Faux Plants

I love my plants, but they are work. I won’t turn away a plant, but I do have to remind myself to fight the urge to get a new one because it requires time.

To balance out my desire for all plants, I am mixed in some faux plants. I find nothing wrong with it. I look for realistic varieties and am not afraid to use them outside.

At our last house, I had poinsettias I put outside. They were so realistic looking. I got them at Old Time Pottery and haven’t seen them since, but I know I probably had people wondering how I kept them alive outside in the cold!

I have seen some fake plants used outside that fade or turn bright green and have this ugly unrealistic color. I steer clear of making that mistake.

Back when I had Mr. Pfitzer, my plants in the window box were neglected. They had to be watered every day. I was up for the task!

But I eventually gave up and bought faux plants. I made sure they were real looking.

Now I am keeping my eye out for them fading. Once they start, they will be replaced.

I mentioned that I tried to keep a maidenhair fern at my office desk, but it struggled until I brought him home. I then bought a faux plant from Pottery Barn and it is happy. I can tell it is not real, but I keep it half hidden from view, so hopefully no one stares too long and can tell. There is a lot of detail that makes it look real.

I also bought a faux maidenhair fern for the screened in porch.

I like a plant out there on the table, but the winters are harsh.

I also bought faux herbs to keep in tiny pots. I tried real herbs in those pots, but the holder requires small pots, and it being kept on the porch, they get no sun.

I also repurposed some liquor bottles for stems of faux plants. I used stems of lavender, peony and lambs ear. All looked realistic to me.

I have them sprinkled in multiple places to tie the spaces together.

I still have my real plants inside the house, but mixing in the faux ones has been a help in maintenance.
 

Rearrange Mom's Collage

Hanging things on your walls takes preparation. You have to take a step back and stare at a space. Do you want it to line up with something else? Center it? Off center it?

I’ve had my fair share of experience with collages. And what I know of my preferences, is I like the outside of the collage to line up. That could be done different ways. All four sides could line up or just the top and bottom could line up.

I have not made any collages in this house, because I grew out of love with them, but Mom has one above her bed as a way to disguise how short her headboard it. She is using my childhood furniture in her room. When we bought her a new mattress set, it raised the bed to where the headboard disappeared!

Mom used the frames she had to display pictures of the entire family. My boys have all loved to sit in her bed and look at the pictures. They point out who everyone is. But while she was away on a trip, I took the time to rearrange the collage. I lift it up, used a few new frames and defined its shape.

Most of her frames were black with a few stragglers. I found some black frames with gold accent to tie in some other frames. I then made the collage be a square shape. All four sides have the frames line up the outside shape.

Now it raises your eye up even higher, so you take note of the tall ceilings. Just a little tweak to change things.

And as we speak, we are actually redoing the collage again. The space currently looks like this ...

I'll be back with an update when we complete it.
 

The Foyer

The foyer has been a room that sometimes feels lacking and sometimes feels adequate.

The buffet was a piece that use to be behind the couch at the old house.

The mirror was from the dining room at the old house (which was from the dining room of the Florida condo.)

I knew I wanted a mirror in the foyer to bounce the light from the doors into the house. And that’s exactly what it does.

I originally kept a basket on the buffet console to house the mail. Mom LOVES to check the mail and she will set our mail in the basket. But it didn’t feel right.

I then bought a new basket from Hearth and Home line at Target (Joanna Gaines).

At the same time, I bought new Holly Ferns to replace ones on my front porch that froze during the winter. I kept them inside on the buffet console until the weather decided to stay warm, but while I kept them on the console, I began to like them there. So, I bought pots for them to stay and bought new ferns for the porch. I liked the ferns behind the basket but it looked like they were in the basket. I couldn’t put them in the basket, because I still needed the function of the basket.

I also bought a new lampshade for the lamp. The old one gave off this yellow color that  didn’t like, so the hounds tooth one was better.

One Winter, I put real poinsettias on either side of the buffet and loved it.

And I had the rubber plants on either side as I was protecting them from the Winter.

So, I entertained the idea of planters with plants on either side of the buffet. But I talked myself out of it. I don’t need extra plants to take care of, and I need to embrace the empty space as okay. 

And at times I feel like making it a bold, moody color, but I don't want it to compete with the office right next to it. 

 

I am so glad I got the doors I did. Originally, the plan was to have a solid door with sidelights. The Architectural Committee for the neighborhood came back with options because a single door wasn't going to cut it. I went with double doors with glass. We now have a view of the gorgeous sunrises across the lake. It is amazing. We see it from the living room and the breakfast nook.

It’s a simple place that is a nice space.

Book Jackets

I have loved my living room built in bookcases, but never found a way to style them that I liked. There is actually a funny story to this. Mr. JCrew learned what triggers me to make me made… move around items on my bookcase! He says he has never seen me madder than when someone rearranges my bookshelves.

We had the shelves made because that was one of Mr. JCrew’s few requests for the new house. He wanted a place for all his books. He loves books and buys so many. Our bookshelves were almost not enough space!

I see many style their bookshelves with little to know books. They look great when there is not a lot on them. As pretty as they are, I see wasted space!

Source: Young House Love

There is nothing wrong with displays on shelves. I love how they look. But when I struggle with "looks vs functionality," the functionality wins. I was looking for a way to make my functionality on the shleves look more pleasing.

I arranged the books to be in different spaces. I put some up and down and stacked others. It gave some variety. But the multiple colors were distracting. Mr. JCrew doesn’t buy pretty books. They are nerdy and have bright colors.

I liked the idea of sorting books by a color spectrum, but it wasn’t going to work.

Source: Rue

After I redid the other side of the bookshelf with different boxes and baskets for the kids toys, I fell in love with the color pattern.

Their toys are really hidden in there. I love it!

So, I searched from brown paper, grey paper and white paper. I was going to make jackets for the books. I used the contractors' paper they use to cover up floors for the brown. I found a white wrapping paper and the grey was bulletin board paper.

I spent a lot of time wrapping the books. I did this in October/November timeframe and the boys thought I was wrapping the books to give as presents. They knew Christmas was coming. I wrapped a few each night.

I then wrote on the spines, in fine pen, the titles. I didn’t want the titles to be seen from far away, because I thought it would be a distraction from the simplicity.

Some books are from my childhood, and are a little girly for my boys to read, but I didn’t want to throw them away. People buy books they don’t read just to be fillers on their shelf. That’s what my old books could be.

I really like how it turned out. It is much more soothing than all the random colors of the books. They are grouped in categories, which is more helpful for Mr. JCrew when he is looking for something. If I had arranged by color, he’d be on the hunt for a book forever.

I still have the top left shelf to recover. They will be in wrapped in the brown paper. I think it will really balance the white box in front of them. 

Shelves are hard. I am not good at styling them. What my eye is drawn to, is not something I can create. But I'm heading in the direction I like. Even after writing this post and adding pictures, I can see more changes I can make. Always a process, and enjoying it.

Lamps On A Shelf

Mom found an inspiration picture on Pinterest that I really liked. It had a lamp in a cabinet.

I knew of a place I wanted to put a lamp instantly. I had a space in the China cabinet part of the kitchen cabinets that would be perfect.

I had added a shelf to those cabinets, but there was an outlet in the cabinet that I had to account for with the new shelf. The only thing I’d have to do was cut out a notch for the cord. I used my scroll saw for that.

In order to give enough space for the lamp, the shelf had to straddle the outlet. I used the bottom plug for the lamp. Pretty much all my lamps are on timers so I don’t have to think about turning it on or remembering to turn it off.

The lamp came from a thrift store. It was pretty hard to find such a short lamp. The shortest of lamps in stores were still too tall. Mom and I created a joint Pinterest Board collecting options for short lamps.

I also wanted to add a lamp to the bookcase in the living room. I felt like that corner of the room was dark if no lights were on. I found this lamp at Pottery Barn.

I also added a basket I found at TJ Maxx. These baskets were so my style and I bought the three they had!

The lamps on a bookcase as part of an item to style a bookcase is currently my favorite. I like the looks of styled bookcases, but I need function! My shelves may not be picture perfect, but they are functional.