Winter Decorating

Hi, all!  How are you doing?  Are you making it through January OK?  I can’t believe it’s more than halfway through!  Part of my January has been spent getting my house into winter decorating mode.  Gone is the red and green of the holidays and now it is time for neutrals to reign in the house.

To be honest, I do not really consider this winter decorating.  I consider it to be more like wiping the slate clean.  I absolutely love decorating for Christmas with all the glitter and bright colors of the season but, soon after the New Year I start to feel a bit claustrophobic.  I tend to move away from color and go towards whites, creams and grays and to declutter a bit.

On that note, for the month of January only, I change out the red bows on my wreaths and swags and add white bows.  The wreaths will come down by the end of January.

I left some of the red berries in the fire pit but, just for a short time.  Soon all of this will be out of there too, but for now it gives me something to look at and I like that.

I need to admit something to you.  I often hesitate to share photos of my house since it is a 1970's contemporary with dark wood ceilings and dark woodwork.  I am often envious of other bloggers' beautiful white woodwork and shiny photos.  I love the work of Yvonne at Stone Gable Blog and Courtney at French Country Cottage and wish my house would photograph as well as theirs.  Of course, some of that could have something to do with my lack of photography knowledge too!  However, the fact remains my house has darker features than most of the homes I see on the Internet.

 I would like to paint the dark wood paneling in the foyer below white but, we haven't gotten around to it yet.  So as they say, "It is what it is."  I have decided this year when it comes to blogging I need to embrace my house just as it is.  I mean I have come to love this place and it doesn't have to be the same as houses on other blogs.  I probably should take a photography course, though!

 Anyway, this house is actually quite unique and my husband fell in love with it as soon as we walked in the door.  I, on the other hand, having loved the Victorian homes we had previously owned, took much longer getting to that "loving" feeling.

But, I am very thankful for this home and I love that it is not cookie-cutter.  (It certainly is not that!)  And, I feel that one of these days we will paint the foyer and I will love it!

I try my best to lighten up this space with light-colored rugs, furniture and wall-hangings.  The skylight helps, as well.  I understand from the previous owner that he added all the skylights in the house.  Before that, it was a solid wood ceiling.  I can't imagine how dark it was inside before the skylights were added.  Sunlight is one of the best things about this home.  It is a pretty cheery place on a sunny day!

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The kitchen is, of course, the center of the home for everyone but, in my house, it is in the literal center.  Two living area wings extend off of the kitchen.

Again, I would love to add white in here also...mostly on the cabinets.  As you can tell, my projects are mounting up!  To be honest, we are empty-nesters and I thought we might be moving closer to our children at some point. (They all live about an hour from us.) This has made me put off projects to some extent.  I'm thinking that might have been a bad move at this point since all indications are that we will be staying here for a while longer.  It might be time to get out the paint brush after all~

Below is an attempt at trying to stay on point and decorate with the home's architecture in mind.  My goal was to make it more contemporary in nature. I've read that copper is going out but, I really do love it here.

While the home is a contemporary, the wood ceilings and accents make it a bit rustic too.  It's a funny house!

Moving into the family room you will notice more dark wood in the ceiling and on the woodwork.  I don't mind it so much in here.  Since my husband painted the large hutch in the room white, the space seems brighter. That little change made a big difference for me.  Besides, this is where the TV is and the room is cozy with the wood stove burning.  We burn wood almost continually from November to April!  It makes for a very comfortable house.

Like I said, there are a lot of neutrals going on with my decorating this time of year.  I do have a few touches of color here and there to not make it totally blah~

As the year moves along, I will continue to add color in different areas of the room, probably something more colorful on the coffee table.

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 I haven't put away this set of Christmas dishes yet.  They were mostly white and I thought they still looked pretty in the hutch.  

Some gold still remains, too~

We rehabbed one of our bathrooms a little over a year ago.  I finally have an "all white" room, even if it is only the bathroom.  Haha!  You can see the full story of the transformation here if you would like.

My final room to share is the living/dining room combination.  This room is also in a state of transformation.  We recently purchased a new dining table and some chairs which is leading to new furniture purchases or, at the very least, some new paint on old pieces. (More projects!!!)  

This room does have some really nice features, though. I love that we have a continual deck around most of the room. When we moved into the house the deck was only out to the back of the house not the side.  We replaced one of the windows in the dining area with a slider and built the side deck for more seating and outdoor cooking space.  Now I can easily access the gas grill from the kitchen making summer meals so much easier to prepare!

A few of my more wintry holiday decorations remain in certain areas of the house.  You can see the white tree on top of the hutch in the photo below.  I thought that was acceptable since it is winter after all :).  You will see tidbits of different kinds of trees all around this space.  I suspect they will be coming down...eventually.

Well, there you have it...my winter decorating tour.  It was part tour and part therapy (on my part~haha!)  Thank you for letting me share.

  I hope to be delving into some painting projects soon and perhaps be able to post about them, as well.  My poor husband, he usually is the one who ends up doing these projects for me but, I'll keep you updated!

Enjoy!

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