The "New" Guest Room

Have you ever had one of those moments where you've just HAD it with a certain kind of decor or just had an impulse to change a room in your house?


Those moments don't happen too frequently for me. We do a lot of planning and talking about our renovation projects and generally come to a consensus before jumping in.


However...things changed in this area during a trip to hang out with my parents this past week. Mom and I went shopping...and I got inspired.


Before I really get started, let me explain what needed fluffing. Our guest room. It is a beautiful room with three windows and a lovely antique bedroom set. The color is nice...a warm, cheery blue. BUT, since we inherited this house from my husband's grandparents, we've had to make the house more "us" and less "grandparenty", if you know what I mean. We've done a lot, trust me. It is not that it was BAD before, but everyone knows what Grandma's house is like. It's nice, clean, but just dated...not my style. We've made our way around to all the rooms in the house, renovating them and changing colors, curtains, bedding, and even furniture. The guest room was pretty much left in the 1960's. One dear reader can attest to this as she's stayed in the room twice recently! We've waited to change the room in hopes that it would be a nursery and we'd just leave it as is until we had a little reason to change it.


The guest room sported curtains that had once been salmon and blue but had faded over the 30 years they'd hung in the room to gray and peach. Not even peachy peach, but peach smoothie that has been left out in the air too long and has taken on a gray tone. Are you with me? Given the fact that I've been home all summer and seen these curtains afresh every day, I came to the end of my rope and decided that last week while at home with Mom and Dad, that Mom and I could go shopping for some new ones. I'd warned LeGrande several times that I was going curtain shopping before school went back, but I guess impulse took over. I just knew that Wednesday was CURTAIN DAY.


Mom and I found the perfect curtains at Target. They are a white, breezy, cotton drape with just enough texture and design that they are understated yet elegant. They will go with my room whether it is a guest room or a nursery, which we hope that one day soon it will become. Since I am not into themed nurseries in a bag that come with matching curtains, I wanted something that would be suitable for both kinds of rooms.


You'd think I'd stop there, but I didn't. The new cute curtains would clash terribly with the ivory chenille bedspread that was Grandma's. We started scanning the aisles for bedding and found a beautiful, simple quilt that was green on one side and blue on the other, with green, white, and blue stitching on each side. I loved it, and the matching shams, and the great sale price. We continued on our search and found a bed skirt that was ivory and on the bottom was a 2 inch band of the same green that was in the quilt. Perfecto!



With all of our loot in the cart, Mom and I started discussing tiebacks for the curtains. I didn't want anything too frou-frou or expensive, but something that went incredibly well with the color scheme I'd created. We stepped into an arts and crafts store and started thinking...ribbon! We found two kinds of ribbon to use for tiebacks. Off home to get started!


At home, I measured and cut the two ribbons. I measured 24 inches of the wide blue ribbon and 36 inches of the smaller ribbon. I folded and glued down the edges of the wide ribbon to prevent raveling.





Then, I glued the thinner ribbon on top of the wide one. I let 6 inches of the smaller ribbon hang off of the ends of the wide base ribbon.





Here they are...ta da...my tiebacks!!! They are cute, inexpensive, creative, and they can quickly be changed to match another color scheme when we redo the room again one day.




I returned home from my little visit and could not wait to start putting the room together. Ironing 6 curtain panels took a while, but the payoff was great. Here are my curtains, complete with home-made ribbon tiebacks!



The bed looked great, but it was missing something. I looked in the trunk and pulled out the beautiful wool throw that my team in Ireland gave me when I left in 2004. It is a colorblock pattern of blues, greens, and periwinkles. The colors were great AND since the thin ribbon on the tiebacks is colorblock, it made it even better!




Things were looking good, but we both thought that a throw pillow was needed for the bed. Girls, this is the BEST part! Last month when we celebrated the 4th of July with my family, we began going through some of my grandmother's things and choosing items from her house that had sentimental meaning for us. My cousin Jenn and I each chose one pillowcase from the bedroom where we'd always slept as little girls. The pillowcase still smells like Nana's house so I'll probably never wash it, but the colors in it go with my new room! I grabbed an ugly throw pillow from a chair in the room and with a few pins, folds, and some extra ribbon from the tiebacks...VOILA...a new, matching, and memorable pillow! (We will be making the pillowcase into a couple of pillows a little later but this fold and pin technique will do for now!)




Here's the room, in it's near done state. I think it looks pretty good, and all we lack is a new fabric for the chair at the end of the bed. I'll have fun looking and redoing, and I'll post an update later!