This weekend Kevin and I are celebrating our 5th anniversary! We have a little surprise getaway planned but I’ll see you all soon… until then, here’s a peek back at our big day.
And I very much wish I could take credit for the creativeness that is my Happy Anniversary card for Kevin this year! But I actually had that spaghettio message made right here at Fiverr by artist madmoo. Fiverr is a must explore site! So many funny and helpful finds, each for a flat $5.
We have a new rug in the living room! This little addition may have gone unnoticed (it looks just like our old rug after all) except that I was so SO thrilled with our new rug purchase that I had to share it here so that I could recommend a favorite rug to any future white-shag-rug-shoppers out there.
I love a white rug. Even though they can be tough to maintain (with a busy house, a baby and a dog) I make every effort because to me that classic, easy look is so very much worth it (plus finding anything else at a reasonable price for a large room is so tough!). Sadly, our previous rug underwent some serious water damage last month when carpet cleaners from a Groupon deal accidentally cleaned the area rug on top of the rug pad and pulled all of that recycled rug pad color right up through the carpet fibers leaving big brown water spots all over:(. We tried to reclean it three times before we finally gave in to replacing it.
But! Not long after we said goodbye to a favorite plush play mat, I found this guy on Overstock. Huge rugs are hard to come by at a good price, and since I still have to figure out the whole reimbursement situation with the local rug company, I was very wary of purchasing anything that we couldn’t afford if we ended up having to pay for the new one out of pocket.
Yay for Overstock! and yay for the plushest, softest rug we have ever owned in an awesome size and at an awesome price. I ended up purchasing during their 15% off rug sale (going on through today) and bought this huge 7’6″x9’x6″ for $239.50 along with this rug pad (which we then cut to size) for $63 + $2.95 for shipping. I’ve shopped, I’ve searched and you just can’t beat it. Truly, truly.
We’ve had this rug for a couple of weeks now and it’s our favorite play spot in the entire house. We unload blocks and legos and books and play, play, play. I use it for short yoga sessions at the end of the day, we watch movies curled up with pillows, we crawl, we sprawl and we relax in its coziness.
Any reservations about a huge rug at this crazy reasonable price are absolutely gone! It feels just like a plush shag Pottery Barn or West Elm rug (in my world that’s the high end budget) and it’s a necessity in our house since our living room is very much Liv’s full time play room.
And yes, Bodie hair blends right in – total plus, but we do vacuum it often. Being the shag rug that it is a good vacuuming is recommended to get rid of the initial shedding anyhow.
When it comes to keeping rugs clean, shag rugs are my best friend. Any funky spots get a bit of spot cleaning and a little trim (aka just cut those bad fibers right out and give the rug a nice tousle). Good to go. I mentioned a while ago that I buy two rug cleanings per year off of Groupon for bigger issues, too. That $40/pop every six months is worth every penny for all of the area rugs and couches in our house – but next time I will make sure that the carpet cleaners are the well-reviewed Yelp types that separate rug pad from rug and don’t work directly on wood floors – also so bad for the house with all of the water they use. Ah well, live and learn. No major harm done and now we have an awesome new rug!
PS more living room posts right here.
The curtains are up! Remember back here when I was debating six favorite fabrics for the new curtains?
I had the hardest time deciding… but thank you all for the comments and emails that you sent my direction! You helped to confirm my final choice which was the Orla Kiely print!
You might also remember that if I chose the Orla Kiely print I’d have to make the curtains out of a duvet cover. Well it was a close close project, but my king duvet cover (90×108″) made for a near perfect fit. I was hoping to use grommets to hang these guys but when I received the fabric in the mail I realized that the pattern ran in the 90″ direction rather than the 108″ – eek! So instead I clipped up my curtains which gave me a few extra inches of fabric to play with to create a wide hem.
These photos are a bit washed out… it was hard to capture the print against the bright windows and I may end up lining them to help show off the design that I love so much!
I’m sticking with just the jute rug for now, though I might swap out for the brown cowhide rug if I can find other ways to bring in bright colors (you might remember that it was my favorite but made the space feel a tad too dark).
I’ve also swapped out two dining room chairs for a bench/ottoman from the living room.
It makes the space feel much more open – though I’m also keeping an eye out for a bench that might be a little higher and a little narrower. This guy isn’t too realistic to sit on for a full meal.
I love most how the turquoisy blue in the buffet is accented so well in the curtains. They really compliment each other and look great in person.
The pattern is just the modern, geometric update that the space needs!
And overall the room is really moving in the right direction… here’s a reminder of the space before we moved in!
So happy I took the leap of faith with these new curtains and ordered an unusual fabric choice (a duvet cover!) off of eBay, they turned out to be much cheaper than buying the fabric by the yard and I’m so happy with the look! What do you think?
Read the full dining room story by starting here: choosing a rug, curtain call part 2, curtain call part 1, newly styled bookshelves, a buffet-over, upgrading the lighting, the before.
