Pandemic Decorating

It’s the weekend and week 47 of this pandemic. Not that I have any concept of time anymore. I realized a few days ago that I’d been working at home for 2 months at this point. I don’t know why I was surprised by that but some days I’m surprised at the fact that I’m a fully grown adult with a mortgage. I don’t know why I’m surprised by that either. I’m knocking on the door of 40 and this is the third house I’ve paid a mortgage for. And speaking of my house, I’ve been doing some updates. It may seem odd to do an update on a house we’ve only lived in for a year, but I’ve realized my style has changed a little. When we moved into this house, I brought stuff from the last 2 houses we lived in. Now that I’ve realized my style has changed and that I actually LIKE decorating, I decided to do some small updates. Since we couldn’t go anywhere, I relied on Amazon Prime. Turns out you can spend hours browsing on that app…who knew?

First, I bought this world print for the space behind my dining room table. I’d been searching for something to do there for awhile and I found a few things, but nothing seemed right. I wanted something dark colored against the light wall, but didn’t want anything too boring. I liked this because it was dark, fit well, and because it was so different than anything else I’d found. James loves maps and globes so he approved right away. He hung it up( I’m awful at that too!) and it turned out beautifully. Big shout out to him for taking the time to hang those up because the spacing wasn’t easy! I’d like to get something different to put on the table, but that will come.

Dining area.

A few months ago, I started following an account on Instagram called @missrusticarrow. I was really drawn to her boho style and wanted to do some of that in my house. While I haven’t painted a wall black yet (only because I hate to paint!), I did order some new tribal printed rugs for our kitchen. Then I liked them so much I ordered one for my front hallway too. When we moved in, I had some blue patterned rugs and my husband wasn’t a huge fan. He’s a much bigger fan of the black and cream colored rugs I got. James has been working in the ink industry for 22 years now and is much better with color than I am. I know most wives don’t defer to their husbands when decorating, but I almost always ask his opinion.

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Kitchen rugs and hallway runner

When we first moved here, I purchased a blue and gray shower curtain for the guest bathroom. After getting it home, I realized it was more beige than gray and it’s irritated me ever since. Every once in awhile, I would look at shower curtains but then never buy one. I was looking on Amazon one night and texting with my mom. Then she sent me the curtain I was looking for! My mom is the best and I’m loving the way it looks in the bathroom! The description said it was gray, but it’s more of a taupe color. I still think it looks great. Last week, when the the stores opened up, I went to Tuesday mornings and found this leaf print for $13. After putting up the curtain and print, I decided the rugs from the master bathroom would look better in the guest bath. So off I went in search for more rugs for the master bath. Sticking with the tribal theme, I ordered these cotton area rugs.The space in front of our master shower is kind of an odd size, so I measured everything and figured they would fit. Turns out the measurements didn’t include the tassels on the rugs they they don’t fit as well as I’d planned. I kept the dark gray rug in front of the shower and put the new rug in front of vanity. It makes the bathroom a little more cozy.

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  Guest bathroom

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  Guest bathroom

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  Master bathroom

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  Master bathroom

Those are the only updates I’ve done. No big projects as I hate DIY things. My sister has me convinced I can paint an old bookshelf that I’ve had forever so I may attempt to do that. She’s great at that stuff (see this post for her kitchen cabinets that she repainted!) and I just wish she could come here and help me with mine! I do have other things I want to update in the house. I’d love to get a new rug for the living room but they’re expensive! I also want some stuff to hang on the walls. I really love this print of a Texas Longhorn for our front hallway but I’m not made of money. I do think that sites like Amazon and stores like Marshalls and Walmart can make decorating really affordable. I used to avoid decorating because I always thought it was too expensive but I’m blown away by how some inexpensive things can really transform a room. I didn’t spend more than $50 on any of these updates. You can also update things seasonally but updating the flowers or greenery in the house. For example, you can put pine in a vase for wintertime and change it out to flowers for summer. Fake greenery is really cheap- I’ve found all of mine at Walmart or Dollar Tree.

Other than home updates, I’ve been working and yes, watching Netflix. I watched the series Sweet Magnolias and loved it! I like that it has three strong female leads and how truly relatable it is. Every time I watch it, I want to have margaritas with my friends…even better if it’s at a restaurant. Someday soon this pandemic will be contained and we’ll be able to travel and do things we used to do. For now, we’ve been enjoying drinks on our back deck and Zoom happy hours and coffee dates with our long distance friends.

We’re headed out to golf soon. And by golf, I mean that James will golf and I’ll sit in the cart and drink his beer. The weather here is hot and humid- there’s a reason they call this place “Arkansauna” in the summer. Have a great day readers!

** All opinions are my own. I am not compensated for this post**