How to Lighten up Your Family Room

Welcome to our family room!  This room has been an ongoing process over time.  I have slowly but surely changed the entire look of this room to reflect my love of vintage farmhouse living.  And I've been able to do it with mostly things that I already had... along with some DIY elbow grease.

Let me take you along on my journey.  Let's start with the before photos I have of the night we put an offer on the house.

 I do apologize as the photos are not great.  But you can see that the wall colors are a dark brown, the fireplace has green woodwork and a slate type surround.  It just felt so dark to me.  The first thing we wanted to do was lighten it up.  And that starts with paint.  We used a Sherwin Williams paint called Pavillion Beige.  You can find a link to this on my Pinterest page below.

Sherwin Williams - Pavillion Beige - CLICK HERE!

When we moved in, I had a lot of dark heavy furniture.  I liked the look once upon a time...but realized one day I was creating a look that wasn't me.  I was decorating my home the way I thought it was supposed to look, as opposed to what I loved.

My best girlfriend had come into town several years back for a visit.  She is a floral designer and blesses me with these huge bouquets of flowers and decor goodies whenever she comes.  On this particular visit, she brought a HUGE boquet of my FAVORITE flower ever, the daisy.  I have loved them since I was a little girl. They were even our wedding flowers!  The problem was that they didn't go in my home anymore!?!??  They are light and fun and wild, while my house was dark and rich full of deep golds, greens and reds.  I still remember she made the comment, "I never thought I'd see a day where daisies didn't go with the decor in your house".  I've never told her this, but it stuck with me, and I started reevaluating the look of my home.

Just for fun, here's a photo of my best friend Bekkah and I!  I hope this doesn't get me in trouble with her, but this is one incredible lady I am blessed to have in my life!  She has been my best friend for 24 years and we have been through so much together.  I love this woman to no end!

You should TOTALLY check out her floral design business if you you live in the Pacific NW. She does weddings, events, holidays and just everyday bouquets.

Check her out here!
THE GARDEN'S TALE - ON Facebook!  CLICK HERE!
or
THE GARDEN'S TALE - ON Instagram!  CLICK HERE!
  

Okay, back to the house.  So when we moved in I still had a lot of the darker furniture and was working on lightening things up over time.  Here's a little time travel.

In this next shot you can see I recovered the chairs on the right to a lighter chevron and got a lighter sofa on the cheap.  This is the same sofa we still have.

You see in these next few shots that I started playing with pillows, taking out color and adding new color.  I made the clock on the wall which is coming to a new blog post near you.  Stay tuned for that! I rearranged a few things, painted some things and added a new rug.

You will notice on the fireplace photo below that we redid the rock surround!  You can find that tutorial on my blog post by clicking below!

 Rock Fireplace Surround - Click Here!

More playing with color and accessories.  

After changing out candles and adding lighter and brighter accessories in the house it made a HUGE difference.  Then, I realized that it was the coffee table.  It was such a HEAVY piece that it needed to be lightened up.  Now I'll tell you, I found this coffee table FREE on the side of the road 8 years ago...that was a beautiful day for me! I would have carried that thing home on my back if I had to.  I still ABSOLUTELY love it and will probably never get rid of it.  It's a super solid piece of furniture that can be updated and changed over time too.  Very timeless.

But look what a little paint did for my family room on that coffee table!  A few other tweeks and I have the look I have today.  Overall I didn't spend a lot of money on it.  I make most of my pillows and curtains and refinish the furniture I can.  I think I may have spent $350 in this room overall including the new sofa, fabrics, rugs, supplies and paints. 

You will notice I also redid the same chair again.  I just recovered the fabric and painted the wood white this time to brighten it up.  I will have a blog post coming soon on this too so stay tuned.

Remember the Before?

And now the AFTER!

I just took these shots with my new camera this morning.  There is definitely a learning curve but I love the difference a good camera can make!  I'm using the Nikon D3100 which is a DSLR camera.  I think it has all the features for someone like me. I wanted a camera to take shots of my family and for blogging but without being the complicated over the top camera that many professional photographers use.  Here's a link to Amazon to check out this camera and all of it's features if you are interested.

Nikon D3100 - CLICK HERE!

Think in terms of textures and layers.  A good mix of metals, woods, wickers, fabrics, patterns, and fresh greens or flowers. If something isn't the color you like it, most often you can change it with paint, stain or fabric.

This is all still a process for me and I have big plans to add to this room in the future, so follow along on my adventure!

The BEST part for me?  I think it truly reflects my personality, and a bouquet of daisies would fit right in and enhance the space.  My space inspires me to be the best me that I can be.

I'd love to see your progress in your home too!  Please feel free to follow along on my facebook page and you can share with me there too.  Thank you so much for stopping by my blog today!