Barn Light Electric Giveaway!!!!

Don't miss out on this GREAT GIVEAWAY.

Its 8:00 Saturday morning and normally I would be racing around trying to get kids out the door to soccer games, however, its been raining for the past couple of days so our morning games are canceled. Can you guess how EXCITED I am. (we were scheduled for 6 games this weekend) Therefore I have had time to read some of my favorite blogs.

Which brings me to the big giveaway. While reading Holly Mathis Interiors I found out about the: 

Barn Light Electric Giveaway

They have absolutely amazing lights. Check out what I fell in love with:

Goodrich™ Husky 17" Porcelain Gooseneck Light

Benjamin™ Polly 12" 2-Light Porcelain Stem Mount Pendant

Benjamin™ Wilcox 10" Porcelain Deep Bowl Stem Mount Light

Ivanhoe™ Sky Chief 16" Warehouse Porcelain Pendant

 

Bo 60's Floor Arc Lamp

Machine Age Metal Table Lamps

Barn Light Electrics biggest giveaway yet! 

Beginning Wednesday, September 21, 2011 Barn Light Electric is giving away one $1,000 Grand Prize and one $500 2nd Place Prize. The two winners will each receive a Barn Light Electric Gift Certificate to purchase new lighting for their homes or to finish off that lingering renovation project.

So start looking around now and show everyone what you love! Follow the rules below to enter yourself, and then share it all on your blog and Facebook for fans and followers to enter. Be sure to email contest@barnlightelectric.com with your article link once your blog post is up (that's how we keep track of our entries).

How to Enter the Giveaway:

1. Look around online at Barn Light Electric and pick lights you’d love to own
2. Feature your lighting picks on your personal blog, and link to the lights if you can!
3. Copy/Paste these rules at the bottom of your blog article so others can enter
4. Once your personal article is up, you must email your blog link to: contest@barnlightelectric.com to be qualified to win. The contest ends Wednesday, October 12, 2011
5. Don’t have a blog? Find out how you can enter by reading the Official Rules

To all my friends, YOU DON"T HAVE TO HAVE A BLOG TO WIN. Just hit the offical rules button above to find out how to enter.

Good Luck,
Stacy

Dining Rooms : YES or NO

Dining Rooms have always been one of my favorite rooms in the house. I know what you thinking;

• Your crazy they are a huge waste of space!
• I NEVER use my dining room.
• We don't entertain enough to have a dining room.
• I don't have a big enough family, so I don't need one.
• We aren't "formal" people.

I think my love for dining rooms goes all the way back to my childhood. We ate in our dining room all the time and I LOVED it. I am not just talking Thanksgiving and Christmas, I mean birthdays, dinners with friends, family get together's, pretty much anytime it required more then 6 people at the table. Our kitchen was very small but then again so was our dining room but some how we managed to get everybody in. On really big get togethers we would spread out into the living room ( which is another room that most home owners have done away with... that will be another post). The time I liked most was dessert time. ( not for the reason you are thinking but that's great to)  I loved it because the adults sat and drank their coffee, the kids sat and ate their desserts, the craziness of getting the food on the table hot was over, the candles would have burned down enough to play with the wax and everyone was content just to sit and talk. Yes people, I said sit and talk. Something, I think in today's world is a rarity; we just don't take the time.

So this post is to get you to see the dining room differently and to get rid of all the stereotypes. Dining rooms can be whatever suits your style of living and can be a huge asset to creating a home filled with wonderful memories.

Take a look at some great dining rooms that show a variety of different styles:

Ambiance Interiors

Anyone who is a collector of fine wine would never want to leave this dining room. We don't have a wine cellar as part of our dining room but we do have a small room devoted to my husbands wine collection. He  will spend hours in that room just looking and rearranging his wines. He often has wine tastings at our house where certain wines are paired with food and even though I don't drink wine, I have learned to appreciate why people truly love it. There is such a great sense of pleasure when the perfect combination of wine, food and friends are achieved. 

Armonia Decor

Adding a pop of color, like these vibrant pink chairs, instantly gives a room energy. Energy that just screams FUN!

At Home in Arkansas

Here is an example of how traditional style chairs are given a modern flair simply by painting them a high gloss white. You have just taken a room that is outdated and given it a whole new fresh look. That in addition to some great wallpaper and you have a room that is fun and inviting.

Censational Girl

What a casual and comfortable setting for a dining room. This is definitely a room you would use all the time: breakfast, lunch and dinner. Can't you picture dinners just lingering on while you and your guest relax and get lost in conversation. Or how about a wonderful Sunday brunch with your family. Wonderful memories are to be had in this dining room.

Donna Griffith

This is what I call "country elegance". I love the mixture of the stained wood buffet with the painted caned chairs and then the iron glass table and crystal chandelier; all against that dark floor. Simply beautiful!

Felman Architecture

What an incredible use of a small space.  Having the whole wall open to the outside gives the impression that the room is endless. I also love how the designer kept the room simple so as to not fight with the natural surroundings. Perfect room!

Horchow

Windsor Smith

I love all the different types of seating in this room. There is something for everyone. Very fun, comfortable and functional.

Sutton Suzuki Architects

 All the remaining pictures are from Elle Decor. Just maybe by the end of this post you will find a dining room inspiration that you just can't live without.

Here is a little teaser of F & J's dining room. Can't wait to show you the rest. By the way, does anyone recognize those wing chairs? They were a Craiglist find and I posted about them here. Check out the before pictures. They turned out beautiful!



Let me know if I changed your mind about dining rooms. YES or NO????

Take Care,

Stacy

OUT OF CONSTRUCTION !!!!

Well, I wish I could say SHM Designs Website was out of construction, but that would just be way to much good news for one day! No, what is finally through the construction phase is a house in Harrisburg which I have been working on for about a year now. Friends of mine decided a couple of years ago to move back to their hometown of Harrisburg, PA and build their dream house. About a year ago construction started and a couple of weeks ago they moved in. Since then, they have had an earthquake, a hurricane, and a flash flood, closing their children's new school for the past 4 days. (Yes, their house is still standing but MOM is not).

My friends have allowed me to share with you some pictures of their incredible house (thanks guys). This project is still very much ongoing, so I will be sharing these over several posts.

I hope you enjoy!

The front of the house is an L shape. Unfortunately, I am not the best photographer so I didn't think to get it at the other angle. Sorry, you only missed seeing ...OH... half of the house. Hopefully I will get better.

This is the back of that side of the house that you didn't get to see. Of course, I would take a picture of something everyone wants to see ...the garage. I think I am going to be apologizing a lot through this.

This is actually the same side as the above picture. It is a portion of the house before the garages start. On the top floor is the children's playroom and underneath will be a future office for F. and a workout room. ( the spot-a-pot is a nice added touch to the picture, don't you think...not)

A continuation of that side of the house on the other side of the garages. The design of this side of the house is so spectacular that you don't even notice the garages.

 A portion of the right side back of the house. The first set of three windows is the breakfast nook and the area with windows above and below is the two story family room with fireplace

.

 Left side back of the house. She will have a window in her kitchen which will overlook this circular covered patio area. It will be a beautiful view.

We are in her dining room making some stud changes with the foreman. Besides building my own house, I had never worked with someone in the construction phase. It was so much fun!  Having a third party be able to look at the layout of a room while still in the stud stage saves you so much time and money. We found several areas where either space was not being utilized or the wall layout was not " furniture friendly". It was SO EASY to make these changes  because no walls were up yet. I highly recommend hiring a designer to give your house a walk through while in this stage. You will be so much happier with the end result and it will make decorating that much easier.

This area is part of the living room. It will house a baby grand piano. It will be such an incredible place for the kids to play. We bought an absolutely beautiful chandelier to go over the piano. I can't wait to show it to you.

Below these windows will be a beautiful custom built bar by an AMAZING carpenter, Mark Strouble. Any carpentry work I have I give to Mark. I can't wait to show you all that he has done. He truly has a gift.

Two story family room with fireplace.

This will house the built-in entertainment center in the two story family room. (also built by Mark)

Overlook into the family room. The little rounded area that protrudes out into the room is just one of the architectural details that makes this house so special.

Kitchen

Back hallway that runs the length of the garages and leads to the future office and workout room.

Another architectural detail on the ceiling of the hallway leading to the office and workout room. Beautiful!

Children's playroom

This is one example of poor space planning. This studded box is the shower. They cut the shower short because of the window above.  Basically they would of had this huge master bath with this super odd looking short shower. (Lets not even talk about the amount of dust that would have accumulated on top of that ledge). Then, they created this window area on the wall of the shower to allow natural light inside. Not attractive. So, we simply water proofed ( not as simple as that but didn't want to go in to all the details) around the already existing window and then included it inside the shower thus allowing for the ceiling height to be proportional to the shower size and adding natural light inside the shower. Very inexpensive fix since still in the stud phase.

The rest of the bathroom.

So there you have it! The first phase of many phases completed. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. Can't wait to show you more!

Take Care,

Stacy

ANNIVERSARY of 9/11

Hello everyone.

 I know I haven't posted in a very long time and because of that I am not sure how many are still following. I am struggling on how to pin point exactly what direction I want SHM Designs to go and therefore I have been confused as to what I should post on my blogs. What I am not confused about and have not forgotten are the millions of people that tragically lost their lives 10 years ago.

My sister sent me this You Tube video this morning and I was so moved that I decided it should be posted for all ( at least anyone whom I am lucky enough to get to read this post) to see. I would love to hear your comments about this truly moving and amazing artist.

Here is the link. I hope you are as moved as I was:

www.youtube.com/v/QZFkZiwMLZ4

Take Care,

Stacy