Touch of Black

A house proud post...well still in apartment,
but you get the idea.

What a week it has been. I will spare you the details, but I had a medical emergency and am feeling very under the weather. Medications are also draining to say the least. To cheer me up hubby helped me with a few sprucing up projects that I had wanted to accomplish. I had started on these projects but just could not finish. 

We plan to do our best to be home owners again by next Fall, and so I have started "collecting" things and making tweaks to what I have to start on my future decor. I have decided to go back to my love of all things black and white... mimicking my wardrobe...always a classic. So with what little budget I have I begun my search for treasures and tweak what I have within that budget. Going back to the roots of this blog when I started and when we had first moved into the apartment.

Thank goodness for living across the street from Lowes and up the street from Joann's Fabric as well as Ross, and World Market, the search kept me close to home. So below see how things looked and what we did to tweak things.

So this was our IKEA sofa table, I had already
added wrapping paper in my fav print under
the glass...

So as you can see I bought a new table.
I keep trying to get a better pic of it, but can not
get a good angle...but once I paint it black, I shall do best.
Something to look forward to. But see the
difference?? YES, I covered the tissue box,
and added trim to the lamp shade...those little touches really made a difference.

I used black tassels with beads trim on bottom,
trim with a velvet ribbon woven through on top.

So this is a dresser our daughter gave us.
She had painted the panels gray, we
then painted it gold. I lived with it
that way for a bit now.

Now look at it!!! We kept the nobs, mercury glass from Anthropology, and chrome handles from Lowes. Notice too the
black runner, found at Ross for a steal, a ribbon & tassel and it continues the color story.
*sorry for poor quality of pic, my hands are shaking lately.

One day I dream of having black crystal flowers in the large vase, or perhaps pink as well as ostrich feathers.

Notice the same paper in my shadow cubes...both found on the clearance rack!

The above photo of the trays,(a great way to collect scattered items) I thought I had a "before", but can't seem to locate a photo in my albums. They were originally a Chinese red, with a yellow flowered cherry blossom design as well as crackle finish...now, sleek, glossy black...really makes the accessories pop! Thinking of painting the "angels wing" silver or perhaps white. The tea light holder is a crystal diamond! I plan to get a new area rug, as well as re-cover the foot stools in zebra or solid black fur perhaps.

Above is how our dining area looked until recently.

one day, this table from K-mart, bought on clearance,

will be either black or white, till then I added a touch 

of both in a very easy way. *Pay attention to the sconces on the wall.

The placemats repeat the pattern I love.

they are turned so they look like two runners. 

The mercury glass w/clear glass cake stand was bought for nearly 70% off at a craft store!

These are my new dining space sconces. Now I know they are a little wonky, one day I hope to have very nice ones to replace them with, but they were on clearance at Ross, and they had crystals, something I have been desiring for sconces and had yet to find. The black candles bought at IKEA, also on clearance and I spent under 20.00 for both the two sconces and four pillars.

So this is my start on my journey to add a touch of black ( white & silver and maybe even that touch of gold) to my living environment. It is not perfection, and it is just a start, and signals to me that something perfect has happened. The fact that I am able to make purchases at all, when for so long I could not. That I feel I can dream of a future decor for a home, not this apartment, and begin to tweak things to fit that dream, means I have rounded a corner in my journey and to me that is perfection.