Happy Monday! Hope you had a great weekend. I am just getting back from a three day visit to Austin for a girl’s weekend getaway and my first BIG weekend away from Liv. It was both challenging and wonderfully relaxing (more on the trip below).

Back at the homestead I’ve been working on finishing up the guestroom/office with a new tufted headboard and new bedding. The new guest bathroom is waiting on a few lovely pieces of Etsy art, a few necessary bath accessories and a super awesome glass shower door install before it can move forward. And my 9-5 work has been busy – very busy. We just finished up with a decent sized product release involving many deadlines, but happily all went smoothly and since overly busy = really productive = loving my job, I’m thrilled about that, too.

But excuses for the lull in posting aside, I’m enjoying warming up our little abode (which after 3.5 years the bedroom is in decorating limbo, err, progression) with a few new purchases and some wonderful inspiration! One is a new rug.

Isn’t it pretty?

While our bedroom usually isn’t on display, it’s desperately in need of a mini makeover that will bring it back to the serene, restful space that is its purpose. Because it’s usually seen by few other than our family, the room has been low on the list for attention. In fact, when we had finally painted it a non-exciting tan, found a new task lamp for reading at night and scored a sweet thrift store chair find, I put the room to rest entirely. Waiting to be inspired at some forlorn point in the future.

But! Imagine my surprise when I came across this stunner on One Kings Lane! And then despite my horrible history of indecisiveness, pulled the trigger in buying it! I’m awful at making decisions about rugs and curtains and bedspreads and fabrics – I wait until I’m sure I’ve made the absolute right decision (is that possible?) and that usually means that no decision is made at all.

After months (maybe a year) of keeping an eye out for a new rug for the master bedroom though, I have found a piece that I’m quite smitten with. Look at that ice blue! And those giant oatmeal-colored medallions.

I’m not a huge Daily Deals shopper for big purchases but I have made a few. My tips for these types of investments are:

1. Keep a list of items you’re on the look out for + an inspiration board of what you imagine those items looking like (to make sure they’ll match your current style/decor). Add measurements of the desired find (a dresser or rug, for example) to the list so that you’re not persuaded by the wrong deal (70% off of a too short $1000 table is still $300 hard earned dollars, after all).
2. Utilize coupons and referral credits to bring a big discount down to an even better deal.
3. Have an escape route. Double check the return policy (shipping back a rug will set you back $20-$60 but that’s better than being out $400) or find an alternative for a big ticket purchase should you not like it when it arrives if it’s not returnable (what could this go for on Craigslist or eBay? Could I use it in a different room?).

Back to the bedroom… here’s the before we moved in photo from the realtor:

We originally configured our bed in much the same way, but found that we had more space when we swapped it for the other wall:

And that cool chair? She’s on the same wall as the dresser, back in the corner there. The tan below is much more realistic to the tan in the current room, not so much the above yellow-tan.

I’m a little hesitant on matching the blue of the chair to the rug, but it’s usually covered in Kevin’s clothes so I guess that’s not the end of the world :).

For a bird’s eye view, here’s the room in the back right section of the house. We have plans to knock out that Bathroom #1, Half Bath #3 and Closet to create a bigger master suite and bathroom combination in the future, but for now the room does have a few interesting chunks taken out of it making furniture placement creative.

It was actually about a year and a half ago that I was on the search for the brown rug that’s currently in the room. It’s a pretty neat rug and if you’re in the market for a basic geometric print I highly recommend. The only problem for us is that the rug is a Dhurrie style and for some reason Bodie’s white dog hair really gets embedded in the fibers. We’ve found that flat weave rugs are just not for shedding dogs and that instead a plush rug is much easier to vacuum.

With this new rug in mind, it’s time to add just a few more pieces to the space! You can check out all of my growing inspiration over on my master bedroom idea’s board on Pinterest.

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PS Austonians, I had such a wonderful time in your beautiful city! I cashed in frequent flyer points and met up with college roommates for our annual reunion (to a city in the US that we’re anxious to explore) to sight see, shop, visit places of historic significance, eat and most importantly to catch up on the craziness that is our lives over cups of coffee or cupcakes.

Here are a few of our Austin favorites:

We toured the capitol building on Friday afternoon, visited the Rodeo and local county fair on Friday night, shopped South Congress Ave on Saturday, walked Lady Bird trail and 2nd Avenue on Sunday, and line danced at a local pub two nights in a row!

When it came to exploring the local cuisine there was no shortage of finger licken’ BBQ in the form of Salt Licks or food trucks. As far as shopping goes, I highly recommend any and all boutiques/cowboy boot shops around that most wonderful treasure called Uncommon Goods (a well-edited version of the Pasadena Rose Bowl Flea Market, if you’re familiar) and a chunk of 2nd Ave that’s near the river.

PS Kevin had a great daddy daughter weekend – I was kept well informed with little updates of them playing at Legoland, on the beach or while golfing. I loved my surprise photos and videos!