A Guest Ready Room

I've been lacking in posts showcasing projects and rooms that we have been tackling recently. I guess that would expected with all of the guest traffic we have going on. Well, I'm back today with a peek at how I fluffed up the guest room for those coming to stay. We didn't have a lot to spend, but wanted to make the room feel really comfortable, cozy and inviting for our family and friends.

Back in early June, we had our first house guest, and in a rather rushed attempt to prepare for her arrival, we got the room looking like this:

Not awful, but still incredibly bare, so we had our work cut out for us. The first thing we did, was add a little bit of artwork. We shopped our home for this and pulled out the headboard from our old bedroom in Toronto, along with a print that B gifted me a few Christmas' ago. The colours worked with the bedding from our old bedroom, along with the paint colour on our garage sale find headboard. 

I also figured, our guests could use somewhere to hang towels, purses, jackets, sweaters - whatever they pleased really. Thankfully, we had some hooks that hung in our house in Toronto when we had moved in. We had taken them down when we painted, and never got around to hanging them again - but we did decide to move them out west with us. So, up they went, just next to the door to the guest bedroom. The perfect place for our guests to hang whatever they may need.

I also wanted to make sure that our guests had everything they needed right at their finger tips when they arrived. I brought down one of our newly painted blue chairs and placed a basket of towels, face cloths and goodies on it for them. All the toiletries one could ever need are in that basket, along with a hair dryer.

For the nightstand, we decided we needed a lamp for our guests to flick on before they crawl into bed. Whether they would like to read, or just not have to worry about getting from the door to the bed in the dark, it was necessary. Since it was short notice, we actually moved one of our master bedroom lamps down there before my friend came to visit in June, and it remained there right up until B's parents left. But last week, after they were gone I was at IKEA and found a much smaller lamp in the As-Is section for only $10. Perfect solution for our small table, and it made room for us to add a clock, as well as a place to keep our guest book.

On the floor next to the night table, I placed a basket that I picked up at IKEA for $5.99. Inside of it, I placed all of the brochures we have collected for the surrounding areas, and other places we have visited. I figure this is a great resource when people are coming to stay from out of town. We don't really make a ton of concrete plans in advance, so this way our guests can take a look at the different places nearby, and maybe decide what they would really enjoy seeing. After all, I'm around all day to help them see the sights, and I'm happy to bring them wherever they would like to go...

I'd say, for mostly shopping our home (with the exception of the $15 I spent for the lamp and basket... not including some toiletries I picked up) that we did a good job setting up the space for guests...

There is still room for improvement to cozy it up a little. Maybe a nice chair, or a dresser, and definitely another nightstand. We'll get there eventually, but slow and steady is our best way to go. We enjoy finding the right pieces and not just throwing stuff in there because it was a great deal. I need to really love it. So I'm keeping my eyes out, and maybe by the next month we have a ton of visitors, I'll have some more updates to share.

So far the reviews from B's parents were great! They loved the room and found the bed incredibly comfy! Come back tomorrow to see how we whipped our "office/work out room" into a guest room in a pinch! Yup you read that right. We have three people staying at the moment and needed to provide some privacy for our extra guests, so we made some moves and shopped our home and pulled together a cozy little space for extra over night guests!

A Monday Giveaway!

Happy Monday everyone! Once again we've been incredibly busy with some friends who have been visiting, and my brother just arrived yesterday. Still a lot more to see and do, but I do have more to share with you this week. Before I get to some of the stuff we've done around here, along with a look at how I prepared the guest room for everyone, I wanted to kick off this week with a giveaway. It's been quite a while since I've done one, so I was happy to hear from Monica over at Printique, who offered up TWO really great prizes!

Printique, is a fun Etsy shop, that has some really great ways for you to dress up your walls in a personal way. Located in New Brunswick, Monica does a great job taking your photos and turning them into beautiful Pop Arts prints.

{Set of 4 8x10 prints}

{Andy Warhol style 8x10 print}

I love that you have the option to get the four individual prints, or one print. She also provides the option to order them as a digital file so that you can print them anywhere and anyway you'd like. How fun would those digital files be to create your own birthday party invites for little one's?

You may also like to have a couple's photo done. Great for framing and hanging, or using for some funky wedding invites, save the dates or even thank you cards.

{Couples Pop Art 8x10 Print}

If you're looking for something a little different, you may be a fan of the custom silhouette portraits that Monica does. You can choose to have it made using the map of a city you love, or have one of the pretty scalloped frames around it. So lovely!

{Custom Silhouette Portrait with Map}                                        {Custom Silhouette Portrait}

So "What?", you may ask, is Monica offering up for my lovely readers today? Well, we're giving away TWO $20 certificates, to be used any way that you would like, to two very lucky readers! Excited? Well, here's how to enter:

1) You must be a follower of my blog! Just click on that pretty "join this site" button on the right hand side of the screen. 

2) Visit Monica's shop, and check out what she has. Then come on back and leave a comment letting me know what you would use $20 towards!

For Extra Entries (please leave a separate comment for each of the below for an extra entry to count):

1) Head on over to First Time Fancy's Facebook page and give me a "Like". Then come back and leave a comment letting me know (if you already "Like" First Time Fancy on Facebook, even better - just leave a comment and let me know!)

2) Head on over to Monica's Facebook Page and give her a "Like", then come back and leave a comment letting me know that you have done so!

3) Give a little tweet! "I just entered to win $20 from Printique over at @FirstTimeFancy!"

Make sure you enter by this coming Sunday, September 16th at 12pm PST. I will announce the winner (chosen at random), next Monday the 17th! In the mean time, if you just can't wait to find out if you've won, or you'd rather do some shopping on your own, Monica has offered up 20% off to all First Time Fancy readers! Just use the promo code FANCY20! Good Luck and Happy Shopping! :)

Fancy Friday Love

Happy Friday my sweets! I'm happy to be back today with some fancy finds with you. Even though I've been busy showing our guests around, I've found some time in the early morning, and in the evenings to squeeze in a bit of blog reading. Here's what I found over the past two weeks...

This house, designed by Geoff Chick & Associates, and featured on House of Turquoise, is not a house that I loved immediately. I actually went back and scrolled through the photos a few times, and the more I looked at them, the more I loved the space. It really is the attention to detail that makes me think it's a fabulous home - what do you think?

I thought this idea for artwork in a children's room, from Apartment Therapy, looks incredibly fun! Maybe something to keep in mind for those puppy dog's that I spray painted for her party last month?

How about another lovely kitchen? This space, designed by Marie-Laure Helmkampf, and featured on desire to inspire, is so relaxed, cozy and inviting. Looks like a dreamy place to start your morning with a warm pumpkin flavoured drink...

To bring a little contrast to the last space, I'm loving this colourful and fun dining room, from Jerusalem Greer of The Adventures of Jolly Goode Gal, featured on House of Turquoise. It's so different from what I am normally drawn to, but really - what's not too love about this happy space?

I've been itching to start pulling out our autumn decor, but wasn't too sure if it was still too early or not. Then, I saw Hilary's fantastic DIY birch candle project, and decided maybe it is time to start crafting and decorating for the new season. What do you think?

Well, this weekend we have some more fun stuff planned with our friends who are visiting from Toronto. Then, on Sunday, my big brother is flying out to stay with us for just over a week. Him and I have already been talking and planning all kinds of fun day trips for us to do with Halle once he arrives.  What do you have planned for this fine early fall weekend? (okay, I know it's technically not fall yet - but we are all ready for it, right?)

Whoooo's Getting Married?

Well... it's not me, but somebody has to be, right? I can only imagine, that planning a wedding must be overwhelming and involve so many decisions. It must also take a lot of research and comparing products and prices, to find exactly what you want, for a price that works for you. Well, today I just had to share something for all of you who may be looking for a unique product for your wedding stationary suite.

Last week, I heard from the lovely people over at Night Owl Paper Goods, who are getting ready to launch their brand new Wood Wedding Collection Designs on September 19th. These pieces are custom printed on sustainably-harvested birch wood, and the recycled envelopes contain 30 - 100% post-consumer waste! I mean, if you plan on taking the green route for your wedding, these products are a fabulous start - plus they are absolutely GORGEOUS!

{Amos invite in lavender}

{Annabel invite in Persimmon}

Whatever you are looking for, they can do it. Save the dates, wedding invites, reply cards, thank you notes, reception pieces, guest gifts and more. What a great way to get some really memorable pieces for your wedding!

{Hibiscus Suite}

Maybe they don't have a design that quite fits with your style or wedding theme, but you still love the idea of using wood for your wedding. No problem - Night Owl Paper Goods can also print your own design on their sustainably harvested wood as well. Incredible - I know!

{Piper invite and reply card in lavender}

I also love that all of their goods are hand made in the US. Okay, I may not be American, but just knowing that everything they do is produced right here in North America is a great feeling these days. Don't you agree? 

{Rainbow Suite}

I'm falling in love with each and every one of their designs, and it makes me wonder how anyone can pick one direction for their wedding and stick to it. Don't you brides just want to change your mind a million times with all of the beautiful options out there?

{Horizon Invite & Reply card}

Keep an eye out for these, and a bunch of other new designs, coming on September 19th, at Night Owl Paper Goods. In the mean time, why not swing by and just check out some of the other fabulous products that they offer?

A Swell Place to Dwell - Guest Bedroom Revamp

Happy Wednesday everyone! Our second round of house guests arrive tomorrow, so I'm thrilled to have another wonderful blogger fill in for me today while I make some last minute tweaks around here. Say hello to Kelly from A Swell Place to Dwell...

Hello fancy readers! I'm Kelly from A Swell Place to Dwell, which is my little slice of the blogesphere where I share my crazy exploits in revamping a 'starter' builder grade home with my husband, while raising a very busy 13 month old and wrangling a totally neurotic great dane. I am excited to be here today, and am super thankful to Kerry for letting me share a little peek into our guest room.

Are you ready? Just imagine you are lucky enough to be staying with us in our house for the weekend. You have a baby trying to share Cheerios with you and a dog who is bringing you his leash. Get the picture? Get ready to relax in this oasis.  Ok, ok....it's not quite an oasis.  But what I hope I have created is a space for my guests to feel slightly at home for the few days they visit us.  The best part?  I revamped our little guest room for $10.  By shopping our own home and redoing a Kijiji find, I was able to give our tiny little guest room a facelift  and a little personality.

Here's the first glimpse of the guest room from the hallway.  The room is small.  11'x 8' small.  Not a lot of room for fluff....just the essentials.

Let's take a peek inside, shall we?

The little dresser beside the bed was a free find on Kijiji (like Craigslist). I repainted it and added the stencil.  You can see the before pictures and the whole process here.  The stencil was the only thing that I actually bought for the whole room.  Using my 40% off coupon at Michael's it was $10.



On the other side of the bed there are two pieces of framed fabric.  The bright orange fabric was my jumping off point for this room.  The fabric was from my husband's Great Aunt, who was a Missionary in Papua New Guinea.  It's really bright and a bit crazy, but I love how it adds some serious personality to this room.  I pulled out a poster that I had in the frame and just replaced it with the fabric.  With some of the left over fabric scraps I used scissors to cut out an intricate pattern and framed it in another Ikea frame that I had hanging around.

At the end of the bed is a little stool that has been in my family for years and years.  I repainted it and added some gold dipped legs (see before and afters here).

The little basket holds essentials for our guests.  I've collected all of the sample size products for free through coupons and mailing campaigns.  It's amazing what companies will send you for free if you just ask.

Heading back over to the other side of the room......

I used some of the left over fabric in a tray that I already had.  The tray is meant to hold photos, but I love how the fabric adds colour to the top of the dresser.  I also spray painted an old bottle with metallic gold spray paint to add a bit of bling (almost every room in my house has metallic somewhere).

Above the desk is a gallery wall of sorts.  It's comprised of odds and ends that were had stuffed away in a closet.

The guy with the crazy lips came with my husband when we moved in together.  He bought it in Cuba and loves it, but I wasn't quite sure about it.  The lips were a little bit too much for me to handle.  I figured he'd been stuffed in the closet long enough though (the mask, not my husband) and should be displayed somewhere.  I think he fits perfectly in this room.  Even though he's from Cuba and the crazy fabric is from Papua New Guinea, they seem to be a perfect fit for each other.  Plus, once the mask became part of a collection of art, the lips became less creepy.

Well, that's the whole tour of the room.  To give you a quick idea of what you can do for $10, here's a look at what the room looked like before.

And after, one more time for comparison's sake...and to save you from scrolling up.

Thanks so much for being a guest in our house! Feel free to pop on by A Swell Place to Dwell and check out some of my other projects. Click on the photo to see the full post.

Thanks so much for stopping by today Kelly! I love that you were able to put this whole room together by shopping your home (and spending $10 on the stencil - totally worth it!). Inexpensive updates are my favourite thing, and this one is no exception! We're still working on making our own inexpensive updates - so keep an eye out for more coming soon! 

Little Orphan Aggie - Guest Bedroom Inspiration

Happy Tuesday readers! Today I'm running around preparing for our next guests who will be coming to stay with us tomorrow. Thankfully, I have some really great bloggers lined up to help out with content. Today, Linds from Little Orphan Aggie is stopping by with some guest bedroom inspiration. I don't think I could thank her enough for helping me out, as she was a very busy girl getting ready for her own wedding which happened this past Saturday! I'm not joking! So a big congrats to this beautiful gal and her brand new hubby! Really, could this girl be any more thoughtful? Check out what Linds has to share with you...

Hello First Time Fancy readers!  My name is Linds and my blog, Little Orphan Aggie, is where I've been sharing the details on our home renovations and, more recently, our wedding. 

At our house we've only tackled the main floor so far, so while I don't have my own guest room to show you, I thought I'd share some inspiration for when we finally do get to working on one.  Our home is a two and a half story brick house so our third floor loft is one with slanted ceilings like those in these pictures.

I love the light, calm, airy feel this room has, and look at the use of space - 4 beds!  I love the idea of adding curtains for added privacy as well...

source

I would love to be able to create a loft space like this, I think simplicity can go a long way in a guest room.  The less there is going on, the more your guests can relax.

source

This is a picture of a child's room, but I love the raw wood ceilings, they add so much warmth to what can easily end up feeling cold, dark and "attick-ish"

pinterest

And this is just pure awesomeness...a loft permanently set up as one big tent/luxury camping trip!?  Now that is my idea of a great guest room.  I would be over the moon if I was a guest in a room like this!

pinterest

After looking at all of these pictures I started thinking about how I like to prepare for overnight guests:

One thing I have to do before I have guests, and this may seem obvious but I'm sure we've all been a guest somewhere where things looked less than fresh and it does leave an impression, is clean.  It doesn't even have to be a major clean if you're short on time, but the bathroom and kitchen, and of course the room your guests will be staying in, are a must for me.  A sparkling tub, toilet and sink and some fresh sheets can go a long way!

I also like to have everything as prepared in advance as I can. So new sheets and a cleanly made bed before the guests arrive is important. That way when they are tired and ready to sleep, they don't feel obligated to help you make the bed as they watch you scramble last minute.

Try to have some of your guests favourite foods available, whether it's a favourite meal you can serve, or just some yummy treats you know they like.  It shows you put some extra thought towards their arrival.

This obviously isn't what I do, since I don't have a "guest room", but having been a guest at other peoples houses, it is something I would appreciate.  As an early riser (or even for night owls) it's sometimes uncomfortable if your host is still sleeping and you're laying there in bed wondering what do you do until they wake up?  Having a tv and maybe some reading material available in the room if possible gives your guests a way to occupy their time.

So there's some of my thoughts and inspiration on guest rooms!  Thanks again for having me over Kerry, enjoy your time with your guests!!

Thank you Linds for being such a HUGE help! I loved all of your inspiration photos - they area all such cozy and welcoming nooks, that I am sure any guest would be happy to stay in!  Come back tomorrow, I have another blogger dropping by, sharing how she spruced up her own guest room by shopping her home!

Happy Labour Day

Happy Holiday Monday readers! Can you believe today is pretty much the last day of summer? We've been having a fabulous weekend exploring, so I thought that now would be a good time to drop in and show you some of what we've been up to this past week with our guests! I'll do a quick run down of what I got up to with B's parents during the week, and save the big trips for near the end of the post - so here we go...

{1. Started last Sunday with a trip to Granville Island, 2. Halle enjoyed playing with the birds in GasTown, 

3. Stopped into ORLING & WU 4. James Hetfield of Metallica having lunch in GasTown}

{1. Last Monday we took a stroll in Fort Langley, 2. Tuesday we visited White Rock,

3. Enjoying cupcakes at Tracycakes in White Rock, 4. Halle had her very own baby cake}

{1. Wednesday we enjoyed lunch in Steveston, 2. Checked out what was on offer for fish,

3. Picked up some Sable Fish for dinner - delicious!, 4. Beautiful Steveston}

{On Thursday, B took me on a date night and we enjoyed a lovely dinner cruise with a beautiful view of the city and mountains. How did we get so lucky to live here?}

We had a pretty lazy day on Friday, hanging close to home and then going for a stroll and ice cream in Port Moody in the evening. We need to rest up for our weekend of big adventure. Saturday morning we got up, ate breakfast and then made the drive up to Whistler. It was the perfect day to just walk around and enjoy everything that Whistler Village has to offer...

Halle really just loved playing in the park with all of the toys that they had laying around for little one's. She was very good at sharing with the other kids and really tired herself out with all of the running around.

Sunday was a very early morning. We were out of the house by 6am, and headed for our ferry over to Victoria. We had made a reservation for the 8am ferry, but when we arrived an hour early, they had room on the 7am ferry and we got to head over early. We weren't complaining, and were happy to get an early start to our time on the Island.

There was a boat festival happening while we were there, so the harbour was full of gorgeous vintage (and vintage style) ships. We loved having the chance to get down there and take a closer look.

I didn't take as many pictures as I expected, but I'm also sure we will be back to Victoria very soon (as in, with some of our other guests). We really had gorgeous days all weekend, and today looks just as lovely. We're starting off slow, and we'll see where the day takes us. To keep up with our activities, you can follow me on Instagram at firsttimefancyblog. 

B's parents head back home tomorrow, and we'll be preparing for our next guests to arrive on Thursday. I have two guest posts lined up for this week, so come back tomorrow to see what they are sharing! Hope you enjoy this holiday Monday!