Pinterest Tried and True| Living Room Redesign with Dark Sofa

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July (221)

Upon returning from a glorious vacation in Washington state at my husband's family's farmhouse (pictured above), I declared that we had “too much stuff” and we “needed to move” because I was sick and tired of our rental house!

After running some numbers to see what this type of overhaul would cost, I came back down to reality and realized that, perhaps if I just took some time and consideration to actually make THIS home feel more homey, that would cost much less than moving and throwing away all our earthly possessions.

Two trips to Goodwill and several trips to Target and Home Depot later, I have an updated look in our main living area. The new look that makes us all feel as though we live in a new home!

My main problems were:

1. I live in a rental home. At first, I didn't want to paint anything, but I came around to the fact that we will be here a while and it will be worth the time or expense to paint over if our landlord doesn't like it. (Yeah, I didn't “ask”.) We've lived here two years and just decided to re-up for another year!

2. I have a TON of dark furniture and dark picture frames that were oh-so popular 10 years ago (and of course, now the trend is light and airy and lots of white)

3. I don't know how to really decorate a home. I missed this lesson somewhere along the line. While I'm artistic in many regards, my open-minded approach tends to leave a room half-complete and feeling unfinished. So, I'm thankful that Scottsdale Designer Christina Peace was available to give me some tips and help me pull my Pinterest board together!

Our photo wall was the first project since it was the easiest one to change. A little paint on the wall, a little paint on the picture frames and voila! A new look!

IMG_6202

BEFORE: The black frames and white wall were pretty outdated.

AFTER: The wall is a turquoise color I selected from Home Depot. For the picture frames, I used simple white spray paint.

wall art

Here's the wall art that I created in PhotoShop and had printed at Costco for $8.99!

JIMELLIOT copyweb

My real motivation for getting things updated was Reagan's birthday party. Not that my friends cared, but it was fun to have a deadline to work toward. The white seats on my dining room chairs were gross and stained. I had zero curtains up.

kitchenbefore

BEFORE: The white seats on my dining room table were less than ideal for 3 kids! The white walls and no curtains made me remember daily that we don't own this home!

AFTER: I love the Navy wall with the classic mirror! The gathered curtains are from West Elm. The center piece on the table is from Target. The orange lattice fabric on the dining room chairs is actually outdoor fabric from Joann's.

Kitchen

BEFORE: I was still working with some red pillows I bought from Target, oh, 7 years ago. The best thing we did was to place the larger sofa on the long wall under the window and moved the love seat onto the shorter wall. This helped a ton to balance the room.

before

AFTER: I found a color pallet on Pinterest that I liked. Neutral base with Yellow, Orange, Turquoise and Navy accents.

livingroom

Instead of feeling like we need to move, I'm ready to live here until this crazy Phoenix market turns around!

 

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