Cora's Nursery Inspiration

We are this close to being finished with Cora's nursery, but I thought I would share some of the ideas that inspired me along the way! 

The feel of the room: I wanted a bright, airy nursery with lots of white and pops of bright colors. 

I found all of these nurseries to be so pretty and cheerful.

1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6

Pops of color in storage & decor: I had my heart set on those sheets, and I knew I wanted baskets in the room for storage. I was also thinking about having a dreamcatcher instead of a mobile.

1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 7 // 8 // 9

Art for the gallery wall: This tends to be the hardest thing for me... I am so picky! I loved the look of the type on these prints, and I also liked the idea of bringing in some fruit prints to the gallery wall.

1 // 2 // 3 // 4

So there you have it - the overall look and feel I was going for, along with some of the specific pieces I had my eye on! Once Cora's room is all the way finished, I will be sharing photos here!

Our wall-to-wall bookshelves

I was reminded after posting this on instagram that I've never shared our bookshelves here on the blog! This is one of my favorite spots in our entire house! Caleb designed and built these wall-to-wall bookshelves for our front living room. He built them to fit perfectly against the wall that you see when you enter the room, and I love the impact that they make! They're screwed to the wall so they're perfectly safe, but he also made it so that we can remove them and take them with us, if we ever end up moving.

We only have about three of the sections filled up so far, but I like that we have plenty of room to grow our collection. We are a family that loves books, so we need a lot of space to store them all!

It makes me so happy to see our gorgeous shelves and all of our books every time I walk by this room! Caleb did such an excellent job with every detail, and they are exactly what I envisioned for this space!

5 Vases for Spring

1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5

We're about a month into spring and I still can't get over all of the pretty blooms. Just in the past week all of the rose bushes in our backyard have blossomed, and I'm reminded all over again why I'm a spring/summer girl. Between picking up fresh flowers on my weekly grocery runs and cutting any pretty blooms from our yard, I typically have a bouquet of flowers somewhere in my house. I love finding new vases to hold my flowers, and here are 5 I've found this week. Happy Friday!

P.S. More 5 Things posts here!

5 Products I'm Using Every Day

Popping in on this Wednesday with another 5 Products I'm Using Every Day post...

ban.do agenda // Back in the fall I wrote a post on my favorite agendas, and I just have to say that I am loving having a planner again! I keep it on the desk in my office, and I am using it each day for reminders, plans, upcoming appointments, etc. I also am using it to keep track of my yearly and monthly goals, which is a great place for it.

The Honest Company multi-surface cleaner // I am a fanatic about wiping off my countertops, and I am loving using this spray. I can rest easy knowing it's safe for Madeleine, and I also use it on her high chair tray. It smells good, which is a big factor to me in whether I will actually use a product or not.

babyganics face, hand, & baby wipes // Again, I love using a product that I know is safe for Madeleine. I use these wipes on her face and hands after she's finished eating. Side note: why do babies absolutely hate having their mouths wiped off??

Urban Decay Original Eye Shadow Primer Potion // This eye shadow primer is amazing. It keeps my eye shadow looking fresh all day, but the biggest difference I've been able to tell is that my eye liner doesn't fade away and look smeared. A little touch of this goes a long way in helping my makeup's staying power.

Sharpie Pens // I've been using these pens for years. They write smoothly, but I really love them because they don't bleed through pages. I am one to frequently underline in the books I'm reading, so I love that it's colorful but doesn't bleed through - even on the thin pages of my Bible!

Pretty Inspiration // Bold Walls

1 // 2 // 3 // 4

Here's some pretty inspiration for your Wednesday! I tend to lean toward neutrals and a very classic/traditional look when it comes to decorating my home, but lately I am loving these bold walls! I don't think I could wallpaper a main living space in my house, but maybe the powder room or a smaller space? I do love those painted stripes--would be fun for a kids' room, don't you think?

Apartment Therapy Complete + Happy Home

I mentioned last week that there are several house projects we'd like to tackle this year. As we work on rearranging furniture and decorating new rooms, I often look to Pinterest, magazines, and home decorating books for inspiration. I recently picked up Apartment Therapy's Complete + Happy Home book to see what it had to offer. 

The first section of this book was full of tips and home decorating "rules" which I found really helpful (the 80/20 rule: neutrals in 80% of the room and highly saturated shades in the other 20%), and it also had a short section focused on setting up each area/room of your home. There was also a small section in the back of the book on tips to maintain your home. A really helpful calendar was included, detailing what you should clean, prep, and decorate in the house each month.

The majority of the book showcased photos and descriptions of others' living spaces, which were all beautiful but most were not really my style. Though a fun book to browse through, I didn't really find any inspiration for the way that I want to decorate my own home. 

I'd say this is definitely worth looking through. There are some great tips included and so many beautiful homes!

I'm looking forward to reading The Nesting Place next, which I won during a fun giveaway that my sister held! I've heard really good things about this book and am hopeful I will get some good ideas.

Disclosure: I received this book from the Blogging for Books program in exchange for this review. The review and opinions are 100% my own. 

House projects for this year

There always seems to be another house project waiting to be finished, amiright? We've lived in our house almost 4 years, and we have done a ton of painting, decorating, replacing, etc., but it seems like the list is never-ending! I thought that if I documented several of the projects we want to tackle this year, it would help us to stay focused in accomplishing them.

Finish the bonus room // The bonus room has been quite the project. When we moved into this house we kind of dumped everything we didn't have a specific place for in the bonus room. A couple years ago we did a major purge, donating a bunch of stuff and transferring a lot of things to the attic. A little over a year ago, Caleb undertook a huge project to replace the supporting beam in the garage ceiling/bonus room floor. Now that structurally we're comfortable with the bonus room, we're ready to turn it into a playroom for Madeleine. This means replacing all of the insulation, tearing out the wood paneling, putting up drywall, replacing all of the trim, painting every single surface in the room, getting new carpet, and then decorating. Caleb has done a lot of this work, and we're hoping that the room will be finished in the next couple of months. It will be so nice to have another usable space in our home!

Refresh the master bedroom // We've been needing a new duvet cover for a while, but I just haven't seen anything that I've liked. I also have been getting tired of the colors in our room, so I would like to replace all of the bedding and curtains and do a total refresh in the room. The goal is to get a lighter, fresher feeling room without having to repaint. This is the project I'm probably the most excited about!

Find wall art for the living room // We need one more piece for this room - a large piece to go above the couch. Investing in a large piece is hard for me - it has to be just right if it's going to take up that much real estate on our walls. I have one idea, I just need to follow through with it. If that doesn't work we need to come up with something else. 

Figure out what's in the attic // Like I mentioned above, we've transferred most of our stored belongings to our attic. I also periodically ask Caleb to take random bins or boxes up there once I've sorted through some section of our house. Because of this, I don't really know what all is up there, and I have a feeling some of it could be consolidated or at least organized better. Part of the problem is I don't ever go up in the attic to look at everything myself, because I have a fear or going up pull-down attic steps. Specifically our attic steps, because they seem rather rickety to me. So I guess the second part of this goal is to fix our attic steps. 

Rearrange our family room // We're not happy with the way our main family room is set up, and we've been trying to come up with a solution that will maximize seating and also be practical for our lifestyle. This is going to take some time, so I'm hoping that as we think about it and try different things over the next months, we will come up with something that will work. Then we will need to purchase the additional furniture, etc. that we will need.

Tackle closets // Am I the only one that seems to do this every year? Right before Madeleine was born, I organized and purged through almost all of the closets in our house. Somehow these same closets look like they need to be tackled once again. I hate accumulating stuff, and the closets seem to be the first place said stuff lands. I guess what I need to do is a better job of maintaining the closets throughout the year instead of letting them get overrun and disorganized.

Do you have any projects or jobs you are wanting to work on in your house this year?

(image sources: 1 // 2 // 3)

Decorating the Nursery

This post is included in Wayfair's campaign #NurseryTale: sharing the story behind my favorite nursery pieces. Find more great nursery pieces at Wayfair.com

Several months ago I shared Madeleine's nursery reveal, but today I'm sharing a little bit more about the story behind some of the pieces in Madeleine's room and my tips on decorating a nursery.  The entire nursery was a labor of love, and it was such a joy to bring together my vision for the room as we anticipated the arrival of our precious daughter.

Choose a theme or a color scheme. There are a ton of nursery theme ideas on Pinterest you can browse through, or you can simply choose a color scheme you'd like to go with. I wanted Madeleine's nursery to be a space that was calming and feminine, and one that she could continue to enjoy and grow into, so I decided to choose a color scheme rather than a specific theme. I chose a soft pink for the walls, white furniture, and accents of gold and black. If you've chosen a rug, curtains, bedding, or something else that has the specific colors you'd like to incorporate, choose your paint color after you've picked out those items. It is much easier to find a paint color to match the room than later trying to find curtains that match already-painted walls!

Pick out the big pieces. It's easier to decorate and fill in the spaces around the furniture, so we worked on selecting the furniture for Madeleine's nursery first. We wanted a crib that was a little bit more modern, and we love the convertible crib that we selected. After much searching, we finally found the perfect glider at Wayfair. Caleb designed and built both the bookshelf and the dresser/changing table, and we hope that Madeleine will be able to use these pieces for years to come. Think beyond the initial baby stage and choose furniture that can be used for several years, whether it's a convertible crib, a dresser that can also function as a changing table, or tables and shelves that can be used throughout childhood.

Incorporate handmade items. We really wanted Madeleine's room to be filled with very intentional pieces, which resulted in a lot of handmade items decorating her room. In addition to the furniture that Caleb built, the basket of blankets on Madeleine's shelf is full of handmade blankets, made by one of Madeleine's aunts and one of her great-aunts, as well as several that I made. The hairbands that sit on top of Madeleine's bookshelf were all made by family and friends at one of my baby showers. The tassel garland was made by one of my friends and was used as a decoration at one of my other baby showers. I love looking at these pieces and remembering how our family and friends were so excited for us and showered us with so much love as we were expecting our first baby, and as Madeleine gets older it will be special to share with her how much love went into her room and the pieces in her room. Handmade items are what can set your nursery apart from others' nurseries, and it's also fun to think about the time, effort, and love that went into creating each item.

Make it personal. The wooden signs that hang in Madeleine's room are also very special to me. The signs above both the crib and the changing table are custom pieces made by a dear friend who runs Olive + Grey. Above the changing table are three signs that say baby in English, Chinese, and French. This has great significance to me as I lived in China for several years as a child and have spent many years studying and speaking Chinese. I also studied French for several years, and Caleb took me on a dream-come-true trip to Paris several years ago. My degree is in international politics and I love for traveling, so it's only natural for me to hope that Madeleine will love foreign languages and appreciate foreign cultures like I do.

Make it practical. Even though as an infant Madeleine can't really get into anything, I still wanted to set up her room in a way that would function well when she is mobile and getting into things. The shelves are open and low so that she will be able to reach for her toys and books, but the top shelf is reserved for items that she shouldn't be getting into (headbands, the lamp, etc.). We left a good amount of floor space in the room as well, so that as she gets bigger and enjoys playing, there will be plenty of room for her to spread out and play on the floor.

Let the room grow with the baby. I had planned on making Madeleine a mobile before she was born, but she was (thankfully!) born a little bit early, and I never got to make it. Now that Madeleine is in a stage where she loves playing and enjoys watching anything that moves, I finally got around to making a simple ribbon mobile for her to look at while she nurses. Now we just need to hang it up! It will be fun to continue to incorporate new items that Madeleine will enjoy as she hits new developmental milestones and continues to learn and enjoy new things in her environment.

What tips do you have for decorating a nursery? Decorating Madeleine's nursery was definitely one of my favorite projects I've ever done! Thanks for taking a peek into her room. All sourcing information is below!

sources: paint: Behr in "Hush Pink" | curtains: Land of Nod | crib: Target | crib bedding: Target | blanket: crocheted by me | wooden signs over crib: Olive + Grey | glider: Wayfair | pillow: Target | Love Never Fails print: Lindsay Letters | bookshelf: designed by me + built by Caleb, inspiration from Oeuf + CB2 | tassel garland: made by a friend as a baby shower decoration | lamp base: Target | lamp shade: Target | | gold flower bowl: Home Goods | hairband organizer: Home Goods | floral heart print: Rifle Paper Co | piggy bank: Target | black rugby stripe bins: Amazon | wooden rainbow stacker: Melissa & Doug | wooden birdie stacker: gifted | wooden alligator: Buy Buy Baby | wooden zebra: Pottery Barn Kids | dresser: designed + built by Caleb, inspiration from Pottery Barn Kids | white + black basket: gifted | changing pad cover: aden + anais | wooden signs over dresser: Olive + Grey 

DIY Painted File Cabinet

Last summer my big home project was redoing the craft room + office, which I wanted to be full of bright and fun colors. We still needed it to be a functioning office, which meant we still needed a file cabinet. I had in my mind that I wanted a yellow file cabinet, and I had my eye on this particular one (which I still love!). However, I couldn't justify spending $300 on a file cabinet, and Caleb definitely was not on board with that. Instead we decided to try to paint the black file cabinet we already had. It looked very similar to this one: 

To start, we removed the drawer pulls. Then I scuffed the entire file cabinet with Scotch Brite scouring pads, to roughen up the surface and help the spray paint to stick. This took quite a while, as there was a lot of surface area to cover. Once we felt like the cabinet had been roughened up enough, we wiped down all of the black dust the scouring had created. We made sure the file cabinet was super clean and dry before starting to paint. Caleb is the spray painter in our house (I always have so many drips!), so he then primed the file cabinet with spray paint primer. After a coat or two of that, he took to spray painting it with the yellow spray paint. It took several coats to cover up the black, but it was worth it! I'm so happy with the way it turned out, and for about $20 we now have a yellow file cabinet.

If you're looking for a colorful file cabinet, I would suggest trying to spray paint an old one first! It really was an easy DIY project, and you can find cheap file cabinets on Craigslist if you don't already have one. Let me know if you try it out!

(black file cabinet photo via)

How to get rid of fruit flies

Do you have a problem with fruit flies in your kitchen during the summer? Of course it is during the summertime that we have more produce sitting out: tomatoes ripening on the windowsill, cantaloupes or pineapples on the counter waiting to be cut, etc., but I cannot stand the pesky little fruit flies! 

Thankfully I've found a solution: fill a glass jar two-thirds of the way full with apple cider vinegar. Secure plastic wrap over the mouth of the jar, and poke several holes in the plastic wrap. Leave it sitting out on the counter, and watch how many fruit flies you will collect! The apple cider vinegar attracts them, but then they get stuck swimming in it. I could not believe how many fruit flies filled the jar in just a day. It is a definite summer lifesaver for me. Let me know if you try it out!

House Tour: Nursery

I'm so excited to share pictures of the nursery today! This was by far my favorite room to decorate in our house. Mostly because it meant getting ready for our little girl! Click through to see more pictures...

House Tour: Laundry Room

Today I'm excited to share another little piece of our house tour! Next up is our laundry room. Here's a little side-by-side before & after:

When we first looked at the house, I had issues with the laundry room. The biggest problem was that the door opened right into the washing machine, meaning you had to squeeze through the half-opened door, then shut the door behind you to finally be able to access the washer. I also didn't like the lack of cabinets and the one lone shelf around the entire room. I'm not a big yellow fan, but this shade especially was too dark, making a small room look even smaller and darker.

To fix the problem, Caleb took the laundry room door off the hinges and cut it in half to make double doors that opened into the kitchen. He cut the door right down the middle and hung new hinges. Since we didn't know what color of paint the door was, we took a kitchen drawer of the same color to Lowe's and they matched it exactly for us. Caleb painted the double doors and added new dummy door knobs to the front. He also put a little magnetic strip at the top of the door frame to keep the door closed tight.

Caleb removed the shelf that was in the laundry room to begin with. Then he painted the whole laundry room with a couple of coats of white paint. The walls and ceiling are the same white, since I just wanted a fresh, bright room. He built a cabinet with two interior shelves, and then built and mounted L-shaped shelves to go around the rest of the laundry room. There is a TON more storage now, which is exactly what I was hoping for.

All I had to do was get a little rug and find cute baskets to store all of my cleaning supplies. And actually when it came time to do that, I realized I had SO many extra cleaning products stored under my kitchen sink. I would just buy extra cleaning supplies thinking I needed them, since I couldn't really see what all I had shoved under there. This resulted in my finding 8 tubs of Lysol wipes - whoops! I'm glad that I now have a clear view of what I have on hand, so that I can replace only what we need.

I am so pleased with how our little laundry room turned out! Cutting the door and making it into double doors made the biggest difference! It was so much cheaper than buying new doors, and I love the way the double doors look. Like usual, Caleb did all of the hard work to make this laundry room a happier, more efficient space, and I'm so thankful for all his efforts!

sources: paint: Valspar Signature Paint + Primer in One in "White" | 

cabinet + shelves: designed + built by Caleb | 

rug: Target | wire baskets: Target 

How to Hang a Gallery Wall

One of my favorite parts of my newly completed craft room is the gallery wall. I had a lot of fun looking through shops on Etsy to find prints of things or words I loved. The part that I was not so looking forward to, though, was the actual hanging of the prints. With different sized prints and different orientations, I really wanted the frames scattered around in a somewhat random clump rather trying to arrange them perfectly (which would totally be my OCD tendency).

I debated several methods of arranging and hanging them, but I ended up using the steps below. I'm sure there are lots of gallery wall hanging tutorials out there, but what I ended up doing was truly foolproof. I made no extra holes in the wall, and I managed to arrange and hang all of the frames all by myself! Having never even used a hammer before hanging this gallery wall, I was pretty proud of myself:) Here's how to hang a gallery wall the easy way:

1. Using kraft or butcher paper, trace and cut out templates for each frame. 

2. Place the template on the backside of the frame and line up the edges.

3. Carefully lift up part of the template to find the hanger or wall mount.

4. Holding the place of the hanger/wall mount with your finger, use a nail to make a hole in the template where it would go as if hanging on the wall. 

5. Place frames on the floor or on a table in the arrangement you would like them on the wall.

6. Using the arrangement of the frames you previously made, tape the templates to the wall using painter's tape. Once you are pleased with the arrangement, hammer nails into the holes made in the templates in step #4.

6. Remove templates and hang the frames.

sources: frames: Michaels & Bed Bath & Beyond | Paris print: Laura Amiss | flamingo print: Wren's Roost | grass is greener print: Brim Papery | work hard print: Maiedae | donut print: Ann Shen | umbrella print & stamps print: Kate Spade

House Tour: Craft Room + Office

Today I'm excited to share photos of my newly completed craft room/office! Click through to see before & after pictures.

Finding My Green Thumb: Flowers that are easy to grow

Caleb and I will be the first to admit that gardening is not our strong suit. I can cook and Caleb is quite the handyman, but when it comes to growing plants and actually keeping them alive, we fall considerably short. Caleb's mom always has a beautiful garden filled with gorgeous flowers and great veggies, and Caleb's brother has a PhD in something to do with plants that is way too complicated for me to understand, but that green thumb did not get passed along to Caleb. In case any of you struggle with plant life like we do, I thought I would share a few flowers that we've found to be easy to take care of  this summer (read: they haven't died). 

1. Hydrangeas // I love hydrangeas. My aunt and uncle gifted up this plant when we first bought our house, and we haven't done anything to it except water it. We will probably prune it now that it has gotten a little bigger. I know there is something about the pH of the soil that determines whether the flowers are blue or pink, but ours are pink and I'm fine with keeping it like that. Read more about hydrangea care here.

2. Zinnias // We planted these zinnias around our mailbox from seeds - seeds, people! If we can put tiny seeds in the ground and have flowers spring forth, you can too. We planted a couple of varieties and just followed the instructions on the packets. Again, all we've done is water them and they've done great. I love these because they are great for cutting and putting around the house. More about zinnia care here.

3. Marigolds // Marigolds are known as one of the easiest annuals to grow, so it's no surprise we picked them! We picked up several trays at Lowe's and planted them in neat rows in one of our front beds. They've done great with just watering. Tips for caring for marigolds here.

4. Petunias // ok full disclosure here: I think these are petunias. That might give you a clue as to how plant illiterate I am. Petunias and impatiens look deceivingly similar, but impatiens don't thrive in lots of sun, so that leads me to believe that ours are indeed petunias. Plus when we bought them at Lowe's I remember that they were a flower that started with a "p". How's that for some reliable gardening advice?! Again, all we do with these guys is water them. They are in our front bed next to the marigolds, and I love all of the color! More instructions on petunia care here. And just in case I've steered you wrong, care for impatiens here.

5. Knock Out Roses // There are several varieties of knock out roses, but I believe ours are the double knock out rose. We have these planted all along our deck and screened-in porch, and I absolutely love them. They were already planted when we bought our house, and they are super easy to care for. I don't even think we water them that much. We prune them back each winter (no careful pruning needed, Caleb just lops some off the tops with garden shears), and they bloom several times throughout the spring and summer. You can see the different varieties and read about care instructions here.

I hope this helps some of you who may be intimidated about growing flowers in your yard! I am, by no means, an expert, so please take everything with a grain of salt. These are just the flowers that we have found to be little to no maintenance needed, and we love how they look. We live in South Carolina, so please also keep in mind I am only familiar with our plant hardiness zone and temperatures throughout the year. 

What flowers or plants have you found you enjoy growing? Please share any tips you have - I still need all the help I can get!

House Tour: Dining Room

Today I'm excited to share pictures of our dining room! We fell in love with this room when we first looked at the house because it was big enough for a larger dining room table. We love entertaining, so we wanted a space we could do so comfortably. We knew the dining room was going to need some work, and I am finally pleased with the way it's come together. Here are a few before + after pictures after the jump, if you're interested...

House Tour: New Front Door

I have been quite remiss in sharing a house tour, but I promise I have a few rooms on the way! There's a couple of things I want to finish up in several rooms, so once they're all the way done I will share them! In the mean time I realized I never posted about our front door transformation! A couple years ago I wrote a blog post about how much I loved brightly colored front doors, and at the end of last summer we finally painted ours! I chose red because I like the pop against the white front porch and black shutters. It makes me happy to see our bright front door every day when I drive home :)

Amazing Bathtub

I came across this amazing bathtub in The New York Times. Isn't it incredible? It's made of sapele, a tree native to Africa. It would be such a treat to soak in this tub after a long day, don't you think? A relaxing evening in a tub that starts at $28,000...

Craft Room + Office Inspiration

We started painting our craft room/office last week, and I'm getting so excited about a fresh start for that room! It was blue before, which made the room feel small and dark. We still have more painting and lots of projects to do before the room is ready, but below are a few pieces of inspiration from my pinterest board.

image sources: 1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6

Throw Pillows

We still have quite a bit of decorating to do in our house, and the main reason it's taking us so long is because I am incredibly picky and indecisive when it comes to decorating. I get overwhelmed when making decisions about what style of furniture, what color of paint, what type of curtains, etc. I always find myself drawn to the little, easier things: the objets d'art, the accent pieces, and the throw pillows. Below is a round-up of some of my most recent throw pillow finds.

1 // teal arrows pillow 

2 // gold fleur pillow

3 // grey weave pillow 

4 // candy stripes pillow

5 // black + white pillow

6 // blue + green colorblock pillow

7 // heart pillow 

8 // pink trellis pillow