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Curb Appeal & Interiors2022-02-19T18:07:27+00:00

A Happy Home

Ideas to inspire you to enjoy the home you always wanted

It’s been said, a House is built with Walls and Beams, a Home is Built of Love and Dreams.  In this section, we will help you build the framework for your picture-perfect Happy Home.  Have fun perusing the fantastic interior design and curb appeal ideas… But remember, the true picture of a Happy Home is most likely found within the following recipe: • 4 cups of Love • 2 cups of Loyalty •  3 cups of Forgiveness • 1 cup of Friendship • 5 spoons of Hope • 2 spoons of Tenderness • 4 quarts of Faith • 1 Barrel of Laughter!

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Colorful combination of succulents adorning entryway pillars.

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White nuetral palette enhancing artistically arranged foilage.

Featured Interior Design Ideas

Take a look at all these ideas to help make your house a home…

Tips for Rug Placement

Rug placement is key Living room: For the living room, consider placing “the front two legs of each furniture piece on the rug.” Dining room: As for the dining

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Turn your patio into an inviting, relaxing space…

Area Rug

Consider an outdoor area rug to difine and make your outdoor space even more inviting.

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Learn From the Experts

Various experts talk about all things Home & Garden

Don’t buy everything all at once. Live in your new house for at least two months before you make any significant purchases. How you think you’re going to use the house and how you actually live in the house are commonly two different things. Maybe that $5,000 you were going to spend on renovating the bathroom isn’t quite as important as beefing up the kitchen and dining area for maximum entertaining purposes. And you may figure out that the living room loveseat would work much better in your master bedroom and the master bedroom’s chaise will work better in the den.

Start with the bedroom. It’s where you’ll be spending almost a third of your time when you’re at home, after all. If you’re on a tight budget, opt for new bedding first, but don’t skimp on thread count! Buy as well as you can afford to spend in this area — it makes a huge difference. If you have a little more money, paint the bedroom walls to complement your new bedding. Still more cash in your pocket? Add coordinating window treatments. Early risers should opt for a lighter palette of colors and more translucent treatments. Night owls who like to sleep in will probably likely be more satisfied with deeper tones and more substantial coverings that block out the light. If you’re really ready to splurge, buy that bed you’ve always dreamed about. And choose carefully. It should mirror your personality, fit your room comfortably and stay with you for years.

Fight the urge to match. Retail stores love to perpetuate the fallacy that everything has to match. They would love for you to buy everything in sets, but don’t do it! A few pieces with the same styling are fine, but any more than that and your home has the lifeless, generic look of a furniture showroom. Make sure your own personal style shows through, which most likely isn’t bland, beige and boring. Top priority should be proportion, scale and balance of your furniture and accessories within each room. Don’t shove five pieces of oversized lounge furniture into a 15×5 den that has a modest 8-foot ceiling. It will look like a clown car. Conversely, putting only a low buffet and a delicate, round dining table for four into a 20×30 room with a soaring 12-foot ceiling will look equally awkward and unsatisfying.

Solve practical problems inexpensively. If your kitchen cabinets are drab, for instance, freshen them with paint and change out the hardware. And don’t bother installing overly decorative (and very expensive) cabinet hardware on cheaply fabricated woodwork — it will look out of place and the money can be put to better use elsewhere. In the bathroom, something as simple as replacing the lighting can immediately improve the room’s appearance. If you find the typical incandescent R-type lamps in your new place, replace them with the less “yellow” PAR-type bulbs. Another inexpensive solution with a big payoff is installing dimmer switches to keep light levels low for a midnight bathroom break or to create a romantic mood for bubble baths for two.

This is the most important rule for professional-looking, attractive window treatments: Hang the curtains high to give your room a luxurious illusion of extra height. The pole or valance should be positioned a minimum of 4 inches and a maximum of 12 inches above the top of the window in most cases. The curtain lengths make the ceilings seem taller and the room more polished, maybe even a bit formal.

If your living space has high ceilings already, compliment them with tall curtain lengths. Floor-to-ceiling curtains can also help to divide space, whether you’re tucking away a window seat (like the floor-to-ceiling curtains via Lonny) or cutting a whole room in half. Heads up: The worst thing you can do when hanging curtains from the ceiling is to hang them too short. The heightening trick-of-the-eye doesn’t work well if the curtain line abruptly cuts off before it hits the ground.

Cons to floor length? They may make your room look too formal for your liking. Dust will inevitably collect around the bottoms. Also, children may be more likely to grab them and use them as a climbing rope. If you’re asking yourself, “Should curtains go to the floor?,” and kids, pets, and dust aren’t a concern, then floor length is probably your best bet.

Tie everything together with color. If you’ve moved into your first place with furniture that spans the 1960s to now, don’t worry. The easiest, most economical way to overcome this seemingly insurmountable problem is unifying through color. Let’s say you have a sofa that has only one thing in common with the furniture in the rest of your living room: a tiny bit of the color in the fabric is the same as the less dominant color in the rest of the room’s upholstery. Solution? Play up that similarity and make it your living room’s unifying wall color. If that’s too much hard labor for you, find curtains, rugs or accessories in this common hue and see how the pieces begin to complement each other.

  • Put your herb garden where you can see it daily—such as near the kitchen or where you’ll walk by each day.
  • Herbs are more aromatic if starved just a bit. Don’t be quick to water and don’t fertilize.
  • Provide plenty of sunshine.
  • Herbs demand good drainage. Plant on a slight mound, especially in areas with poor drainage. Avoid planting where water stands.
  • Pick leaves just before flowering. That’s when they’re at their peak of flavor. Morning is the best time to harvest.
  • Keep harvesting. Herbs are happier when constantly clipped.

Some herbs, like rosemary, are available at any time of year. Others, like basil, are summer annuals so are available only in spring. And while seed racks boast a plentiful and varied supply of herb seeds, be aware, Loveall-Sale warned, that some can take a long time to germinate.

“Basil and parsley are pretty quick, but rosemary can take as long as 300 days,” she said. Read the packet to find out how long you’ll have to wait.

The most common reason that plants’ leaves turn yellow is because of moisture stress, which can be from either over watering or under watering. If you have a plant that has yellow leaves, check the soil in the pot to see if the soil is dry.

“If you have health, you probably will be happy, and if you have health and happiness, you have all the wealth you need, even if it is not all you want. “
Anonymous • Quote of the Day
“Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude.”
Anonymous • Quote of the Day
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