Dinner on us!! Back to school can be overwhelming and stressful for teachers. I wanted to thank Lawson's teacher for all she had done to prepare for this school year! I got cute paper plates and napkins from My Minds Eye and added a doordash giftcard! Super quick and easy and I know she will love it!! Linking everything I used to put this together HERE ! If you want to download the little tag I made for this gift idea you can see that below! DOWNLOAD this cute little printable to add to the top of your gift! You can gift this to anyone with any theme or cute plates and napkins! New mom, teacher, co-worker, friend!!

I DESPISE sanding!! Like truly I will avoid it at all cost, so the fact that I went from... THIS TO THIS... ...with no sanding and 2 simple steps is shocking to me!! I found this beautiful old Pottery Barn vanity on Facebook Marketplace recently and I knew it would be perfect in our bathroom. I really wanted to keep it the color it was but when I got it home it was just too red and I knew I wouldn't be happy long term. I did love the depth of the wood and the warmth it brought to the room so I tried to bring those two things back in with this 2-step method I found while scrolling Pinterest for help. I found THIS blog post from Vintage Porch and if you ever are trying to figure out how to make a furniture piece bleached looking and beautiful she is your girl!!! What You'll Need: THIS exact "magic" antique wax Any warm white chalk paint (I used THIS ONE from amazon & was super impressed!!) 2 paint brushes (THIS is the one I used, its my fave!) Broom of any kind! I started by taking the doors and drawers off of the vanity and taping so that I could paint quickly! I had to do 3 coats of the white chalk paint but it dried super fast so I knocked it out quick! I tested the antique wax on a scrap piece of wood because I had no idea what it was going to look like, I was honestly super skeptical. I wiped it on with a rag and somehow it looked like wood! What I did learn on my scrap piece though, was that if there was any section of paint that wasn't absolutely & completely dry it would mix in with the wax and kind of turn gray in those areas (this was also because I was using a rag to apply at first). Have I ever mentioned how impatient I am? It's a really bad quality that comes out when I am doing projects, ha! I can just see the panic in my Aunt Donna's face as I grab the rag and start wiping it on. But as you can see I started on this side of the cabinet, which also happens to be the side you see when you walk into the bathroom!!! A little bit of the paint was wet AND I applied the wax with a rag..... So I walked away from it for a bit and when I came back things started to get better. This is why I am here right?! To try these crazy things, learn the best methods and then share them with you! Okay, so I learned that applying with a brush is absolutely the way to go, and guess what...... the stinkin' instructions told me to use a brush. One day I will learn to listen ;) I saved some up close videos of this project on my Instagram profile HERE if that will be helpful for you! But honestly it is SO easy to work with I know you can do it! I just brushed the wax on super heavy to cover each section I worked on and then brushed it all in the direction I wanted the faux wood grains to go. Then the super fun part! I used an old broom and brushed that on at the very end and I kid you not it looks like real wood!!! It even has wood-like texture!! One more thing that I ended up doing and now I love it even more. I did two full coats of this wax process. After one coat I did love it and it was a very light wood, bleached look. But it was a little splotchy and looked a little more rustic than I wanted. After the second full coat I absolutely love it!!! I am still not sure how it works or if my eyes are playing tricks on me. But I am super happy that I have the wooden vanity that I wanted and that I didn't have to sand! Also, It looks even better in person!!!! Stay tuned as I finish up this bathroom (FINALLY)!!! I have my heart set on a vintage rug, block print curtains, and a cozy chair for this space!

Thinking back to when we bought this house, it all still feels so meant to be! It felt like home the second we pulled up. And although the previous owner was there while we walked around (because it was a for sale by owner), it still somehow felt like ours. My brain began exploding with ideas of how to make it feel more like our style before we even walked out the door from the first showing... One thing I knew I wanted to do was Romabio Lime Slurry to the exterior brick! We had wanted to use this product for years and had actually swatched it on one of our previous homes. For whatever reason it never ended up working out. Years later I still cannot believe it when I drive up to our house. I cannot believe it is ours. A house that truly feels like us and feels like home. The lime slurry is everything and more that I hoped for! The richness and texture, the way that it slurs the grout lines. It truly is such an amazing product!! Romabio products are natural and MADE for brick and stone. You don't have to worry about paint chipping off or the brick being able to "breathe." Watch when we first swatched it on the house HERE. When we started the project, we planned to do the lime slurry on the entire house, but after chatting with my friend, Patty from Romabio, and her showing me some before and afters of their Venetian Glaze, I was sold! It is a glaze so it is super watered down, but doesnt hide or take away the dimension that stone can bring to your home. We ended up going with Swiss Coffee by Benjamin Moore in the Lime Slurry and Romabio's Cristallo White in the Venetian Glaze. We chose Natural Cream by Benjamin Moore for the trim and siding. I absolutely love the combo. It is everything warm, cozy and inviting that I wanted! The icing on the cake was building these extra large shutters and window boxes with my dad and painting them, you guessed it: Pigeon! I truly do smile every single time I catch a glimpse! If you have been wanting to transform your home but have been nervous about what products to use, Romabio is the place to start! Don't forget to follow on Instagram @thebloomingnest for more videos and behind the scenes of this project!

I get so many questions about our appliances so hopefully I am able to answer all the questions for you! When renovating our kitchen we ripped everything out and pretty much started from scratch. We kept the range and refrigerator in the same place they were but wanted to update them and of course I wanted....pigeon appliances! If you are new around here that is my favorite color and it goes with everything! You can read more about our renovation and cabinets in this post. After lots of research we went with Big Chill appliances in the color Agate Gray. The color looks just like pigeon! You can pretty much order these appliances in any color you could ever want. They have standard colors, premium colors, and a huge list of custom colors to choose from. There are also 4 different trims to choose from. We loved the brass and retro style of their appliances. We have been so happy with them and get so many compliments! You can check out everything they offer on their website here. We went with the 36" Classic Fridge, in color Agate Gray with the brass trim. If you are wondering about the ice and water, there is an internal water dispenser and ice maker. There are drawers inside and plenty of storage room! This fridge makes such a statement in our kitchen! Click here for the exact fridge we ordered! For our stove we ordered the 48" classic gas stove. We ordered this in the Agate Gray and brass trim. For the stove you can choose to have the sides painted also. If you have a free standing stove in your home this is a great option. If you love to cook this stove has 8 burners! The oven is huge and could fit commercial sized cookie sheets. If you would like to see the exact one we choose click here. We have loved these Big Chill appliances so much! They make such a statement in our kitchen and the quality is so good! Makes me want to cook more because I get to enjoy my pretty Pigeon appliances!

I get a lot of questions about paint colors and the wallpaper from all over my home, so here ya go! I will go room by room (in the finished spaces) and let you know the colors I chose for every space...so far. Let's get started!! All the main living areas are painted Natural White on the walls and baseboards. My doors are painted Gossamer Veil by Sherwin Williams. Playroom Wall Color: Gossamer Veil by Sherwin Williams Baseboard Color: Natural White by Sherwin Williams Fireplace Color: Natural White by Sherwin Williams Dining Room Wallpaper: Scalamandre Linnea Wallpaper by Sandberg in the color Garden Green. Find it here! Baseboards and wall Color: Gossamer Veil by Sherwin Williams Lawsons Room Wall Color: Contented by Sherwin Williams Baseboard Color: Contented by Sherwin Williams Kids Bathroom Wall Color: Natural White by Sherwin Williams Vanity Color: Contented by Sherwin Williams Scallop wall and trim: Contented by Sherwin Williams Brennan Room Wall Color: Basking Ridge Beige by Benjamin Moore Half Bathroom Wallpaper: Karins Bukett Indigo by Sandberg Wallpaper. You can find it here! Trim: Ashland Slate by Benjamin Moore Vanity: Tate Olive by Benjamin Moore Hope this was helpful! Happy Painting!!

When designing our new kitchen I wanted bright white cabinets. We have such an open floor plan, I knew that with my white cabinets and white walls I was for sure going to want some contrast. If you know me at all, you know black usually scares me, but I felt like in this case going with a darker countertop would ground the space and break up all the white! I did keep an open mind when I went to the slab yard to check out all the countertop options. I came across this beautiful Quartzite called Taj Mahal. (pictured below) that I really loved! Ultimately I knew it wouldn’t give me the contrast I wanted and I couldn’t get over the natural movement of the Soapstone. The employee helping me at the slab yard told me all the pros and cons of Soapstone. PROS Natural stone Natural color and movement Heat resistant They won’t crack easily They won’t stain CONS Can scratch Not many color options Need to treat yearly with mineral oil to prevent dark patches from oils In the end, I am so happy with what I chose. Soapstone counters are so beautiful in person. The color variations and texture of the Soapstone makes our kitchen feel unique and custom. Make sure to come back when our kitchen is finished to see how it all comes together.

Let’s chat about our process of ordering all of our kitchen cabinets from Lowes. I am going to share the pros and the cons, cost, and of course lots of photos!! When we purchased our new home we were deciding between custom cabinets from a local cabinet builder or ordering somewhere like Lowes. We decided that ordering through Lowes may save us a little money so we stopped in one day just to browse their options. They have a ton of cabinet door styles and colors hanging on the wall in their kitchen design center. We chatted with one of the designers and took a few brochures home to browse. I will preface this blog post with the fact that my friend Meagan, who is an interior designer, helped me with the majority of figuring out my exact kitchen layout and design. I am not sure what the process would be like if you were trying to figure it out just with the Lowes designer. If I am being honest, I don’t know that they are qualified enough to actually design. They just know how to plug measurements into their program and do different layouts for your space. We decided to move forward with Lowes after chatting with my friend Meagan and coming up with a design I liked. It was just a matter of ordering the right cabinets to fit the design. We will talk about cost towards the end of this post, but Lowes offers different lines of cabinets that vary in quality. We decided to order the majority of our cabinets from the kraftmaid brand. Mostly because I liked one of their door styles, the Cayden. We worked with a designer at Lowes to get everything ordered down to crown molding, island legs, quarter round and more! It was time consuming and I was worried that we would miss something or something would come in wrong. Spoiler alert I was right! We chose to order cabinets through Lowes but install them ourselves to save a little money. I think this is why we ran into some issues. If a Lowes contractor is the one that installs your cabinets and anything is wrong with the order they will just fix it! So lets just break it down: PROS: semi quick turnaround time more affordable than a custom cabinet builder they arrive painted the color of your choice CONS: quality is not the same as custom some items may be missed during the ordering process My one tip if you decide to order cabinets through Lowes is to make sure you upgrade your cabinet boxes to full plywood. This was something we were really strict about having… and guess what? They somehow missed that when the order went through. So the one thing we are not super happy with about our cabinets is that they are not solid wood. Cabinets that have the full plywood boxes are sturdier and more durable and overall better quality! Spend some time to read over and make sure they have this in your order if this is an upgrade that you want! COST We didn’t get a quote from a custom cabinet builder because we needed our cabinets ordered ASAP. I would imagine it would have been at least $10-15k more than what we spent. This is what we bought for our kitchen: upper and lower cabinets, island cabinets (with tons of drawers), island legs, quarter round, crown molding, crown molding spacers, island feet, walk through pantry cabinet, and two upper cabinets we ordered and ended up putting in our laundry room. Our ceilings are 10ft so our cabinets are extra tall and we added smaller cabinets to the tops of them for added height. TOTAL COST: $22,000 COLOR AND STYLE We chose Kraftmaid brand Cayden door style in the color Dove white! We got the tapered island legs from Kraftmaid as well and 4″ crown molding. You will have to stay tuned for a full kitchen reveal post! We are ALMOST DONE! Just waiting on appliances and finishing up few small details! Tap HERE to read about our soapstone countertops!

When moving into our home there was so much to be done! Let's be honest...there still seems to be a lot that needs to be done. While living in our home during the renovation process it has been stressful and I always seem to notice the things that are NOT done. As I reflect back there is SO much that has been done!! I am going to share some of my favorite spaces in our home. It has come so far! Enjoy the Before and After photos! Dining Room before and After We finished this up last summer and the wallpaper is the most Blooming Nest wallpaper I have ever seen! All the right colors!!! I did the DIY art that I highlighted for you here. A new light fixture was added from Anthropologie. I wallpapered the top and painted the bottom the same color as my trim in my home. The color is Gossamer Veil. The rug was a Homegoods find! Kitchen eating area before and after If you have been here since the beginning can you even believe how far this has come? If you are new here, there was a very large bathroom by the back door. We made that smaller to create a bathroom AND drop zone area by the garage door. So glad we made this change! I had so many baskets and boards in my storage closet and decided to put those to good use. I hung them on this large wall in my kitchen and it made such a difference in the space. The table and light were items from Anthropologie I had been eyeing for the longest time. Spending more on large items like light fixtures and large furniture items will last you forever and you will not regret it! Brett built the banquette sitting area and it turned out better than I even imagined. The color on the banquette is Tate Olive by Benjamin Moore. The bamboo shades are linked above in the shop my space. They are a great Amazon find! Playroom before and after I loved this space decorated for Christmas! SO cozy!! We took out the bookcases in here and I bought a beautiful mantle that I painted. We retiled the fireplace as well. On the wall you can not see, there is a closet that I use for all the toys. A new light fixture and lighter floors brightened up this room so much. It was used as an office before but I am loving a space off the main living room for the kids to play! Kids bathroom before and after This space changed so much! There was a sink where the shelf is that we did not need. I knew I could use that for more storage. The big changes we made were taking that sink out, retiling the floors, new custom countertop and allllll the paint! Painting the walls, trim, vanity, and even the shower tile brought this space to life. I showed a little more of the painted tile here! On this link I also include the color of the paint I used. I could not find a shower curtain I loved for in here so I actually bought a table cloth from Zara that was on sale! It worked perfectly. There are so many more spaces that are in transition! I will be sure to post a part 2 soon with some more spaces. Our master bathroom is so close to being done!! I will reserve a post to the kitchen coming up! Have fun decorating friends!

Scallop walls look hard and tedious but let me assure you that with the right tools and the right paint brushes this project is really fun and you can more than likely finish it in a day. We recently re did Ashley's daughters bedroom. They recently moved into a new house and are busy making it their own. The scallop wall detail was on our list of to dos for a while and we knocked it out in under 3 hours! I am going to give you an easy step by step way that we knocked out this cute scallop wall! The color we used for this project was Benjamin Moore in the color Boudoir. Things you will need for this project: - pencil -a long level -your favorite paint color -2" paint brush -small roller -something around your house you can trace for the scallop- or make your own stencil First we decided how high we wanted to do the scallops. Every room is going to be different for this. We just did what we thought looked best to the eye. We measured up in a few places how high we wanted it and got a long level. We placed the level on our marks to make our first long line. From here we used that long line and level to make a line all the way around the room. We used a pencil to do this and the paint covered it up fine! Next we searched around the house for something that was the size of the scallops we wanted. We ended up finding a lid to a jar that was perfect. Our scallops are about 6" wide and 3" tall from the line. You can make a little mark half way around the lid on each side and line up those marks on the line you drew on the wall. We went around the room on our line and once again traced with a pencil. When we got to the corners it could be a little tricky. We just free handed it in the corners to match as close as we could to the others. Now that all the tracing was done it was time to paint! No need to trace each one with a little bitty paint brush. We found that a good thick 2" paint brush was perfect. With a dip in the paint we could trace the scallop lines just over the pencil all the way around with one stroke! This may take a little time and that is okay! I promise its worth the patience to do this all around the room! Once we finished up the scallop detail we used a small roller for the rest of the room. The smaller roller just covers way better than using the large ones. We were so excited I think we moved the furniture back in place before the paint was even dry! This was such a fun little project that made a huge difference in the room. Ashley still has some things she wants to add but for now its looking great! Her daughter LOVES IT! Remember: its just paint!! You get tired of it down the road or your child grows out of the look its so easy to change! Tap to Shop! Happy Painting!

“Your house always looks so picked up and clean!” “How do you keep your house clean with a toddler?” “Where do you keep all the toys?!” This is a question I get often and one I am excited to answer! I’m going to take you on a little tour around the house and show you all the places that I hide the toys. My number one rule when it comes to toy storage and home organization in general is “if it doesn’t have a place, either create one or get rid of it!” The other big rule that I started implementing when Lawson was really young was that we clean up one toy before we get out another. This quickly became habit for him and to this day he naturally starts picking up when he is done with a toy and ready to play with something else. This helps me stay sane and helps him play so much better. I think kids can sometimes get overwhelmed with large amounts of toys all mixed together, and it can sometimes cause them not to play/imagine as well. Let’s start in Lawson’s room… We recently purchased this Ikea Tarva dresser so that we would have more storage in his room. His clothes and diapers only take up 3 of the drawers so I use the bottom two, which are accessible to him, for his nicer/more expensive toys. We keep Lawson’s books in his closet on these Ikea shelves. I love these shelves because they keep the books nice and neat rather than all falling over and out of a regular bookshelf. I painted them in the color Pigeon by Farrow and Ball. We keep his smaller books in baskets that he can reach and read whenever he wishes! Just like I mentioned at the beginning of this post, if we ever end up with too many books and they won’t fit in these baskets/shelves, I will either see if some need to be packed away with his baby items or taken to Goodwill. Stuffed animals go in the basket on the right and also in one of his dresser drawers. Toy closet… This closet was originally a linen closet. After living in our house for a couple of months I realized that this closet off of our family room would function much better as a toy closet (plus linen closets are always a mess and so hard to keep straight!). We have a large armoire in our bedroom, that was actually a side-of-the-road find, and I moved all of our linens and extra pillows to it! This was such a great decision for us because now we have an organized toy closet with different baskets he can’t pull out. Being a stay-at-home mom, it is so important to have organized toys because bored kids at home all day is no fun at all. Living Room… We keep trucks and balls (#boymom) out in the living room because they are the things he plays with most! These baskets are my favorite because they are super sturdy and really cute! We’ve used them for toys since he was a little baby. We have a few more toys kept in our media cabinet as well that he can access easily. I love this media cabinet because it has such great storage for things that you don’t want to see out. Toys can be such a hard thing to find places for because there are so many of them and they aren’t pretty to look at! I really hope this was helpful in showing you ways to store and hide ALL THE TOYS.

Image source I love that wallpaper is back in style. It is such a fun way to make your home unique and bring in fun prints and colors! Wallpaper on the market today is not your grandmas’ wallpaper. Its easy to apply and easy to remove! Image source We applied real wallpaper to our dining area for the first time almost two years ago and it was surprisingly easy. We removed it a little over a year later because I love to change things up and I was SHOCKED at how effortlessly it peeled from the wall. (Black and white floral wallpaper linked below) But even easier than that is peel and stick! You can stick it on the wall, reposition it, and whenever you’re ready to take it down, it comes off in one easy peel!! It’s amazing. We applied peel and stick for the first time in Lawson’s reading nook. (shiplap wallpaper linked below) Ive rounded up a few of my favorite wallpaper picks! There are so many amazing options available. I will probably end up using one of these when we do our laundry room makeover! Click on each image below to shop!

*This post contains affiliate links and is in collaboration with Walmart I love adding fresh touches to our home for each season! I was so excited to work with Walmart to add some Spring touches to our living room… and all on a budget!! Walmart just launched a new home decor and furnishing line called “Flower Home” with celebrity Drew Barrymore! Everything in the collection is so fun and colorful, and you can’t beat the prices! PLUS, they offer free shipping over $35! I purchased a few things from the new line to put in our living room, and I really love the way it came together. You can check out the new line here! The quality of this brass and wicker lamp really blew me away! I love the height of it as well, because a lot of times I find floor lamps to be too short in our home. This is by far my favorite piece I purchased from the Flower Home line. I love the pop of pink and fun that this throw pillow brings to my otherwise neutral living room. It came already stuffed, and the price was great! I purchased all four options of the tree prints, because I couldn’t decide which one I liked best. They are so beautiful and add so much character! I really think these would look good in any style of home. Shop the products I picked out below!