we are finally, finally all moved in. unpacked. decorated. completely settled. our bedroom was the last to come together and i think it might be our favorite bedroom in our 10 years together. lots of light. color. and fun (hello, [fake] zebra rug!).
the painting above the bed is the one mati and i painted together. bedding was found in the clearance section over at macys.com and our globe lamp on the left was an ikea find (and so fun at nite). like the rest of our home, this room is a collection of new, vintage, art, funky, and color.
i found this vintage vanity at a garage sale years ago. i immediately took it home, painted it white, and have loved it’s girlishness ever since (we all secretly want a vanity, right ladies?). it holds my porcelain hands that hold my treasures, an old beautifully aged jewelry box, and a couple other lovely tokens that make my heart warm.
this would be my side of the bed :). painting is by a portland painter whose name i can’t remember (and who, i think, must have forgotten to sign the back of this particular painting). i loved the experience of finding this piece of art with john. we both saw it and loved it right away. an old wooden sewing machine case (with black doorknob feet) sits on top of a couple of vintage suitcases. and a quirky vintage shade is paired with a glass lamp – totally doesn’t “go” but i love it anyway.
some of my fave necklaces….
the framed polaroid print is from friend hula’s etsy shop (love all of her stuff). and the winged bottle was a creation of my mom’s that i just can’t live without.
and finally…last but not least:
call us crazy, but we bought a funky green couch. a leather one. omg. we’ve had this baby on order for weeks and weeks and it was so fun to have it delivered (finally) last week while my parents were here. i have no idea what’s gotten into me, but i’m so incredibly thankful i have a partner in life who is adventurous, embraces the creative, and supports the buying of green couches. i can’t help but smile wide whenever i sit on it. it’s just so….risky. and quirky. and cute.
dearest blog peeps, please tell me i’m not crazy. that i will still love this couch (as much as i love it today) years and years from now. that being bold is following our bliss. that life is too short not to have a green couch. that it works. and if you don’t mind, i’d love to hear about your craziest decorating judgements – the good ones. the bad ones. the funny ones. how do you express your creativity in your home? does it come thru loud and clear? is it subtle? are you feeling the heavy compromise with your partner who prefers neutrals over colors (or vice versa). are there ways you can sneak your undeniable creativity into your living spaces (because this is so important)? i’d really love to know 🙂
you are so NOT crazy…the couch is oh so cool. I can relate to the difficulty in deciding about a couch. We purchased our first totally new couch last year, it took us several months of looking to take the leap and now we have a comfy place to snuggle in and the couch is exactly what we needed….brave in all things…works in decorating too….
I am absolutely
completely
without a doubt
in love with your home.
and i shall be your faithful blog reader forevermore.
heee!!!
but seriously, it’s like you live in my brain and put together the home i WISH i could.
have a beautiful day!
xo
Life is too short —Embrace what you love!!!!!!!
The green sofa is such fun! What a wonderful space you have created! My husband and I are working through ‘Taking Flight’ together. We were in Winners (a discount home store here) and he saw your blank journals for sale. He said, ” Aren’t these by the artist you really like?” I said yes and he put one in our cart!
I’m going back today to nab the remainder for presents (alas, there are only three left). Your art makes the world a better place. Thank you for sharing your talent with all of us who need a bit of a nudge to find what talents we may have lurking inside us.
Godspeed.
Nancy Morgan, Victoria, BC
I love your couch and your home! My husband is a bit more conservative than I am when it comes to home decor. When we bought our new couch and chair we compromised. The couch is a neutral color and the chair is yellow.
Your home is so beautiful and a place in which to love and live. I love the green couch too. It will take on different ‘personalities’ if you choose to change cushion arrangements/colours too (not that the present cushions aren’t gorgeous! It’s so sad today that many homes are decorated with chain store, ‘buy now, pay late’ type furniture and look ver similar and lack soul. Your home definitely does not lack soul!
My own home is full of market or second-hand shop finds. A favourite comment from my mother is “Mmm, it will look ok with a coat of paint” Usually I have no intention of painting it!
Love your home Kelly Rae and I am so enjoying your blog as well. Your book has been ordered and is hopefully ‘taking flight’ (or ship) and making its way to me here in Australia – can’t wait!
Kelly,
You will continue to love the couch for a long time. It is perfect for you!! I have come to believe that it matters not what others think as long as you love it!!!
Just found your blog through decor8. I just love, love, adore, envy your house! I wish I had the money to completely re-do my apt!
I’m an amateur painter, photographer, writer, and poet. After years working in healthcare, I’m able to focus on my passions. Blogs, like yours, keep me inspired. I definitely want to see your paintings!
If you want see mine…www.artbybeatriz.blogspot.com. I haven’t really figured my style. I’m all over the place.
I love that you seem to have a cohesive and beautiful style! Look forward to more!
I absolutely love your decor style. Just as much as I love your art! It reminds me of an updated shabby chic look and I’m a huge fan of the style. have no regrets about the green…. but I can’t be remiss in saying how lucky you are to have a guy that can live in so much color and so much woman influences. tj09
I LOVE your green couch! I think it looks lovely, homey and FUN.
Hey, this is some good stuff here! you have put together the decor really well. its really refreshing! The green sofa? Hey, you’re stepping out and living boldly!!!
hi, kelly rae.
the couch is lovely. your whole home is lovely. i hope it is not -as the title of that entry reads – the “last” of your home tours! if you rearrange or redecorate in big or small ways, i hope you will share it on your blog with people like me, someone who finds inspiration in your ideas and actions.
brave in sadness, brave in love. and brave in trusting yourself and choosing a green couch. all good. 🙂
thanks for sharing.
kathy
OMG I LOVE your couch!! It matches my favorite leather purse. Who wants a taupe-colored life anyhow???! : )
Your color choices are exciting and you will not regret the couch! Our 4 yr old son was given the choice of wall color for his bedroom…RED…bright red. I did “suggest” a few softer shades, but he was adament about his choice. What would that have told him if we had denied him his choice for his own bedroom? After several coats, the room looks adorable. And after all, how could I refuse that color choice when our dining room is painted a very bold turquoise?!
I painted a feature wall that color in our last house! My husband still thinks I’m crazy! But I know he secretly liked it. He just can’t believe I mixed the colour myself and didn’t run out of paint!
You’re not crazy! My mum just bought a lime green couch. That she loves. And wishes she’d bought 20 years ago when she wanted to! I think you’ll still love it many years down the track.
love the couch and the colour and character of your lovely home!
everytime you look at the GLORIOUS green couch you will be reminded of how brave and bold and creative you are!
i recovered a stuff english wingback chair in purple and orange stripes and it felt like my very own princess throne.
it is in storage as we have emmigrated but it will be mine again soon 🙂
I am just beginning to express creativity in my house. For some reason art in my home is hard for me to wrap my brain around.
BUT I did something big for me and picked a style I loved…and stuck with the vision of what I wanted in my living room. We drove everywhere and worked really hard to get things that were less expensive but the style we wanted. At first we almost bought a nice sofa which we liked, but it was before I had an overall vision. I totally LOVE your colorful style. I still have a lot of ‘country’ hand me downs and can’t afford to trade them in, so I can at least one room that is all me.
I love your house. It is amazing. I painted my bedromm about that color green so a couch is nothing:) Yes, life is too short to not have happiness around you.
i love the green couch, kelli! would i have had the nerve to buy it? no but i’m proud that you did! for me, i have spots of orange in every room in my house. it is my signature color and i’m always on the lookout for orange things to buy, etc. love to be creative with orange!
I LOVE the couch – I love your whole house! May I come live with you?
Our home is a mixture of traditional, quirky, vintage … if I like it, it’ll work somehow. My guy’s not quite as adventurous as I am but he is good at saying “ok” when I move furniture around (who can live with it the same way all the time?) or change the wall hangings around or whatever change I feel the need to do… I doubt our home will ever be “finished” as my tastes change, as I discover new art or create something new.
Bliss is indeed where each of us find it – and it’s never a bad thing!
wow. that is beautiful. the entire thing is completely amazing
YOU ARE FABULOOOOUSE….the green couch is so wonderful.it will always remain in style becuase you can do so much with it..where did you get your bed and curtain rods..I have serached everywhere for simple cool curtain rods for my house…AWESOME thanks for sharing.it makes me want to redo my room. Love color.
ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS COUCH!!!!! and you WILL love it forever…because you followed your hearts desire…I ALWAYS coach my clients to buy what THEY love…not what they think they SHOULD!…That’s the way I “roll” in our house (you can see some on my blog) and that’s the way we ALL should! LOVE IT!!!
Enjoy! ( and I know you will :))
your house is so beautiful. it makes me feel happy just sharing in your pictures. i would love to come home each day and just be in a home like yours. seriously, has it been showcased in a magazine yet? i wouldnt doubt it. i just love it. we use to have a red couch. i loved it until it finally collapsed. i just changed up the surroundings and never tired of it. :)your lucky to be bold enough to follow your creative choices. its perfect.
btw. i am reading your taking flight book. i am a paper crafter who needed something to lift me up–and i think i cried during chapter one. thank you for your ispiration. it was exactly what i needed. exactly. 🙂 im so glad you wrote this book!! thank you.
(a new fan of your creativity and inspiration)
sherry williams
severna park md
I love your green couch! Very fun, full of happiness. I have a thrift store china cabinet that is calling for that very same green. Just waiting for the rain to stop!
Kelly your home is so precious!! I think you will love the green couch for a long time to come…and when you quit loving it, find another bold fabric to cover it in! I am preparing my home to sell, and at the realtor’s recommendation, I painted over my limey-guacamole walls to a nice conservative taupe. sigh. hopefully it will work for someone else…but I am already dreaming of the things I will do to a new home, and you are giving me inspiration!! hurray for the artist in us that wants to be bold and adventurous!
That couch is soo cool, and I love your room tours. I hope one day when I have a place of my own again I can make it as colorful and inspiring as your home is. Thanks for the peak into your home.
I love your spontenaity and sense of whimsy in your decorating style! I think you will love the green couch forever (or at least until you have that urge to be bold and crazy again! 😉 because it represents a part of who you are.
I am a slow decorator–mostly because I’m still discovering my style. I’ve had an old red screen door (which hangs sideways on our great room wall) that still has an empty pane awaiting that special something to fill it. I’m ok with the empty spots. But I want to learn to let go more and trust my heart.
Thanks for taking us on a tour of your home! Very fun and inspiring.
Kelly, thanks for sharing your green couch. Im just in the process of choosing fabric to recover my old thrift shop couch and was feeling compelled to go down the ‘safe beige’ route. But its just not me! I need colour! Thanks for permission to be bold.
Your pretty green couch fits your personality-
happy happy happy!!!
Your husband is a keeper, my sweetie would have said an emphatic NO to the green couch, but in a loving way of course!
WHO CARES! we have but a short time here let alone doing, saying and buying things that are ‘safe’ and a comprimise to who we are, if you love it that’s all that matters, and if no one else likes it blow ’em a big rasbeery and say to bad, my house!
i have had my great big purple couch for years and still love it, and recently bought a blue and red dougnut chairs to go with it cause those colours make purple. Its ok to have a little crazy!
Oh I LOVE looking at your blogs! The colors just make me smile (oddly, since I’m more of a inside-of-Hogwarts-colors person)!
It reminds me of the comfort eyeballs get when looking at a field of wildflowers in full bloom.
Thanks for being a ray of sunshine on an overcast day! 🙂
yes you are completely crazy- what were you thinking?… Just Kidding! Besides my mother keeps reminding me that she is the only person on the planet who is “normal”
LOL
(but you know, my grandfather used to tell me that Normal people have their legs growing out of their ears)
You can see my goofy decorating on the mastheads of my blog(s) http://www.maunaleamanor.blogspot.com Those are all pictures of the rooms in my house/castle 😉
My husband thinks our house looks like a Turkish Bazaar but I love it!
Oh I LOVE looking at your blogs! The colors just make me smile (oddly, since I’m more of a inside-of-Hogwarts-colors person)!
It reminds me of the comfort eyeballs get when looking at a field of wildflowers in full bloom.
Thanks for being a ray of sunshine on an overcast day! 🙂
Inspirational! In every way you brighten my day! LOVE your bedroom and I am with HEather….I am SOOOO close to a white wash painting job on all my darks…..
The couch is FAB! It is so funky and fun! I think that we all need to let loose and give in to our inner colorful child.
I have been wanting to finish the kids bathroom for like 4 years now…..and this post gave me the motivation to go out and buy the fabric for the curtain! Later or tomorrow I will be buying the paint! I am sooo excited!
Thanks Kelly!
Michelle
LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!!! your style is awesome… and you will always be happy because you are following your heart and your creativity. you go girl! I love the whole house.
Whether you love it forever or not, the best part is that you are in love with it now and didn’t let an inner voice tell you not to get that fabulous couch.
My Dad calls my house the circus (makes me laugh), what can I say I love color. The only neutral in the house is the carpet, one couch is purple the other is red. So a green couch seems perfect to me!
Love the color, love the green couch. I think you would be sorry years from now if you had not bought it. I love your house and all the color and white, clean, simple and white, perfect. Love your blog. Peggy
Kelly,that color is called “Gleeful Green” It is like the color of my living room and you will always love it! You follow your heart and it shines! I am so glad your art has come to my small town. Keep scattering joy!Blessings and light,
Amy Sperry Faldet
i love, love, love all the color! and that green couch is a keeper 🙂 simply dreamy.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE that green couch! I tend to lean towards the neutral with my main furniture pieces but love the quirky stuff as accessories. I have a partner who encourages the artist in me and is pushing me to create BIGGER to put it all on display! You have a wonderful home!!!! I could just roam from room to room everyday (and I would touch the paintings you and Mati made each time, I love them!)
i want to move in…..NOW. i’ve been drooling over your house and it’s funky, fun, vintage chic style since you first started sharing pictures.
when i grow up i so want a house like this. *smile* i keep sending my husband links to your photos saying……..”see, like this….”
hahahah.
and girl, you are SO not crazy. there’s always more couches if you outgrow the green. but i have a feeling you won’t.
thanks for the inspiring photos of your dwelling space. for now, i’ll just keep on dreaming.
I love all the colors you’ve used in your decorating (especially your green couch). Enjoy your new home!
LOVE the sofa! The room is so bright and cheery and light-filled; with the sofa, it comes together beautifully! (And how fabulous that your man shares your taste!) Your bedroom looks great too.
As for my decorating issues, whenever I buy something I think I love and find later that it no longer works, I don’t hesitate to sell it or give it away. I don’t believe in living with a piece of furniture just because it was expensive. I change my decor around often by replacing pillows on the sofa, switching art, etc. It’s good to mix things up. Recently I gave a dinner party and a friend had told her husband about my collection of Native American pottery. When she arrived, I’d changed all the art in the room and put the pottery away. I’ve found in a small apartment, I have to shake things up or I’ll go mad, staring at the same things all the time. xo
The green couch will serve you well… it will be a reminder of not only this moment in time but of shared adventures with your husband, of youthful optimism and the audacity of believing in green couches. You will love it always. Really. Trust me on this one.
thanks guys 🙂
it’s so much fun…like having you over for tea and talking about all things color and decor.
to answer a few questions:
the bedding in the spare bedroom is from anthropologie. the bed in that room was found at a junk store.
our bed in the master bed is the farmhouse bed at potterybarn.com – we bought it on clearance. not sure if there are more but maybe! love how low it is to the ground and only the top mattress is needed.
the green couch also came from pottery barn. it’s the manhattan leather couch in parsley green and worth every penny.
if you have questions, keep asking and i’ll answer here in the comments!
thanks again for all the enthusiasm and “your not crazy’s”.
xxo
these rooms are amazing! I always thought Portland was gray and dreary, you make it look like the brightest and sunniest place on earth! awesome! ( I am now *this close* to white washing all my dark bedroom furniture!)
If you love the green couch you will always love it. Purchases from the heart never lose their magic. I have a love seat that is bright barn red with folky rustic style embroidery all over it…I loved it then, I love it now! And to me, green is a neutral. everything matches green!
Lovely home. So bright and cheerful!
Do you mind sharing where your bed came from? I have been looking for a simple white bed for awhile and cant find anything with a low footboard. That one looks perfect.