Personalized Presentation

One of the most common mistakes I see in home decor is a lack of personal touches.  Many people feel that they just need to fill the space and forget to make it reflect themselves.  To make a home feel like YOUR home it has to represent you and your family.  Of course, there is nothing wrong with a few generic store bought elements but be sure to mix them in with your personalized details wherever possible to make your design more YOU.

Here are a few examples of ways that we have personalized our home both aesthetically and functionally...

Personal touches- The silver tray was a wedding gift, the mirror and the type writer box were both from antique store ventures with my mom, which is a pretty frequent thing(the type writer is on display in our office).  But, the real PERSONALIZATION here is in the functionality of this arrangement.  The storage basket (from World Market) is a hiding place for our 2 year olds train track toys and the console is of course a great place to hide all kinds of junk.  As I continue to share pictures or our home in future posts you will probably notice a trend of storage solutions for toys.  We are swimming in toys these days.  Entry Table- Hand-me-down from my parents that I refinished to tie in with the rug (also a hand-me-down).  No, that is not chalk paint.  It is just a paint and primer in one from Lowes and my own dark wax concoction (regular furniture wax with ebony stain mixed in).  The pulls are from Hobby Lobby.  

This wall decor collage is full of personal elements.  A print my Dad gave us from an artist in his hometown, a map of our beloved SouthEast, New Orleans print from our first road trip together, vintage postcard from our time living in Arizona and the Hobby Lobby magnet frame is a great way for us to switch out more temporary photos.  

The Family Business- This is my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE artwork.  It may not be pretty to most people but it has a very personal story behind it and means so much to me to finally be able to display.  My grandfather was a draftsman and the hours and hours that I spent with him in his workshop growing up are a big part of why I decided to become a designer.  I actually used a lot of his drafting tools in my architecture classes in college and have several of them displayed throughout our home (including the two small compass on the wall).  This floor plan and detail that he drew were for a home that my parent's built that I grew up in from age 8-18.  Up close, you can see his perfect architectural handwriting and even eraser marks since this was an early on draft. I have been carrying these around for years and my parent's had these framed for us as our housewarming gift.  

MANTLE DECOR- I have a never ending obsession with switching out this arrangement, especially for various holidays.  Right now though, this is one of my favorite looks mainly because of my PRICELESS artwork.  Yes, that is a finger painting from my two year old!  I would much rather have this displayed than art from any other artist and the best part is it was free!  It makes me smile every time I see it and he loves to show off his "painting" to all of our visitors.  I always like to include elements from the various places that we have lived so when I saw an episode of Fixer Upper where they used cotton branches I had to steal the idea to represent the cotton farms that we live near.  The milk jug and window are more antique store finds and the vase and bird are my splash of color, I change my mind on colors pretty frequently too so I like to use things that are easily switched out or moved to other rooms.