Guest Room/Home Office Pt. 1

There are some areas of our home that I have made some springtime goals to improve. I'm focusing especially on our guest bedroom/home office and our patio this spring because of the opportunities summer brings to host and entertain. Levi was out of town this past weekend on a camping trip with the guys, so I decided to take advantage of not having the (welcome) distraction of a husband around and started to tackle the guest room on Saturday.

I was fully intending to take a picture of the space before I started, but it slipped my mind. Since we moved, the room itself has been more or less clear and organized, with the closet being the source of overflowing possessions, but in the past few weeks even the bedroom has become overrun with a collection of Levi's various projects. Guns and gun parts...camping equipment...tools...car parts and repair equipment...you get the idea. Basically, the floor was almost completely covered with all of these items and the bulky boxes in which they were shipped.

I took care of that. Once the boxes were thrown out and I collected all of the man's items into a corner for him to sort through later, I was able to put away some of my own clutter, clean down the furniture, and start thinking about how I wanted to develop the decorations in there. For the longest time I've known I wanted to develop a nautical atmosphere in the guest room as a place where guests will feel extra relaxed and where I'll enjoy working at the desk. I hadn't gotten very far on that theme though, and I was ready to get to a point where I could actually be satisfied with it.

I'm not entirely there yet, but I made a lot of progress! I didn't have the full picture in my mind when I went shopping Saturday afternoon, but I was still able to find some key elements. When I woke up Sunday morning though, before I even got out of bed, all kinds of ideas instantly popped into my head. I was inspired - no coffee yet involved. I did some more shopping Sunday afternoon and picked up a small table (Craigslist find) to put the printer on next to the desk. I'll show off some elements of the desk in another post after I finish them up, but for now, here are the finds for the top of the bookshelf.

I found this awesome lantern at Pottery Barn, and no it was not cheap. But I love it. And after combining a gift card that I received as a generous house-warming gift from a friend with the 20%-off-all-lanters sale they were having that day (I hit that just right, right?), my out of pocket cost was $40 - half of the original price. Considering that was the most expensive purchase, I feel pretty good. I added a 3-wick fat pillar candle (NOT from Pottery Barn, where they cost $20) to complete it, and it glows so pretty.

The next piece is an over-sized sea shell figure with an extra large opening that was begging to hold something. I originally thought of putting some kind of collection of shells and/or decorative balls as filler in a bowl, but my plan changed when I saw this in Michael's. I also wanted to incorporate greenery somehow, so in the absence of a good sea grass option, I went for these fern branches. Some other greenery I tried just looked strange coming out of a shell, but I figured I could get away with the ferns because they look so wild and natural.

The shell was on sale for $12.49 from $25, and the fern was on sale for $0.99. Win.

The last little piece on display there is a simple coral reef figurine that caught my eye at Target. I still don't believe it was worth the $15 I paid for it, but I have a strong weakness for all things nautical and it was just too perfect to pass up. I may move this down to one of the square openings in the bookshelf if I find a picture of some kind to put on top of the shelf instead. But for now, it rests next to its ferny neighbor. The boat picture hanging on the wall was a gift from my former college roommate, who let me keep it after I house-sat several pieces of art for her while she was in temporary housing. (Free art adorning the walls of my house. It was great.)

   



















There's still work to do, but being off to a good start encourages me to keep going! Next time I'll show some details from the desk area, and hopefully sooner than later I'll have scored just the right set of curtains that I've been searching for. Stay tuned!