Day 31– 10 tips to a beautiful home

This post is part of a 31 day series – “31 days to decorate your home on a budget.”  You can read all the posts in this series here.

And if you don’t want to miss a post you can subscribe by email, join me on facebook, or follow this blog in your reader.  Thanks for reading along!

(Picture is my dining room – you can find the before/after post here along with paint and fabric details.)

Today won’t necessarily be a certain theme like decorating with fabric, spray painting, or adding wainscoting, but more like some tips and thoughts on decorating that I hope will be a help to you.  (

1.  Have a budget for your decorating.  I don’t necessarily have a budget like “I want to only spend $50 to re-do/decorate this room” (although if you were doing a complete room re-do, that would be a good idea), but more like price points that I am not willing to go over for certain things.  I am collecting picture frames right now for an upcoming project and have told myself I won’t spend over $1.00 for any 8×10’s or smaller.  And I have found a good number for even less than that (50¢) at yard sales!

2. Concentrate your decorating on one room or area of the house at a time.  Wow, I am bad about this!  Hubby will say” No new projects,  you have 10 projects all started at one and not one is completed!”   So if you start a project, try to finish that one completely before you being something else.  Plus, getting one room “done” helps you sense accomplishment and spur you on to do another room.

3.  Take your time.  Again, work on one room at a time, but don’t feel like your home has to be completely 100% the way you want it TODAY!  I will be the first to tell you my home is NOT!   I have rooms upstairs, I haven’t even touched with my decorating hand.  Having just in the last year or so finally “found my style” and learned much about shopping yard sales, spray painting, and the many things I have discussed in this series,  I have a lot I want to do to make those rooms beautiful too.  BUT I have the same limits you do – TIME and MONEY!   Plus, if my house was completely done, I wouldn’t have any projects to do and dream about and this blog would be very boring read. 😉

4.  Accomplish large projects like room makeovers one step at a time.  We started with this kitchen when we bought out house, and honestly planned on doing everything except gutting it.  We planned to install new flooring, paint, new or refinished cabinets, get new table, install new countertops, and we already put in new appliances when we bought the house.

But we have worked on it steps at a time.  Put up a chair rail, painted, got tile installed, bought a new table set off Craigslist…

And now it is even more “done” with a new paint color, permanent curtains that I love, and new décor.  I would say this room is at a “finished” state for right now, although we still want to work on the cabinets and countertops.

5. Don’t just decorate just to decorate, or buy stuff just to fill space.  Think about what you are buying, only buy it if you LOVE it and it fits your home, your style, and your family.  Otherwise years down the road you will have a huge yard sale of stuff that you wish you hadn’t bought cause you never really liked it.  And if you have something in your home that you don’t really like (but Aunt Sally gave it to you as a wedding present), get rid of it or pack it away!   Maybe have a swap meet with some friends and neighbors and swap out all your outdated or unwanted décor for something new-to-you.  I love shopping my mother-in-law’s yard sale stuff – I always come home with some fun finds!

6. Make your home sparkle.  We talked about this already, but seriously, dusted furniture, sparkling floors, clean windows, clean carpet, touched up paint does wonders to make your home beautiful.

7. Get a friend to help you decorate or give you decorating advice.  Sometimes a fresh set of eyes can help gain a perspective you don’t have.  Switch with her – she gives you some tips on a room at your house, you give her some tips on a room at her house.  Maybe you even swap some accessories in the process too.

8. Make your home personal.    Display family photos, family heirlooms, things that remind you of your family memories or hobbies.  That will make your house feel “home” and special to you.

9.  Stick to a neutral color palette – grays, tans, etc. on the wall.  Then you can add and take away colors in accessories rather easily.  And neutrals never go out of style.

And if I could leave you with one last tip to remember out of this entire whole series it would be this . . .

10.  “It doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful.”  This is Nester’s mantra and it is so true.  Don’t wait until your home is perfectly decorated from top to bottom to enjoy it . . . Enjoy it NOW!   Share your home, have people over, and use it.  Enjoy the process of making your house into a home!   We aren’t perfect and our friends and family still love us . . . your home will probably never be perfect either, but embrace it and love it.   Be content with it.

Stop wishing for that perfect home – look around and realize you already have it – now just do your best to make it as beautiful as you can with the money, time and resources that you have.  But don’t wait to enjoy it!

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That’s it – 31 days to decorate your home on a budget!  (I remember thinking on day 8, that this month was going to take FOREVER, and I was going to run out of ideas before I ran out of days!   But we made it!)

And don’t worry, just because the“31 days to decorate your home on a budget”  series is over, does not mean that the frugal decorating tips end!   Remember, all those unfinished rooms of min – I am going to have fun taking my time to decorate them and share it all with you.  I am even working on some things right now that I talked about in my series – pillows, curtains, painting a room… so I am sure you will be seeing some of those in the near future.  Plus, I am hosting and cooking my very first Thanksgiving in OUR home this year, SOOO EXCITED!   And I will share every detail as I make my menu, plan my formal table, and enjoy having others into the imperfect home that I love!

Thanks for sticking with me these last 31 days.  It has been a fun journey!  If you missed a post or want to go back and reread a few, this post has the links to all 31 posts.

{cj}