Redecorate Without Spending a Penny

Sunday was my niece's birthday.  The birthday celebration was at my brother's home.  After lunch, my sister-in-law and I started to chat about her plans to update her bedroom.  They want to redecorate the room and she wanted my opinion.  (Before I continue this story you should know that I had no idea how much furniture we would start to move, so I don't really have before photos and all the photos were taken on my iphone).  So...we went upstairs and I took a look.  She told me that her plan is to remove the wall to wall carpet and add hardwood floors and to repaint the walls.  She wanted my overall impression of the room.   She had this very large chaise lounge in her bedroom.  The piece felt very overpowering in the space.  It didn't take much convincing to get her to agree to let me move the chaise lounge to the sitting room on the first floor.  She thought my brother would be against the idea, so I called my husband upstairs.  I knew he would move the chaise with me.

Here is the chaise in its new location, the sitting room.  It goes perfectly with the decor in there.  They colors in the room are golds and creams and they have a black baby grand piano.  The chaise looks so much better here.  What a perfect place to curl up and read a book or listen to someone playing the piano.  I wish I had taken out my phone to take photos of my husband and my sister-in-law's sister-in-law (got that?) carrying the chaise down the stairs.  We were all laughing so hard because it felt like we were doing this undercover, all the while with my brother in the other room watching the football game with everyone else.  My brother and his wife have beautiful furniture, most of it from Ethan Allen (my favorite store).  It was just a matter of moving it all around.  Next step was to add a seating area to the master bedroom where we just removed the chaise lounge.

Here is their new seating area.  One of these chairs was in their family room and the other chair was in their foyer.  My husband brought them both upstairs to the master bedroom.  The table in between the two chairs was one of their night stands.  The truth is that they need a desk area in the master bedroom.  This new desk will be in lieu of a nightstand.  My sister-in-law has put me in charge of finding the perfect desk.  I am in love with this new seating area.  I wish I had a before photo of the chaise lounge in this space (I did ask my husband to bring everything back upstairs just so I could get a before photo...he didn't go for that one).  Isn't it gorgeous?

Then we moved the chair from the sitting room (where the chaise lounge now resides) to the foyer to replace the chair that is part of the new seating area in the master bedroom.
(Are you all still following me?)

Now that I took away one of the chairs from the family room, I needed to add something back.  I added these two stools that were just hiding in a corner.
I also needed to balance the piece of furniture that was to the left of the fireplace.

I did that by having my other brother (I needed to recruit more people in my plan at this point) move this little secretary desk to the other side of the fireplace.

Then we moved this chair and table over to the right in order to center it more in the window.
Four rooms redecorated and not a penny was spent.

So what is the moral of my story?
Before you go out and spend any money on new furniture...first shop your own home.  You will be surprised at what you find.  If you are having trouble seeing your existing furniture in a new light, ask a friend or relative to help you.  I promise, you will have so much fun!

-Judy