Random and Inspiring

I thought today I would share some beautiful pictures

Love the organization, love the white, love the chalkboard door

Very cute, would be adorable for a garden party

makes me miss spring

I love the big bold stripes

So pretty, I will try soon

This looks like the most beautiful little place for a girl to grow up

I love this nursery. This is such a beautiful space

These floors are to DIE for.

Art made from a canvas and elmers glue. White is a color

Perfect for a low budget party

Why isn't this hanging up in my house? so cute and playful

I am so thankful that I have a daughter.

Fun right?

All images from my pinterest account feel free to follow

And I hope you'll take a minute to become a follower or subscriber to this blog.


Have a fabulous day!

Looking at some trends in design

Do you ever wonder about the things that are super trendy right now, and wonder what you'll think of them in a year, in 5 years, in 10 years?

Deer Heads

twigandthistle.com

Stenciled Walls 

cuttingedgestencils.com

Bird Stuff

Pottery Barn

Chalkboard Everything

www.robinbecksnest.com

Photo by Style Files


Chevron Everything

twogirlsbeingcrafty

Gallery Walls



curbly.com

Striped Walls




Cassie from Primitive & proper




little green notebook

Palette Projects



source

Globes



Armelle Blog

Grainsack Pillows



attic mag

I genuinely really like all these trends. The deer heads was probably the only one that I didn't like right away. At first I didn't get it, and didn't like it. Then in time I saw the humor of it, the fun-ness, the whimsy, and now I like them. I don't own one, but I like them.

Its hard to believe that we'll ever feel embarrassed, or confused by our decor choices.



All I can say about trends is chose wisely. If you really love it, go for it.

Paint is always easy to change, so have fun, paint is a really low cost investment for high impact. Nail holes are easy to fill, don't let that stop you from having the best and biggest gallery wall. Buy a small dose of that pattern that you love, no need to slipcover your entire couch with it, maybe a few pillows will do?

I'm really still loving all these trends, how do you feel about them? Do you have any of them in your home, or are you itching to get one in your space?

Starting a collection

I'm one of those people who see something and then I want it, like immediately.

When we moved to our first rented house before we were married we started buying furniture and accessories and filling the space.

I bought this cute light green shower curtain with white flowers on it, and then I bought green towels in what could only be described as geese poop green. Back then I didn't think about my purchases as much, I thought they matched, they were the only thing available, so I bought them.

We also had some hand me down towels from my parents that I somehow managed to get bleach all over. Needless to say my towel collection was just a hot mess.

Then my style evolved. Suddenly I realized that geese poop green towels were the last thing that I would ever want, ever. But going out and getting a whole new set of towels really wasn't in the budget. So I made a little mental note that someday soon, I would start replacing them.

I thought I wanted tan towels. I figured they were neutral enough. One day I bought two to try them out. After a couple months I realized, I didn't love the tan. Both my bathrooms were tan, so I thought it made sense, but I just didn't love them.

What I really wanted was all white towels.




I sure was glad I didn't buy a whole collection of tan towels on a whim.

Then we put our house on the market, and I thought what better time for some fresh white towels to hang on the towel bars. So I went to bed bath & beyond and I used some coupons and bought 4 white fluffy towels.

6 months later I knew that I loved them and wanted to replace all of the towels. I took my Christmas money, and my coupons and bought 7 more towels.  Then a couple months later I bought 4 more. We've removed all the old towels and now have just the white fluffy ones. I feel like I'm in a spa and I love it.

The truth is life isn't always about instant satisfaction. Sometimes we need to wait for what we want. Sometimes when we wait, we better understand what we want and need. And a collection over time makes better sense on the wallet.

real vs ideal

In case you missed this post.

I'm here to talk to about Real Vs Ideal in our homes. Home bloggers obviously want to show the pretty side of our homes. We may show some ugliness along the way, but for the most part we are showing DIY projects, room makeovers, and amazing pictures from other bloggers or pinterest that inspire us, because the hope is that we inspire you.

Because our work is shown online, it pushes us to do better, work harder, and be more creative, however people can be left feeling less than. Wondering "Why isn't my house always perfect?"

Well no ones home is perfect, not even mine.

During a project, my home is anything but ideal.

The truth is real living happens and life is messy.

Here are some ways that I get my home to be tidy is:

1. Everything should have a home
2. That home should be easily accessible to where you use the item
3. Make sure every one knows about where items live
4. Use it, and then put it back
5. If you forget to put it away, make sure you return everything to there home every night so you start out fresh the next day.

My home is real. We use it, we get it dirty, we make messes and then we clean them up.

We use our living room and dining room all day long. I have storage all over the place and it takes me 3 minutes to go from baby toy disaster to tidied up.

This video shows how I can clean up my daughters mess really quickly. I hope you enjoy!

Before & After Pictures

I do hope you'll come over to my blog and check out some of my posts on  cleaning , organizing or  decorating. Here's my post about Toy Storage.

The very first tip to getting organized

Recently I've been told that I'm very organized. By fellow bloggers or readers who read AP2CH.

If you asked my mum if I was organized, she would probably love to tell you how messy I was growing up. My room kind of always looked like a bomb went off in it. I wasn't one of those messy people who knew where everything was. I was the kind of messy person who was more worried about boys and my hair and making sure that my outfit was ready for the next day at school.

Sure I lost all sorts of things that were important, but being organized just wasn't important to me, even being tidy wasn't important to me.

I always felt like I had too much stuff for my room, no matter how big my room was.

College was more or less the same. But now we own our own home. And no one is quietly tip toeing into my room to collect my dirties and bring back fresh folded laundry.

Now my home is truly my sanctuary. Yea I still mess it up, don't worry, its not always perfect. But I care about our home and how it runs, so I make the effort.

 I don't day dream about boys anymore, I wonder about how to make our small home function better. No...really I do.

There's so many great tips about staying organized. But the very first tip that matters is that you need to want to be organized to be organized. You need to try to be organized even when its easier not to. You need to understand that in the beginning it wont be fun, or easy and you'll probably want to give up.

  The first tip is that you need to be willing for the change, even though it's difficult and easier not to

Join me next Friday as we talk about organizing. Hopefully we can slowly change some naughty patterns that make our homes less organized and tidy.

Please remember to become a follower or subscribe through email. 

Guest post from Cassie from Primitive & Proper

I'm so happy to have Cassie here today to talk to you all. . She is the nicest person and she inspires me so much with her eclectic style, I'm so happy that shes hear to talk to you today. First I'll share a couple of things shes done very recently that I love.

so cute, I want 10

fabulous

Her daughters adorable chalkboard closet doors

Hello!  I am Cassie from Primitive and Proper and I am so excited to be here on Jen's fabulous blog!  I found Jen's blog back in December through the Nester's holiday home link party and was blown away by her talent and style!  Isn't she amazing?  Her home is awesome and a great expression of who she is and who her family is.  And that is what a home should be... an expression of who we, the people who live in it, are.  My family is currently living in our third home.  Our first home was in Louisiana, and it's where both of my babies were born!  (Well, not in the house, but you know what I mean!)  I remember getting together that first nursery... I was so excited and so proud of it.  Yet now, looking back, I am so embarrassed!  It's not at all what I would choose today.  But style is evolutionary, so laugh at me all you want, but I am still evolving.  Do you want to see it, so you can laugh? So here is Sawyer's nursery in our first house.... everything was so "matchy".

My mom made the quilt and pillow and those are still so special to me.  I had painted the dressers which were my parents baby dresser, and I painted the changing table which came from a thrift shop.  So I was still thrifty and revamping furniture, just much differently than I would do now! When Emmy was a baby of about 2 months we moved into our second home.  I reused Sawyer's furniture, and her room is a little better....

I painstakingly used a formula lid to draw all of those circles and then went around painting them all.  I still think the walls looked cute, but that room is also a far cry from what I would do today if I were to decorate a nursery.  My how my style has changed! I am DONE having children, but I still like to look at nurseries and imagine creating a new one, only because I know I could do it so much better now!  So I thought it would be a fun activity to share what today's nursery would look like.  I am going to go gender neutral for all intents and purposes.  I am a huge fan of rustic, with a touch of glam, and a touch of aqua. First off, I am really digging white walls lately, so I would go with my favorite white, Benjamin Moore's Cloud Cover.  That way everything else would take center stage and pop against it. For the crib,  I definitely would not go with the honey colored crib of yore!  I am a huge fan of the simple Jenny Lind style, and love the crib that Ali painted for her twin sis Lisa.  I love it in this dark gray that could work well for a girl or a boy...

For bedding, I think I would go with basic whites and grays with some texture.  I adore this set I found on etsy!

And to bring a little pop of aqua to the bedding, this fun deer pillow just might be nestled in the corner... Also to bring some color to the crib area, I would most certainly hang a fun bunting!  I love the unique style of this with the crochet designs and colors...

And of course we would need a gorgeous rug to anchor the room.  This one from West Elm would be perfect!  I love the slight geometric pattern and the texture.

Now so far, it's pretty neutral with whites and grays, we need some color, right?  I would bring color, though slightly muted, in with the dresser which would also serve as a changing table.  And I would love to have a piece like this....

And above the dresser, of course we would need some awesome artwork...  perhaps these prints which I actually have and will be going in Emmy's room....

And of course, we are talking about a nursery, here... and since I am sure there would be many nights where I would be sitting next to the crib begging the baby to sleep, I think I might need one of these in this fabulous bronze finish... Planning a nursery is SO fun!  But here's the thing... free time is SO fun, too.  And my kids will both be in school full time next year, so I choose free time.  But if any of my friends decides to have a baby soon, I might stake claim on decorating the nursery. Thank you so much, Jen, for having me here today and letting me dream of the "what if".  I hope you will hop over to my blog and follow the progress of our "new" house and all of its non-nursery rooms!

Thank you so much Cassie! I cant wait to start the nursery makeover asap!