New Home Keepsake Idea

Myself and my boyfriend, Matt, moved out of our family homes over a year ago and when we did we were gifted with many new home cards. I've kept hold of them all, because I'm basically a hoarder, as I wanted to try and do something creative with them so that we'd be able to and display them. I came up with the idea of making a collage, almost like a patchwork quilt, that we could put up in a frame on our photo wall. 

Last weekend, when I finally had the motivation, I decided to start my little project and get it up on the wall.

To create this I basically looked at each card and identified the most interesting parts. Using the edge of another card, whilst resting on a wooden chopping board, I scored a few squares into the front of each card with the scissors. I did this rather than cutting to give it a sharper edge. From the cards, I also picked the key people we wanted to feature and cut their names out, as you can see on the picture above. Some of the people named in the cards are no longer with us so I just thought it would be nice to have them highlighted on here.

Then when all the squares were cut out I set to organising them on a piece of A4 card and sticking them down with a glue stick. I am really pleased with the end result as it just brings together all the designs from each card and displays some of the most important people in our lives.

What do you think? Is this something you'd do in your house?

Hallway highlights

Today I thought I'd bring you a little inspiration for decorating your hallway by showing you some key pieces in mine. I know hallways aren't the most exciting places to decorate but we have a few cute bits in ours.

First is our arch 'window' mirror. This is from Barker and Stonehouse. I really wanted it when we first saw it so we decided to get it not knowing where exactly in the house it would go. After being in the house a good few months we got the hallway painted and had new flooring laid then finally found the best spot to put it. Matt's Dad and Uncle kindly put this up for us as we'd have no clue how. It's such a heavy mirror! This does really work where we've positioned it as it bounces the light from the front door window brilliantly making the hall much brighter. Also, most importantly, we can check our appearance on the way out of the house.

Next to the mirror, we have a little table with a phone and lamp sitting on top. Initially, I bought a really cheap phone from ASDA when we first moved in as I thought, who really uses their home phone? After a while of being in the house, we found the other phone to be really flimsy and not easy to use so we splurged on a new one. This blue retro phone was from John Lewis and I think it was the style that both of us were looking for. The little table was from a store called At Home which is local to us in Stockton. It was the last one which was lucky for us and I just think it's cute and very functional.

When we moved in there was a huge fuse box sat behind the front door. Very unattractive. Matt was keen to cover this in some way so we got a joiner in who made us this little cute wooden slide box. Of course, we had to 'decorate' this and add a few bits to it. We picked up these little fake plants and glass stopper bottle from John Lewis and they went perfectly. However the bottle was empty, so Matt took some of my dried black beans out of the cupboard and decided to fill it. Although I was down on black beans, I do think this looks really effective.

Lastly is the light fitting that we chose for our hall. It's very basic but it's exactly the style that myself and Matt like, very industrial. This was from the Portrack Lighting Centre in Stockton and it came in silver or gold but for our hallway, we thought this colour went much better. We also bought a special bulb for this in which you can see the filament when the light is on. A little like old fashioned light bulbs.

So what do you think of our little hallway? We personally love it. It's a nice space to welcome people to our home.

Have you got any home post? Link below!

Spend some time in our spare room

Ever since we moved into our two-bedroom house last year, we've had plans for the second bedroom. No, not baby plans. We're too selfish for that right now. Our plans were to create a room for both of us to enjoy our separate hobbies - gaming and blogging. When we started discussing what we wanted to do with this room I think we both got a bit more creative than we did when planning our living room. As I've said in other posts, we love the industrial style. I'm talking exposed brick, reclaimed wood, lots of metal and even a little steampunk. You'll see that a lot of that comes across in the way we've put together the spare bedroom.

So as you can see a crazy selection of furniture, little nick-knacks and a whole bunch of fake plants. When shopping for this room we wanted the items to be different. Nothing you could really get from the high street and I think we achieved that. First, we had some dark flooring put down and contrasted this with white walls and white exposed brick wallpaper. We found the massive light fitting on Etsy and knew we had to have it. It is different, so quirky and goes with the space brilliantly.

We picked a tweed sofa, a reclaimed wooden TV unit, a shipping container shaped sideboard and a 'post sorting' desk. I adorned a lot of the surfaces with fake plants, all from Ikea, and lots of pretty candles. Yes, it's a little eccentric but it's exactly what we wanted. 

We now use this room for PS4 sessions with the lads, a quiet area to blog and a room to watch Netflix in before bed. We really love this room and the way it's come together. It will be a shame when we eventually have to move.

What's the story of your home?

I've only just moved out this year into a house of my own my boyfriend. We are pretty similar in our tastes and want our house to look very sleek and simple yet stylish. At present we have only fully redecorated two rooms in our house but we've put our stamp on the others in many different ways. We have a good-sized two bedroom semi-detached house in the North East that we picked because of the quiet location, lovely garden and the potential we saw for each of the rooms. I've already done a tour around my living room and bathroom in previous posts but I've not touched on our bedroom. Your bedroom is somewhere you come to relax, snuggle and have dreams about anything and everything.

I've come to have a real love for the colour blue and it seems to appear in all my interior design ideas. For the bedroom, I didn't want it to be too girly so we went with a deep dark blue for our accent wall. The other walls are painted a creamy colour rather than white because of the stark contrast this would have created. I brought my bed with me from my old house but we bought new furniture. All from Ikea, but all beautiful and sleek in white. I think the white bedside tables and set of draws look great against the dark blue wall as it provides a bit of brightness.

In addition to the main items in the room, we also have little knick-knacks such as a stand to present my perfumes, a little vintage flower bowl to hold my rings and our two matching white touch lamps. What I like most about this room is our canvas that sits on the wall above the bed. I got this canvas made for my boyfriend last Valentine's day and it has been packaged away until we got into our house. I feel like this is the perfect place to for it to be as it quotes one of our favourite songs - Arctic Monkeys, I Wanna Be Yours. So there you have it, the inspiration for my bedroom and the explanation behind all the little things in it. Hillary's Blinds are asking everyone what is the story behind their home. Get involved and share your stories!

The nine best bits about having your own home

Me and my boyfriend have recently moved into our own home. We love it. We've decorated the living room and bedroom to how we want it and now it is a case of saving up pennies to get the rest of the house done! Over the few months that we've been in, we have appreciated the little things about being in the house by ourselves. In my opinion, these are the nine best bits about having your own home.

1. You can wear as many clothes as you want - I don't know about you but my mum always wanted me to get the wear out of my clothes before putting them in the wash. Now that I do all the washing I can wear something for five minutes then decide it needs a wash. In the end, it is just more work for me but then again I kind of enjoy the washing...
   
2. Knowing all the post will be yours when you get home - It was always a bummer getting home to see lots of post on the floor but see that none of it was yours. Whenever I get home now all the post is either mine or Matt's but the problem is with the digital age is that we barely get any - instead, we get emails!
   
3. Your own style is in every room of the house - As we are the ones paying for the house we get to decorate it to our taste. It wouldn't be the same if say I decorated it all, or if Matt decorated it all but I think we have a happy medium which is sleek, classy and modern.
   
4. No one messes with your TV recordings - When I watched the main TV at home and had recordings set anything could happen if there were two going at once and someone wanted to watch TV. It was either your recording or another that would be deleted, and would they find another time it was on and set it for you? Sometimes but not always and then you've missed an episode! Now I get to set what I want safe in the knowledge that Matt won't delete it - although I do make sure I have only one recording going at once!
   
5. No one stealing my clothes - At home, I would notice that a lot of my clothes would mysteriously disappear from my wardrobe and appear in my sister's. I wonder how that would happen... but then what was worse is that because Mum saw her wearing them she would give the clothes back to her when they were washed. Err Hello they are mine! Now obviously I don't have that problem! There is a good 10 minutes between my wardrobe and my sister.
   
6. Not getting moaned at for using too much water or electricity - As per point 1, we now pay for our bills so we can use as much as we want and know that we will have to face the consequences in the end...
   
7. Picking whatever food you want - Luckily for me, this means being able to pick up more fruit and vegetables to cook meals and having more choice. Also picking up pop tarts and biscuits, but shhh!
   
8. Having lots of space - We've both gone from having a bedroom (Matt's was like a shoebox) to having a whole house to ourselves so it is a huge difference for us. Having so many rooms is great as we can go where ever we please with only each other to answer for.
   
9. Being with your boyfriend - Obviously, you can have your partner around your house when you want at home but you have to ask or let people know they are round and we both had our own homes to get back to. Now we've got only one and can see each other all the time! This has to be the best perk of having your own space!

What do you think? Do you agree or do you have any others? Let me know!

If you don't have your own house are you looking forward to the above nine points?

Yankee Candle Wax Tarts

I own many candles. Tea lights, Yankee Candle jars, home-made candles, votives and Glade Christmas candles but I had never tried wax tarts. So one lunchtime when I fancied spending some pennies I ventured into House of Fraser and indulged in some Yankee Candle scents.

I picked up a tart burner that would fit in with my living room which featured a white ceramic (well I think it is) open flower which sits on a black metal base. The flower holds the tart and the tea light sits below to melt it. Simple.

I picked up four Yankee Candle wax tarts all together; Champaca Blossom (burning in the holder), Paradise Spice, Black Cherry and Lake Sunset. These are all quite sweet smells so if you are into musky ones I wouldn't suggest picking these up!

When I first lit the tea light and left it for the wax tart to melt I could really smell the fragrance. As I've continued to burn it (at different times) I feel the smell is getting a little more faint each time. I'm yet to get to the end so I can't say what is left in the holder but I do hope it all burns up so there is no scent contamination.

Although my first foray into wax tarts I have to say I quite enjoy them, so much so I've bought some more. That may just be because I am a hoarder...

The Living Room - styling our home

Since moving into our new house we've been working tirelessly to make it ours. The first two rooms were the bedroom and the living room. We are really happy with what we've achieved so I wanted to do a post to show it off! Here is what it looked like when we moved in...

Photo from Rightmove

We basically stripped the wallpaper, painted every surface, had the carpets cleaned (we are clean freaks!), changed the light fixtures (we have a dimmer!) and added our own furniture. Here is what it looks like now...

As you can see we've gone for a dark grey accent wall with white furniture but also some wooden furniture. With the light shades, we've added a pop of mustard colour which we hope to couple with some accent pillows to finish the room.

We decided to have a two-seater and a chair on one side of the room and the TV, unit and bookshelf on the other with the coffee table in the middle of the room. The TV is up on the wall which looks super cool and I think it helps keep the room looking spacious even though we have quite a bit in there. We've also got a small dining table coming from Baker and Stonehouse for the right corner as you enter the room but that probably won't be here until July as it is a 20 week lead time!

We've added many little things to the room like candles, flowers, DVDs and books to personalise our space. We have amazing double doors which open on to the garden in which we get the sun all day so the front room is always toasty. This means we need to get some blinds which we will probably be getting soon.

As I say, overall I am really pleased with what we've achieved as we think it looks really stylish and modern but still very comfy.

The big move.

I'm not sure if you've noticed but I've been blogging a lot less lately...well I've just moved into my first house with my boyfriend! We took some time off work to get the house cleaned and painted and finally moved in on Wednesday. It was all pretty stressful with people everywhere but they really helped us get the house to where we wanted it for our move-in day.

I packed up my room in my Mum's house and it was sad to see it empty and know that I wouldn't sleep there again. It is a weird feeling but I am happy in our new house and I can see us doing well. I can't wait to get everything unpacked and give it all a place in the house. At the moment the spare room is just a storage facility and as I didn't see a need to label boxes at the time I do not know where anything is. Clever...

In the collage above, in the middle is our new house the day we moved in, then to the right is our food hamper from Matt's Mum and below that is the first new home card we received with some yummy chocolates. After that is me in my empty room at my Mum's house, the blue and grey room is our newly painted bedroom ready and awaiting furniture and lastly is our Friday night tea courtesy of our new toastie maker!

I have a few more house posts to come when we have put up a few more pieces of our Ikea furniture so keep an eye out.

Ideas for a potential new house

Last week me and my boyfriend starting looking into buying a house a little more seriously. We've booked an appointment with a financial advisor and even went on our first house viewing. All very serious and very exciting. I'm not sure if this is just a girl thing (as Matt has no interest in this for now...) but as I've looked more into houses I have been thinking more and more about how I want different rooms of the house to be decorated. Now we don't have an endless budget so whatever I pick may just be a dream but I think there is always some way you can get what you want. I've been trailing pinterest looking for ideas for the house and below are a few of my favourite picks!

Kitchen

In the kitchen I am really a fan of large 'brick sized' tiles as a back splash although I am not sure what colour I'd go for. As well as this I want my kitchen to be slightly grunge and would love some exposed lighting like the second picture. Lastly I have to have some creative storage in my kitchen. At home I hate having to rummage through the cupboards to find what I want. I need some clever ways to store things that makes them easily accessible.

Living Room

For the living room I am really keen on a sort of retro vibe to it with clean lines and a sofa like the one in the third picture (although I don't know how comfy that would be). I am in love with having a photo frame wall, whether this be in the living room or going up the stairs. Finally I would like to think that we could have some quirky up-cycled items in our house just like this cool coffee table in the second picture.

Bathroom

I'd like to keep the bathroom quite clean and white, maybe with some sort of accent colour, I'm not too sure on that. What I am sure about is that I need lots of clever storage! The amount of beauty and shower products we have between us is quite substantial so we would need some interesting and sensible places to store it all.

Bedroom

The bedroom is the room in which I have the least ideas. I want the bedroom to be somewhere that we both like so I don't want it to be girly but I also don't want it to be cold and masculine. I want something very bright, maybe slightly retro with a few bold colours but most of it clean and white. I'll have to get approval off the boyfriend first though ;)

What do you think? Any ideas that you like? Do you have any house posts? Link me!

> To see how our bedroom, bathroom and living room actually turned out click the links! 

A new way to store my nail polishes!

I've been obsessed with nail polishes for a few years now, always wanting more than I could possibly wear in a year. I would say that I have over two-hundred polishes now from OPI and Chanel to Rimmel and Maybelline. My stash was getting so big it was in two large boxes, so I decided it was time to go big. Lots of people on Instagram had invested in a helmer from Ikea to store their polishes as the draws were tall enough for the polishes to stand upright, which is a must for me. I finally took the plunge and ordered one.

It was a pain to put together (Ikea flatpack!) but we managed it. When I say we I mean me, my sister and my dad. A three-man job...

This is a bit of a picture heavy post but I wanted to show you the mass of nail polishes I own! Probably more than most salons do. I've organised the draws by the colour of polish and think it worked out pretty well.

If anyone wants their nails done, come on round mine.

Do any of you think you'll invest in a helmer? Does anyone think they have more polishes than me?