Living Room

I am finally getting around to sharing some pictures of my living room on the blog.  I have finally mostly finished decorating it, and I love how it turned out.  When we were looking for a house, and then coming up with house plans, I knew that one thing I would not go without was a living room right off the entry to the house.  My former house had the ever popular open floor plan, which gave everyone a direct shot of my kitchen and family room from the front door.  Since I do a lot of cooking, and projects, and my kids do a lot of playing, it was rare that these spaces were company ready.  I hated feeling embarrassed every time someone popped in.  I tried to tell myself I shouldn't be embarrassed for feeding my family, or letting my kids play, but ultimately it still bothered me.  So, a living room right off the entry that was always "company ready" was a big priority for me.

When you enter my house through the front door, this room is immediately off to the right.  It is not large because I didn't want to waste too much square footage on a room that wouldn't be used that much.

This is a shot of the front wall.  I planned this room around a couple of prints I have of my great-grandmother's paintings.  I love the soft colors in these paintings for a living room.

This room actually gets used a lot more than I thought.  People stop by a lot and we use it when the home teachers and visiting teachers come, plus my kids practice their piano in here every day, but otherwise it is off limits to them.  I originally wanted lighter colored furniture in here, but Jeremy convinced me that we should go a little darker.  Light colored furniture is just too risky with five boys - even if the room is off-limits to them.

A close-up of some of the decor on the piano.  My mom gave us the Christus statue as a housewarming gift the first time she came to see it.

And a close up of my side table lamp.  I bought two of these for this room before the house was even finished and the room was just conceptualized.  When I set them on the tables while I was decorating they seemed too short, but I still loved the lamps and wanted to use them. So I gave them a little boost with some old books that Jeremy had inherited from his grandma.  Now, not only did I get to use my lamps but we can all think of Jeremy's sweet grandma every time we are in this room.

This picture is blurry (sorry), but it gives you a little bit of a better idea of how this room is situated in the house.  As you can see, I still haven't invested in a cute rug for the entry, so we are still using a remnant of carpet.  We are finally working on landscaping the front yard, so hopefully I will be able to get a cuter rug soon.

And since I gave you a glimpse of our Easter mantle in the last shot, I will finish up this post with a few close ups.

The Easter mantle is coming down tomorrow and it will be nice to take a break from the cutesy holiday mantles for a month or two.  Tad and I will just have to read a few more stories and put together a few more puzzles to keep us busy instead.