One Room Challenge Week Four: Hanged

Here we are at week four of the One Room Challenge, trademarked by Linda @ Calling it Home! I am working on my eight-year-old daughter's bedroom for this round. You can read about my plans, inspiration, and progress in weeks one, two, and three.

While I wait for the wallpaper to come in, I have a million little projects and those were the focus for this past week.

I used some of the principles from week two to hang the gallery wall. I laid all of the frames on the carpet and then started arranging them into columns. Since the frames are a mix of black, white, and gold, I wanted it to feel balanced.

Then I just started eyeballing and pounding nails.

I also stumbled upon a solution for my window treatment problem from last week. These pale pink silk dupioni drapes were in the clearance section at Target (fittingly enough on Pink Sunday), part of the Shabby Chic line. It looks like you can purchase them online at regular price--and proof that sometimes it's better for your pocketbook to go to a store than order online.

These are wider than the blue drapes I had purchased from JCP and showed you a little peek of last week. They are lined which I like. They are also significantly less expensive, so suddenly we have another $100 in the budget (or we will after I make returns)! And I love how the pink of the drapes looks against the blue headboard.

The only drawback is that there is no valance with these. Although I wasn't sure how I was going to hang one, a valance was a big part of creating the effect of a canopy over the bed. Trompe l'oeil for a pretend daybed (I did find this custom upholstered daybed thanks to Pursuit of Style, and would be all over it if money were no obstacle, but my total budget for this project is $300).

For next week I need to work some styling magic on this huge built-in shelving unit. Wish me luck!

Now go check out everyone else in the link-up (154 last week!) and the official participants too.

ORC: Week 3 "The Blues"

Welcome back to my One Room Challenge, hosted by Linda of Calling it Home! I am redecorating my eight year old daughter's bedroom in six weeks. If you want to see where I began, you can read week one here and week two here.

This was a productive week! I got everything ordered that we will need. The price on the Parsons desk even came down! It was delivered with Amazon Prime's two-day shipping, along with some neon feathers for our craft project. 

And, although I would not say that arts & crafts are my jam or likely ever will be, my daughter and I did manage to make a dreamcatcher that looks like the picture in my head.

She added colorful beads from our stash to this wreath form that I've had forever. I tied the shapes inside with yarn and we hung the feathers from bright ribbon that I had purchased for another project last year. Easy peasy! I'm hoping my Native American friends approve.

My husband even took off the old, noisy bi-fold closet doors. That was a great surprise! (Part of my plan but not part of the schedule).

When the closet doors were open, the bedroom door didn't open all the way (and as you can see I've put Bela's dresser in her closet to maximize play space in her room). Not having the doors makes the room feel so much bigger now. 

The only drawbacks to the week were 1. the wallpaper may not arrive in time. It's going to take three weeks because it's coming from the Netherlands (but it was half the price that I expected and I'm getting twice as much!) and 2. the blues...

This is the headboard with the new window treatments. Two very different blues. Can I make it work somehow, or will I need to course correct? I'm just not sure...

Now go check out all the other linking participants here (soooo much good inspiration!!) and the official participants here.

Better than Before

Habits are the invisible architecture of our daily lives, says author and influencer Gretchen Rubin. In her latest book Better than Before she identifies four tendencies that affect how a person is able to change their life.

I am an Upholder, responding equally well to both external and internal motivation. For more explanation and to see which you are, visit Gretchen's blog here. 

This tendency may explain why I'm so keen to read books like Better than Before, to always be on a quest for self-improvement, and to be (quite literally) a Gretchen Rubin superfan.

Gretchen is also the author of the books The Happiness Project (which inspired me to start this blog) and Happier at Home. She considers the new book a prequel to those, as good habits answer the question, “How do you start doing those things that lead to happiness?”

In much the same way that Gretchen considers herself a "street scientist" who can be more influenced by the stories of ordinary change (a datapoint of one), here are my habits.

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Church -- a good friend who has a strong faith asked me at the beginning of Lent if I was going to church regularly and I was sad to say no. Since then, this has become a non-negotiable in my weekend.

Outdoors -- the weather has been so much nicer this week so I've been leaving our doors wide open, but this habit really got its start in the colder temps of winter when I would force myself to walk outdoors.

Housekeeping -- Each week I do an adaptation of the Flylady's weekly home blessing hour that works for me. Every morning I make my bed and every night I run the dishwasher. And I've been decluttering here and there.

Moving more -- I'm really out of shape but I'd like to be strong. So I've been running a little bit, very early in the morning, before it even gets light outside so no one will see me. Today I ran around the block without stopping. My lungs burned and my legs felt like jelly, but I ran for more than the length of an entire Taylor Swift song and that's progress for me.

Eating better -- For me this is all about less sugar. Right now I'm just trying to cut out the obvious culprits especially soda pop. Which makes me an abstainer but in a moderate way.

Reading everyday -- I am making good progress on my GoodReads challenge. Our local library offers audiobooks through the Hoopla app, and since there are many books I want to glean information from but not necessarily read the words, I'm using that to maximize my reading progress!

Email -- I've never had a set time for answering messages and feel so badly when I have unanswered emails, comments, etc. so I'm working on developing a time during my working day to incorporate this necessary function (rather than just try to answer things on the fly).

Similarly, I've had better productivity at the office this year by simply keeping track of my working hours. I use an Excel spreadsheet to record when I arrive, when I leave, and what I've accomplished vs. what needs to be done each day.

These habits fall within the seven categories that Gretchen identifies in the introduction of Better than Before, called "Decide Not to Decide."

I highly recommend this book! Have you read it yet? Do you plan to?

A Few of My Favorite Things

Happy Monday, friends! With spring break and the #OneRoomChallenge last week, I missed my High Friday post. Since we could all use a little treat on a Monday, here a few of my favorite things lately...

beach towel / contest / drink

The Lilly Pulitzer for Target sale starts Sunday. Six days, people! I'm hoping to pick up one of these cute beach towels for a classroom gift. You can view the exclusive first look on Elle here.

Today is the last day for the $500 Loloi giveaway on Bellacor. Click here to enter!

This drink has become my new favorite. It's not sugar free, but it's got to be better for me than soda. And it tastes like a mimosa without the buzz!

I'm almost done reading Better than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives--I hope to write more about habits in another post, but getting ahold of my emails and not eating the muffins in the break room are at the top of my list for today.

This op-ed stirred me...

How about you? What are you reading/drinking/buying right now?