Around the House: Guest Bedroom and Bathroom

I originally had one looooong post about the guest bedroom and bathroom as they stand, plus all of my hopes and dreams for the spaces.  But I figure my three loyal readers don't want to read a 2340987 word essay in one sitting, so I'm breaking it up.  First up, the guest bedroom and bathroom as they were and are.

The guest bedroom started out as this sad little room with a boob light.  (Those are azalea bushes right outside the bedroom window-- beautiful in April!)

The boob light is still there (I'd love to replace it someday with a ceiling fan to keep our guests cool), but it looks much more friendly these days.  Isn't it so happy?  I've loved that comforter since the day I bought it -- I've got a thing for stripes -- but it's a twin-size comforter and the bed is actually a full.  A little short on the sides, unfortunately, but it definitely works until we can revamp this room a bit.  Once I get around to getting another comforter, I'm stashing this one in the attic until I can put it in a girl's room someday.  I just can't give it up!  :-)  And a tip for any of you who doesn't have a bed skirt that matches your comforter, just follow Martha's lead.  I just bought a full-sized sheet that matched the green comforter stripes, and voila!

I'm so not a knick-knacks person, but I have a few of my favorites on display on top of the dresser here.  My grandmother embroidered the beautiful framed piece below, based on a pattern and a picture/memory she has of me as a little girl picking flowers in a Virginia field.  I love that it matches the current comforter.  So sweet.  The mountains print is actually a card my mom sent to my first post-college apartment; it reminds me of the Shenandoah Valley where my mom grew up and the Blue Ridge Parkway where we vacationed last summer.  

Here's our family gallery wall.  I was struggling with how to display pictures of all of our family (both of our parents are divorced, so we have a biiiiig "immediate" family).  So what better way than a happy gallery?  A nice way to honor the folks who stay in our guest bedroom.  :-)

 

 

Our first dances a loooong time ago.  I'll have to share our story one day.  :-)

Update:  I keep all of the frames straight by following a tip from Apartment Therapy:  stick a bit of electrical tape on each corner of your frame, and it'll provide enough stick-um to keep the frame from moving too much.  It's definitely not perfect, but it works pretty well!

Diagonally across the hallway is the guest bathroom.  Wasn't it charming with the blue floral toilet seat?  [Actually, when we replaced that seat I wished we could get it back-- definitely didn't replace it with the most high quality, and it really is important to have a quality throne.]

So to spice things up in there a bit, we put a shelf above the toilet and hung an IKEA print above the towel rack (it's opposite the toilet).

Source list:  Dresser, IKEA Hopen; comforter, JCPenney way back; steam trunk, Habitat ReStore; curtains, IKEA Lenda; Mirror, Wal-Mart