I will first tell you a few things we WANT to do with it, and then post some pictures showing you the space we have to work with.
1. We want a picture of Jesus Christ somewhere in the living room. (Oh, and does anyone know of any cool pictures of Christ that shy away from the Greg Olsen/Simon Dewey genre?)
2. We want a framed "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" somewhere. One idea I had, which I am SO willing to change, is to do a framed Family Proc. with different size pictures of our families all around it . . . any ideas on how that would look?
3. We want some curtains up. Our pervasive living room coloring is brown, dark brown, and more brown, soooo . . . maybe something with some kind of color?
4. We have a "Carper, est. 2009" tile hanging up & a drawing of the temple & our marriage certificate hanging up that we want to keep up, but are also willing to move them.
So, that being said, here are the pictures!
The back wall of our living room is a gigantic built-in book shelf. We have several empty shelves that we could potentially put frames on.
This is the "Carper, est. 2009" tile. It is currently hanging next to the front door.
The temple drawing & our marriage certificate. They are currently on this small wall right next to the stairs.
The big empty wall that we want to put SOMETHING on. It extends all along one side of our living room. We have nothing over the piano or on the wall in between the couch & the TV. Ugh. You can also see a corner of the front window that we want to put a curtain on (on the far right of the picture next to the TV). Maybe red? Floor length or window length? I have no idea!
The other half of the long wall with nothing on it! Bah. We are also open to moving our lamps around, FYI.
So there you are! Put on your decorating caps and help a hopelessly un-crafty sista' out! HELP HELP HELP!
** Also, those of you who use blogger, how the heck do you post pictures easily? Every time I want to insert a picture, it puts it at the top of my blog, instead of where my cursor is. So, I have to drag the picture all the way to where I want it. ANNOYING! Any tips?
So there you are! Put on your decorating caps and help a hopelessly un-crafty sista' out! HELP HELP HELP!
** Also, those of you who use blogger, how the heck do you post pictures easily? Every time I want to insert a picture, it puts it at the top of my blog, instead of where my cursor is. So, I have to drag the picture all the way to where I want it. ANNOYING! Any tips?
Ok, this is going to be long....
ReplyDelete1) Minerva Teichert all the way. http://tinyurl.com/28kx43t
2) If you're thinking of doing a picture wall, make sure you either go completely symmetrical, or completely not. I like to lay pictures out on the floor before I start hanging them so I can get the positioning spacing just the way I want them, before I start making holes in the wall. Maybe go for a unifying theme of frames that are all the same color rather? A mix can look good too, but then make sure that you have a good mix, and not three frames that match and one that doesn't.
3) Either length of curtain should be fine, as long as you make sure you give yourself plenty of head room above the window. Taller curtains make your window look bigger and the ceilings higher. Also, if you go for window length ones, give yourself a good six inches (at least) of fabric below the window.
Color-wise, I would try to pick a color from something you already have in your room. Like I noticed a copper-goldy color in the fabric on your lamp by the door and again on the pillow on the couch. That can tie things together without getting all matchy-matchy.
4. You could move your tile, temple and marriage certificate to the same wall as the family proclamation and photos and make it a family wall. Or you could maybe break them up and hang them throughout your house, not just in one room.
Continuing in a new comment - because I'm wordy AND opinionated.
ReplyDeleteOK, your bookshelf is going to be the main feature of your living room, no matter what you do. So I would focus a lot of attention on prettying it up. Maybe try splitting your books up so you have more room for "other stuff" (frames, decorative stuff) throughout the shelf, if that makes sense. You could also lay some books horizontally, just to break up the monotony of shelf after shelf of books. Maybe try organizing your book according to color, like here: http://tinyurl.com/2wcvqvs
Oh, and maybe split your lampage up, PS. Share the love.
Done!
And for blogger, use the "Edit HTML" option and just copy and paste the photo tag. If that makes sense.
I'm with Tamsin on the Minerva Teichert. How about using the painting's colors to purchase/find/make accent items like pillows, plants and/or nick nacks for the book shelves/tables.
ReplyDeleteAre the lamps all different metals? You could spray paint them all one color, or black and put new coordinating shades on them.
I had such a hodge podge of stuff that I have used the color black to sort of tie it all in. All my picture frames, lamps and bookshelves are/will be black.Since I got my floral couch with multi colors the stuff in the room sort of comes together. My fake plants are a welcome splash of green.
I wish you luck with all this.
Ooh, so many good suggestions!
ReplyDeleteTamsin, what do you mean by "give yourself plenty of head room" under the comment about curtains . . .
Mom, the lamps are a problem. We like a few of them, but hate one of them (the yellow one!--ugly!), but right now it's what we have. Hmmmm.....the changing up the shade thing is a good idea.
Ack! The more I think about what I want to do, the more I get overwhelmed! Sheesh! Keep sending me ideas people! I love it!
I mean, don't hang your curtains smooshed an inch above the window. I think they need to be at least four inches above the window to not look weird. Make sense?
ReplyDeleteIs spray painting the yellow one an option? It might make the actual lamp not so gross. Black will hid an ugly shape.
ReplyDeleteHmmmmmm, if that bookshelf has way too much brown in it you could tack a lighter (color coordinating of course) fabric on the backs of the shelves to lighten up the heavy (with all that brown)wall.
ReplyDeleteI will make my commentary in person, as I have that power living down the street and all, and I am a spacial person, not a wordy one... :)
ReplyDeleteHey Erinator ----
ReplyDeletePaint that brown bookshelf Black--shiny !
Get into the 21st century already.
If youre renting and its built in to the wall, just call and ask the landlord if you can paint it. They probably wont care.
Netti-bones
I love this panting of Christ walking on the water. I just have a little print of it that I bought from the BYU bookstore. Someday I'd like a big one, but they're pretty pricey!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.whiteelegance.com/Art/Inspirational/Christ-Walking-on-the-Waters/p54