Using What You Have - Transforming an Entertainment Center

I know that I'm not the only one out there with an entertainment center that fits the big tube televisions of the past.  You know the ones with the doors to "hide" the television.  

I looked into purchasing a new entertainment center...one specifically made to house a large flat screen television.  For starters, a new entertainment center is thousands of dollars.  Also, most of the ones I looked at would be wider than the space I have available, since it's the center unit that is wider to fit huge flat screen televisions.  Another factor I considered is, I have a two story family room so I feel I need the height of an entertainment center rather than just a console for a television.  Most importantly, the truth is, I still like my entertainment center.  What I didn't like is it not being able to fit a large enough flat screen in the wall unit.  

We had put a small flat screen into the unit a few years ago, but with the doors on, it only allowed a 36" television set.  After inspecting the unit carefully, and measuring and remeasuring, I decided I could remove the doors and upgrade to a 48" television, plenty big for the room.

First I removed the mechanism that moved the door.

However this left an unfinished piece of wood on either side.  It was screwed and glued down, so I didn't want to rip it off and cause damage to the unit.

Instead, I stained it.  Once I realized that I had stain that matched very well, I removed all of the other hardware and stained the wood below.

Tough to get a good photo of the wall unit without glare off the glass doors and television, but here is the new wall unit. You would never know that it once had doors.

This whole project cost nothing since we bought the television with anniversary gift money from my mother in law and all the stain and any other supplies we had in the house already.  That's what I call a perfect project.  

Have a great day.

-Judy

Ralph Lauren Home Lamp Find

For Valentine's Day my husband surprised me with an Ethan Allen end table.  It's a beautiful table and deserves a beautiful lamp.  So, since then, I have been keeping my eyes open for something special. 

On Sunday I did a quick walk-through of my favorite store, Home Goods.  It was a zoo on Sunday and I was sure I wouldn't find anything which would happily allow me to avoid the long lines.  I headed to the back of the store, and at the end of the lamp aisle, on the bottom shelf, I spotted this lamp.  

Immediately the gorgeous color and finish caught my eye.  The next thing that caught my eye was that it was from Ralph Lauren Home.  I picked it up and it was heavy and in pristine condition.  It also had a gorgeous pleated silk shade.   I could see and feel just how much of a quality lamp this was.   Home Goods was selling the lamp for $119, which is expensive, however the tag said that it retailed for over $300 at Ralph Lauren Home! Okay...this lamp had to come home with me.

  When I got home I did a little research on the lamp.  It's called the Alston table lamp by Ralph Lauren and sure enough it did retail for over $300 when it was being sold by Ralph Lauren ($330 to be exact).

It is the perfect size lamp for this table. 

It also balances off this side of the room.

I am so in love with my new lamp.

Yes...I must cut off the tags now!  Lol

Don't forget to stop back tonight for my Winter Blues Wednesday party.

The party opens at 8pm EST.  Hope to see you then.

-Judy

Sharing with Savvy Southern Style

Picnic Basket Turned Magazine Holder

My husband and I were engaged in 1990.  One of our favorite engagement gifts was this picnic basket.  I always loved it and pictured going on a lovely picnic with it. 

It was from Crate and Barrel.  

My friend had filled it with everything we would need for a romantic picnic.

It was filled with plastic plates, utensils and wine glasses.  A table cloth, napkins and a cheese board and cutter as well as two candles filled this beautiful basket.  You can see...everything is still wrapped.

Well, it's 2013 and we have yet to actually use the picnic basket.  We have always wanted to, but it has never worked out for one reason or another.
It has moved to three houses and spent time in many closets.

Pretty pathetic, I know.  

So I figured it was time to take it out of the closet and actually use it. 

I took the smaller basket out from under the table, and instead filled the picnic basket with the magazines and a throw pillow.

It hides the magazines, and it fills the space better than the
other basket I was using for magazine storage.

It also makes me very happy to be using something that I always loved, 

but just never got a chance to use.

Can't wait to hear what you think.

Don't forget to stop back tonight for my Winter Blues Wednesday party.

The party opens at 8pm EST.  Hope to see you then.

-Judy

Adding Color to the Family Room with Pillows

When I blog about one of the rooms in my home and look at the room through photos, I tend to see things that I don't otherwise see just walking through the room.  

  So when I rearranged all of the furniture in my family room a few weeks ago, I realized that the brown chair by the fireplace could use a little color.  I wanted to bring in some of the green accent color.  I went to Calico Corners, where they were having a 25% off fabric sale, and found this fabric.

I liked it because it brought in the green I wanted as well as picked up on the wall color.

I bought 1 1/2 yards of fabric to make two 20" square pillows.  Since the fabric has such a large pattern I had to order the extra 1/2 yard to make sure I could center the pattern.   I used the existing pillows and just covered them with a new pillow cover.

I cut two 20"x20" squares out of the fabric.  I centered the pattern on one, and let the back side fall wherever to give me options as to which side I wanted to display.  I placed the two squares, right sides together.  After sewing three sides together I clipped the corners and turned it back to the right side. 

 I hand sewed the open seam together.  

This is upholstery weight fabric so it hides the stitches wonderfully.

Here's the chair with a little color added to it.

After being so careful to center the pattern, I think I may like it better on the reverse side.

Here is the reverse side.

Here is what was left of the fabric after the two pillows were made.

Be sure to stop back tomorrow to see what I did with the leftover fabric.

I can't wait to hear what you think of my new pillows. 

-Judy

Lamp Swap

January seems to be a month where I take a step back and take a fresh look at my home.  With the lull after the holidays, it's a perfect time to revamp and revitalize my home.  However, January is usually a month where I also take a step back and try to cut back on spending...especially after the holidays!

It's a great time to get a fresh look just by changing a few things around.

You know that I completely rearranged all of the furniture in my family room last week.  In case you didn't see the before and after, you can click here.

 While I was in the family room I noticed that the lamp on the sofa table looked a bit too formal for the room.  I felt like it would look better in the living room.  So I went into the living room to see if I could find a spot for the lamp.

In the living room I noticed this lamp...which when I really started looking at it seemed a little oversized for this room.  So I decided to do a little switcheroo.

I moved the tall lamp to the family room, which is a two-story family room with 17' ceilings, allowing the larger scale of the lamp to work so much better in here.

Then I moved the smaller, more delicate lamp into the living room.  

It works so much better in there too.

It's funny...I have never considered moving either of those lamps before, but I should have done this a long time ago.  It breathes new life into both lamps.  Another no-cost redecorating idea.  

How about you?  Any no-cost decorating going on in your home?

Have a great weekend.

-Judy

No-Cost Decorating

On New Year's Day we took down all of our Christmas decor and put it all away.  Over the holidays we started tossing around the idea of rearranging the furniture in our family room after the tree was put away.  It was also a good chance to really clean the room from top to bottom, since we were moving nearly every piece of furniture. 

Here's a look at our family room with all of the changes.  

Here is our family room as it was set up for the holidays.

Before we started moving any real furniture, we moved it all on a piece of graph paper with the floor plan drawn out with cut outs of all of the existing furniture we have in the room.  It's something I have for each of the rooms in my home.  Makes trying out different furniture arrangements much easier on our backs.  The before photo above is our family room right after the tree was put away which is why the far left hand corner is empty.  One of the issues with the old floor plan was that having the sofa in the middle of the room cut the room in half.  It also left only a small amount of space to actually enter the room.  The sofa also seemed to block any focus on the fireplace mantel.  

Here is another view of the room.  

I actually did like the game table on an angle in the before photo, however it was rarely used since it was hidden behind the sofa.  I'm hoping it will be used more now that it's more accessible.

It's funny...we have lived here more than thirteen years and we have used the sliding glass door in this room maybe once or twice.  I've decided that since the door is never used, I'm going to treat it more like a giant window that furniture can go in front of.  

The lamp is from my home office.  It's a Pottery Barn lamp and lamp shade.  It was next to my copy machine in my office and it tended to get in the way each time I needed to make a copy. 

 The lamp works really well with the decor in this room - maybe even better than it did in my office.

The room is very open with this furniture arrangement and it actually feels so much bigger now. You can still see the television perfectly from the sofa, even though it is no longer directly in front of the television.  In fact, you can now see the television from all of the seating in the room.  Plus, we actually get to use the ottomans that came with the chairs.  In the previous arrangement there was never any room for those and they had to be separated from their respective chairs.

 While I was at it, I created a simple vignette for my mantel.  The candles are my favorite and were one of my gifts from my husband for Christmas this year.
They are battery operated and look so real, even in person.

Here is a view of the room from the fireplace.  To the left of the sofa I brought up a table from the basement that works well for now.  I also completely changed up what is on the coffee table, adding flowers, books and potpourri to a wicket basket also from Pottery Barn.

By rearranging our furniture and using a couple of items from other rooms, I have given our family room a completely different look - all for FREE.  You gotta love no cost decorating!

I can't wait to hear what you think of my new, more open family room.

-Judy