Tag Archives: interactive

Shopping for Your Home Online

Shopping for home furnishings, appliances and more is now becoming more popular than ever. Shoppers no longer feel a need to touch and examine items first hand, preferring the ease of picking out their purchases from the comfort of their homes. New, easier policies, such as being able to order online and pick the item up from the store, or being able to return an unwanted item to the store instead of shipping it back, has made shopping for large items appealing. Still, there are some things you should know when shopping online for furniture, fabrics and more. Here are … Continue reading →

Remove Musty Smells

Do you have some old furniture that has been stored too long in a basement or garage? It happens to the best of us. When we moved to our new home, we used our garage as a staging area for some furniture until the time that we could fix up the walls and rooms. The furniture that didn’t get placed right away, well, when it came time to clean out our garage, we finally decided that we could do without it. We do want to pass it on to others, but unfortunately, a slight musty smell developed from the time … Continue reading →

Hotel Furnishings Go High-Tech

By now I’m sure you are familiar with Westin’s signature Heavenly Bed. The pillow top-mattress bed, introduced almost a decade ago, became an instant hit and is credited with starting a revolution in hotel bedding. (You can now buy your own Heavenly Bed at Nordstrom stores.) The mega-popular bed set off a hotel furnishing war of sorts and Wyndham Hotels fired back with a “Smart Chair” aimed to do for comfortable multi-tasking what the Heavenly Bed did for sleeping. For those of you who don’t frequent Wyndham Hotels the “Smart Chair” is a high-tech furnishing that has integrated pivoting tables, … Continue reading →

How about Some Dual Purpose Furniture for Outdoor Living Spaces?

I love home and garden centers and home improvement centers. I could get lost in these places all day. I like Home Depot as much as my husband does. He even shopped for one of my birthday presents there and his friends all told him he was going to be in big trouble when he gave me a pair of sawhorses for a gift. “Nope, she wants them,” he replied, and he was right. Not only do I want to be able to play outside but I also want to be able to work on my hobbies outdoors too. I … Continue reading →

Looking for Change in the Kitchen, Bedroom, Bath, or Hall? Go Vintage

Vintage decorating is a great idea for adding charm to your home. Vintage or vintage-look fabrics and other items can go a long way toward adding softness, a bit of nostalgia, and a sense of comfort to various spaces. Kitchens, bedrooms, bathrooms, are the most likely rooms to be decorated in a vintage fashion, but the style will work anywhere, and the hallway or entryway is a good example. Try Vintage Chairs Not only can you find unique designs in vintage chairs, but it’s also not usually too difficult to find a one of a kind piece at an antique … Continue reading →

Slipcovers Are Your Friends

If you asked me 10 years ago what I thought about slipcovers I would have simply answered: “I don’t.” Slipcovers? You mean those things that grandmothers and neat freaks cover their sofas with? No way, they were not on my decorating radar. Fast forward to today, and here I am writing a blog about slipcovers and (gasp!) how they’ve become wonderful attributes to my household. So what changed? I gave birth. Contrary to popular belief, the fact that my water broke on our unprotected sofa wasn’t the moment I became a slipcover convert. I think it may have been after … Continue reading →

Save on Furniture with The Three “F”s

Want to save money on new furniture? Try using the three “f”s to furnish your rooms for little cost or even for free! The first “f” in saving on furniture is “freecycle.” In case you aren’t familiar with it, freecycle is a community group in which members give away all sorts of tangible goods from toasters to computers. Furniture is often offered on freecycle. Furniture is usually large and heavy, so people are especially happy when someone comes to take it out of their home. Furniture is just one of those things that seems to always be available. Here in … Continue reading →

Removing Furniture Stains

Furniture and stains are a part of life and there’s no need to panic if odd-looking things have come to roost on your wooden tables, chairs and the like. The thing to do is to get rid of them, send them off and running to someone else’s house, someone you don’t particularly like before they have a chance to reproduce and multiply. Consider these tips for quick stain removal. (Getting rid of those unwanted relatives should only be so easy!) General Stain Removal Make your own all-purpose stain removal for your wooden furniture by combining lemon extract, oil of peppermint … Continue reading →

Reusing What You Have: Beds

It has been mentioned before, and I will say it again, reusing what you have is one of the best ways to be frugal. Many things in our home are reusable, or can serve a different purpose than that it was intended for. Beth McHugh, who writes for the Mental Health blog here at families.com, left a comment on the article I wrote – Reusing What You Have: Baby Stuff. She shared a really cute idea she had, where she turned a doll house into a book shelf. Not allowing her daughter’s outgrown doll house to go to waste, she … Continue reading →

Give Your Furniture A Lift

For the past five years I have drooled over a certain down-filled custom couch from Pottery Barn. I sit on it each time I am in the store, and following my wedding I went in and picked out the fabric, color and cushion style. Two weeks before actually shelling out the money for it I discovered I was pregnant. Needless to say, the money that was supposed to go for the couch went to furnishing my daughter’s nursery instead. Years later, I still don’t have my dream couch, but I still dream about it. So what is the attraction? It … Continue reading →