Simple and Stylish Kitchen Counter Decor

Keep your kitchen functional and stylish with these simple kitchen counter decorating tips!  Kitchen countertops are magnets for unnecessary decor and clutter.   Trust me, I know how quickly and easily random clutter can accumulate. I try to keep my kitchen counters clean, but it never fails, as soon as I get them cleared off they get covered again.  I finally decided I had had enough and cleaned, organized, and simplified my kitchen counters, hoping to keep them clutter-free for good. Our kitchen, living room, and dining room are completely open, so a cluttered and unorganized kitchen negatively impacts how I feel about the rest of my home.   Can you relate? Keeping the kitchen counters clean, the sink clear, the countertops simplified and my plant babies thriving has reduced my stress and improved my mood, which makes me one happy mama. There can be a fine line though between having a clean, organized, and lived-in kitchen versus one that feels bare, ......

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Open Floor Plan: Rancher With Open Center Stairs

A renovated 1970's rancher style home with open center stairs. About two years ago, our traditional ranch-style home went from having small, dark, boxed in rooms to light, bright and completely open.  I took you along for the entire process of the  renovation , but never shared in depth detail and pictures of the open center stairs.   There's very little inspiration on old ranchers with open center stairs, so in an effort to help others who plan similar renovations,  I'm sharing a closer look at the design and layout of our open-concept center rancher stairs. ...

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Open Floor Plan Kitchen Renovation Reveal: Before and After

Before and after bright white kitchen reveal. A small ranch style home gets a major open floor plan kitchen, mudroom and dining room makeover.   Well friends, today is FINALLY the day I share all the before, during and "after" pictures of our bright white, open floor plan kitchen renovation! There are still a few minor details to complete, but considering it may be a bit until I get the custom black walnut shelves, decide on lights for above the window and order the correct microwave, I thought I'd go ahead and share the "reveal" now.  ...

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Friday Favorites: Stylish Kitchen Shelf Decor

Beautiful home decor to perfectly style open kitchen shelves!  Happy Friday, friends. The kitchen backsplash was FINALLY installed this week and it looks so good!  Unfortunately,  the tile I wanted was out of stock, which held up progress, but it's installed and was totally worth the wait.   Of course, now that the tile is complete I've been searching online for new decor to style the open shelves.  I went with floating shelf brackets from  Shelfology , but the shelves themselves are being custom cut out of black walnut.  ...

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Clean and Modern Dining Room Progress

Simple, clean and modern dining room renovation progress! It's been a while since I've shared progress of the kitchen/first-floor renovation , but today is the day.  Today, I'm finally sharing how the modern dining room is coming along.  There's still more to be done (patching, caulking and painting), but it's looking pretty good thanks to new molding, a new modern light and cool mid-century modern chairs that I scored from an auction. I kept the furniture and decor to a minimum to help maximize the small space and new open floor plan.  It feels so much more open and the perfect clean modern vibe that I was going for.  ...

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Friday Favorites: 12 Stylish Canister Sets

Add style to your kitchen and storage to your pantry staples with gorgeous kitchen canisters!  I finally bit the bullet. I placed an order for the kitchen backsplash tile.  Then received an e-mail that the tile was out of stock, and my order was canceled.  Figures. Instead of searching for another tile source, I got sidetracked and browsed online for stylish kitchen canisters.  Sounds reasonable, right?   We might not have working outlets, lights, or a backsplash, BUT I will have a stylish set of decorative canisters on the kitchen counter.  Priorities.  There are many canister options available that make it nearly impossible to decide on just one set.  I'm currently loving the white canisters from West Elm and the matte black canisters from Crate and Barrel.   KITCHEN STORAGE CONTAINERS AND CANISTER SETS Help me decide!  Which kitchen canister set do you like best?......

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Vintage Modern Mudroom Renovation Reveal

A simple mudroom gets a vintage modern makeover with custom molding and budget-friendly decor.  The other week, I shared a glimpse into our Mudroom , which was part of our kitchen and first-floor renovation that we started back in April.  It's been a loooong few months full of frustration, inconvenience and headaches, but I can honestly say, it's been worth all the trouble.   The mudroom turned out better than I could have imagined and I'm crazy excited to share the fully renovated space.  I used a lot of the same decor, but new flooring, custom wall treatment, paint and budget-friendly decor made this space cleaner and brighter for the perfect vintage-modern vibe. ...

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Kitchen Renovation Progress: Board and Batten Wall, Craftsman Style Columns and Railing

An open floor plan of a ranch style home with white craftsman style columns and black modern railing.  It's coming to the end of the kitchen renovation and it feels so good!   Counters and appliances have been installed and the kitchen has finally been usable for a couple weeks now.   There's still work to be done, but seeing it all come together could not be more exciting.   The latest project to be completed (well, almost complete) are the columns and railing that we added after removing the walls and opening up the stairs.  Let's take a look back at how the house looked a few months ago.  ...

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Week 14 Kitchen Update: Floors, Island and Trim

Week fourteen kitchen expansion and first-floor renovation update of our little ranch style home.  If you have been following my Instagram stories then you probably know all about our crazy 4-week hardwood floor drama.  Without rehashing all the traumatic details, let's just say, the guys who refinished the floors were incompetent and failed miserably to refinish them properly.  They ended up having to correct and refinish the floors not once, not twice, but three times to get them acceptable.  It was beyond frustrating and set us back weeks on the renovation. Thankfully, the floor drama is now behind us and we are moving forward and getting so close to being able to actually use the kitchen.  The cabinets, island, sink and a lot of the trim work have been completed and the quartz countertops should be installed by the end of the week.  The house is still very much a work in progress, but having the floors finished and being able to move in fu......

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Week Eight Kitchen Update: Drywall, Paint and Countertop Shopping

Week eight kitchen expansion and first-floor renovation update of our little ranch style home.  It's been a while since I've shared a kitchen update, but honestly, there hasn't been many drastic changes since the  week two renovation update .   Demolition, installation of the new window, framing and electrical work happened pretty quick.  Everything came to a crawl and sudden halt when it was time to move the HVAC and install the new hardwood floor.  Unfortunately, the flooring contractor strung us along for almost a month then went MIA.  It was completely frustrating, especially since it was someone both myself and my contractor knew.    Thankfully, we finally have the HVAC issues wrapped up, drywall has been installed, taped and mudded, the new triple window has been painted, the walls and ceiling primed and the new hardwood floor is getting installed as I type!    Here's how the kitchen looked a few weeks ago whe......

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Kitchen Update Week Two: The Walls are Gone

Week two first floor renovation update of our small ranch style home.  This week was all about demo and removing ALL THE WALLS! Our contractor made major demo progress and was able to remove all the walls around our stairs, completely opening up our floor plan.  It's AMAZING how much larger our small home feels simply by removing a few walls.   We still have a way to go, but having the walls down and being able to visualize the space is such an amazing feeling.            ...

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Modern Farmhouse Kitchen Renovation Design and Before Tour

Tour a living room, dining room and kitchen of small ranch style home before a major kitchen and first-floor renovation.   It's hard to believe our kitchen renovation is underway!  We've saved for this project for many years and dealt with a few major financial setbacks (like needing a new septic system, furnace and air conditioner), but we are FINALLY moving forward with expanding our kitchen and opening up our floorplan.   I've mentioned in the past that we struggled with the decision to move or renovate our current home and we decided to renovate.  Yes, it would be nice to have a larger home and more property, but ultimately, that's not what was most important to us.  We are perfectly comfortable and content with the size of our home, we just wanted to make it work better for our family.   ...

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The Best Stylish Counter Height Stools

The best counter height stools for a beautiful and stylish kitchen!  Ever since deciding to move forward with our kitchen renovation I've been spending my days meeting with our contractor and kitchen designer, packing, researching and making lots of design and decor decisions.  It's quickly made me realize I have champagne taste on a beer budget.  Well, I've always known I had expensive taste, but planning and picking materials, products and decor for a new kitchen have REALLY made me realize just how expensive my taste is.  Every time I found something I knew would be perfect for our home it was either out of our budget or more than this frugal girl wanted to spend.  Of course, there's the option to just buy what I want and stretch our budget, but I'm all about saving money and searching for something less expensive.  The thrill of the hunt is my favorite part of the design process, so searching for budget-friendly alternatives is someth......

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Our Next Big Project

Exciting changes are coming to our basic ranch style home! If you follow me on Instagram then you may already know that big changes are coming to our small ranch home!  Changes that I envisioned, planned and dreamed of doing since the moment we moved into our home.  Changes that I never thought would take thirteen years to complete, but life has a funny way of not always going as planned. In 2014, I shared our phase one renovation plans that involved tearing down our carport and building a kitchen/mudroom addition and oversized two car garage.  It was a major project to tackle, especially for my husband who did all the excavating, digging, rebar, footer, concrete and leveling work.  We were thrilled when the addition was done, but we definitely weren't ready to jump into another huge project anytime soon. ...

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How Are They Holding up? Smart Tile Backsplash Review

Have you ever considered adding Smart Tiles peel-and-stick backsplash in your home?  Are you curious how Smart Tiles hold up over time?  Get all your questions answered and find out how ours are holding up three years later!  I can't believe it's been over three years since I installed our Smart Tiles peel-and-stick subway tile backsplash .  At the time, I was looking for an affordable, quick, and mess-free update for our kitchen and these peel-and-stick subway tiles were just what the space needed.   They're the next best thing to a real tile backsplash and perfect for a temporary budget-friendly update.  They were super easy to install (I installed them myself one afternoon while my husband was at work) and I couldn't be happier with how they turned out.    I get a lot of questions about their durability and now is a great time to let you know how they are holding up and answer all your burning questions.  ARE PEEL-A......

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