Did you know that I did not live in a home for 4 consecutive years for my entire life? Our current home is the longest I have lived anywhere, ever. Needless to say I am used to change. Not only am I used to it but I crave it.
As strict budgeter's with lofty financial goals change isn't always an affordable/practical option. Unfortunately that knowledge in itself is not enough to keep me from wanting change...to sell all of our furniture and redirect entirely. This inner turmoil forced me to be creative. For years the room that bothered me the most was our dining room, it wasn't bad I just didn't love it (unlike what my smile may portray haha). When we moved in it started out like this.
We had the hanging hectagon's behind our dining room in our basement suite so I thought why not do the same in our new place? Answer: because you'll get sick of them.
Realizing we didn't have any pictures throughout our house I thought this might be a great place for a gallery wall. Still dead set that no colour should enter my home I created a black and white gallery wall of significant places to us.
The pictures from top left were:
The valley where Daniel grew up,
San Diego
The place we got engaged
A shot from our wedding day
Mexico
The Grand Canyon
Palm Desert
and Canmore (where we had our first big fight)
For years we had these pictures on the wall and every time I looked at them I could go back to a moment in time that mattered to us. I thought about the laughs, the growth, and the memories.
Last summer as I became obsessed with green I felt like I was ready to take a big step and add colour into my house (it only took me 3.5 years haha).
As I mentioned earlier the wants don't always match reality which was the case for me with our dining room. My budget was tiny tiny ($75) but my wants were BIG and my determination was even bigger. I saw pictures all over Instagram of beautiful matted photos and I wanted them. I started researching and realized my whole budget would go to that. Which meant it was time for creativity.
I started our printing pictures with a similar colour scheme for around $5 from Costco. Then I re-used my frames from my previous gallery wall (adding just one more for $10). Daniel then came up with the idea of simply taping the pictures to white watercolour paper I had sitting around the house, and although I was skeptical they gave the look I wanted. I had also been seeing eucalyptus all over the internet and began searching high and low for some. I ended up finding the fake branches at Bouclair for around $10 each. I finished the look off with a glass vase and white pottery-esque vase. Just like that I had a simple and inexpensive dining room refresh.
Now I look at this space and feels like it captures us, our marriage, and the adventures we've embarked on. Have you done a cost effective room refresh? If so I'd love to hear about it!