Category: Home

I’ve coined the style of my house as “bohemian farmhouse”. I don’t think that’s an actual style, but I threw together things I liked and I feel like that’s what I ended up with. I have an obsession for rugs so of course I need one in every room. I also think I’m pretty good at finding the best deals, so that’s what today’s post is about. I’m going to share my biggest tips for finding the best prices for your home decor.

I have bought almost all of my main decor items online. My key tips for successfully shopping online are:
1. Take measurements of your space and read the dimensions of the product
2. Read the reviews
3. Check their return policy
4. If the company has social media then check it out. Customers buying their products tag the company all the time and you might see the product you’re eyeing

Now let’s talk retailers and prices. My main places to shop online for home decor are Wayfair, Joss & Main, Overstock, and Amazon. These retailers carry SO many different things, and oftentimes even the same products. That’s where price comparison comes in. The products won’t be named the same thing across all of those websites, but if you look, you’ll find that a lot of the time one retailer has the exact same product for $20-$50 cheaper. Hello savings!

For example, my colorful bohemian living room rug is available on Wayfair, Joss & Main, AND Overstock. So what’s the difference? They are named the same thing on Wayfair and Joss & Main, and it has a different name on Overstock. Each website has price fluctuations, but currently this rug is almost $40 cheaper on Overstock!! So even though it may take you 10 extra minutes to check each site, I’d say it’s worth it.

In my kitchen I have a 6ft square seagrass rug. It is also available on Wayfair, Joss & Main, and Overstock. Their prices are all currently about the same.

Side note but the lantern light fixture over the table also came from Wayfair.

I had been wanting a cow hide rug so when I decorated my office it was the first thing I purchased. I knew I was going to have a black and white striped accent wall so I wanted a cow hide with a little bit of black in it. I found this one that has a mixture of black, white, and gold so it was PERFECT!
Another side note, my pink velour couch is actually a convertible sofa and it’s from Wayfair. My writing desk is also from Wayfair.

The last rug for today is my leopard print bedroom rug. If you can’t already tell, I love to mix patterns so this may be too wild for some people. For sizing reference, I have a queen bed and I went with a 7×10 rug. I know the prices go up and down, but I purchased it from Overstock for around $130. I think that’s awesome for such a big rug. I searched forever because I didn’t want to pay hundreds of dollars for a leopard rug and that was the best option I found.

I started purchasing these rugs in 2017 so some of them I have had for over 2 years now. All of them are holding up beautifully and I’ve been very happy with the quality. My Roomba works great on them except for the leopard rug in my bedroom.. it’s not that thick but for some reason it gets stuck a lot. I haven’t let it go over the cowhide rug much (it’s thinner than the others) because I have teeny tiny jewelry parts all over my office and I don’t vacuum very frequently in there in case something has fallen on the floor. I also do no not have pads underneath any of the rugs. I’m not sitting on the floor very often, but I think the living room and bedroom rug are fine without one.

I hope this guide was helpful and for more decor posts follow me on Instagram @maryannajefcoat and on Pinterest @maryannaj

Do you have pieces of furniture or decor that you bought in the past but now either A. Don’t serve their original purpose or B. No longer match your new decor? That was the case with this little farmhouse shelf. I really liked the size of it (great for throwing mail in and etc.) but I didn’t need it anymore in the room I originally bought it for. I did however need something this size for my office but it didn’t match the decor in there. I had found a few gold carts/shelves that I could purchase but some of them were kind of pricey. Instead of getting rid of the farmhouse shelf I decided to give gold spray paint a try.

There are only 1 million different gold spray paints to choose from so my suggestion is to google or Pinterest “gold spray paint” and actually look at other peoples’ projects. It’s hard to tell what color gold it will be from the top of the can so seeing the color on someone else’s project is really helpful.

The color I chose is Krylon Short Cuts in Gold Leaf. Yes the can is really small, hence the name “Short Cuts”, but apparently they don’t make the color in a larger size can. I bought mine at Hobby Lobby, but I also saw it at Michael’s. It’s on Amazon but don’t buy it from there because it’s about 3x’s more expensive. I think the spray paint is always 30% off at Hobby Lobby so that helps since I had to buy 3 cans for $3.99 a piece. Michael’s also often has coupons on their website that you can use in store.

Spray paint is pretty self explanatory, but I just sprayed one good even coat on it and let it dry! I love the color and it now matches my gold/black and white office! You can check out how I painted a black and white striped accent wall here or my inspo board for the office here.

If you’ve been following along then you know that a few months ago I shared my Eleven Collection office inspo board (post here). I was dreaming of a black and white striped accent wall, and I thought it was going to be wallpaper.

I ended up finding Dimples and Tangles tutorial for painting a striped wall on Pinterest. I was worried about painting instead of putting up wallpaper because I wanted perfectly CLEAN lines with no little out of line smudges. After reading her trick I decided to give it a try (and painting was much cheaper than the wallpaper)!

So here goes! I have pictures for each step.

Here’s the BEFORE

1. Decide how wide you want your stripes to be. My ceilings are 8 ft. tall and I wanted thicker stripes so I ended up doing 10.5 in. stripes. I roughly measured that out and free handed the white stripes. Just make sure you’re painting them a little OVER where the exact line will be.

Here’s my favorite tip – Nobody likes the clean up process so put a plastic bag/garbage bag in your paint tray that you can throw away after each use. No more cleaning out the paint tray every. single. time.

2. Let those white stripes dry. I waited overnight because you want to be sure they are completely dry before you put tape over fresh paint.

3. Now it’s time to tape the walls for the black stripes. I can’t cut straight, draw straight, or tell if something is even to save my life. That was another reason I was super hesitate to paint STRIPES across a wall myself.

To make it easier I purchased a laser level to show me exactly where I needed to put the tape STRAIGHT across the wall. I purchased this one from Lowe’s for $20. Yes it got the job done, but honestly I should have spent a few more dollars to get one with a stronger light. This one only uses the little watch size batteries and if my wall had been longer than 10 ft. it wouldn’t have been a strong enough laser to reach across. I’m not sure why I didn’t buy a laser level sooner though!!! It would have made hanging curtains and picture frames so much easier.

I’ve heard good things about Frogtape’s “Paint Block Technology” and if there was ever a good time to try it out then it is now! I definitely need it to BLOCK any black paint from getting on my white paint.

4. Now as you’re applying your tape, make sure you’re pressing out all the bubbles because we don’t want any paint seeping through to mess up the clean lines.

5. The next step in blocking the paint from seeping through is to paint over the tape line. I’ll show you what I mean in the pictures below. This is apparently the magic trick for getting clean lines!

6. Wait for the new white paint over the tape lines to dry then it’s time for the black paint! I bought the black paint from Lowe’s. I just went to the paint counter and asked for them to make me some regular plain ole black paint. It only took a quart that was $15 so that’s a win. I had to paint two coats of the black.

Painters tip #2 for you – wrap your paint roller in plastic and stick it in the fridge to avoid cleaning your rollers between coats. What a time saver!!! I wish I had known about that trick for the countless number of previous paint jobs.

7. After my second coat of black paint I immediately took off the tape. I didn’t wait for the stripes to dry. I held my breath as I began peeling back that first piece of tape…. and I was delighted to see a clean, crisp line behind it!

Here’s the final AFTER

I think I smiled the entire time I peeled off that tape. I was in love with how it turned out! My fear was gone and I was so happy I tackled this project that cost me less than $50 (Tape $8, black paint $15, laser $20, and I already had white paint on hand). You can do this too! I hope you found this helpful and made you ready to paint some stripes!

The rest of the office reveal is coming soon!