I went to the Holiday Homes Tour for the benefit of Health Care Access last weekend and found many great ideas. Keep the tour in mind next year as you begin your holiday decorating. But if you want to make additions this year, try these ideas I noticed on the tour:

• Candle holders with different Christmas bulbs on top some pointed some round. Make a display of them for your centerpiece on Christmas day. The decorations could be multicolored or they could have gold, silver and cream as a theme as the tour house did.

• Use small theme trees throughout the house. These could be really small to fit on the vanity in the guest bath or they could be taller to fit in a bedroom. Keep in mind the scale of the decorations for these trees.

• Start a theme for your decorations Santas, snowmen, nativity scenes, dishes, and stockings are all possible and easy to do. Ask for these items as gifts and it will build your collection with wonderful variety.

• Don’t put all your Santas together, all your snowmen together, and so on. Tuck these figures throughout the house on the book shelves, in a corner of a chair, on the bed. Mix them up in size and quantity

• Frame some special Christmas cards from last year. Many cards are almost works of art and would give you variety from your usual art.

• Don’t forget holiday towels. Unusual towels and sizes will add flair to the bathroom and kitchen with little effort.

If it is too late for you this year to make a change, get up early on December 26 and shop for those bargains that can transform your home next year. Adding a few items each year won’t break the checkbook and you will have fun enjoying the process as you add new items each year.

Happy Holidays! Enjoy the season with your friends and family.

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But it might not tell you the whole visual story.  An easy way to see what works in your room is to cut out life size shapes of your furniture.  Measure the widest part of your tables and upholstered furniture – width and length. Cut these rectangular sizes out of newspaper that you have taped together or use craft paper from the hobby store.   This gives you a really good visual look at your room.  Is there enough leg space between the sofa and coffee table?  Can you easily get around that large piece of furniture?  The “furniture” is easy to move into different configurations without any effort from your spouse.

Of course this works better if the furniture you now have is moved out of the room.  This may be hard but it is better to organize a room’s content without being influenced by what is already there.  Move it out of the room and when you have moved your paper furniture around and have decided on the arrangement, move it back in to the desired location.   And if you need to get rid of something, this is the time.  What could be easier?

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You may have decided to stay in your home and not move, but that doesn’t mean you should stay with the same old tired look.  When you move, you are forced to make changes, but let’s look around your home and see what simple modifications you can make to create a new updated look. 

1)     New paint is always a good option and a relatively inexpensive one.  Get some magazines and see what the designers are using for paint colors. 

2)     Add valances over those old blinds.  Blinds and shades are very functional but they could use some pizzazz.  Simple or elaborate top treatments could make your room look entirely different.

3)     Change the throw pillows.  Most pillows in the family room are used and get tired-looking and limp. Get new filling and new fabrics to update your color scheme. 

4)     Take EVERYTHING out of the room except the heaviest pieces and only put back in the room what you need.  Take away those gifts that were given to you that didn’t really match but you didn’t want to throw away either.  Put everything you don’t need or use in a box in the basement and if after six months you haven’t missed it, then sell the items at a garage sale or give to a local charity. Here in Lawrence that could be Penn House or St. John’s garage sale house. 

5)     And lastly, call a professional.  I perform a lot of one hour consultations that give advice the homeowner can implement.  We can talk about what colors you would paint your rooms based upon the existing furnishings you have, how to arrange your furniture and what additional pieces you might need, or what colors/styles you might use for kitchen counters, flooring, or cabinets.  And after you have painted, I can help arrange and re-hang those pictures. It might be time to move Aunt Martha’s painting to a back room and hang that new painting you saw at the local art show.

Don’t let your home get tired just because you aren’t moving.  Spring is a good time to throw open the windows and move into high gear.  Enjoy!

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If you are like me, you can never find a decorating idea when you need it. So I have started IDEA  and HOME  files. 

Marked IDEAS, I keep a file beside me where I do my reading, especially magazine reading.  I have a 6-pocket expandable file and a scissors within easy reach.  I do not think magazines are sacred and readily tear out and cut up pages.  Whenever I see something that inspires me, I tear it out.  It might be the color of the whole room, or the style of the furniture, or a great looking window treatment.

I have divided the 6 sections into Living room, Dining room, Kitchen, Family room, Bathrooms, and Bedrooms.  Then I can put the magazine picture directly into the “room” to which it applies.  This saves sorting again later. Touch that paper once!!  Then when you are ready to make some decorating changes, you won’t have to search back through months and years of decorating magazines to find that picture you love.  This works especially well if you are planning to build a new house. You can fine tune the ideas you eventually use from these magazine pictures.  And this is a good source of ideas to take to your design professional.  It is so hard to verbally describe a look and here is where “a picture is worth a thousand words” really does apply.

The HOME file is also an important tool.  Get another folding file and put your existing finishes and fabrics in the file – paint chip colors, wallpaper samples, carpet or wood floor scraps, fabric samples, arm covers from and pictures of existing furniture that you plan to keep. Even having some measurements of the rooms is a great idea.

Keep this file in the car so when you are out shopping and you have found a terrific deal on towels for the bathroom or an area rug for the dining room, you will have the information you need to make good decisions.  Also as you have new design products installed in your home – fabric treatments, flooring, etc – be sure to save some scraps before the installer throws all those little pieces away.  They will tuck nicely into your HOME folder. 

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