My new house mantra is one room at a time. It's a lot like my personal goals (one goal a month) and it's helping me tackle one thing at a time without the pressure to do it all.
It applies to both picking up the house on a daily basis as well as getting all the rooms feeling close enough to being done decorated wise. It all started the other day when I decided I wanted to tidy up our bedroom during nap time. The goal was to pick up and put away everything before leaving the room for the morning. This meant making the bed, putting away clothes, and gathering things that needed to be taken downstairs. The end result? A beautiful and tidy bedroom!
It ended up being a small gift to myself all day as every time I went back into our bedroom I was greeted by a clean and put together room. I decided from now on instead of trying to tidy up every room only half way, I was better off cleaning an entire room completely. I find once a room is picked up it tends to stay that way at least for a couple days because I have set the standard that this room is tidied up.
So once our bedroom was finally clean for once, I was able to have new eyes to see what was left for me to decorate. Having the blank canvas of a picked up room allowed my creative juices to start turning which resulted in our master bedroom being about 99% complete! And it feels great to know I have one room in our new home pretty much completely finished. Progress people!
The only thing that is left is I would like to find a fitted sheet to cover the box spring of our bed. I had a light tan and white striped sheet on the box spring of our old (now guest) bed that I would like to try to recreate the look. I just haven't found one that I like.
Our new bed is a dream. It's the perfect mix of traditional yet still modern and I am absolutely in love with it. We decided that since our master bedroom was so large and that we needed guest beds for family that visits that it was time to finally purchase our very first grown up bed! No more hand me downs (or futons!). Seven and a half years of marriage and we finally bought a bed!
The bed is from Overstock and we got a pretty good deal on it on Black Friday. The mattress is Saatva which we are really happy with and was recommended to us by a family member. Buying a bed and mattress can be really overwhelming especially when buying online. But I can say that we are completely satisfied with what we found.
We switched out the existing chandelier with the white one we had in our old bedroom. The linens are all the same except for these two large square pillows I recently found at Marshall's.
We decided to also shop around for new bedside tables as our old ones were pretty small (and are now being used with our old bed in the guest bedroom). Bedside tables are crazy expensive. I was shocked. And being out in the country with a little one I don't have the same time or energy to hunt at thrift stores. After looking around we decided to go with these simple side tables from Ikea. I liked the simple and sleek design that I felt worked well with the modern lines of the bed. And at under $10 you just can't beat that! We ended up buying two more for our other guest room in the basement.
The lamps are also new and from Target. I like the addition of a little black and an industrial feel.
On each bedside table I added a small basket with holes for handles to corral our things. The open handle allows us to run chords through the basket without seeing them on the table. This is a great trick for hiding cables (we did this in our old entryway with a flower pot!). I am also currently reading the book Girl Meets Change and loving it.
The botanical prints are a repeat of what were in these frames from the past. This time I just reprinted them so that they actually completely fit the mat! Sometimes it takes moving across the country to finally fix those things you have been meaning to do for years! You can find the link to the free botanical prints in this post here - as well as how we styled a gallery wall around our TV.
In front of the bed I have a vintage trunk I recently picked up at a thrift store. On top is a basket from Target that I use to hold a few toys for our son. I am slowly finding pretty baskets to stow away a few toys in most rooms so that we always have things to play with.
The previous owners left up all of the curtain rods which has been nice for some of the large walls full of windows. I hung up my go to Ritva Ikea curtains that we use throughout the entire house.
It is interesting that now that we have more wall space I find myself hanging up less on the walls. I have yet to put together a large gallery wall in this house and I am thinking I may not. I am at a season where I am longing for simple and it is being portrayed in how I style this home. When given the chance to completely start fresh, I surprise even myself at how my style has changed.
We would eventually like to get a long short dresser to share (and use our old dressers in guest rooms) but I haven't quite settled on what I would like. As we purchase new things for this home I am hesitant to just buy things when we feel like we need them. I want to be intentional about picking out the right item since we are at a phase of life where we are now buying new instead of repurposing old.
I cannot just run out and hit five different stores in an afternoon to find what I want. Instead I am spending more time online (during nap time!) and having to be patient with searching for the right item at the right price. Eventually the decision happens pretty quickly once I have shopped around but this often will take at least a few weeks.
This reminds me of how I feel about parenting right now as well. Forcing things only makes me anxious. Usually when it is time to try something new, it comes when I am ready (or so over something) that the time just feels right. It is a gut feeling and I am applying it to how we furnish our home.
The room is spacious, airy, and welcoming. It is a mix of old and new. And I am really happy with it.
One room down and quite a few more to go! But with tackling one room at a time I will eventually get there!
