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My House
Antiques

Arranging linens, silver and ironstone…

As I was preparing for Christmas day, I realized what a mess the cabinets, drawers and shelves where I keep my tableware, serving pieces and linens were.  After a few years of buying, making and using things for photo shoots and then shoving them in no particular order behind a closed door, it was hard to find anything.  Linens were balled up, unorganized.  Serving pieces were stacked, balanced and piled haphazardly.  It not only looks messy, but it’s very inefficient.  I had to hunt and dig for things. I started purging and organizing this fall and have continued with a drawer here, a cabinet there.  After experiencing the frustration while setting the table for Christmas, I was motivated to deal with it.  I also needed to clean out the hutch in the living room, since a buyer is coming for it on Sunday.  So, I started with the corner cabinets

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December 28, 2013 56 Comments
Miscellaneus

home projects completed in 2013

It’s been quite a year for changes in our home!  I left my space as a vendor at Lucketts in January and that freed me up to work on my home more.  We had been putting off a lot of projects because I was so busy with my retail space, so now I actually had time to work on things for me!  I also ended up with a lot of home-related freelance projects for the kitchen and master suite, so those helped push me along. It’s awesome when your business and DIY to-do lists are one and the same! As I was putting this post together, I can hardly believe how much we accomplished.  Here are the main projects we worked on… We kicked off the new year by installing new engineered hardwood floors in our family room and master bedroom. We repaved our driveway, which isn’t very fun or

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December 24, 2013 No Comments
Before and Afters

French Daybed Reveal

I apologize for missing FFF last night!  My site was down, which you might have noticed if you were trying to link up.  So, we’ll suspend our furniture link party until after the holidays.  Just save up those furniture projects for a couple of weeks. A few months ago, I bought a caned French daybed from a used furniture shop. I think I paid $175 for it and it was in amazing condition with a full down cushion!  The upholstery wasn’t bad at all, but it was a yellowish-gold with a metallic shimmer to it, which isn’t really my thing.  The cane was all intact and the finish was nice, so I knew I wanted to leave those alone.  I did, however, want to reupholster it. I presented a few fabric options and was planning on going with the plain hemp fabric, but then did a “room reset” and changed

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December 20, 2013 143 Comments
Family Room

“the sofa” update & explaining my shop

Well, my new sofa was supposed to be delivered tomorrow.  I received a call from Pottery Barn today to get my “delivery time window.”  I answered the phone with bubbly anticipation.  Will it come early?  Will I have to wait all day?  Instead of getting a time frame, I received the disappointing news that they had overbooked the route for tomorrow, so they couldn’t deliver it.  Bummer.  Okay, well, when can it be delivered?  It seems they only deliver to my area on Wednesdays.  It quickly hit me that next Wednesday is Christmas and the following Wednesday is New Years.  I’m not going to get my new sofa for at least three weeks.  It’s not a big deal, but I gave away our sofa yesterday and we’re hosting Christmas this year.  I took a moment to remind myself that it’s a small thing.  Some people have to go through the

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December 18, 2013 29 Comments
Family Room

speaking of…

I went to get my hair cut and colored today, which is always a treat, but it does take a lot of time.  When I got home, I was ready to make the most of the two hours I had before I needed to pick the boys up from school.  I walked into the family room and saw my new rug from Pottery Barn had arrived.  It’s the Heathered Chenille Jute Rug.  It was in our room at the inn we stayed at in Charlottesville and it was just what I was looking for.  Fortunately, it had a tag on the bottom, the rug was still available AND it was on sale!  It’s natural jute, so it’s neutral and provides great texture, but it’s also soft, so we can play on it and exercise on it, which is important.  I bought my other jute rugs off Joss & Main, since

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December 14, 2013 54 Comments
Family Room

how I saved for “the sofa”

It all started with a contest.  I was asked by Pottery Barn to be a part of a design challenge against some of my peer bloggers.  We received $100 Visa card to participate and the winner received a $500 gift card to Pottery Barn.  It seemed like fun, so I decided to participate.  In the back of my mind I was thinking – if I win this thing, that gift card is going towards a new sofa. Well, thanks to your votes, I won! So, the $100 Visa card and $500 gift card started my sofa fund.  I also sold my pine dining room table, so that gave me another $600.  $1200 was a great start, but the sofa cost $3200 total (including taxes, shipping and a surcharge.)  I still had a long way to go and I agreed that I wouldn’t pull from our regular household income to pay

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December 14, 2013 234 Comments
Decorating

Painting Trim, Sewing Pillows & More

 Between a sick boy and snow days, we’ve basically had a four day weekend, which is fun (aside from the sick kid), but it ‘s tough when I work from home and have things I need to do.  We snuggled, though, and went to see Frozen and built a snowman.  Today they were back in school and I was back to work.  My husband installed new trim in the family room yesterday, so I primed and painted it today… It’s just simple pine boards, but it ties into the 1940’s part of the house and looks a little beefier.  I like beefy molding.  Just putting that out there. We still need to add some shoe molding and 3/4 height wainscoting to finish things off.  This room is pretty big with a cathedral ceiling, so it would greatly benefit from some architectural detail.  I would love to add some wood beams

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December 12, 2013 30 Comments

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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