Organized Clutter

Today I'm sharing a large room (16 1/2' x 22 1/2')  in my home that is a combination den and guest room . The room is perfect for visitors with pets or kids as the furniture is older, painted, slipcovered but in pretty decent shape. It's sort of farmhouse style, and is decorated with a lot of my blog projects and vintage thrift store finds. I recently purchased the 8' x 10' area rug on Wayfair for under $100.  It's an indoor/outdoor rug that is easy to clean. It was my first Wayfair order ever!

The last time I shared this bedroom, it was brown, and decorated with vintage hunting and fishing decor. I just refreshed this room with new paint, and decorated it with my upcycle projects and some vintage items.

My kitchen needed a fresh coat of paint so badly! The old paint color was a little too almond colored, the ceiling was green, and I had painted a section of chalkboard above a corner shelf. I hope you can read on and see my small, farmhouse kitchen get refreshed on a shoestring budget!

One of the rooms that recently received a refresh is my 3/4 bathroom. The bathroom is really small, with barely enough space for a vanity, narrow toilet and a neo-angle shower.  Luckily my youngest daughter painted the room for me in Dover White. She was able to paint above the shower, behind the toilet, and on the ceiling, all difficult places for me!

  Probably about fifteen years ago, (maybe more) I had homespun valances and curtains custom made for my den/guest room.  Red was my favorite color, and this red and gold homespun plaid was well suited for my primitive country decor.  (Now I have transitioned to a farmhouse decor style in this room.) The scalloped roller shades are even older.  I purchased them from the old JC Penney catalog.  I desperately wanted to update the window treatments in this room without spending a lot of money.

Last weekend I attended the annual Little Falls (Minnesota) Arts & Craft Fair . It was my very first trip to the craft fair. I purchased the botanical butterfly wall art above at the fair from  Salvage Sisters - A Repurposed Store .  The panoramic style frame contained distressed paper with a bee and several different black butterflies, along with plant sprigs on the sides. The design was most likely created with rubber stamps and ink. The perimeter (mat) of the frame was created with distressed book pages, torn into varied and uneven pieces.

In 2017, I gathered these clipboards for a photo gallery wall in the bedroom. 

The last time I shared my foyer decor on my blog, it looked something like this.  (This has always been a difficult wall to photograph.) The shelf was repurposed from dresser mirror salvage  HERE.  The plaque on top of the wall display was also a piece of furniture salvage.  Both were painted with Annie Sloan Cream Chalk Paint.   My pew was painted in off white chalk paint. A couple of vintage flower pictures, a shutter, and family pictures rounded out my wall decor. See how this wall looks today in my new blog post below.

My friend Diane gave me this little vintage bookcase to upcycle. I gave it a makeover, and put it in my bedroom.  

  This was the fireplace in my 1950's ranch style house until recently.  I haven't changed a lot about the fireplace since moving in back in 1990.  The mantel was already painted white by previous owners, and I painted the yellow brick surrounding the doors with white paint.   I have contemplated changing out the dated brass fireplace doors for a long time , but recently got a little more serious about it.  I looked online for black replacement fireplace doors.   The doors ran from about $265 to $400 at the big box stores .  I then watched several YouTube videos about painting the fireplace doors and settled on this cheaper route.

I chose this tan and cream herringbone fabric for my new Flexsteel sofa and chair and a half.   My fabric choice was a Revolution Performance Fabric : "Revolution Performance Fabrics® by STI and Brentwood Textiles are true performance fabrics.  Woven with Olefin yarn, the fabrics are virtually unstainable, easy to clean, and extremely durable; yet beautiful and soft while also resistant to fading from the sun. Revolution Performance Fabrics® are made with upcycled fibers and have no chemical treatments making them easy on the environment."  

The furniture store that I am employed by sells decor accessories from Kalalou .  I was recently inspired by Kalalou's  Clip Board Photo/note Holders  gallery wall.

I have actually had this little table for over a year.  I got it for a song at a local thrift shop.  I loved the hairpin legs, even though they were brass or gold tone.

I am still busy purging, organizing and re-doing my den/guest room into a triple purpose room.  It is now becoming a craft room as well.  This rustic wooden shelf was used for a while in my shop for display.  I decided to paint it with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in French Linen and faux distress it with the Plaid Layering Block. I have shared previous projects with the Plaid Layering Block  here ,  here , and  here.   I am planning to do a training video very soon on the Plaid Layering Block and share it on my blog.

About a year ago, I purchased two slat style shutters with chippy red paint at one of my local favorites  Jackson's Icebox Antiques & Collectibles.  

In 2015, I removed the legs from an old wooden ironing board , painted it with chalk paint and hung it on the door between my laundry room and kitchen.

I purchased these floral Tri-Coastal Design decorative boxes 10+ years ago brand new.  I would like to use them in my craft room/den/guest room makeover.

I am still working on the makeover of my den/guest room/craft room.  The wall behind the sofa has a new wall display arranged from 3 frames, a wooden letter "C" from a Hobby Lobby clearance sale, and two wooden basketball shapes from our local craft shop.

Usually this old terracotta vinyl tile floor in my foyer is covered with lots of scatter rugs because I don't like the floor anymore.  One year ago in August, while my husband was away for four days for a fly in fishing trip, I decided to paint it with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in Old White.  While white may not be the best color for an entry, I will have a mat and a couple of scatter rugs to keep it as clean as possible.   I thought the creamy white would lighten up the whole area. So I started painting, and ran out of paint about 2/3's of the way through the project.  I called several friends that use chalk paint to rehab furniture and nobody had any to spare.  There are no stockists for 100 miles.   So I covered my half painted floor with some area rugs, and quickly ordered more paint and floor laquer online to finish the job. And then LIFE happened, you know, unforeseen events, problems, time constraints, etc. and soon we had snow an...

I am so pleased with the new hardwood flooring I had installed in my living room last week. I chose a  Shaw Engineered Hardwood, "Jubilee", in the color Honey spice .  An engineered hardwood has a hardwood veneer or wear layer, but is not solid hardwood, making it an economical choice.  Engineered hardwoods can be re-finished just once or sometimes twice, but at 59 years of age, that sounded pretty much like a lifetime to me!