Farmhouse Living Room

Here is our newly repainted and refreshed Living Room! It seemed to take forever for me to get this room done but I must say I am very pleased with the way it all turned out! I didn't really make any major changes to it, it is the same furniture and lay out as before.  I had just grown tired of the grayish white color that I had painted this room a couple of years ago and once I decide I don't like something anymore I can't make it go away fast enough. Plus once I get my wheels turning I can't rest until I get the room the way I have it in my head.

The color it was before was a cooler white and I wanted to make the room feel warmer but also lighten it up some so I chose Behr's Cottage White, one of my favorite whites. I plan on doing a post about whites in the near future because I get soooo many emails from you guys about choosing whites. This white can be almost creamy at times and is very soft, because of the high ceilings in this room I didn't want to go with a pure white.

Another challenge in this room is the pot belly stove chimney (behind the couch) that I am always working around. I plan to remove it at some point but I am into enough projects at the moment so it will have to wait for now. It was crumbling as I painted it though and boy was it hard for me not to just grab my crowbar and go at it. But since it is here for the time being I decided to just work with it and hang all of our family photos around it. We don't have a single hall-way in our farmhouse and this is just about the only wall that is big enough for them all.

I repainted the big step-back cupboard that Neal built us (far wall) Glidden's Crisp Linen White. This is a new white for me and I can't say that I love it. I thought I would try some new whites out since you guys are always looking for the perfect one. It might just be the light in this room but I am not in love with the Crisp Linen White, I was hoping it would be a hair creamier looking. It photographs well but in real life is a bit lackluster for me.

Neal built us a chimney style cupboard for all of our DVDs (back wall behind couch on the left) and I painted it Behr's Antique White, it IS one of my favorite whites on the other hand. This is the color I painted the living room of our last house and I still love it.

The cupboard I have on the table beside the couch is in as found condition, wonderful as it is.

I made the couch slipcover from drop clothes a couple of years ago and it isn't perfect but it is way better than the floral pattern underneath. As for the pillows on the couch I wanted a very simple, comfy and collected look.

I was on the search for some soft linen pillow covers with some old fashioned touches but couldn't seem to find any that were quite what I was looking for so I just made my own.

To make the pillows I mixed store bought linen with ticking and lace edging. I always wash the linen first so that it gets that antique linen look and because it usually shrinks a little. I always buy my linen from the remnants bin at JoAnn Fabrics, it ends up being a fraction of the price of the stuff right off of the bolt.

I bought some grain sacks on ebay to make into pillows but I couldn't bring myself to cut them, they are just too gorgeous plus I love having the option to use them different ways. To create a square pillow cover from one without cutting it I just put a feather insert inside and folded the grain sack over twice.


And I was so excited to find the extra long antique ticking pillowcase on Etsy, to say I absolutely love this thing would be an understatement. And of course I put a white quilt underneath them all.

This is usually the couch I sit on if I want to watch a movie by myself or work on my blog so I always have a tray of candles on this table. The one corner of this room that I don't show in the pictures is where the TV is so you won't be seeing it but I have a few plans for that area....don't tell Neal:)

On a recent antique shopping trip I bought another bushel basket, what can I say I love these things. they are rustic but yet so pretty.

The cupboard that Neal built me from an old window also got a new coat of paint. I painted it Better Homes and Gardens Antique White and changed the handle.

I continued the same trim color as the rest of the house into this room...Glidden's Swan White.

I swapped out the curtain I had on the door with a simple linen panel that I made. For the days that I want the sun to come in I can tie it back.

I moved the little cupboard door from the dining room onto the mantle for some height and flanked the fireplace with our two slipcovered chairs.

If you are a long time follower you know that I found this mantle for $25 at a salvage/junk yard and that it is not original to our farmhouse. Since it is just decorative there is no brick or anything behind it and the empty space inside the mantle box bugs me. Hopefully someday we will turn this into a working chimney but in the meantime I think I want to do how I did in the family room with the vertical boards inside. However, this room was taking me so long to finish that I wanted something fast and easy for the time being so put textured wall paper inside the space.

My mom bought me the awesome rusty bucket for my birthday and I was just waiting for the perfect place to put it.

I hope you enjoyed seeing this room! Let me know if there is anything that you would like to know about that I didn't cover!

We are making slow but steady progess with the dining room reno....hopefully pretty soon I will be able to do a camera shot from this room looking into the dining room. I know one of the things that I want from a blog are wide angle camera shots that really give you a sense of the space and I try really hard to do that for you guys. For now I will just give a you sneak peek....

Wall Color - Behr's Cottage White
Trim Color - Glidden's Swan White
Floor Stain - Minwax Dark Walnut

A New Cupboard With An Old Window

Okay so don't be mad, I know I said that my next post would show our new family room but the ceiling part is taking us longer than expected and I don't want to show it until it is completely finished. In the meantime I have done some other things that I wanted to show you like my new cupboard.

Over the summer Neal built me this cupboard using the old window that I always placed on my mantel. Originally I thought about hanging it the new family room but I put a different one in there. I also wanted to use it to display some of my blue and white dishes that I had to box up when we took the wall down in the kitchen. It made sense to put it in the living room since I have touches of blue in there already. The corner between the window and the door seemed like the perfect place.

I put a table that my mom gave me that I had always loved in her house under it. And then under the table I put some of my old crocks. The larger crock is original to the house actually, my neighbor grew up in our house and the crock went with his family when they moved out, he brought it over to me one day and said "my kids don't like old things, thought maybe you would want it". I was tickled, not only do I love old crocks, but it was back in the place it belonged. The other one was a $7 thrift store find. And speaking of finds...I just found the little pillow on the arm chair brand new for $3 at my Goodwill, it is "Threshold" from Target and is at my Target right now for $25!

I painted the cupboard Glidden's "Whispering Wheat" because I love it with the blue, and because I just love the color. I figure I will change what I put in here a million times over and this soft wheat color goes with all of my collections.

I left the door unpainted and added an old rustic handle.

The feather edge platter was one of my very first "I can't believe I found this" flea market finds. I got it about 8 years ago at the Leeper, PA flea market for $10 and I absolutely love it. That is a good flea market if you happen to camp at Cook Forest State Park like we do.

A new place for my blue and white quilts...for now:)

Some other things that had to be boxed up when we started the kitchen demo were my cows. I found them a new home in the living room next to the step back.

They are in new frames that I picked up at the flea market for $2, the blue gray color of the frame compliments the colors in the cow pictures perfectly. Plus their size and weight holds up next to the very large cupboard.

I was excited to find a blue stripe grain sack (on the couch) on Ebay that I could actually afford, it was cheaper because it has some stains but that is okay by me because inevitably my son is going to wipe his Dorito covered hands on it. Which reminds me, some readers had asked me about the coverlet on my couch. That is also there because of the Dorito hands, it is much easier to wash once a week than the entire cushion slipcover, and because you know how I love layering. It is from Ikea and washes beautifully, I have had it about 10 years, but they still make them. Gotta love Ikea, one of the only places you can find simple staple pieces like that.

So here is what we are currently working on, this is the ceiling of the family room (that is what we have decided to call it officially).

We have it about half finished. I wanted it to be plank boards or shiplap so Neal was going to just cut down pine boards but then he found this heavy bead board at Home Depot that when turned over looks just like shiplap. It interlocks and cost us about $300 dollars less than just plank boards would have. Below is a picture of the bead board side.

And below is them flipped over,  I paint them (my dining room table has been covered with a rotating supply of these boards for two weeks now) and then Neal slides them into place. Hopefully we will have it all finished sometime soon and I will show the room in total, hang tight:)

Welcome to all my new followers and thank you to all of my followers that let me know they love what I am doing. Reading what you guys think often turns a "Serious Day" as my son calls it, into a great one:)