Tour of Home :: Part 1 : Living Room

Here are some before and after snap shots of our living room (with commentary, of course) -

**Disclaimer - none of our rooms are completely finished. Work in progress :)

:: Before ::

:: After ::

As previously mentioned, we repainted all of the walls in our house (and ceilings too!).

The wall color shown is Benjamin Moore's Paris Rain. We got all

our paint from our friendly neighborhood Rosing Paint Center. They matched

colors and were super friendly and easy to work with!

Our map collection is in the to be completed stage - next up is this map of the Carribean...

at the request of my husband who's pretty much obsessed with sand and water. The

map on the left is of Italy and is actually sold as a sheet of wrapping paper. I purchased it, bought

a frame from Ikea, and now it's a wall piece. World map was a gift from the brother.

Desk from Lofty Ideas in Augusta, GA.

Couches were Jamie's from college. We tried several different layouts, but,

at my sister's suggestion, wound up like this. I'm satisfied. Rug and t.v.

stand both from Ikea. And that's the Oprah Show on the t.v.

This painting was a wedding gift from a dear friend of my family, Lynwood Hall. He

also did the flowers at our wedding! He's extremely talented, and this particular painting

is of a trail around the lake at High Hampton in Cashiers, N.C. (where we met Lynwood).

I had it hung somewhere else, but changed my mind, so it'll be hung here soon!

Champagne bottle lamp was one my mom had gotten made.

I decided to go with yellows in the living area. This particular pillow was a free gift,

from the amazingly talented designer friend of mine, Jessica Duncan.

I told her my plan, and she just happened to have this pillow case in the trunk of her car!

Guess that's how designers roll. The other pillows came from Pottery Barn and Ikea.

My older sister, Jennifer, has great taste, knows what will go best where, and has

learned pretty well how to stretch a dollar. She came in after I'd had most

everything in place, and just completed the look. I call her my finisher. She brought

some live plants, which scare me a little. But so far, we're a month in, and I haven't killed any!

**If you're looking for someone to be your finisher, I've got lots of talented friends.

One in particular just started her own business doing just this, and you can check out more details

and entertaining design posts and home ideas on Tyler's blog here.

This trunk came from another antique store in Augusta (they've got some great ones downtown), and

little sister, Robin Anne, bought this for my birthday. I think it's pretty much perfect

as a coffee table, considering the space we have to work with.

Since we've been on the house hunt, Jamie has been talking about wanting a "man" chair. While this

wasn't exactly what he had in mind, we got this for a steal from...you guessed it...an Augusta

antique store. It's a little worn, but for the price we paid, it's perfect for now. I bought an ottoman from

Home Goods to give him a spot to prop up his feet. The leathers don't exactly match, but it was cheap,and I just

threw a blanket over it (and put it away when we have company!) Side table is from another Augusta antique

store. Lamp base is from Ikea. Shade from Target. Mirrored window I got custom made years ago.

Sidenote: We do intend to stain our front door. Just hasn't happened yet!

My sister and brother-in-law live in Carrollton, GA, which happens to be the hometown of Steve Penley.

They're friends (in fact, my twin nieces are the same age as one of his children, and for their birthday

one year, they each got a beautiful Penley canvas of their own), and when my sister ran by to

grab us a print, he whipped this up real quick. We were super excited to have our first Penley!

This piece is one of the most traditional pieces in our home, but I love it. Originally we it thought it

it was a hunt board, but realized it was something else I can't remember the name of. And we got it from

Lofty Ideas in Augusta for a steal! Great storage and beautiful wood. The cane stool tucked below

was a wedding gift from our dearest family friends, the Goldsmiths.

Thus ends the tour of our living room, and all of my commentary. It's really the most complete room in the house, but I'm working to get the others together soon. So more pics to come.