farmhouse on a budget

from the inspiration fabrics and photos, i started pulling mary beth's design together. i selected a floral fabric for her shades in the dining room. i planned to find off-the-shelf silk panels and lucked up to find the perfect color in the clearance rack at a brentwood interiors, a designer fabric store.

fabric for shades

silk panels

i did most of the shopping for accessories and artwork at designer discount stores like homegoods and tj maxx. sometimes you can really luck up at those stores. they are great for small budgets too.

here is what the dining room looked like before the redesign. here is what the completed dining room looks like. because we were trying to get the most out of mary beth's budget i decided to recover her existing antique dining room chairs. i also opted to make fabric shades out of her existing mini-blinds. here's the link to the directions on the little green notebook blog.

fabric for shades

here is the kitchen after.

another after shot.
mary beth had previously owned a slip covered sofa and wanted something with a little less maintenance. for the family room i selected a broyhill sofa with a dark, neutral fabric on it.

one of our best buys while we were out shopping was a rustic bench from hobby lobby. it was originally $159 and because one of the edges was chipped we were able to get them to mark it down to $52. don't ever hesitate to ask for a discount if something is slightly damaged. most chips can be fixed with a marker or a little bit of paint. the bench worked perfectly in the entry area. another great find was a club chair that i found on clearance at homegoods. it was upholstered in a beautiful plaid fabric. the best part was that it was marked down to $350 from $600.00. what a steal!
if you are shopping on a budget another good place to look is at antique stores. sometimes shoping at antique stores requires a little extra effort to dig through the junk but when you luck out it's worth it. it was definitely worth it to find this beautiful antique coffee table. it was originally $140 and because this particular antique store offered a cash discount we were able to get the table for $80. the top was originally the same woodtone as the legs but it was a little scuffed up. instead of touching it up I antiqued only the tabletop. the paint and glaze for the antiquing was only about $12.

here is a before photo of the family room.

here are some photos of the semi-complete family room. i'll be posting homework for mary beth soon so that she can complete the rest of the room on her own.