Thursday, December 29, 2011

Let the sunshine in

My obsession with yellow is getting out of control. For Christmas my mom bought us this yellow cabinet which will reside in our stair landing/hallway. I'm totally in love with it. I have a frame collage in the works for the blank wall above the cabinet and I stocked up on lots of white frames from Michael's for 40% off with an additional $25 off the total. 


Meantime I have been ruminating over yellow throw pillows for the living room. Seriously, the amount of time I have spent trying to decide which to get is not normal.
Greg and I both have off today so I think we might take a trip to Crate and Barrel to check out some furniture I have been scoping out online. Who knows, maybe we'll come home with a new entertainment unit. We also started playing around with a new living room arrangement via cut outs Greg made that we can move around- everything is to scale. Is he cute or what? (Note the giant recliner on the right)




Do you ever have an obsession with a particular color and want to work it into every room? How do you play around with furniture placement? I liked this cut out idea much better than physically moving the furniture around although I'm sure we will do that too. I'll keep you posted where we end up.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

What have I done???

So after weeks of Greg continuously asking for a Lazy Boy recliner I actually caved and got him one for Christmas. The result is much what I anticipated it to be...
I expect to see him here for the better part of next week since his office is closed for the holidays. 
After my mom and I snuck it in the house last night and quickly rearranged some furniture so I could have it set up when he walked in, I immediatley thought- what have I done? How am I going to work this monster of a chair into my living room??
I was very resistant to the idea of a recliner (for obvious reasons, I think) but it was the only thing he was asking for so what could I do? I set out to find the least recliner-looking recliner I could find. Now the challenge is to figure out 1. where to put it (ie: rearranging my entire living room because this thing is gargantuan) and 2. how to camouflage it as best I can (ie: decorative pillows, a nice throw draped over it...)
Once the Christmas tree is out we will have to do some major shuffling to make this guy fit. If nothing else it gives me a reason to redecorate and change up the color scheme while I'm at it. I've been obsessed with all things yellow lately (I even have my eye on a yellow couch!) so I'm going to switch out some accessories and brighten up the room with some yellow touches. We are in need of a new entertainment center as well since we are still using the one from my first apartment bought from Target. It's held up pretty well through two moves but I think its time to go. 
The livingroom has come a long way though- here is what it looked like when we moved in...





We had a great space to start with- the previous owners added this room on to the back of the kitchen- it is huge and surrounded by windows- it's really what sold us on the house and I love it. The space really just required new flooring (wide plank dark walnut wood installed by Greg and my uncle) and freshening up with paint and molding (all the work of master-painter Greg).
Here is what it looks like today (or pre-recliner)...



Over the next couple weeks I am going to be searching out some new items (pillows, lamps, vases, etc) and I have some DIY artwork in mind as well as some shelving I want to add. And then hopefully some new pieces to replace the old entertainment unit and console. I have some time off next week so I will definitely be checking out Home Goods, Target and Michael's to see if I can score some great finds and cheap frames for pics and art. Oh and finding a place for our newest member, the recliner...

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Life as we know it...

Hey, I’m Kelly. When I was little my dream was to work in fashion and that is how I make my living today in the crazy world of NYC. Although my job has very little to do with design or styling I love coming up with my own outfits and helping friends. I love yoga and just recently completed my teacher training. And just to mix it up and get a little crazy I do CrossFit too. I devour books by the week and I delight in cooking up healthy meals. 7 years ago I had an unexpected encounter with a guy named Greg in the middle of New York City while taking cover from the rain. 4 years later I married him…but 2 years before that we bought a 1960’s split level in Long Island that needed some love. We had an entire house to renovate (Greg’s job) and decorate (my job) and so began my love of making my design visions come true. Here is where I will share the happenings of our ever changing work-in-progress house, the design and ideas that go into each room, as well other random interests and inspirations along the way.