understand that endurance.” It does sometime get tiring when a makeover is a marathon and you wish you could just beam yourself to the finished room…sit in it and have your tea and enjoy the glorious done-ness of

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All Things Home

back at the house & JAK Camera Strap Giveaway

There has been a lot of activity at the studio and things have been pretty quiet at my house.  I did rearrange the family room a few weeks ago, but otherwise, my house is just my house, which is a big change from how it was a couple of years ago. If I was at this stage of getting ready for Lucketts, I would have things piled up in my dining room, pieces in every corner of my basement and I would be hauling furniture up to my family room for quick photo shoots before I rearranged the furniture back in place by the end of the day. I realize I’m enjoying my house much more as just a home, not a place of business AND a home. Anyway, after living with the new arrangement for a couple of weeks, I am totally sold on it.  I still have a lot

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All Things Home

the zinc-topped table goes home…

I’m starting to wonder what I posted about before I had all of these furniture makeovers… Today, we’ll take a break from the before & afters and I’ll tell a little story about a table with rickety, uneven legs. He had one thing that made him really special, though – something that kept him from being a run-of-the-mill old table.  He wore a zinc top that had a perfect patina. The problem was not one of his legs was the same size as another, so he sat at a wonky angle and, even though I tried to sell this table, no one wanted him. So, I took him back to the studio and gave him a little TLC.  I sealed the chipping, flaking paint with Tough Coat… …evened out the legs and added little casters to the bottom… You can read the full makeover post HERE.   He looked so much

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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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