There are some magazines that I buy once, and then never buy again. I am either unable to focus on the good content due to the abundance of advertisements, or there just isn't content that fits my style in the first place. There are other magazines, however, that I am a loyal fan of. One such magazine is Romantic Homes.

I promised my husband A WHILE AGO that IF I bought any new magazines into the house, then I would make sure that I got rid of a magazine from one of my stacks. I'm now down to my favorite stack of magazines and I'm afraid I may have to stop buying magazines so that I don't lose any of my good ones

I think one of the reasons I love Romantic Homes is because of the variety of styles they cover. Their November 2007 issue covered my husbands favorite decorating style: British Colonial. Their April 2010 issue covered my favorite style and explained all the elements of it in-depth: French - Country, Elegant, and Old World. Their most recent issue showcased a shop named Magnolia Pearl that is going on the road in their Air-stream, something my husband and I have both said we would love to do "one of these days" -- maybe not having a traveling shop, but hitting the road in an Air-stream, most definitely! 

Romantic Homes tag line is Casual Elegance, Personal Style. I love every issue I see and usually can't wait to browse the next one, even if its just standing for an hour flipping through it at our local bookstore. RH is one of the magazines that I frequently open to a page I love and try my best to mimic the styles shown in my own home. I ♥ Romantic Homes!

What about you? Do you have a favorite magazine, decorating or otherwise? Feel free to share in the comments!

Sallie

My daughter, Victoria, and I discovered a decorator fabric outlet several months ago in a nearby town. We have stopped in several times to "ooh and aah" over the fabric but for the most part it is still a bit pricey for my pocket. I have picked out several toile type prints to recover/slipcover my living room chair and am simply waiting for them to go on sale. Every few weeks when we are in town to pick up laundry detergent at my favorite hardware store, we will stop in at the fabric store and check out the remnant table for coordinating fabrics. A month or so ago I was blessed to find some Waverly fabric in the color combination I like on the remnant table: browns, blues, and reds. We picked up several yards of this lovely paisley print called Prelude Paisley-Sepia, as well as some red check, and red ticking.  

Victoria used the majority of the Prelude Paisley to sew two panels for the large main window in our living room. The panels hang on the ends of a decorative rod with several sheer panels in the middle. For the smaller window, there wasn't a huge amount of Prelude Paisley fabric left so she made a simple decorative "button-up" valance (without the buttons) using the small bit of leftover fabric and the red check . She did not use a pattern. She looked at a picture in a magazine of a valance similar to this one and then she just made it. She's very talented like that :-) We haven't used the ticking fabric yet but I am considering making some pillows. One of these days we might get around to it....LOL

I'm very blessed to have a daughter who loves to sew. I can sew... but it isn't my favorite activity. I don't know how in the world I will do any creative decorating when she moves on to take care of and be creative in her own home. I may have to just "borrow" her back every so often :-D

Have you made (or had a daughter make for you...lol) anything creative in your home lately?

Sallie

Today I was suffering a bit from cabin fever and so I grabbed the girlie girl (aka Victoria) and we went antique shop browsing. We also found a fabric outlet store in New Bern. We were both in heaven in that shop. I don't know how you feel about nice fabrics and discount prices but when we walked into the store, the two of us actually drew in a deep breath and slowly let it out. I looked at her and she looked at me and I think at the same time we both actually said "Oh, it smells so nice in here." Fabric can do that to a girl!

We have a chair with down cushions that I love but my husband has pretty much hated since the moment I bought it. I think partly its the fabric, and partly its the down cushions. The back one gets lumpy and it has a deep seat and, anyway, he just dislikes it. I found wonderful Waverly fabric (actually two and some special trim but I'm still trying to decide on the perfect coordinating one so I won't bother showing you that one yet...LOL) for it and rather than re-do the cushions myself, I've found a local upholstery guy to do it for me. It's actually a pretty simple chair but I think I will have him build a new back cushion out of foam or something and that will take a little more re-working than I am used to. I will, of course, recycle the down to use for some throw pillows, though. I hope to go back to the outlet with Mike sometime this weekend and make sure the fabric is OK by him. I mean, it wouldn't make sense for me to put a fabric on that he hates worse than what's already on there, right?!

I have been working on my bedroom a little more everyday. Today I was able to add a few antique/flea market finds to the room. Every time Mike buys me roses we save the dried petals because we eventually want to make beads out of them for a necklace or bracelet. I guess that makes them a gift that keeps on giving. I found this sweet milk glass urn today for just a few dollars. I think it's a perfect home for my dried rose petals. I also found the covered sugar dish today. I paid $4 for it! It's sterling silver (not plate) and very heavy. I love re-purposing things like covered dishes in a bedroom (or any room, really) because you can store so many trinkets inside them! The porcelain door knob is a souvenir from our days of building for Habitat for Humanity last fall. I unearthed it while working on sealing the foundation of the new house sitting on the site. They told me it was finders keepers day and I didn't complain one bit :-) 

 Oh, yes, are you wondering what bedding I went with? Belk made it very easy for me to decide by only carrying one of my choices. They did have coverlets of the other two styles, but I was determined to have a bedspread so I could get rid of the bed-skirt and bulky comforter look that we had previously. So, which did I get? The MaryJane chenille bedspread. I absolutely love it. Oh, and the throw pillows? I got rid of the long red one I said I wouldn't get rid of and the square tulip pillow. I shopped the house and brought up a peachy-bronze one that we had on the chair downstairs (the one we're having reupholstered). The color of the pillow is reflected in several places in the room -- the sunset of the kimono, the seashells, the tones of the wood of the Japanese corner chairs, etc.. -- and I love the pearl detailing. It's very feminine and sweet. Romantic, too! 

I am still looking for a side table for my side of the bed. I am currently using a kitchen stool. I went in four furniture stores today besides the antique stores. One table might have worked but I wasn't in love with it so I didn't get it. I know that I'll know it's the right table when I see it. Does your mind work like that, too?!

I looked all over at Christmas for feathers and couldn't find them anywhere. I finally found them today at one of my favorite shops in New Bern: New River Pottery. I went in there looking for baskets and walked out with feathers, flour sack towels in pretty muted colors (first time I'd ever seen them in anything other than white), a few beverage pitchers for the fridge, and a cow creamer pourer "thingy". It's cute. I've seen them in magazines for years but never actually saw one in a store. I think sometimes God gives me a blind eye when I'm shopping because I know they are probably in tons of the stores I frequent. I just always miss them. Anyway, I added the feathers to the pitcher of flowers by my bed and I love it even more now than I did before. I also added the star fish (again, I shopped the house... my favorite store in town...lol).  

I don't have artwork up yet, except for our Japanese kimono, and I'm still looking for baskets for the bookcase to hold my clothes. I'm looking for lighting for my side of the bed as well but still not sure what type to get. Again, it's one of those things that I'll know it when I see it.

So, do you like what I've done with the place? Have you found any great pieces at antique shops or flea markets/thrift stores lately? I'd love to see what you're doing with your place, too, so feel free to leave a comment so I can visit your home, too.

Sallie

This morning did not start off so great for me. I choose to make it a better day, though, and not focus on the negativity. Its amazing what a few prayers and quiet moments can do, isn't it?! 

Mike is home today for an extra bonus to Presidents Day. We tried to really enjoy our weekend of snow and a get together with old friends on Sunday afternoon so we put house work off for a few days. Today is a make up day :-)

Mike has been working in the garage this morning and made a run to the recycling/trash center. I am working on laundry and a bit on my bedroom makeover as well. We have a LOT of red and gold in our house. Those are Marine Corps colors but also happen to be favorites liked by both Mike and I. I wanted to steer a bit away from that as possible for our bedroom. Our only real artwork in our room is a Japanese kimono that features gold cranes flying into an orange/pink/and cream sunset. I chose to add a few splashes of color to our room by going with a kiwi/lime/pistachio green color. As you can tell, I'm not necessarily great at naming colors...LOL. I am happy so far but that might change in a few days as it all settles into place.

We have a housing inspection later today. One where the big shots come in and check to make sure your electrical plugs aren't too crowded and the exits are all free of debris and clutter. Its sad that they can trust you to defend the country but not live in a house they provide (the term "provide" is loosely used here). Oh well, the kids are happy to have an extra day off of school to spend time with dad. Maybe if the inspection is done early enough in the afternoon, we can go for a nice drive and have a picnic somewhere along the way. That would be the perfect ending for the day!

What are your plans for the day?

Sallie

Do you remember back in January when I wrote this post about being sick (thereby being stuck in my bed for more time than I care to spend again in the near future) and realizing how much I really hated our bedroom and how I said I was going to be changing some things? Do you remember how I said it would be a work in progress because I couldn't afford to just run out and change everything all at once? Well, I'm please to announce I've made a little progress :-)

I'm sorry I don't have a before picture because I just wasn't thinking when I started tearing everything out of the room earlier today to switch the furniture around that I should really grab the camera. Actually, pictures were the farthest thing from my mind! Decision making kills me but once I set my mind on something I'm good to go.

Remember, this is only a small glimpse of the beginnings of change. Small change. You should be used to that by now considering our government. Ha ha ha... I crack myself up. Anyways....

I found some GREAT lampshades at Ross last weekend. So great that, as a matter of fact, I changed out every single lampshade in my bedroom AND living room! I was pleasantly surprised at the assortment of sizes and colors of the shades available as well as the price: 5 bucks! I also bought new pillows and pillowcases. Our old pillows were so flattened and worn out that we actually had to stick 2 (count 'em, TWO) pillows into one pillowcase just to get a halfway good nights sleep. We've bought lots of pillows in recent months; it just seems like they always went to the kids instead. I was selfish this time around and bought four brand new ones and told the kids HANDS OFF! Funnily enough, these pillows are so fat and fluffy that I get a neck ache trying to sleep on two so I've ended up throwing my extra one on the floor every night this week :-) I will most definitely be keeping my longer red pillow with the gold edges but the tulip pillow might go. It's always just been an extra but not something I was totally in love with. I guess it just feels like there is supposed to be a square pillow (or a small-ish sized one) tossed in the middle of the bed. What do you think? Leave it. Or, toss it?

I haven't bought new bedding yet but I have my eye on a few bedspreads at Belk (they are having a winter white sale at the moment). I grew up with bedspreads. My husband grew up with comforters. We've always had comforters in our home but I'm so over them already. I think a bedspread is more romantic and pretty. I keep pouring over the online pics and zooming in and out but that really isn't very helpful. I like the Columbine Cody Oslo bedspread equally as well as the Lamont Home Charlotte Bedspread. I also like MaryJane's Chenille Tufted bedspread but I remember often picking the chenille loose on my moms bedspreads when I was a child and I'm afraid our cat might do the same thing to any that I might buy. Remember what I said about decisions killing me?! I am going to Belk this weekend to see if they have the bedspreads in stock so I can look and feel them. If not, I'll probably do an eanie-meanie-miney-mo to decide...ok, not really but that might truly be the least painful way.

I decided to "shop the house" for furniture for the bedroom (since I am getting rid of my dresser) and found that I really like one of my Japanese corner chairs as a side table. I put a bamboo tray on it to hold a crystal lamp, alarm clock, and small picture of me (since this is my husbands side of the bed). Mike isn't so hot on change and I know the best way to make him happy when changing things around, is to keep some things as close to original as possible. These three items were on his nightstand and he will be very happy I kept the arrangement for him on the chair/side table as well!

This room is still very much a work in progress! What do you think of the small change so far? Any preferences on the bedspreads? Should I go stark white or linen? Trust me. Any suggestions you make will save me from the turmoil of trying to decide ;-)

Sallie