Love Your Home Challenge: Chalk Paint Spruce Up

I'm so excited to be a part of the Love Your Home book tour. I've been a long time lover of The Inspired Room blog, especially after going to college with Melissa's (the author!) daughter, Courtney. We worked on many interior design projects together over our years in design school. Last year, I began writing a blog post each month for The Inspired Room, so I was thrilled be able to join their team! Melissa's first book, Love the Home you Have, just recently came out, and oh-my-goodness, I just adore it. Melissa does an amazing job of reminding us to really treasure and find joy in our homes, even if it's not perfect. (Because no one's really is!)

Today, I was invited to complete a simple Love Your Home Challenge, along with other sweet  bloggers, inspired by the new book Love The Home You Have. In the back of the book, you'll find a bunch of super simple ways to really fall more in love with your home. They take little money, time and effort, but they make a huge impact. I think so often, we can be discouraged by our own homes (however big or little it may be), because visuals of other's homes are so readily available. In magazines, on blogs, and for Heaven's sake, the number one offender, Instagram! Everywhere we turn, we're bombarded with other people's gorgeous homes and we are left to feel like ours just isn't enough. Melissa reminds us we are enough, our homes are enough, the decor and our hearts are certainly enough.

The challenge I took was "Make it Happen", which challenges us to actually get a project done in our houses that have been hanging over our heads lately, stealing joy, and leaving us uninspired. If you follow me on Instagram, you saw a sneak peek of a project I was working on. When I first moved in to my apartment, I had come from California all the way to Michigan, with nothing other than bedding, a few small pieces of furniture, and some pretty goblets I had collected over the years. It was so overwhelming (and now kind of funny) to look around my apartment and see nothing. I was watching TV on the floor of my living room, with my TV propped up on a moving box. One day I went to World Market and quickly chose a TV stand I thought worked "fine" for the room, just to make myself feel like the apartment was getting done. This media cabinet has never felt like "me", so I finally took this challenge and gave it a little chalk paint makeover by painting just the bottom portion. I left the top the rich wood color to give it some contrast. I love how it turned out!

Now the piece reflects my vintage, farmhouse, shabby chic style.

If you want to buy Love the Home You Have and take one of the challenges, be sure to share about it on Melissa's new website, Home Love Stories. Get all the details here! To end, I absolutely love this quote from the book. Doesn't it ring so true, especially as we enter into Spring?

Let's allow our homes be places of joy and thankfulness, instead of comparison and uninspired moments. You can visit these bloggers to see the challenges they took on also!

Reluctant Entertainer /Julie Blanner / Mom Advice / Sawdust Girl / Liz Marie Blog / Tidy Mom / Infarrantly Creative / Love Feast Table / Balancing Beauty and Bedlam / All Things Thrifty / Just a Girl / Emily A Clark  / My Sweet Savannah / Lemonade Makin Mama / Jones Design Company / Fieldstone Hill Design / Jenna Burger Design / DIY Show Off / Not Just a Housewife / Beneath My Heart / A Thoughtful Place / Home Stories A to Z / Southern Hospitality / My Blessed Life / Pretty Handy Girl / The Nesting Place / Shabby Nest / Funky Junk Interiors / Songbird Blog / The Shabby Creek Cottage / Miss Mustard Seed / 320 Sycamore

Don't forget to visit The Inspired Room and get yourself a copy of the book so you can complete some of the fun home challenges. If you do the challenges, be sure to share on Instagram with #loveyourhomechallenge.

Have a lovely day!
xoxo

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