{ Spring Has Arrived at Our House…Or at Least the Front Room }

We have been teased for the last few weeks with warmer temperatures, but I think that they are finally going to stick and usher in spring down here in the south. The kids have enjoyed being barefoot and running around outside like it’s the middle of summer. The other day they even whipped out their swimming suits and wanted to run through the sprinklers. My advice that it wasn’t quite that warm fell on empty ears, so we just let the natural consequences follow. A few minutes later I had shivering little people running inside looking for their beach towels to warm them up.

Though it isn’t quite time to be enjoying the weather from the view at the side of a pool, I am enjoying the view of all the beautiful things that spring has to offer. Bright yellow flowers, bees buzzing around once again, and the nice cool fresh breeze when I open up all our windows in our house. I just love it! I decided I better capture those feelings of spring in our house before the cooler temperatures try to sneak their way back into our life. Our family room has been craving some nice cheery springtime colors since it lost all of it’s Christmas decorations months ago.

    

Our front room is one of my favorite spots in the house, but unfortunately it has sat mostly undecorated for the last two years since moving in. My grand idea to have these fabulous built ins around the fireplace became a huge challenge when it came to actually putting something on them. I had tried so many different items, and then would just end up returning them to the store because they didn’t look just right. I only wanted to put stuff on display that were things I truly loved. I go by this room a couple dozen times a day, and I wanted to see things that had sentimental meaning to me or just made me happy when I looked at them. I wasn’t interested in a bunch of little items I would end up dusting all the time-just deliberately placed things to brighten up the space. For a while the paint in that room had bothered me, but after I painted it this last summer it was much better. I thought that I would be able to just decorate to my little hearts content after that, but then I was still stuck. I began to actually wonder if I had made a mistake in painting it, and my wacky pregnant mind almost started hating the blue in there.

  

Last fall before Thanksgiving I finally figured out what part of my hang up was-there was just too much white. I LOVE white in my house and thought when we built them that the clean palette would be great. What ended up happening was that things were just getting lost in a big sea of white. I looked at a lot of different options-painting the back of the shelves (I didn’t want to ruin the nice smooth finish that was sprayed on when they built them though), wallpaper (too hard to remove if I change my mind), vinyl designs I could apply (too expensive), stencils designs I could paint on (too time consuming to apply).

   

I finally decided on fabric. I was on the hunt for a great neutral fabric with just a bit of kick that I could add a pop of color to throughout the different seasons. I scored some at Joann's that was on sale, and I applied it with liquid starch. Once it dried, it looked as good as wallpaper, but I can remove it if I don’t like it down the line and it will have no damage to the painted built ins.I loved the pattern and punch it gave to the room, without a lot of commitment on my part-I think paint and wallpaper would have been too much work to reverse. Now with the fabric there I love the contrast with the light blue walls-I am so glad I didn’t paint them again.

          

One issue I had with this room is our big leather sectional. It is a great sectional, but man is it BIG. With a family of 10, we need a lot of seating, but it just felt like it was always taking over the room, and I think with the dark color it just stood out too much. I had dreams of getting two lighter colored sofas and having them face each other and be perpendicular to the fireplace with a couple chairs where the back of the couch is. I couldn’t find any couches I loved or could afford right now, and I think reality hit that leather is really the best option for here where we have lots of little messy fingers close by. I was trying to figure out a way to disguise the couch more without having to actually get rid of it. Once I knew that this couch was going to have to stick around for awhile, I decided that I wanted a long console table behind it with two large baskets. I found a few console tables I liked on Pinterest, but when it came time to look for them to buy, they were no longer sold or I couldn’t locate them in my area. Boo! One thing I don’t love about Pinterest. I finally found this table and fell in love with it! It was on sale at World Market and they had the exact baskets on sale I had been looking for too at Pottery Barn, but with a much nicer price tag-love that! We keep all of our scriptures in one basket and the kids soft blankets in the other.

    

I am finding out that I didn’t pay nearly enough attention to lighting when we built our house. We get really great natural light in this part of the house during the day, but at night it never seems bright enough to me. I was on the search for some lamps to put on the console table. I had three different pairs at one time just trying to find the right match. I love the simplicity of these glass ones. They can actually be opened up and filled with things, which we tried out at Christmas time, or just left clear for a nice clean look. I am so happy with them! I love that because they are clear they seem to not obstruct the view from the kitchen into the family room, but still serve to divide the space up a little.

   

I love our set of little chairs. Our family mission statement is “No empty chairs”, and these make me think of that goal every time I see them sitting up on the shelves. They originally sold at Pottery Barn for $100?, but I scored them on ebay for $25 plus free shipping! Brianna noticed that there are only 6 chairs and we have 10 people…so we need another set. I am on the lookout for some more to make our family set complete.

The disco ball. Oh, how I LOVE that disco ball. After buying one for the playroom we made over at Christmas (still need to blog about that) I decided that I think every room needs a disco ball. It adds just the right amount of whimsy so the room doesn’t seem too serious (we are far from serious at this place) and when the light hits it, it bounces around all these fun little lights that seem to dance around on the ceiling and walls. It it just fun and makes me smile-I love a house that makes me smile.

    

The mirror above the fireplace was a birthday present from Aaron this year. I had admired one on a decorating blog I read for quite sometime-though hers was black and she painted it white. I was searching online and came upon this one, and happily notified Aaron that I found my birthday present-he likes my help like that =) I struggled to take down the picture of the Savior I had hanging there, but decided that I was going to make a fun gallery wall including a new picture of the Savior I found on the wall to the left behind the sofa. This is the new picture. I am excited to get that done-I love the new picture! I have the old one sitting in the piano room right now waiting to be rehung somewhere in the house.

   

I love my new spring house. After I had put up the fabric and we had gotten the console table and lamps, Brianna came home from school and was so excited that our house looked so…decorated. It made me smile, and happy that looking at it made her feel the happiness that a little decorating brought to the home.

Source List (mostly for myself because I have a crazy bad memory and I want to remember where I finally found some of this stuff that I looked forever for, for when I actually get around to decorating the rest of my house.)

Paint color-Sherwin Williams Quicksilver

Brown Leather Sofa-Furnitureland South in North Carolina about 8 years ago

White Casbah Mirror above fireplace -Lamps Plus

Everett Foyer Table-Cost Plus World Market (on sale and an additional sale I could combine+free shipping)

Large Baskets-Cost Plus World Market (sale)

Lamps and Lamp shades-Better Home and Garden Collection-Wal-mart

White wood box on console table-Hobby Lobby (40% coupon)

Yellow flowers and green moss balls in white box-Hobby Lobby (sale)

Metal spheres, gray picture frames-Target

White candle stick, white Moroccan vase, small yellow vase, green glass vase, yellow picture frame, large wood lantern, white square tray on mantel, light blue and yellow pillows on couch, white silver dollar shells, canvas quote, white pitcher for lemons-TJ Maxx

Yellow and white flower bowls and plate-Pier 1 Imports (Clearance)

Numbered glass jars, watercolor painting on bookshelf, wood tray on bookshelf by yellow/white bowls-France during trip last spring break

Baskets on bookshelf-Michaels (50% off)

Disco Ball-Wal-mart in party section

Six Pottery Barn wooden miniature chairs-ebay

Big wooden trough on bookshelf-ebay

White pillow on couch-Pottery Barn

White and green chevron blanket-Homegoods

Gray and white fabric on bookshelves-Joann Fabrics

Temple Picture-Cari Osborne Photography