How To: Hide those annoying cords!!

Ok so who has else an issue with cords showing all around your house? Isn't it just the MOST annoying thing ever?? You work SO hard to make your house as perfect as you can, but then you have the unavoidable problem of cords... Whether it's your TV cords, speaker cords, or just a whole bunch of random electronics being pluged into one area... it's just flat out annoying. 

For years I have always used a little trick to make those annoying cords "invisible", and today I am going to share it with y'all! In the past, I used to try and place some sort of furniture or decoration in front of the bundle of cords. Well, that never worked very well because it always ended up looking awkward, out of place, and/or cluttered. Thats when I started using my little {basket trick}. It's SO easy, SO cheap and much less cluttered!

Check out my {How-To}!



Step by Step:

1. First, try to grasp the size of your "cord bundle". Mine was rather large because we were dealing with a VERY dated, VERY large set of speakers. Yes... I think they are seriously from the late 80's... Ok maybe not, but they sure aren't from this decade! Hey - they still work, so thats all that matters! They really bring a whole new meaning to "vintage", huh??

2. Anyhoo! The next step is to go shopping! I went to Ross (OF COURSE) to find my basket. I mean, lets be honest... There really isn't any better place to shop for wicker baskets. I found this one for ONLY $13!!! And it's massive. Great find:) I had to make sure to find one with no handles since I was eventually going to flip it upside down.

3. ** This next step is only if your dealing with cords for speakers or anything that you might need to have easy access to any sort of extention. In my case, we need this cord to plug into our iPhone to hook up to the speakers. So I didn't want it to be hidden underneath the basket.

When you get home with your new basket, flip it upside down and feed the needed cord through your desired area of the basket. Since the basket is wicker (or seagrass maybe?), there are tons are openings to feed your cord through. I chose a back corner so I could just leave the cord hanging out the back. It still remains hidden, but it's also really easy to get to anytime we want to play some tunes!

4. Keep the basket upside down and tuck everything in underneath. Make sure it's all hidden so your basket sits flush against the floor. I chose to top it off with some vintage luggage pieces to give the corner some height. And there ya have it! You're all done:)

This whole project literally cost ONLY $13 and it makes SUCH a difference! It's truely amazing how much better it looks with no more cords:) You can also use this trick other areas in the house as well. Another way you can use the {basket trick} is to NOT flip the basket over and simply place the cords into the basket. Drape a throw over the basket and it hides the cords! 

Hope y'all enjoyed my little tutorial! Have a wonderful long weekend everyone:)

Formal Living/Dining - Phase 2!

Over the past few weeks I have been transforming our "formal" living and dining room. It's one long space and there isn't really much division between the 2 spaces. For the longest time, it was basically the "leftover" room of all the furniture I didn't use in the rest of the house. It ended up working pretty well for the last year we have been in the house, but it was about time for some change! Today I will be posting about { phase 2 } of 3 phases of this room makeover.

When I posted about my recent settee makeover, I also photographed what I thought was the "final" formal living room. Well, something in me knew that it still wasn't a finished space. It just didn't WOW me and I was still unhappy with a few key elements of the room. Although the room has changed since I took these photos, I want you to see the phases I work through when I design a space. It doesn't always end up the way you think it will, and that's perfectly okay! I am still in the third phase of the room, so that post will be coming soon;) 

First, I want to start with my inspiration board that I made for the space. Basically... If I was SUPER rich, this is what my formal living space would consist of. I like to call it { French Farmhouse Industrial! }

BUT I'm not super rich, so this is what my space REALLY looks like...

Phase 1:

The above is what our space has basically looked like over the past year or so. I really didn't mind it at all, but I always knew I would eventually change things up.

Like I said, a lot of this is "hand me down" furniture that I have either re-finished, or re-painted. I love most of it, but the designer in me does wish it wasn't so mix-matchy. The size of the different furniture pieces aren't meant to all be in the same room... 

And by that, I'm talking about the ENORMOUS buffet against the main wall. It's massive. Ginormous. Fabulously HUGE. It's an 1800's antique that I refinished and I just love it. BUT it's too large for this area and dwarfs any surrounding furniture that I try to place near it.  When we moved in, we didn't know where to place it, and it just ended up in that spot. It has always bothered me in that location, but it was just too heavy for the hubby and I to move on our own... or so we thought!! Stay tuned because { phase 3 } will give a whole new life to this fabulously large buffet. But until then, below is what the room has looked like over the past few weeks. Phase 2!!

Phase 2:

So there ya have it - the second phase of our formal living/dining room.  I am so excited to show y'all the finished product once it's all done! Hope y'all enjoyed!

Oh and I just have to share some updated pictures of my little Bailey girl;) Isn't she just the cutest little kitty?? I just love her:):):)

Happy Monday!!

Guest Bathroom Reveal

A few weeks ago I talked about our guest bathroom updates, and today I am finally here to post about it! I've had the walls re-painted for a while now, but I really hadn't completed the accessories until today. Today we had a new Home Goods store open literally 3 minutes from our house, so of course I had to stop in for the Grand Opening!!! It was pretty terrifying actually and I would never go to a Grand Opening again. I think my heart rate increased to an unhealthy rate due to the overwhelmingly large crowd, but needless to say I did survive. I left the store with a few goodies and finally found the perfect accessories to finish off the guest bath. Yippee!

FIY - the navy paint color on the walls is called "Night View" by Valspar. Really a great color! I totally plan on using it in other areas of my home. I actually also recently used in on my back porch makeover!

{ Before }

Sorry about the {before} picture! I was so excited about my new paint color and totally forgot to take a real {before} photo. But to give you a general idea, the walls were grey (which I loved) but my shower curtain, rug and other accessories didn't really match the grey. The room needed a "pop" of something, so I chose a much bolder color on the wall. I think it made a HUGE difference! What do you think??

{ After }

Much more exciting, right!?? 

Hope y'all enjoyed!

{Antique} Settee Makeover

Hey guys - Well today I'm back with another ::Before & After:: post for y'all! This is really one of my favorites, so I sure hope you enjoy:)

A few months ago I found a beautiful settee at a local antique store and just had to have it! For a while now, I had been looking for a small settee for the end of our bed in our master bedroom. I knew this would work perfectly and at only $100, it was too hard to pass up. The cushion needed to be replaced {or removed} and I also had some plans to paint the piece as well. Here it is sitting in the antique store before I bought it.

I ended up not using the settee in our master bedroom like I had originally planned. It sat in there for a while, but I eventually found a new home for it. I have recently been working on making over our formal living room {this post will be coming soon} and needed more furniture for the space. As much as I loved the settee in our bedroom, I knew it would fit better in the formal living area. Below is the process of what I went through when making over the settee.

Here are a few of my ::inspirations:: for the piece:

{via}

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Here is my ::before & after:: for the piece:

 { Before }

 

 { Process }

 { After }

So what do you think?? I am still considering adding a new cushion, but that will come in time. I have brainstormed a few ideas on how I could do it myself, but we shall see... I'm also very excited to show y'all our formal living room makeover as well! More of that to come:) Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.

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Look What I Found - My Art!

Happy Friday all! Today I will be posting about something a bit different than I normally do - MY ART!! The other day I was looking through some of my old iphoto albums that I haven't even thought about in YEARS! In those pictures I found a TON of all of my old art from college and even a few from after graduation. But before I post about that... I also found some pictures of the hubby and I from our honeymoon!!! Aww, takes me back:)

** Ok side note!! So my hubs is going out of town for the weekend and I'm kind of sad about it and I'm totally going to miss him.... So yes, I'm posting some old pics of us. Lame, I know;)

Wow this is the last vacation we took together, and that was

over TWO years ago! Aw, isn't he just adorable??

 Look at me being "artsy" ;) Or attempting to at least haha

Ok now that I've got that out of my system, back to my REAL post!

While looking through my old photos, it really took me back. Back to a time where I was a lot less stressed and had a lot more time to do things I enjoyed. One of those things was painting. I used to paint all the time! Here I am, claiming to be an artist, and I just now realized I haven't painted in years... So sad, right!!?? While taking my stroll through memory lane, I found a bunch of my old art and thought I would share it with y'all. Lets call it "proof" that I actually am an artist;)

This is me back in college painting for my Oil Painting class at Baylor

And here it is all finished!

 And here it is all framed up and hanging in our guest bedroom!

Here is another oil painting of mine. It's actually called a triptych since there are three different canvases which are meant to hang together. These are hanging in my parents house currently. For this piece, I did an entire study on the form of sculpture. I took TONS of photography of different sculptures and chose these three for the final product.

Here is a sketch I drew for a part of the study:

Below is my favorite piece that I have ever done. It was my first oil painting and also the first time I knew I could paint! After that, I was hooked. 

I actually painted this from a photo I took from when I studied abroad.

Here is the picture I painted from:

Here are a few pieces that I painted right after I graduated:

The below painting is one I did a whiiiilleee ago - I think maybe when I was a freshman in college? I collected a bunch of coffee holders from this little coffee place at Baylor and put them to good use! The coffee "steam" is actually made up of the coffee holders. My dad and I also made the frame as well!

 The sign below is something a bit more practical that I painted. This sign hangs on the Granbury Square (the sign on the bottom) for an old client of mine. The square has certain restrictions when it comes to hanging signage, so my client was wanting a hand painted sign to really match the historic feel of Granbury.

I also found some awesome pictures of some of the past homes Graham and I have lived in since we got married. Man - I realized my style has changed a TON! Too funny! That post will be coming soon! Hope everyone has a happy Friday!