Prepping a house for Parade of Homes

Quick note: I know things are not good for a lot of people on the Gulf Coast and East Coast right now. I actually work for a company that builds FEMA safe shelters, so I’ve been looking at sad images and hearing scary stories all week. Posting pretty things online seems especially frivolous at a time like this, so please know my thoughts and prayers are and have been with those suffering at this time.

My family has finally settled back into our house, and even though we have a punch list of finishing touches as long as my arm, we are so grateful to be at this stage of the game. Next week I’ll start posting lots of before and afters, which should run for a couple weeks.

But today I’ve got our local Parade of Homes on the brain. I’m helping decorate a home our contractor built, and we’ve got big plans for adding a little polish to the place. The homeowner has done an excellent job decorating it already and has great taste, so we get to do fun stuff like bring in fresh flowers, fruit, pillows, and artwork.

The parade house (above) is beautiful but a totally different style than mine, which makes it challenging and fun to think up decorating ideas new to me. Here are a few inspiration pics; I’ll have photos from the parade (and some preview photos of other parade homes) soon.

via—cognac + B&W = dreamy

via—large-scale B&W art over a desk

via—a collection of globes in a kid space

via—a blanket ladder with cozy throws (and cute potted trees)

via—for the front porch, a little bit of autumn

via—woven chargers and blue linens

Hope you have a wonderful weekend. Fall is a gorgeous time of year in the West, and I hope it’s lovely where you are too. •