I have been chipping away at the living room bit by bit, happily dreaming of what my next move might be.  I love weathered wood and velvet pillows and soft lighting and oh I wonder what I might find?  And I’m on a budget, of course.  When bam!  It’s a good old-fashioned government shutdown, complete with bickering and insults from both parties.  I would love to tell you my thoughts on this, but this is a decorating post after all.  Lets not sour the mood with any of that political mumbo jumbo.  However, my husband, along with 800,000 government employees, has been sent home on furlough – indefinitely.  I thought at first that cottage fix should probably go on furlough too, considering my husband so kindly provides the funds for the majority of my projects and shenanigans.  But then I had a change of heart and decided it might be more fun to see what I could come up with on a budget of basically zero, free, living off the land!  What do we have in the garage, the yard, and tucked in drawers around the house that I can have some fun with?  It’s a furlough challenge!

In the garage I found some gray paint leftover from when the previous homeowners painted the master bedroom.  I mixed it with white trim paint to get a soft light gray and painted the armoire.  I have been wanting to do something with the sconces. There are a total of four in the living room and while I didn’t hate them, I didn’t love them either.  Well, maybe I hated them just a wee little bit.  I spray painted them ivory and they look much better. Not as good as if I had replaced them with shabby chic ones with distressed metal and dripping with crystals, but better.  Although my next blog post might have to be called “stop painting things ivory!”