Guest Room Decorating

I'm frustrated with all the looking and not-finding-anything I've been doing lately. Or, when I do find something - Ikea cabinets, for example - not being able to fit them into our car to get them home, nor wanting to spend $199 for shipping from Orlando to our house. For the time being, I'm taking a break. Who would ever have thought it would be wearing to shop?! Instead, I'm spending time doing what I have the wherewithall to do.

We brought along lamps, not knowing which, if any, would suit our new house. This plain white lamp has been in our house for years. You can tell from the dinginess of the lamp shade!

After reading a few tutorials about how to cover a lamp shade, I tackled it for myself. I rolled the shade across a big sheet of craft paper, tracing the edge to make a pattern. With that pattern I cut a single piece of fabric, adding about a 1/2-inch on the top and bottom edges for turning under. With Sobo fabric glue, I glued the fabric to the edges of the lampshade using binding clips to hold the fabric in place while it dried.

How glad am I that over the past several years I've bought palm tree (in this case, philodendren) fabric whenever I came across it!

I love it!

Such a simple way to add another coastal/beachy/Florida element to the guest room.

Another task was to recover a homemade "headboard" we brought along in our move. The headboard is simply a sheet of insulation, cut the width of the double bed and curved along the top corners. It has two yardsticks glued vertically to the back so the whole thing stands at the end of the bed, against the wall.

I removed the old blue/gold cover and used it to played around with font sizes/words printed from the computer. The phrase, "It's another beautiful day..." is one I chose because it's so often said here in The Villages, "It's another beautiful day in The Villages." Folks on WVLG radio say it all the time... because it's true!

Using a fusible, Kona Azure fabric, and variegated YLI thread, I machine appliqued each letter to a white print fabric.

Then I pressed fusible fleece to the back to give it the puffy look I wanted. Using small applique pins, the whole piece is securely attached to the insulation along the back edges.

Along with the "Friendship Medallion" quilt finished last March, this is the start of creating a colorful, welcoming room for visitors.

Linda