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How to Spot Luxury Looking Throw Pillow Covers & The Best Insert Ever
Ladies, I have made all of the mistakes for you and can convey this lesson with the utmost emphasis for your benefit. You can find luxury looking throw pillows for very little money, but you have to know the features that make them look higher end. What were my throw pillow “mistakes”? Really, they are just observations of my decorating adventures, and yes, a few misspent dollars to realize that certain ones never quite rose to the occasion. After years, a lifetime really, of buying throw pillows, analyzing, rearranging, buying different ones, and rearranging my sofas and beds again…I finally learned another lesson, that throw pillow inserts matter. It only…
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The Best Romantic Master Bedroom with Elegant Decor Ideas
Ladies, The master bedroom is meant to be a getaway. One of the first things I ever did as a new wife was make this room a place free of clutter, business, and anything that detracted from feeling relaxed. I looked to what luxury hotels and vacation rentals do. The ones overlooking the ocean in Italy, a vineyard in France, or ones that have an outdoor courtyard or balcony. This was always my romantic master bedroom template from my Mediterranean and French country decor preferences to a flow from indoor to outdoor living. Beautiful vacation destinations do this well because they want people to book and stay. So, if you…
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The Best Fashion Essentials for Day to Evening Elegance
Ladies, Welcome back to a continuation from where we left off about The Best Versatile Dress in a Feminine Classic Wardrobe! When we have this kind of dress in our wardrobe, it is quick and easy to get dressed in the morning to look and feel elegant all day, even into the evening time. Do you ever consider feeling and dressing elegant? Elegant does not mean formal, it applies to every aspect of us in our ordinary day. Elegance from Day to Night Our daytime elegance is the fact that we wear something in a beautiful shape and color, something that not only works in function but what makes us…
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The Best Versatile Dress in a Feminine Classic Wardrobe
Ladies, “Variety is the spice of life” as the old saying goes and even though I enjoy variety in clothing I find myself increasingly more appreciative of the dresses in my wardrobe that do everything. Let me introduce you to the “Everything Dress” Do you have an “Everything Dress”? Mine is a navy blue and white polka dot dress that is for running errands, church, walking, housework, and nice evenings out! Yes it does it all. This one dress transforms to the occasion by the shoe paired with it, the jewelry worn with it, and the hairstyle. This is how to identify an Everything Dress for your Classic Feminine Wardrobe…
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Spring Cottage Garden The Best Roses & Wildflowers
Ladies, For all of the insects that plague the Southern garden, there are as many early blooms. The humidity is descending as the temperatures rise to the upper 80’s already as of May 1st. But as my favorite cool air is now relegated to the nights of enjoying it through the open window, my days are spent in floral bliss and breathing in the heavenly scent of flowers. Finally, flowers For the non-gardener, or the flippant garden-admirer, they may not realize how fleeting flowers can be. One might not realize how many months it takes to finally experience the blossoms and then how quickly they are gone. Our photographs preserve…
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The Best Feminine Fashion for Realistic Daily Style
Ladies, Feminine style does not have to be exclusive to a day when you feel up to wearing something fussier. Up until recent decades, women dressed in their feminine fashions daily and it was not seen as unusual. Our modern fabrics and styles have only become more comfortable, not less, so comfortable feminine style is more realistic than ever. Yet, so much of what we see as “feminine fashion” is not tailored to the outdoor life, a life with children or pets, or messes. I wonder at how clean people must be staying to wear the trendy outfits….white trousers….white button down blouse…towering heels…the truth is, I don’t want the life…
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The Best Decorating Advice & Tips to Your Authentic Style
Ladies, I love decorating advice so much that I enjoy decorating podcasts, blogs, home & garden books and magazines, and how about a good old cruise on Pinterest? But you know what I also love? I love just decorating with what I like. And guess what, I would even call the decorating advice that I go against helpful decorating advice. Why? Because different perspectives help us see something differently and different perspectives help us to analyze why we do or do not ultimately like something. What do you actually like? I want to encourage you to decorate in spite of the trends and current decorating advice but also in light…
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How to Shop & Style Realistic Faux Flower Arrangements & Houseplants
Ladies, The faux floral department is really a beautiful flower shop. The buckets of flowers and stems sing to my heart when they look so realistic. This spring I found some lovely faux stems at one of my favorite places to shop for them, Hobby Lobby, which you can see styled in my home here! Now days, our faux arrangements are not ivy draped out of a basket over kitchen cabinets collecting grease and dust. Not that there is even something “wrong” with that, but there are updated ways to decorate with faux items that make them look more natural, as well as the items looking more realistic now days…
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SPRING DECORATING with Realistic Faux Flowers & Plants from Hobby Lobby
Ladies, Even if you love real flowers and plants like I do, I advise you to not limit yourself by snubbing good faux florals and plants to decorate your interiors! It is an effortless way to decorate for year-round beauty indoors. They are never going to dry and crumble, wilt or die. Once purchased, your faux florals and plants are in your decor to be used again and again in fresh arrangements. Read my article here on identifying the most realistic faux flowers & plants to get your collection going. This spring at Hobby Lobby I bought four of the most realistic items they had (oh they had more good…
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Romantic Flower Garden Design for a Rental House on Budget
Ladies, The gardener must have a plan. But the plan can be “I am craving violas”. Yes, let the flowers romance your decisions. As winter suddenly turned into spring this year as of March, I found myself longing for a long-lost friend, those first blooms of spring during my childhood up North. Violas would appear and then we knew: spring was here. Yet for many years I valued them little. I didn’t think they were worth my time or attention in a romantic garden full of more saucy flowers, showy and brazenly gorgeous. Especially since they are the first blooms of spring and do not last long. But it was…