What’s the best way to refresh a space when your wallet is recovering from the holidays (and those hard to resist post-holiday sales)?
Move the things you already have around!
Swap an end table with a night stand. Use that old trunk at the foot of the bed for a coffee table. Move your dining buffet lamps into the living room. It’s amazing sometimes what giving new purpose to an old piece can do – and it’s free.
I have been eyeing up the basket of honeynut squash at my local Trader Joe’s for a few weeks now. I’m not sure that I have ever seen honeynut squash before – if I have I never paid them much notice – but this year they kept jumping right out at me with their pretty, muted color and miniature size. They practically begged me to take them home.
And this past weekend I finally gave in and grabbed a few for my cart with the idea I could use them to create a pretty Thanksgiving tablescape.
And now I’m kind of wishing I was hosting Thanksgiving dinner, because I love how it turned out.
I am all about using something pretty and simple to make a seasonal statement on the dining room table from day to day. My antique round table is on the small side, so it can be easily overwhelmed – plus, who wants to move a bunch of stuff out of the way every time you want to sit down at the table?
Not this girl.
So today I rounded up some of the ways I’ve added a little bit of fall beauty to my dining table over the last few years. All of them are simple, classic, and can be thrown together in just a matter of minutes.
I really love my jute rugs.
Love the texture, love the color, love the simplicity – what’s not to love about a jute rug? They’re very loveable.
Buuut….
I’ve been feeling the pull for something with more pattern lately.
I know, right? Who would have thought.
The dining room seemed like a good place to start, so I decided to give a wool rug I had in the basement a test drive to see how I like it. That way – even though this particular rug isn’t exactly what I had in mind – I can see if something with more color and/or pattern is something I may want to keep around for the long term.
I really hate shopping for curtains.
There is just simply nothing about it I enjoy.
They’re expensive.
If I find a pattern or color I like, I hate the material.
If I find a material I like, I hate the pattern or color.
They’re expensive.
No matter where I’m shopping, they always seem to be one panel short of however many I need.
Oh, and did I mention they’re expensive?
So yeah. Not my favorite part of outfitting a home.
How about a little spring decorating, dining-room-style today?
Our dining room is such a small and simple space, I don’t like to add too much or it starts to feel a bit claustrophobic. I like small spaces that are filled just enough to be cozy, but not cluttered. It’s a fine line I find myself crossing just about every time I’m changing things up from season to season, and as soon as I do, I start taking away a little from here and a little from there and suddenly it all just feels right.
“So in other words, it looks like winter.”
This was the response I once received after I got done saying that I don’t like to decorate with a lot of color in my home. I tried to explain that I like neutral colors, wood accents, lots and lots of texture, and that my walls are all shades of white, gray or beige…
White. Gray. Beige.
Wood accents.
I suppose that does sound a bit like winter, doesn’t it? 😀
We will be heading back to Michigan for Thanksgiving this year, so we won’t be hosting Thanksgiving dinner, but I thought I would put together a simple tablescape to share with you anyway.
I had big plans for the kind of table I was going to do.
Pumpkins, and candles, and metallic leaves, and pretty little place settings.
But then I procrastinated.
And a bunch of my pumpkins rotted.
And then I procrastinated some more.
Good morning friends!
I hope you all had a beautiful weekend. I don’t know about where you are, but the weather here has been hot, hot, hot! Much to my surprise, I’m okay with it. It’s actually been kind of nice…
But ask me again in a few weeks if I still feel that way…I’m not usually a hot weather person. 🙂
So I have a few little updates to share with you from the dining room today. I was really pretty happy with how it looked for spring, so I didn’t want to change up much, but I did want to tie it in to the living room by incorporating some of the same elements. I always like these two rooms to flow since they’re right off one another.
I was so excited about the new wall color in the dining room, I just had to try out a couple new dining chairs to see how they would look. After combining a sale (which unfortunately just ended 🙁 ) and a 15% off coupon, the Anna Slipcovered Chair in Linen from World Market was a deal I simply couldn’t refuse.
So I brought home two. 🙂
