Start the staging

So getting ready to sell a house is one of my new happy things to do. Probably because it forces you to clear out the clutter and dig through clearance bins! I wanted to show you a quick before/after of what we did with the office to make it look roomy and stylish. First and foremost clear off everything and start with a blank slate. then choose an accent color (clearly I chose a lime green to balance the dark wood. After that, just place items in odd numbers to make it feel balanced. Look at the entire shelf as a whole and don't be afraid to put items off center. It will make it interesting to the eye, but not feel out of balance. Forgive the bottom three shelves since I had to adjust the items to be "Carson" friendly. Which only means that usually the plastic plate of fake apples is all over the floor and I took out the glass from the little lantern.





On the desk, we put Jesse's fancy chess board (to make people think that the people that live here must be really smart and if they buy the house they can be too- HA!), the little desk lamp, the green plant (which makes the area feel clean and organic), next to a few more antique books (using the principal of 3 items). Also we added another pop of green with the little rug that adds balance without being too distracting.

We spent probably about $150-200 on the accessories in this room to include the rug, plant, desk lamp, 2 green bins, fake apples, the limes box, candle, green lantern and (my fav) little pig with wings. Everything was found on clearance and most was under $8, except the pig which was my splurge at $15 and a new celing fan that was $60 at HD. Normally they say that you should "de-personalize" the space and get rid of all pictures of your family so that the potential buyers can see themselves in the space. I decided to keep the three pictures of the kids and the one of all three on the wall. Mostly because I didn't want to spend more to buy/make art for the walls and because my kids are cute! Ha!

And lastly it would not be my blog without a pic of Christopher as a super hero and Carson on top of something!