What a good mommy you are! The new bedroom sounds dreamy enough for any little princess. How to stay motivated? It helps me to have some excitement about the final outcome. Do you have any inspiration pics to put up on the fridge to keep your spirits up and your motor running? There are a number of them in the Gallery in the post on kids rooms. There are also some in the bedrooms post, and even more in the Cottage Decor post. Close this thread and you'll find a link to the Gallery at the bottom of the page that lists all the threads. Also another link at the top right just above the list of posts. I second Dian's brilliant suggestion about audio books. I get audio book CDs from the library and listen to them in the kitchen, or wherever I have mindless work to do. I love them. I'll bet if you snoop the web you can order a ready-made slipcover for that chair for not too much money. You might start with eBay and amazon.com. On the sewing, all you're talking about is sewing straight lines. That isn't difficult. Seems to me you must have a gf who would be happy to come over and supervise you until your "rust" is off. That would be a lot less daunting than a class, to me at least. Your mom or mom-in-law might like to help. When our kids are grown and gone, we suddenly feel unwanted, useless. We are thrilled if we're asked to help. We feel valued, and if we're retired we have the time. Well, most of us, anyway. If yours don't live close they could at least sew a pillow or something. Just a thought that could improve family relations and lighten your load. Make a family party out of it. You supply the steaks, hot dogs, the barbee, and the paint, and invite them all. They can bring salad, dessert, etc, and extra paint brushes or whatever. I'm looking forward to helping with my granddaughter's bedroom makeover somewhere in the next few months. I'm really excited about it and I'm collecting ideas. One idea I ran across is these giant tissue paper flowers. They would be so darling hung from a little girl's ceiling. Do you like those? This URL shows you how to make them -- very easily and cheaply. It would be a good project to do with kids, depending on the age of the child. Here is a link that might be useful: How Make Tissue Paper Pom-Poms (scroll down)

I'm late to the conversation, but I'm glad you are leaving the room the colors it is. I went through this with my dd two years ago. She was almost six and had picked out the bedding, curtains, and pink wall color herself. She was really upset that her room was to be changed. It wasn't worth stressing her out any more than a move already does. At the stager's suggestion, I took down the pink curtains and replaced them with white. I switched out the bedding for a more nuetral color that went with the garden theme of the room. Dd's stuff (with her permission) that wasn't used for staging went into a box for the new house. When we walked through the house with the new owner, she complimented the room. It was the only room in the house that she complimented. IMO, it helped sell the house. I think if your rooms look magazine worthy, then leaving them as is, is fine. If they are just a hodge podge and a mix of stuff, it is better to repaint or stage so that it looks more appealing. I have seen some kid's rooms that made me cringe because everything clashed or looked like it had been thrown together with no thought of what worked.

Being your first time here, you may not have expected the replies you got about your daughter's two rooms. Don't be offended. We mean well. I tend to agree, tho. And not to get personal, but how do you and your hubby have any intimate time together if you're sleeping in the LR? I would at the most, give your daughter the larger room so she does have room to play, but would take the advice of others to store the toys in the same room. Maybe it's time to go thru them and donate the ones she no longer plays with? Kids only play with half of the toys they own, anyway. Involve her in choosing which ones to give away and explain that she is helping kids who have no toys. Make it fun and help her learn that being charitable is a good trait. I'm sure if you google, there's an article on how to do that because I've read about it. That being said, I think you did a bang up job on the white furniture. That is my taste exactly. Shabby-chic and cottage-y. I am single and on a disability budget and my home is about your size. So storage is critical. I do all my furniture shopping at thrift stores. I bought a dresser that I use as a buffet, yet I keep my tools, gardening stuff, plastic storage bowls and seasonal linens in the drawers. I also bought a tall handmade shelving unit with cabinets below for storage and an old console with cabinet type doors for extra counter space in my kitcken (up against a wall) and storage for my crockpot, platters, bowls, mixer, etc. That one I painted but have yet to paint the other two. Rule #1 - paint before you get it in the house and start using it or you will never get around to painting it due to the dilema of where to store all the stuff inside while it's being painted...lol. I've also found new curtains, quilts, pillows, shower curtains, and even Ralph Lauren bed sheets at thrift stores. Target donates lots of stuff to Goodwill. Most of my decorative kitchen stuff and household knicknacks came from thrift stores. Lamps are always cheap and can be spray painted. They make textured metalic spray paint if that's your taste. Just do a good tape job first. They always have lamp shades, too, and many of them are new. I've gotten wall mirrors and done paint treatments on them to make them look shabby chic. You can repurpose sheets to make curtains, pillows, and even a shower curtain if you're handy with a sewing machine. I also got my two sofas from the thrift store. One for $40, the other a pull out bed for $50. For the first one (red checkered...UGH!!) I bought a white slipcover from Uglysofas.com. They sell Pottery Barn slipcovers pretty cheap (they call them Brand X since they can't advertise where they came from). I guess they're seconds but there was nothing wrong with mine. The 2nd couch was actually in perfect condition. It came from a hotel remodel so there were several, along with club chairs to match. I liked the fabric, so it didn't need covered (but I still do...I like the white better). Do you have a Restore Store (Habitat for Humanity) near you? They have soooo much stuff for remodeling, including paint. I buy my drawer pulls from there (which are very expensive at big box stores). Yes, it takes some digging around to find the quantity you need but they really update older painted furniture. And my store has started a thrift store section with furniture, mirrors, lamps, etc. As for paint color....I like the sage green but that's just me. I see you have a blue and pink pillow, so you could pull off that. However, paint isn't cheap so if you can live with the sage, live with it for now and work on making a sanctuary for you and hubby and a nice new LR. Ohhh...i forgot to mention. Are you familiar with Pinterest? If not, you MUST check it out. I've gotten so many decorating ideas from there. It's all visual. Pic, pics, and more pics. You just type in 'shabby chic decorating' for example, or 'cottage bedroom'. I search by color since i have a beach cottage color scheme. So I type in 'aqua shabby chic.' Just saying....if you are thinking of blue, they use blue in your search. You have to sign up to use it but it's no different than signing up for this site. And there are no ads, no spam, nothing !! It's addictive tho....trust me. Looking at beautiful picture is so inspiring. And then you can pin a pic to your 'board' so you can save it. It's like a virtual scrapbook. I LOVE IT !! Well, I've rattled on long enough. I do love your taste and wish you the best in your decorating !! Bonnie This post was edited by brit5467 on Sun, Apr 20, 14 at 22:00

1st Pic is Living Room and the other 2 Pictures are the Dining Area which gives way to the Living Room and Kichen