Five Ways to Affordably Update Your Home

It doesn't take a ton of money to make an impact! As an interior design shop, we often hear from customers who long to make a drastic change in their living or dining areas, but have a limited budget. We try to be a place in our community that offers affordable and functional design elements, and although we carry large pieces of furniture, we also carry smaller, budget-friendly items that can really update your home. We wanted to share five versatile and inexpensive ways to make your home feel more cozy and welcoming:



Doormat or rug:

A large area rug will definitely be an investment piece, but a smaller rug or sisal doormat can really bring a space to life! We love fun, statement doormats, because they are often one of the first things a visitor sees when they arrive at your home or office. If you're looking for an indoor rug, we recommend a textured style in a neutral tone, so you can move it around your house depending on how you change your decor! This "Let's Stay Home" one has been a very popular choice in our shop, because it matches anything from farmhouse style to a more modern feel.

Wreaths: 
We are big fans of greenery in just about any form, but especially in a wreath! The classic magnolia leaf wreath looks great in a farmhouse or minimalist style home, and can be layered as shown with another wall piece like a window-frame or door. We have been looped them around candles or wooden crates for a tablescape that will welcome any guests! They can also be used for multiple holidays (try weaving mini LED lights inside for Christmas!), making them a versatile purchase.

Signs:
If a large sign is out of your price range right now, consider purchasing a smaller-scaled sign with a wooden frame. It is a very budget-friendly way to add character to bookshelves, above your sink, or in little nooks like next to your coffee maker. Whether you choose something with humor, or a classic quote or scripture, make sure it's something meaningful, and it'll be the best value for your money. If you're not sure which one to choose, a simple one that says "Farmhouse" or "Home" will be able to be used for years to come.

Pillows: One of our favorite ways to add charm, warmth, and pattern/texture to your decor. A pillow is a small investment, which means
you can afford more volume and quantity, and you can layer them on couches and beds. It also means that if you change your style up in a year (or a few months, for those of us who change our minds often :)), a pillow can be re-covered or moved to another room. We always have multiple styles in our shop, and rotate our stock frequently, so you'll be sure to find something that will work in your home.

Tea Towels: Searching for a gift for a friend that is affordable? Not only are these a way to add fun and personality to your own kitchen, they are also a gift that just about anyone would love. We have many different designs in stock, and yes, they are washable, which means they are practical, too.

If you're looking for something specific, you can always ask one of our shop employees to help! They love helping you search for what you're looking for! Visit us at 305 Bartlett Street in Medford anytime!

Meet Isabel from Krue & Co.

We sell products from many local vendors here at Pretty in Paint, and we love the idea of supporting and investing in our local economy! We wanted to introduce some of our vendors here on the blog, starting with the lovely Isabel, the heart and soul of Krue & Co. If you have been in our shop recently, you've surely seen some of her beautiful signage! Let's get to know her:

"Almost three years ago, my husband and I were newly married. Finances were tight as we were both going to school, and we were barely getting by", explains owner Isabel Thomas, "I wanted to contribute, but didn't know what that would look like. I found out there was an opening for a sign vendor at Pretty in Paint, but I hadn't had a ton of experience. The start up costs were about $300, which at the time was a big deal for us. I prayed and prayed, and took the leap, buying the machine. I had my first debut as a sign vendor in 2015, and over the last year, I have begun making signs full-time!"

"As a stay-at-home mom to a one year old little boy, making these signs has allowed me to supplement my income, while being able to stay at home with my son. I want to show him how we can serve the Lord in different ways, through what we do. Serving the Lord will look different for everyone, and I am in constant prayer over the signs that I sell. I hope they always bless someone, through laughter, the words they pray over their children, or the verse that has gotten them through a hard time", she continues, "My vision is always for these items to be hung up, in homes, as a piece of decor that says something about them and gives their space meaning".

The faith-based, inspiring work by Krue & Co. are some of our highlighted pieces here in the shop. Isabel herself has a favorite sign, and explains, "My favorite sign is about four feet longer and says, Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. When my son was born, all we had to do was turn that song on, and it calmed him down to sleep. It is a special memory that I hold dear." As a small business, Isabel hopes to expand and sell her signs in more places, and wants to give back to the community who has supported her so kindly. She also hopes to expand to an online presence. "Being a small business means late nights and dreaming", she adds, "It means doing a bit of a happy dance when your items sell, and always being blown away by the people who show up and bless you by purchasing from you. It means meeting others and empowering each other; creating community over competition. For me, it also means working from my garage and raising my baby in sawdust and paint!"

Right now, Pretty in Paint is the place to purchase Isabel's gorgeous work, and you can check out her work on Instagram HERE!

Introducing 4 Wall Revival!

Our story has always centered around redemption. Bringing life where things were dead, breathing new life into spaces, giving fresh perspective to places where people have lost hope. So, it makes sense that our latest project would involve breathing new life into homes and buildings...meet 4 Wall Revival. We are launching in 2018, and we will be renovating old houses, as well as making new designs from old furniture. 

Why renovation and restoration? We have a true passion for real estate and design. We used to build and sell homes during the early 2000's, and we loved it! My husband, Luke, has kept his general contractor's license active since 2002, and we have been waiting for the right time to enter the market while maintaining our love for furniture, as well. 

What will you be focused on? We can't wait to begin renovating homes that need quite a lot of love, and then offering them at an affordable price. Besides this primary focus, we will also be building and renovating furniture pieces. We will be utilizing our background in retail (running Pretty in Paint) to renovate, design, and stage the homes we will sell as 4 Wall Revival. At this stage, we are searching for homes in the Southern Oregon area, and will keep you posted with our progress! 

What do you want people to love about your brand? When people think about our 'revival' projects, I hope that can capture our vision; to see forgotten, dilapidated homes become a beloved and beautiful space. Also, we hope our audience can see our eye for artful design, high-quality craftsmanship, and current style trends. We hope to become a leader in the home market in Southern Oregon. 

What's next? You can find us on our new blog, which we will be revealing soon, and which will feature DIY tutorials, tons of before and after photos for inspiration, and design ideas. Thanks for following our journey, and you can follow along on our Instagram HERE!

Our Celebration Sales - Medford, Oregon Home Store

"A community is a place where everyone feels welcome, and where it feels like home every single day.  It is here that we find our closest connections, if only we will reach out our hands to one another" -Unknown 

We feel very blessed to be part of a close-knit community of people here in our corner of Southern Oregon. They have rallied around our shop, bolstered us when our energy was low or we were discouraged, and they have been the reason we have seen such incredible growth. I think people have really caught our personal vision for the store, and why we are here, and that is so encouraging. Each year, we love to reward our amazing customers and friends with a great Black Friday/Small Business Saturday sale, and this year was no different! Since we really believe in the power of community and small businesses, we make a big deal of Small Business Saturday, but both days held great prices and
fun perks for everyone who came to the store!

At 10am on Black Friday, we had a scratch-and-dent sale in our parking lot. This was the perfect chance for customers to get items at amazing discounts, and we had special guests JAM Coffee serving up plenty of hot drinks for the chilly temps (You can check out their handcrafted coffee and specialty drinks anytime at 507 North Main Street in Phoenix, Oregon). We had lots of friends stop by for our sale, AND they brought their friends, too! We hosted over 500 people for our parking lot sale, and KOBI even featured us in a small video, which you can watch HERE on our Instagram page.

But, the real fun was still to come for our huge Saturday sale, where we featured free gifts with purchase (adorable mugs seen at right), a mobile bar with adult Christmas drinks by HJB (another locally owned business, complimentary BBQ lunch, and live music! In addition, we also had plenty of hot cocoa and coffee from JAM, as well as gourmet baked goods from the Bakehouse. Best of all, we offered a whopping 20% discount on everything in store!

To catch all the fun, you can watch the amazing video (video by Shawn Adams) below:


Pretty in Paint 11-2017 from Shawn Adams on Vimeo.

We feel so grateful for the support, unending loyalty, and joy that our community and customers bring us. Thank you so much!

Blog Update! -Southern Oregon Home Store and Design Blog

You may have noticed we had been a bit absent from the blogosphere for awhile (thank you for reading and sharing our last DIY post this month!), but we had a pretty great reason: our little shop grew and grew, and before I knew it, years had passed us by in a whirlwind of blessing, challenges, and joy. Now, we are blogging again consistently, and I wanted to share some of my heart as we get back into it! So why now? We love reading blogs! We draw inspiration from blogs about faith, family, interior design, and more, and we always want to gain more insight about life from other's experiences. We hope this blog can be an encouragement to you and your family and friends!

In the past years since we opened our shop, so much has changed. We started out small, with just a little bit of inventory, and it grew at a rapid pace. We doubled in size, and now have a bookkeeper and nine amazing employees, and a delivery driver. We even have people in our warehouse, and it's turned into a full-time company. Of course, there have been growing pains involved, but ultimately, we feel so grateful and supported by our Southern Oregon community. We also love our employees, and we wouldn't be where we are today without the Smith family. They always help us in every way possible! My mom pitches in with shipping and receiving, and she is unbelievably efficient. Jami helps bring order to our chaos, and Jill is hilarious and brings her infectious laughter along with her sweet spirit. We also have Tami, who loves people so deeply and well, and Isabel who helps us learn how to use new social media. We will also be introducing them individually here on the blog over the next few months, so you can get to know the people we consider 'family' now.

And while some things have changed, others have not. We always put God first, and love people. We adore jumping into new adventures, but always seek His will and watch Him provide the way. Our mission also hasn't changed: we want our store to be an affordable, beautiful, inviting place for women to come shop and relax. We want our customers to feel "heard", and to know they can always ask us for tips, or help choosing a piece for their home. We also love offering small businesses a place to sell their hand-made items, and we believe in bolstering our local economy and helping each other!

What will you find here on this blog? Stay tuned for special events, faith-related encouragement, news, updates, design inspiration, and most importantly, DIY projects! We are so glad you're here!

Love, Mindy

DIY White Painted Floors - Southern Oregon Interior Design

I couldn't be more excited to be sharing the tale of our new white floors! But to do that, I have to start back at the beginning...four years ago, to be exact. That's when we installed a whopping fifteen hundred feet of pine flooring straight from the lumber yard! We knew we were heading into a 'down and dirty' remodel that we are now three years into. We have remodeled every room, and we have ripped out walls as we moved from room to room. We custom build furniture for our store out of pine, so we knew that we would have a use for those pine boards when our remodel was complete. Although we are years into our intensive remodel, we aren't ready to replace our flooring just yet, so I began dreaming of painted floors, instead.

When I say 'beginning', the truth is, I have been eyeing white floors for quite some time. I have stalked and scrolled enough Instagram pages for a lifetime, and I've even woken my husband in the middle of the night to whisper, "Look at these white floors!" He actually was more excited about the idea, because his style is clean, minimalistic, and modern. I lean towards a modern farmhouse style, but with a simple approach. I was bolstered by friends and family to finally make this happen, so today, I'm sharing HOW we brought the dream to life!

BEFORE:

Here are the floors before we started the project. As you can see, they were hard to keep clean, and the clear coat was wearing off.

MATERIALS:

I began my researching the best paint and products I could use. Home Depot had the best prices and options for what I needed. Here are the items I bought ($167.00 for these items, but prices will vary based on how much paint you need, and which items your local store has)

• Kilz Primer 
• Floor Paint
• Scraper
• TSP cleaner 
• Blue painter's tape
• Brush
• 1 gallon water based Minwax Top Coat 

THE PROCESS: 

1) I vacuumed the floors thoroughly, and scrubbed them with TSP cleaner. If you are using TSP, be sure to ventilate your work area, and wear gloves. It's a very harsh cleaner, which is why it works well, so keep out of reach of children/pets. I used a metal scraper to get any lasting residue, and then scrubbed again with TSP.
2) I painted the primer on. I did two coats, with a two hour dry time between primer coats.
3) Painted the floor with three coats of floor paint, with a two hour dry time between paint coats.
4) I then applied 2 coats of Minwax Clear Coat, with an hour dry time between coats. I did note a slight yellow tint with the addition of the clear coat, but the floor would not hold up well without it. This is the best clear coat I have found, as it has the least amount of yellow tint.
On the right, you can see the various stages.


AFTER (After images courtesy Lahna Marie Photography):

FAQ's:

How long did this project take? I had to work on the floors throughout seven days. I had to section off my house so my family could still use it, as we have two children and three pets. If I had an empty house, this could have been done in about two days, but we needed to use different parts of the house as I worked!

How do we keep it clean? This has been the number-one question as I have shared our results! Any mom knows keeping their floors clean is hard enough, so it makes sense that lots of people are concerned about dirt. Yes, it is a bit more high-maintenance, but not nearly what you'd imagine. we have a  Roomba, and I highly recommend that for keeping surface dirt and crumbs to a minimum. We do try to take our shoes off before coming inside, but any footprints or dirt wipe off extremely easily due to the top coat finish.

Any other advice? The only thing I'd change if I did this again is getting some sort of knee pad for my poor knees. You'll be on the floor for this project, so I'd recommend one of the knee pads you use for gardening, or a similar pad to save your joints!

If you have been dreaming of white floors and currently have wood floors, I say, GO FOR IT! Our entire family loves it, and it has brightened up our space (which makes it feel larger and so welcoming).