Happy Halloween!

Even though it's still 90 degrees here in Southern California, we are embracing the fall season.  I think Halloween is my second favorite decorating holiday.  My kids love it too.  It's always hard to feel motivated to get those boxes down, but your kids are begging you to do it.  So you do it for them.  Once I get started though, it's a little hard to stop.    You'll see what I mean.

The Kitchen Branch came back out after a stint of hanging in the garage. 

 It's the perfect place for our owl to perch.

Isn't he cute?

A skull tree on the lazy susan, what else?

After making the mantle look spooky, I couldn't decide  if I should use the banner that tells you it's spooky.   It actually makes the mantle look less spooky.  But I did it anyway!

I just had the kids have a go with the spider webs.  I am really not good at using that stuff!

We've been on the Tower of Terror ride at California Adventure quite a few times recently, so we were chanelling the creepy old hotel look in our dining room.  

Of course, we love our favorite doll head with the candle in it to make the eyes glow.

We went to an antique store to find old portraits.  We picked out the most evil looking ones.  I apologize if these are your relatives.

I think I bought out the last fake black crows in Temecula.  I searched high and low to find them.  

More creepy relatives.

This was Lindsay's idea.  She spent a long time perfecting the cobwebs.  If you come over, don't touch them.  She will get mad at you!

Thanks for taking a look!  Have a great Halloween!

A Refresh Reunion!

 We just love it when old friends call us back to do more in their homes.  It validates us and what we do, ("you like us, you really like us!") plus, you just get to know people really well doing what we do!  Shari is very sentimental and we love it.  When she showed us her "Grandma" print, we knew it would be the perfect inspiration for her sewing room.  So we filled it with lots of her treasures and mementos, things from her Grandma, things from her kids and grandkids and just the stuff that means a lot to her.  Of course, we threw in some bright,  fun and funky things into the mix because that's just how Shari is.  We think it suits her very well.

So here's what we started with,  a twin bed and lots of lamps!

This red chair is probably where this story began for Shari.
She bought it because she loved it, and then just had to make the rest of the room fit in with it.  

Fun, bright funky?  Did we exaggerate?  No way!  We went all out.  Shari isn't afraid of anything.

We found this rug even before we were working on Shari's room.  We pushed it around in the cart at HomeGoods trying to think of who would need such a rug.  Finally, when nothing came to us we were forced to put it back.  Luckily it was still there when Shari called!

Gussied up the sewing cabinet...

Used that cute red leather chair to our advantage.

Here's the print that we started with to inspire our creative juices.

We pretty much used up all the space in this room!

There's a lot of love in this room.  Hope you love it, Shari!

The Nesting is complete!

And just in the nick of time!  Shortly after we finished Kaycee's rooms, she went and had her baby!  Hooray more cute Munoa kids.  We felt like part of the family after spending a few marathon days at their home.   Here's more of what we were up to....

BEFORE:  Good bones, but needs a little pick me up.

Look at all that room for pillows!!  We were practically giddy!

There are a lot and I mean a lot of shelves and niches in this house.  They were definitely our biggest challenge.

And here you have it!  Some great accessories, and of course lots o' pillows!

They had this great piece in storage!   It definitely had to have a place in this room.

We figured the ottoman would be a great place to put up your feet or even stash away a few magazines.  It actually is now the kids favorite toy!  Who knew?

Forget diamonds, pillows are a girls best friend!  

Love those lamps!

We just happened to find the perfect sunburst mirror at Home Goods.

And we mixed some of her existing accessories with some new things.

We hope she is sitting on that couch right now just enjoying that sweet little baby!

Taking back the living room!

So we have a friend who is nesting.  And we literally mean "nesting"!  She is expecting baby #7 in a matter of days!   She was going to be hosting a luncheon at her home just a few weeks before her due date.   So she figured it was a good time to do some of the decorating that she had been putting off.  

Look at all those adorable kids!  When we saw these pictures she had hidden away in a drawer we knew we had to get them up on the walls!

We borrowed the ottoman from the family room to show how practical and useful these ottomans are!  They go just about everywhere!

Kaycee is all about her kids as you can tell from her living room BEFORE shot.   The playhouse had been in the living room since Christmas! 

But she was ready to have a more grown up friendly living room.  We said Goodbye to the big playhouse and rearranged her furniture.  This is truly a budget makeover.  We used all her existing furniture and just added some finishing touches.

The piano was moved to take center stage.  We also added some pretty dramatic curtain panels.  

We had to get creative with curtains because most 120 inch panels were way out of our budget.  We actually used two shorter panels and had them sewn together.  This is where her wonderful Mother-in-Law comes in (who just happens to be an amazing quilter)!!!  Thanks Janice!

We swapped out some of the loose back cushions that came with the couch for some decorative pillows.  We decided that brown on brown room needed a little bit of color!

Here's another BEFORE shot looking into the dining room.

They switched out the light with a chandelier they had in storage... makes a huge difference!  We love handy husbands!!   The scale is much better for the big table, plus it is hung a proper distance from the table.  Those measurements really matter!

We found this picture at Ross for a great price.  It blends better with the color scheme of this room and the adjacent family room.  Doesn't it just feel more calming and serene than the picture that was there before?  With 9 people at the dinner table every night, I am sure she will take all the calming influences she can get!

So I recently read a blog that referred to fake plants as "permanent botanicals".     I guess we will go with that!  

More "permanent botanicals".   We love them and use them all the time, but we try to be somewhat particular with them.    We have some go-to winners that we like to stock up on.  When in doubt, just put it down and walk away!

More dramatic custom, yet unbelievably priced curtains thanks to Janice.  It may be hard to see but they are colorblocked blue with brown like the others in the living room.  We really needed to use the full height of the windows to cut out the sun that came through those upper windows.  Every night at dinner time, the person on the end was blinded.  These will definitely be appreciated! 

We still need to install some tiebacks on those!  A designer's work is neverending, sigh!

So there you have it, a few simple changes and you have a grown up living room on a budget!  Coming up next, fun new changes to the family room!