Mother's Day Gifts Under 50 Dollars

Here's my favorite Mother's Day gifts so far. These are on my own personal list.

I found these all on one page on Layla Grace.

Spiffing Up A Plain Jane Home: Shutters And Window Boxes

Several days ago, I did part one in the series of spiffin up a plain home with awnings. Today, I'm going to concentrate on shutters and window boxes! I love them! First off, if your house is rather plain, you really should consider awnings. They add some architectural detail to an otherwise boring house.

Traditional Exterior by New Port Richey Architect Bud Dietrich, AIA

Contemporary Exterior by Minneapolis Design-build Orfield Remodeling, Inc

 

Awnings are not cheap. Window boxes are relatively inexpensive and you can always Google how to DIY one yourself!

They should match the window frame plus any trim. If there are shutters then add 4-6 inches on.

 

Sometimes I like them a little longer than the frame.  Longer window boxes tend to draw the eye in more and the look can be very lush with the right plants, like the one below.

Traditional Exterior by Vancouver Landscape Architect Pot Incorporated

Traditional Exterior by Minneapolis Design-build Great Neighborhood Homes

Traditional Exterior by Chicago General Contractor Greenside Design Build LLC



If you already have shutters, try a nice bold contrasting coat of paint to make them pop! Finish them off with flowers and plants that color contrast the window boxes.

Traditional Exterior by Tarrytown Landscape Architect Westover Landscape Design, Inc.

Tropical Exterior by Other Metro Architect Barefoot Design Group, LLC

Traditional Exterior by Beaufort Design-build WaterMark Coastal Homes, LLC

Oh No She Didn't! Two Bloggers And The Same Post

If you have been blogging long enough, more than likely you have ran into someone who posted on the same topic as you or their post was very similar. Off and on, in the DIY blogging world or the design blogging world, I will notice that someone in a comments section will think they are doing the blog's author a favor and kindly point them in the direction of another blog who supposedly stole their post or project.

When I have run into these, I almost always will go over and look for myself. What I find usually is not what was thought they saw but someone who happened to have the same idea yet the post was written in their own words. There was no plagiarism going on!

Via  White Kitchens House Beautiful

One thing that we all have to keep in mind is that no one has the monopoly on a certain idea. I can write about white kitchens and guess what? There will be 500 other bloggers writing about the same topic. And the odds are that some are going to write the same week I do, even less may even post within a day or 2 of when I do.  But it does happen often!  It's even very likely that we may use some of the same inspiration photos. After all, Pinterest makes sure we all get to see a lot of the same inspiration images. Let's face it, a lot of us have the same tastes! How many posts have you read on Chevron over the years?

                                                                      

My Chevron Pillow DIY. This pillow cover will look much nicer with a larger pillow in it.

        

Granted if they copied your post word for word, well that would be a whole other enchilada.

I think we are doing each other a great disservice by judging or jumping to conclusions about another blogger's intentions. I can say with perfect confidence that I don't steal posts, but this happens to me literally all the time. There are how many design/diy/craft blogs out there? Thousands upon thousands? Millions? I don't know the exact number but I know there are a lot of them and I know that I will have a post in draft and work on it as I have the time, and very often someone will beat me to the punch and write something very similar to what I am already working on.  The more I post the more I see it.

 I can say it's happened to me more times than not, actually.

The most recent time it happened is just this past week when Centsational Girl wrote a post on Homebuying Tips, I believe. I haven't read the post yet, but I did see the title of the post when it was posted.  Well, guess what I have in draft?  First Time Homebuyer's 411.  I've learned so much the last few months in house hunting, that my husband and I thought it would make a good post. However, we've been working on this for quite awhile, and I didn't want to post it til I was done with the process.

It's OK! We all will very frequently have the same ideas. It's all rather innocent. And to be honest, I like reading more than one blogger's tips on a subject I'm interested in!

One time I was gold leafing a chair with my Krylon gold leaf paint pen and getting ready to post about it, the very same day, Jenny, from a Little Green Notebook, posted a coffee table that she had gold leafed with the same paint pen. Her table had very similar features to my chair legs.

                                                                               

My shame, the UGLY chair. Aka, my Doug chair. Those who use to watch TLC's Trading Spaces back in the day will know what I mean.

I was just getting ready to post this! I froze. I was thinking, "Oh no! What if someone thinks I copied her?"  I was 2 seconds away from NOT posting it and deleting the whole project. In hindsight, I should have scrapped it because my chair was UGLY!  Her table turned out great, though. She's really an amazing stylist and DIY'er.

                                                                                   

The "iconic" paint pen.

One last example, recently I was writing a post on Jonathan Adler coming to JC Penny and all of a sudden, another blogger on my reading list posted the same topic! Did either of us know the other was already working on the idea? No. No harm, no foul!

Let me point out that doesn't mean that you can't find information on another blog and share that news with your own readers! Of course you can! Just make sure to put it in your own words!

There were many other times that I did delete a post because someone else beat me to it.  Finally, it happened so much that I realized there is no way to avoid it, if it was happening to me, then surely other bloggers knew this happened too, and I just let myself relax a little on it.

Trust me, if this hasn't happened to you yet, it will.  The more blogs in your niche that you read, the more linky parties you participate in, and the more blogs that you have on your reading list, the more likely it is that you too, will find other bloggers blogging about something you just posted or were getting ready to post.

 I just put my own spin on my own ideas and I put it out there.  If someone else happened to do it too, then that's OK, cause it's going to happen.

We are not in competition with each other.  Blogging is about community.  Isn't it so nice just sharing what you love and finding someone that loves the same thing and chatting over it for a short time?  I find it refreshing to see someone post similarly to me but they bring something different to the table.   It makes it interesting and it's inspiring.
                                                                                    
                                                                                

I think we have a community of ethical bloggers in the DIY/ design world.  Let's give each other credit and not tear each other apart.

BTW,  I don't remember the people who participated in the commenting.   I'm not singling anyone out!

Linking up Here
http://itssoverycheri.com/2013/04/21/its-party-time-4-21-2013/  http://www.threemangoseeds.blogspot.com/

A Realtor Nightmare And How Not to Get Thrown Under the Bus by Your Realtor!

I've been working the last several weeks on a few different home buying posts, as I learn and as I've had the time, for first time homebuyers. They are lengthy but it's necessary to convey the information needed to 1st time home buyers so they are not thrown under the bus by dishonest people.

As a first time homebuyer you should familiarize yourself with some basics to protect yourself from your Realtor. Don't get me wrong there are ethical people out there but because you never know if you are working with one, you should protect yourself with knowledge!

 

 

 

 

 Our Story

 

 

We started our hunt with 3 homes to choose from.

 House number 1 was a ranch house with mediterranean features.  It needed updating and minor repairs but had brick floors and

                             an acre of land with a big pond that had fish (and possibly an alligator according to my best friend, Ethel)! 

 

Contemporary Exterior by Mineral Wells Architect Amy Hopkins Designs

These are not the houses but are souped up versions of the original that I found on houzz. They are  there for visual effect. ;)



House number 2 was a cabin type home.
It wasn't my type of house but it had 2 acres and was so new and pristine on the inside.



Traditional Exterior by Minneapolis Interior Designer Michelle Fries, BeDe Design, LLC

Not the original cabin but he plays one on TV.

 

 The 3rd house was a BEAUTIFUL, 2 story, white, 1920's home, with newer wood siding and beautiful updated windows with muntins!  It was in an upscale neighborhood and was at the top of our price range. There wasn't much of a yard, however.

 

Traditional Exterior by Naperville Architect JB Architecture Group, Inc.

 

Our first Realtor showed us house number 2 first, aka, the mold house. As she was going through the home she smelled strong mold and continued showing my husband the home without mentioning it. It wasn't until I came out of the car (I wasn't feeling too well) and approached the house, that I realized there was a serious mold issue. I was immediately alarmed and told my husband to leave the house, there is a mold issue. At that point she decided to admit that she too had smelled it and it was bothering her. 

Traditional Exterior by Minneapolis Interior Designer Michelle Fries, BeDe Design, LLC

 

The fact that she was willing to risk our health so she could make a sale, should had tipped us off that she wasn't on the up and up.  However, we gave her the benefit of the doubt and continued on to house number 3, our dream home! 

The pictures I'm using to convey an image of the houses we looked at remind me of Lifetime Movie Network actors, the actors are far better looking than the actual person the movie was based on.

Traditional Exterior by Naperville Architect JB Architecture Group, Inc.

 

This home showed so beautifully online and let me say we were quite surprised to see that someone, after the home was listed, obviously wasn't too happy and had come in to this BEAUTIFUlL home and just took a sledge hammer or something to it.

 I've heard internet stories of owners who have been foreclosed upon and they will literally trash their home to get back at the bank. I'm not sure if that is what happened here but something happened!  There were holes knocked in the walls, the downstairs restroom was stripped, and the wall between the bathroom and garage was partially tore down! I could not believe what happened with the home!

Foreclosure Rage:  An act of anger and revenge. The act of chopping your home up with an ax or sledge hammer in little bitty pieces because your home was foreclosed upon.

 

I won't say the things that were said or unsaid by the Realtor lady that bothered me during the walk-through, but the final straw was how terrible the home looked and none of this damage was done when the home was listed nor did they bother updating the photos on the listing to show the new damage.

 She came up behind me and said, "you better hurry, there are many other offers or interest in this one." I'm not sure which it was that she said.  I felt very upset at this point because it seemed like she was being dishonest.  In hindsight, I almost wish we had went with the house and just renovated it but we decided to go on eventually to the cheapest house, house number 1, and we got rid of our Realtor.

BTW, the house sat there for a while before it was finally purchased.
 

Our New Realtor

second verse same as the first........

 

This guy seemed great. He was an investor so he would point out potential issues with the homes we were looking at. He even offered to sell us one of his properties a few times.  Take that however you want to. The problem was that weeks had gone by and we could never seem to land a house. Every time we went to look at a home it became unavailable as soon as we looked at it, including house number 1 that we settled upon.

 Well, according to our Realtor they became unavailable. Now this was may have been true, there were times the house showed under contract online, so it was confirmed sometimes. After all, the market had made a small upturn and houses where I'm at were/are selling pretty fast. However, there were other times the homes didn't seem to be under contract and I started wondering if he were in fact lying to us at times. Why? I couldn't be sure, but maybe to steer us to be desperate enough to buy a house from him. I honestly can't be sure. This is only speculation.

We finally found a cool mid-century modern home with an amazingly large solar heated swimming pool.  This home was special to me. It reminded me a lot of my childhood home and evoked comforting memories.  We started the contract process.  I told my husband to tell the Realtor to put a financing and inspection contingency in our contract. If you are a first time home buyer, this is very smart and quite common. What this does is give you an out if the house has too many issues show up during inspection, or it gives you an out if something happens and the Lender ends up not being able to finance you.



These pictures of my "houses"  remind me of the Lifetime Movie Network actors, the actors are always way more attractive than the actual person the movie was based upon.

Contemporary Exterior by New York Architect Eisner Design LLC

 He told us that we could not put a financing or home inspection contingency in our contract. He stated this would cause us to lose the home because the seller would not even want to mess with us!  This is obviously a lie but also very bad advice! No contingency = the possibility of losing your earnest money deposit or forcing you to spend all of your cold hard cash on the house should financing fall through. It's very easy for financing to fall through, too!

Are there times when no contingency in the contract is good? In other words could the Realtor had made an honest mistake?  The absence of a financing and inspection contingency in the contract is for someone willing to accept the home as is and that has the money to buy it in cold hard cash, period. This will make your offer more lucrative to the seller.

Our Realtor never asked us if we had the cash to purchase this home should financing fall through. So, he risked financial ruin for us at the most or at the least he risked a small fortune in losing our earnest money deposit.

This was absolutely not his risk to take! On top of that, he outright lied and said the seller wouldn't mess with us if we wanted a contingency. He obviously thought we were too stupid to know this since we were first time home buyers. It is common knowledge that if you are buying a home you automatically ask for those 2 contingencies to be included in the contract. So much so, that our current Realtor didn't even ask us if we wanted it, he already included it.

This angered me cause I had done some of the research already and knew that no contingency in the contract was a bad thing.
I told my husband loud enough so the Realtor could hear, no contingency, no house. I won't buy one without it.

My husband took me to look at the house and while we were out we found out that the listing agent had supposedly given us 30 minutes to put in our highest bid and we missed it so we lost the house!


He may or may not have been telling us the truth about that, but I've never heard of anyone being given that time frame to bid. I was so upset with myself because I already had become emotionally attached to the home. I blamed myself for losing the house.

Traditional Exterior by Coronado Architect Christian Rice Architects, Inc.

                                                                                  
By this time we looked at dozens of homes and a lot of time had passed. I was exhausted by the home search.  I was so scared of the house getting taken before I could even get a bid on it.   I told my Realtor to put in a bid and get a contract ready on a house that I found online. I told him I would look at it during the inspection period. This was really stupid I guess, but I was exhausted and if you had seen how many houses we lost you might have understood.

This didn't work out because now days had gone by and the Realtor finally got back to us and told us he had been out of town for business. We tried again and this time he was out of town for pleasure.

I was kind of happy and upset at the same time. I was upset cause no matter how hard we tried to get a home they just kept slipping through our hands or our Realtor was too busy for us. I was happy cause this allowed me to find a new home that was available and it was so cute! It was in a nice neighborhood and the whole neighborhood was lined with red brick streets!

 Taditional Exterior by Mill Valley Architect Mahoney Architects & Interiors

The final straw with him was when he told us we could not bid on the home. It was unavailable, and that there was a waiting period of weeks before we would be able to even put a bid on it. He said the listing agent themselves had said this to him and that he was going out of town (again) so he would not be able to help us for awhile, and thanked us for our patience! 



 I told my husband to speak with the listing agent himself and see if the home was available, just for peace of mind, and to our surprise the listing agent had quite the opposite story to tell on this home. It was very available, and it was available now! My husband asked about a waiting period, and she told him, "there is no waiting period now, nor was there ever!"

Our Realtor needed a fire extinguisher cause his PANTS WERE ON FIRE!

I was so upset. My mind was swimming with the weeks upon weeks we wasted with this man. I had wondered why he would do all of this. What could possibly be his motivation to do all of this?

We decided we would just immediately stop all contact with this man and start all over. Eventually we found a house, it wasn't any dream house, it was plain and simple, but seemed to have the least issues, so closing would be faster than most homes we looked at already. The neighborhood was awesome, so we took it. We called a Realtor, he showed it, he made a contract, we signed it. No craziness, things just got done.

By the time we were finished with 2 less than ethical Realtors, I will not lie, I was less than trusting of our new Realtor. I had wondered if he lied about there being other bids on the home so we would increase our asking price therefore increase his commission, but what can I say, the way things are done in the real-estate game there is no way to be 100 percent sure if that is being done, and unfortunately there have been Realtors who have admitted this does happen, whether on the listing agents behalf or the Realtors. Either way, it's a tricky game in buying a home.

One last piece of advice that I can offer you is to find an exclusive buyer's agent. They are suppose to work for you and you alone so that there are no conflicts of interest. You thought your Realtor was already working for you and you alone? Haven't you been reading anything I've written so far? ;)

This doesn't guarantee that you will have a 100 percent honest Realtor but it is suppose to help up your odds in getting fair representation. I think the only way to get a 100 percent fair representation is to find a trusted family or friend ,who is a Realtor, or find one that will do a flat rate fee. This way you don't have to worry they may fudge on the details about there being other bids on the home so they can increase their net worth.

Let me add that there really are honest Realtors out there, and a lot of them work a lot harder for their money than average people realize. So, you may have a harder time finding someone willing to work for a flat rate, but it's not impossible.


Linking HERE.

http://itssoverycheri.com/2013/04/21/its-party-time-4-21-2013/

Narrow Hallways

One of the secrets to a well designed home is to make use of all the space you have. You don't have to renovate, just learn to decorate with what you have.  Some of the best designs come from homeowners working with the quirks of their home.

A lot of people neglect narrow hallways, not knowing really what to do with them. Don't let the fact that it's narrow, cause you to neglect the space. Decorating a narrow hallway can be the finishing touches to a well feathered nest.

via Apartment Therapy

deniot.com

Andreea in Brussels

Living Etc...

Sometimes, the best way to decorate a small space is to put all of the design into the floor, wall, and ceiling. Another words, leave out the photos and console tables, instead choose flooring in an interesting design. Moldings on the wall lend to the architectural detail, and choosing an interesting light fixture can finish off the space.

Spiffing Up a Plain Jane Home: Awnings

Have a plain jane home? Awnings can be the perfect solution!

Traditional Entry by New Orleans Architect Bockman + Forbes Design

Traditional Landscape by New York Landscape Architect Susan Cohan, APLD

Traditional Exterior by Austin Architect Tim Cuppett Architects

Traditional Patio by Los Angeles Interior Designer Sue Firestone

Exterior by Dunlap Artist And Artisan The Metal Shoppe, Custom Metal Design, Fabrication

Traditional Exterior by Jenkintown Architect Asher Associates Architects

Spaces by North Hollywood Specialty Contractors Calshades and Awnings, Inc

Trending: Flamingos

SpringKorn Cusion Cover via IKEA

Contemporary Wallpaper by Other Metro Design Kist

Tory Burch Flamingo Chiffon Scarf via Shop Bop

 

Tory Burch Flamingo iphone case via Nordstrom

Lonny Mag

Southern Living July Edition, 2011

Tropical Pillows by Brooklyn Furniture And Accessories West Elm



 

Contemporary Artwork by Other Metro The Animal Print Shop

Jonathan Adler Is Now At jcp!

If you keep up somewhat with the economical woes facing many retail giants, you probably have already heard that JCPenny aka jcp is seriously struggling and rumored to be on the verge of closing many stores and perhaps even disappearing from the retail scene altogether. 

Apparently, they tried to revamp themselves by deeply discounting merchandise permanently, instead of  keeping the steeply discounted sales they were known for. This backfired and sales fell even more putting them on the brink of retail suicide. Well, it was kind of suicide.

I don't really shop there but every once in a great while.  I found it so sad, though, that something I've grown up with is joining the growing list of retailers failing and disappearing from the public eye due to the troubled economy!

JCPenny is  fighting back, though and bringing names such as Martha Stewart and JONATHAN ADLER to their line!  I love Jonathan Adler, but his designs are not, for the most part, in my price range. And when I say for the most part, I"m saying maybe I can afford a few of his plates for the table or something.;) This makes it 10 times more exciting that he's at jcp!

Here are some of my picks from his Happy Chic Line........

Btw...I see a lot more visits to jcp in the future. I hope they expand this line and follow suit by bringing in more relevant designers at much more affordable prices!