Family Room Reveal
A while back I mentioned how I updated our family room out of desperation to see something change for the better. Well, today you get to see it.
Our new arrangement was inspired by needing more floor space. Our sprouting gymnast alerted us to the fact that there's no place in our house to do gymnastics. So the front half of this room is now empty and she can do back-walk-overs to her heart's content. She and her brother like to play games on the floor too. It's just nice to have open space. So we concentrated our furnishings in the TV area and love how cozy it is.
Here's my one tip for coffee table decor. Leave room for cups or bowls or remotes. It's tempting to fill the whole space with pretty trinkets, but it renders the thing useless. The more practical people in your life will likely gripe about it and you yourself will have to admit to the problem when you wish you could just put your cup down. So lets let the real world be real and make some space for the necessities. I think it still looks alright. : )
Here's an overview of the whole room. To see how I originally decorated this room (6 years ago) and why the orange hallway, you can go here. After a couple years I got tired of the colors and took out anything colorful. It stayed neutral with no direction for a long time. Then came a light-bulb day when I realized my friend's house (which I adore) could be inspiration for this room. She uses the most interesting mix of glam and rustic. She has colorful pieces grounded by neutral walls and furniture. So I began.
I collected art, painted walls and found an antler (harder than you'd think in Nebraska!) The orange hallway will get a fresh coat of neutral paint, though I may paint the wall opposite the same confederate blue I used on the family room accent wall. Also, the old TV cubby will someday have matte black shutter doors we plan to build. Until then...I spy...our camping stuff!
This little grouping is in the corner left of the camping stuff and helps that open area feel decorated rather than forgotten. So that's my effort at marrying Mexican blankets and gold mirrors and antlers. If you see anything you'd like to know more about, let me know in the comments! I will talk more later about how to put together an art grouping like the one over the sofa.
Our new arrangement was inspired by needing more floor space. Our sprouting gymnast alerted us to the fact that there's no place in our house to do gymnastics. So the front half of this room is now empty and she can do back-walk-overs to her heart's content. She and her brother like to play games on the floor too. It's just nice to have open space. So we concentrated our furnishings in the TV area and love how cozy it is.
Moving our TV out of the cubby meant that it was suddenly obvious it wasn't a flatscreen. But a new TV is not on our radar, so I got creative to reduce the attention our TV's huge backside would normally draw. We positioned the buffet a little away from the wall with the drapes on either side, so it's not obvious, and pushed the TV back as far as we could on the buffet. Then I grouped larger items on the sides, coming just in front to look meant-to-be. I'm amazed how natural it looks. It's no longer an eyesore - yay!
Here's my one tip for coffee table decor. Leave room for cups or bowls or remotes. It's tempting to fill the whole space with pretty trinkets, but it renders the thing useless. The more practical people in your life will likely gripe about it and you yourself will have to admit to the problem when you wish you could just put your cup down. So lets let the real world be real and make some space for the necessities. I think it still looks alright. : )
This is one of my favorite things about this room. It's an old screen we found, but you could make one with a window frame and chicken wire. Tiny clothespins clip our Christmas cards to it and camouflages the electrical access behind it. Since we occasionally need to get into that, I love that it's not too heavy and easy to rehang. We can't fit all the cards up there, but collect the overflow in a wooden bowl on the end table until the season's over. Eventually, all our cards get cut to 4x6 so they can go in a photo album. It keeps them in order and I add any baby announcements or wedding/engagement photos too. The album ends up being a sort of flip book of our friends lives.
Here's an overview of the whole room. To see how I originally decorated this room (6 years ago) and why the orange hallway, you can go here. After a couple years I got tired of the colors and took out anything colorful. It stayed neutral with no direction for a long time. Then came a light-bulb day when I realized my friend's house (which I adore) could be inspiration for this room. She uses the most interesting mix of glam and rustic. She has colorful pieces grounded by neutral walls and furniture. So I began.
I collected art, painted walls and found an antler (harder than you'd think in Nebraska!) The orange hallway will get a fresh coat of neutral paint, though I may paint the wall opposite the same confederate blue I used on the family room accent wall. Also, the old TV cubby will someday have matte black shutter doors we plan to build. Until then...I spy...our camping stuff!
This little grouping is in the corner left of the camping stuff and helps that open area feel decorated rather than forgotten. So that's my effort at marrying Mexican blankets and gold mirrors and antlers. If you see anything you'd like to know more about, let me know in the comments! I will talk more later about how to put together an art grouping like the one over the sofa.
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