OH BABY!

I have to admit one of my favorite spaces to design is a nursery.  Just the thought of a sweet little angel sleeping in a well-organized and of course adorable space brings a smile to my face! 

In 2011 I found out I was pregnant with a little boy and of course I was over the moon!  I started buying tiny baby boy clothes, having things monogrammed (I am a sucker for it!) and naturally I could not wait to start planning the nursery.  At the time one of my best friends and fellow designers, Emily Hewett, was in the first year of her blog and design business so we decided Baby Oliver’s nursery would be a great project to collaborate on…I mean two designer minds are better than one, right?!?

I knew that I wanted something more modern and not overly “baby”.  To achieve this look simple furniture and geometric patterns was the way to go.  I had tans, browns and accents of blue throughout the rest of my house so I went with something different for his room and used gray, white and yellow for the color scheme.

Jenny Lind crib

Waverley Cross Section Charcoal fabric

Little Castle Monaco II Glider

Yellow "love" pillow

With the simplicity of everything going into the room it definitely needed a “wow” factor.  Something to grab your attention when you walked in.  So Emily and I put our creative caps on and decided it needed stripes…chunky, gray and white stripes around the entire room.   And to this day that is one of my favorite things I have done in our entire house.  We get compliments on it ALL of the time!  You can see the full blog post she did for the design board and finished product HERE.  And since I was only one day away from giving birth when the room was coming to completion she even came over and hung the paper poufs over the crib and helped with all of the finishing touches.  Aren't I a lucky gal to have her as a friend?!?

Finished Room photo

Finished Room photo

And when we moved to our current home a few years ago I moved it all with me and recreated it as closely as possible...stripes and all!  However, this little boy got lucky and his room has quite a bit more space so I added a couple of bookcases on each side of the crib.  They are simple white IKEA bookcases and I painted the backs of them yellow to add some pizzazz.  Since he was almost 1 when we moved I did not keep the paper poufs over the crib.  Knowing his room would be changed within the next year or so I did not want to spend a lot of money on anything so I decided on a DIY canvas to be centered over his crib.  I bought a blank square canvas, some wood letters and acrylic paint to coordinate with his room.  It was a very inexpensive project but turned out to be a cute addition to his new room!

The nursery ended up exactly how I envisioned it!  My sweet little baby is now three and has a totally different room but this was a fun trip down memory lane for me so thanks for joining me! 

OUTDOOR FUN

Clear skies, warm sunshine, green grass and beautiful bright flowers…doesn’t the thought of that make you want to spend all day outdoors?  We are right in the midst of spring here in Texas, which means a lot of our days are filled with lovely rays of sunshine without being scorching hot yet.  Since I have two young boys and work from home now, I try and find any excuse I can to get outside and enjoy the season. 

Over the last couple of months all of my home décor catalogs are all about outdoor furniture.  And it sure does make me daydream about being on a patio overlooking a beach or a lake or even a lavish garden.  Here are some of my favorite outdoor spaces I have been seeing.

Picture from Ballard Designs

Naturally, the neutral tones of this space catch my eye.  The wicker furniture looks so comfortable and I like the combination of the natural wood occasional tables with it.

Picture from Pottery Barn

And in my opinion, you can’t ever go wrong with a classic black and white scheme whether it’s indoors or outdoors.  The bold, striped drapes are my favorite!  And any pop of color works great when added to this kind of scheme.  The black iron furniture is striking as well but unfortunately with the heat of the Texas sun it would end up getting way too hot for my liking.

Picture from West Elm

Picture from Architectural Digest

I have always wanted an outdoor dining space that can be used for casual family meals or a fun dinner party!  I love the simple, wood slat chairs with the “X” bench and table in the first picture.  And I would take that view any day!  

And the large square table that faces the stone fireplace in the second photo would be such a great space to entertain.

But back to reality…it really makes me want to redo our backyard. I must admit that our patio needs some major TLC.  One of the main reasons we bought our house was because it sits on a decent size lot so we have a lot of yard space and the previous owners had not done much to it.  Which is nice that we have a blank slate to work with but that kind of update can be quite pricey and really isn’t in the budget right now.  So for now, I will do some small updates and DIY projects to get it into shape for spring and summer!  I will keep you posted on how it is all going!

COLOR ME HAPPY

What does your home décor say about you?  Is it full of neutrals or do you prefer to play with color?  Or maybe you have mostly neutrals with pops of color that can be changed throughout the year depending on the season or your mood? 

Although my house is full of different shades of taupes, grays, whites and off-whites, I love getting to decorate with fun, bright colors. They just seem to exude happiness!  Which is why the Virtual Design Boards I worked on for some good friends was so much fun!  They moved into their house a few years ago and wanted to make some changes so when Britney contacted me to help them I couldn’t have been more excited! 

Today I am sharing the Virtual Design Boards I completed for the Family Room and Dining Room.  In the Family Room the inspiration was a couple of paintings that are filled with beautiful, vibrant colors.  My apologies for the grainy phone picture!

I selected sofas in a darker gray since they have twin boys that are coming up on their 2^nd birthday and added punches of color through accent pillows and other accessories throughout the room.

The Dining Room Virtual Design Board was more for accessories, art and a chandelier.  The chandelier was originally selected for the Kitchen but she decided it was a little too much for that space and moved it to the Dining Room.  Great call on her part…it looks amazing and really makes a statement in there!

To top it all off they didn’t just stop with getting new furniture and accessories but they also updated their fireplace, Entry floor and Kitchen.  And I was able to shop with Britney for the selections!  Could a girl ask for anything more fun than shopping for design selections with a great girlfriend?!?  More to come on those details in the next couple of weeks along with before and after pictures of how everything has turned out!

NEUTRAL ZONE

A couple of months ago I received the privilege to do a couple of Virtual Design Boards for some of my favorite people…The Smiths!  I have known Scott since high school and feel like I have known his wife, Kelly, for the same amount of time.

We have shared so many great times together, including a trip to Hawaii for our wedding, so when Kelly reached out to me to help with their newly built home I was honored to do so.  Since they live outside of the Dallas/Fort Worth area a Virtual Design Board was the perfect option for them!  Quite a bit of furniture (sofa, chairs, coffee table, dining table and chairs) had already been purchased but they wanted some assistance in the final details for their Family Room and Dining Room.  The larger, substantial pieces of furniture are crucial but it doesn’t quite feel like home until you have accent tables, rugs, pillows, draperies, and all of the other accessories.  So my job was to gather all of those items for them!

I had so much fun working on this project for them as we have a very similar style when it comes to design…loving the neutrals with some contrasts of charcoal gray!

I know things are on order and I can’t wait to see how the rooms turn out!  And of course I will share the pictures with you once I get them.  Thanks again Scott and Kelly for letting me be a part of this.

If you are interested in having me complete a Virtual Design Board for any rooms in your home please contact me at tessa@interiorsbytessa.com.

OUR GALLERY WALL

Hi everyone!  It’s been a couple of weeks since my last post…life has been so crazy!  We have had snow and ice several times here in hot and sunny Texas over the last couple of weeks, which has had me staying inside with the kiddos! 

Knowing that this was our “forever” home I have been so afraid to make any mistakes in this house so I put off hanging anything on our walls for a long time…a year and a half to be exact!  My husband came to me one day and told me that we needed to make our house finally feel like a home.  

My design philosophy for this house is less is more.  I love simple, classic style when it comes to our space.  Plus…having two boys means the more I have, the more there is to be broken!  I have been giving you insight about our Breakfast Room and the final piece to the puzzle being complete was personalizing it.  Above our coffee bar, which I showed you here, is a beautiful, white, straight from the 90’s intercom system. Since I don’t have a lot of places for picture frames and I wanted to detract from the intercom I decided this would be the perfect place to put up a gallery wall. 

I looked through tons of magazines and all over the web to find some inspiration pictures of what I would want.  I got a lot of great ideas but this is the one photo that really spoke to me.

So I started shopping. I found the mirrored frames first from West Elm and selected a variety of sizes.  You can find them here.  They were more than I wanted to pay so I asked Santa to bring them to me for a Christmas present!  I also added some decorative mirrors and monograms, which are just wood letters I painted.  The other frames I got from Hobby Lobby…for half off of course!  I bought several sizes of the same white and silver frames and a few shadow boxes along with some simple white mat board and linen fabric.  The linen fabric was used as the backing for the white frames and the white mat board was for the simple white frames.   This totally transformed what could have been boring picture frames!

Now it was time to decide what to put in them.  Mostly, I used pictures but I snuck in a few quotes that spoke to me as well.

Preparing to put the gallery wall together and get it all hung was definitely a chore!  I laid it all out on the Family Room floor first…after Oliver was in bed of course!

And then it went up on the wall…and I absolutely LOVE how it turned out!

Also, I am so glad I decided to put it in our Breakfast Room.  It’s a space we use every day so I get to really enjoy it.  And I think it takes away from the intercom as much as possible.  Tell me what you think about it!  Do you have a special place that you display your family photos?

Buffet to Coffee Bar

When we moved into our new house there were several pieces of furniture that we had to find a new use for.  One of them was this console table. 

We bought it when Oliver, our first son, was born and kept it in our Family Room.  All of our bedrooms were upstairs and as previously stated in my last post we did not have any storage downstairs so we needed something to put diapers and wipes, blankets and baby toys in.

In the new house it became a buffet in our Breakfast Room.  It held the usual items...table linens, napkin rings, silverware and other small accessories.

One day my husband decided he wanted a new, fancy coffee maker.  Works for me!  I put him in charge of shopping and purchasing the new machine.  You all know how that goes...he picks out the one he likes and that's it.  That's the one we are getting.  Well, he didn't look at any dimensions and of course once he gets it home and set everything up we realize it doesn't fit on the Kitchen countertops.  YIKES!!  What do we do?  I guess our buffet is going to be our new coffee bar!

Since we were changing the use of the table I wanted to give it a face lift!  I had only painted a small nightstand before but figured this couldn't be too bad.  It definitely worked within my budget...some paint, glaze and new hardware.  And other than painting outside in the heat of the Texas summer it wasn't too bad of a project!

Here is how it all started...by removing the hardware and doors.

Next step is to bring out the primer!  I use Kilz Primer for all of my painting projects that need priming.  For me, this is the worst part of the project because I always think, "Ohhhhhh no!!  What did I do?"  I am afraid it will end up looking like this after it is painted as well.  Thank goodness I am always wrong.

Time for paint!  I knew I wanted something dark and I decided on a charcoal gray.  Here it is with the first coat of paint.

I knew it needed at least two more coats of paint but something about it just wasn't doing it for me.  Maybe because the lines of the buffet were so simple and clean it just needed some more pizazz!  So I decided to add a black glaze to it and that did the trick!  I had never used glaze before so I was a little nervous but it really was easy.  It added depth and texture to this piece of furniture.

After the final coat of varnish was dry I reinstalled the doors and moved it back into the house.  Now all it needed was a little sparkle...so I bought some new crystal cabinet knobs from Anthropologie for the doors and drawers.  These were perfect because the tied in the crystal and style of the chandelier in the Breakfast Room.

It definitely adds the weight and substance that was needed to the Breakfast Room.  And I really love having a coffee bar!  Everything is right there and easy to access for all of our coffee needs.  It still houses table linens but also all of our coffee mugs and cups and I added a tray with some hand towels, small basket for Keurig cups and sugar dish.

So there you have it!  My Breakfast Room DIY project changing a buffet for baby stuff into a coffee bar!  It was not a painful project and I am happy with how it turned out...especially the price!

Breakfast Room: Before & After

When my first son was born I remember asking my husband, "How long do you think it will be until we are ready to move?"  "Anywhere from one to five more years," was his response.  Well, the floor plan was not very functional for a growing family; there was no yard space and absolutely NO place to put anything.  Now I know every woman complains about not having enough storage space but in addition to small closets upstairs there was not one single linen or coat closet or even a pantry.  Needless to say, eleven months later we were on the move.  And for us, we hope it is the last move for us for a long time!

The new house was built about 20 years ago so there is a lot we want to do to it to make it ours and since we doubled the square footage of our previous home we were lacking a lot of furniture and decorative accessories.  And as much as I would love to have everything completed at once it just is not feasible for us.  The good news about this is that most everything in my house is budget friendly and I have a LOT of before and after pictures to share with you!

Today I am going to give you a glimpse into our breakfast room since this was the first room to be completely finished.  Here is how it started...green walls and a tiny white light fixture that screamed 1990!

Let the changes begin!  I started by having the walls painted Worldly Gray by Sherwin Williams and purchased some new furniture.  I also removed the light fixture and replaced it with a bronzed, crystal beauty!

Whew!  Now it's starting to look more like me!  Even just those few changes made a world of difference.  Next on the list to get were a rug and some draperies.  I love the texture and additional color the round, seagrass rug brings into this space.  For the draperies I knew that I wanted AND needed some pattern because although I am a sucker for soft neutrals, it sure can get washed out.  I did want to keep the tone on tone feel so I used a taupe and off-white Greek key fabric.  I was a little worried I would get tired of the pattern after some time but I still LOVE them!  I truly believe drapes can transform a room.

 

  

What do you think?  Is it a change for the better?  I have to admit the table is never set like this but I am so happy with how it all came together!  Such a change from when we originally moved in.  The last item on my checklist for this space is replacing the tile with some beautiful wood floors but that will be a ways down the road.  Believe me I will let you know when that happens!