Transform the Interior of Your Home on a Tight Budget

Posted on December 16, 2016

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Photo Credit: BeeYoutifullife

When most people hear the words interior design, they imagine work being done in the home by experts who are handed blank checks to transform the design and layout. Interior design in the coming year is all about more for less, meaning more functionality on a more efficient budget. The following home decor tips are from the online interior design retailer GoHaus and will help you completely change the look of your home and interior design while not busting the bank.

An affordable way to change the appearance of a living or dining room is to change the color of the blinds covering the windows. Traditional wooden or white mini blinds are common in a majority of homes still, but you can make a huge difference by just changing the to color. Painting wooden blinds one of the accent colors in the room helps to tie everything together while giving it a fresh look and costs a fraction of doing a full replacement.

Blending Room Colors

One cool interior design trick that will look like you spent a fortune is painting your kitchen with blended colors. To pull off this home decor trick, you need to start with the solid color you want to use in that space, then mix a gallon 50% lighter and one gallon 50% darker. Now you can paint the walls the solid color with strips of light and dark shades to accent. Stools can be painted in one color while the seats or legs a blend darker. Cabinets can be painted with the solid color, with the trim and knobs the shade darker or lighter. Not the best when it comes to color matching? Check out this tool from Adobe to find the perfect compliment, triad or monochromatic color to any shade in your home.

Transform Open Kitchen Space

Photo Credit: Budget Dumpster

That open space above the kitchen cabinets is a perfect pallet for giving the room some real character. Think themes here, so if you are going with a mid-century modern theme in the rest of the house, utilize that open space to help blend the kitchen with the rest of the home. Place different accessories and lighting fixtures that reflect the mid-century modern design. Stick with neutral colors when you accessorize here so it doesn’t become the focal point of the room.

Install Vinyl Plank Flooring

Having new hardwood flooring installed in the kitchen, bedrooms, hallways, dining room, or living room, can be extremely costly, time consuming and often require professionals to do the job. Look for budget friendly flooring choices like vinyl plank flooring. Often it is a fraction of the cost and you can get the vinyl flooring in a click and lock construction to make installation extremely do-it-yourself friendly. Vinyl also comes in every color, grain pattern and size that you would want. You can find the perfect color to accent your color scheme or match a previous flooring in another room. Vinyl is also significantly more durable that hardwood. Making it the perfect budget friendly install for any room.

luxury penthouse apartments living room with designer features

Faking Square Footage

One of the ways to increase the size of the bathroom is to simply fake the increase of square footage. While most bathrooms have shower curtains or frosted glass showers, this cuts down the size of the room to the eye. Clear glass shower doors add instant square footage to the bathroom and really open things up. Making this one change in the bathroom makes the room feel larger instantly.

Now you know some of the tips for transforming the interior of your home on a budget. Sometimes the simplest home decor tricks can have the biggest overall impact, so give one a try and see how your home interior improves right before your eyes.

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Parenting

Trend: More Parents are Opting for Wood Floors in Nurseries

Posted on December 10, 2016

Cap Off Busy Weeks with A Friday Family Movie Night

Posted on November 4, 2015

This Post is Sponsored by Coca-Cola

When the weather turns cold, families have to get creative and find indoor activities for entertainment after school and during weekends. Family game nights are an excellent way to unwind and have fun after homework and dinner and before settling in for the night.

During the weekend, a family movie night is one of the best ways to chill, kick back, and enjoy some downtime after a hectic week.

We love sci-fi, nature, and superhero movies. When we’re not quizzing each other watching a quiz show or catching up on animal stories on a nature channel, we’re catching up on the latest episode of one of our favorite superhero television shows.

But for Friday family movie night, each member of the family gets a turn during the month to select the flick we watch. We all snuggle up under the covers on the sofa in the basement with some popcorn, snacks, and refreshments, including nice, cold Coca-Cola.

It’s the perfect start to the weekend, and a great way to cap off our usually hectic weeks.

When you add refreshing Coca-Cola to any situation, things go from good to great. Because when you add a little delicious Coca-Cola, it all adds up to memories.

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Parenting

The One Thing Parents in Large Families with Multiple Children Must Do

Posted on October 26, 2015

This post is sponsored by Coca-Cola

In families with multiple children of varying ages, it is easy for a child to get lost in the hustle and bustle of a busy household.

Between travel to school, after-school practices, and weekend social activities and games, there are few opportunities for each child to get one-on-one time with a parent. These are precious and essential moments that parents have to make time for.

Meanwhile, we parents are all just trying to raise good, conscientious, civic-minded children to become well-adjusted, optimistic, happy, productive, and, hopefully, successful adults.

I have three children of varying personalities, with different temperaments, tastes, and likes. My husband and I make a concerted effort to carve out moments to connect with each of our three children. It’s their special time.

They are moments without their siblings around to compete for attention. It gives us a way to access what’s going on in their personal, academic, and social lives at school, and determine where our help is needed, if at all.

It has worked great for us!

The tween years are tough, but I’m discovering with my now-teenage son that the teen years are the toughest. But one-on-one time helps a lot.

For example, this year, at the end of each band performance, cross-country meet, or other event, my teen son and I celebrate the highs. It’s become a tradition.

We’ve been celebrating those days when he gets a personal-best time in cross country, and this season has been especially phenomenal because he has gotten progressively faster and has improved tremendously in four seasons of running.

As a treat following the meet and to cap off a great race, we chill with a refreshing cold mini can of Coca-Cola. It’s our thing and our thing only.

When you add refreshing Coca-Cola to any situation, things go from good to great. Because when you add a little delicious Coca-Cola, it all adds up to memories.

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Reviews

NUK® is the Only true Orthodontic pacifier (GET $1 OFF to TRY)

Posted on May 22, 2015

Forget what society says, Let’s Re-Define “Having it all” (VIDEO)

Posted on January 20, 2015

Each year, social

scientists reveal think pieces, studies and surveys asking whether women truly

can have it all: the career, the husband and the family at the same time. I’ve teamed up with Nissan on today’s post on re-defining what it means to “have it all.”

The truth is the

definition of “all” cannot be uniform and apply to all people. If we

are malleable, honest and upfront with our personal needs and goals, we can

redefine what’s most important in our own lives and strive for that.

I was truly inspired by celeb blogger Latham Thomas‘s video presentation that is part of my blog

content partner Glam Media’s “Haute Havens” video series. Lifestyle

maven Latham Thomas is all about living well. That includes her home, too:

I connect with Thomas’s

style aesthetic and lifestyle, easily. Like Thomas, I too enjoy daily shots of

green herbs and juices to cleanse the palate, taking regular calming

and stress-release baths, accenting my daily looks with a variety

of scarves and doing strength and balance exercises like yoga

to keep fit. Thomas’s home too embodies what I value most in living

quarters: clean open spaces that connect with all living areas and ample cozy

nooks to snuggle up with a good book and a hot cup of tea.

These pleasures are

among the things I, personally, value and if I am able to make them part of my

life, then I am “having it all” but in a way defined by me. In our society, we

are constantly seeing messages defining what we should value, but if we can

step back and appreciate what we’ve accomplished and all the little things

already in our lives, we would quickly realize that we may already have it

all.

With its stylish looks and premium interior, the Nissan Altima is just as much an individual as you are. Not fitting into one mold is what makes the Nissan Altima not only unique, but very exciting!

Disclosure: Compensation was provided by Nissan via Mode Media. The opinions expressed herein are mine and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of Nissan.

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BumpNews

Attitude of The New Social Media Era of Expecting Moms (INFOGRAPHIC)

Posted on December 16, 2014

Believe it or not, December launched conception season!

It’s the time of year that most babies are conceived given that 10 of the most common birthdays are in the month of September.

In particular, December 17th thru 31st are the most common conception date with being December 24 being the most common.

And we are in the era of the social media pregnancy as a recent survey by Wakefield research for Natera, a leader in non-invasive genetic screening, found that 83% of the 500 expecting moms surveyed planned to share all their baby moments with friends online.

About 47% of them plan to post updates 2-3 times a week to keep their Facebook friends up-to-date on their baby-baking journey.

The survey also found that 3/4ths or 79% of those surveyed will find out in advance their baby’s gender.

And for older moms like the 40 plus celebrities who gave birth after 40 (above), genetic testing is even more important given the increased risks for birth defects in their babies. Knowing as far in advance as possible can be essential

Companies like the new Panorama™ NIPT, which sponsored the survey, have created genetic screenings that can test for abnormaliites as early as 9 weeks via a routing blood draw and without all the invasive screenings like with amniocentesis which carries a miscarriage risk.

There is a bonus in that this new test can screen for gender at an accuracy rate of >99%! That is super early in the pregnancy! Amazing! Would you do use the screening?

Learn more about the new new Panorama™ NIP from its Homepage: http://www.panoramatest.com; Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/PanoramaPrenatalTest or follow on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/PanoramaTest

And in the meantime, check out this great infographic:

*note: compensation was paid for sharing this post with you but my opinions on how awesome this option would be for new and expecting moms is the same.

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BumpNews

Happy Pi Day: 14 Kid-Friendly Pie Recipes to try!

Posted on March 15, 2014

Happy Pi day!!

March 14 is generally recognized as a day worldwide, we geeks recognize and celebrate the mathematical phenomenon that is the unique irrational number: Pi!

Pi is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter and is approximately equal to 3.14159…… The numbers after the decimal never repeat and go on forever!

Pi has been represented by the Greek letter “π” since the mid-18th century,

Pi day is also a great day to celebrate, make, eat and be all about PIES!

And just in time, I’ve joined Foodie by Glam‘s campaign and have curated a collection of 14 kid-friendly pie recipes. Get ready, pore through this collection and pick one or two of these recipes that are super easy to make and are designed for the pallet of tiny tummys. It includes some mini versions of traditional pie recipes for teenie hands!

Baking is a wonderful family activity to do as an alternative to playing video games or watching TV. It also has educational aspects because children learn about units of measurements too!

Fun and instructional! You cannot beat it!

If you make a pie recipe with your children soon or anytime this month, please send us a photo and let us know! We’d love to showcase it on the blog later! Thanks!

Do note for full disclosure, this collection of yummy recipes were curated as part of a paid opportunity but that doesn’t mean I didn’t assemble it with you lovely readers in mind and heart. Have fun baking moms and dads and grandmoms and nannies too! ha!

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