Suzannah Hamlin Stanley's Blog

The perfect high quality rug solution for a uniquely shaped room!

I have just majorly up-leveled my living room! (I hope I used that term right.) Point is, I have a unique, long, skinny living room in my historic Tudor revival house and there is just no way that a modern standard rug was ever going to be the right size. Back in the day homeowners could order from the Sears & Robuck catalog or other mail order sources to get a custom piece of carpet or linoleum cut to exactly the right size to give a nice border around the room. My parents' 1910 home still had ...

Timeless style updates to my plain all-white kitchen

I redid my kitchen in 2019, which was not that long ago, but I was still figuring out my style at the time and I chose some then trendy, more modern finishes I would not choose now. (I also was still very much in a fixer upper mindset, and the house had glass block tile and peeling wallpaper and three layers of old roof tiles and… point is, I just wanted something fresh and clean and new.) So I ended up with a very white, pretty boring kitchen.

But it feels wasteful to redo a new kitchen. I’m not...

Otto's blue and yellow classic bedroom update

I did not find decorating for a seven-year-old boy to be particularly easy or fun, but I’m excited that I finally have finished Otto's bedroom after more than a year of picking some upgraded, non-toddler, still not big boy, things! And this room features a lot of special touches, including a watercolor of us at the coast and some pieces he chose himself!READ POST

Bedroom updates, and affordable custom trimmed curtains

After many years of subpar window treatments in my bedroom… I finally cracked the code! I had been using slightly-too-short standard 84" Target curtains, pretty good blackout, but just the hidden tab top, because I knew they would be quiet for opening and closing while the kids were sleeping nearby. But I really wanted the elegant look of pinch pleat curtains on rings. Well, I figured it out!

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Floral wallpaper transformation (and more) in our plain upstairs bathroom

I think I’ve done it… I think I’ve wallpapered the last room in this home that needs it! I hesitated for a while because I had already renovated this bathroom… Back in 2020, with kind of a mix of that organic earthy modern thing that was trending for a while plus some traditional elements like wainscoting. It was...fine. Honestly, fine. But I also thought it was sort of begging for wallpaper about the wainscoting on the white walls.
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New sofas in the living room!

A couple years ago I finally figured out the right layout for my long skinny living room. Two couches facing each other: simple and classic, but very comfortable, with lots of seating options. Plus an ottoman instead of a coffee table for comfy foot resting, and of course lots of forts and jumping by the kids. But as for the sofa style, I debated for probably a year and a half before I figured out the right combination. Well, they’re finally here and I’m so excited to reveal them!
Thanks to Inter...

Classic bracket open shelves in my historic house kitchen

I was really proud of these DIY industrial wood/bracket shelves when we redid our kitchen in 2019. I couldn’t find thick enough wood on its own so I use stair risers and cut off the rounded edges. They worked great function-wise, and when we first installed them, they added some nice warm because the kitchen was so plain and so white. But now… I’m really going for a more traditional, classic, and cohesive look here, and they were sticking out like a sore thumb. 

So... I replaced them with somethi...

Re-doing the entryway wallpaper! With something way better

Well, I’m to the point of redoing DIY projects I did at this house a few years ago…! I wallpapered this entryway with peel-and-stick wallpaper in 2021, My first wallpaper project in this house. That paper was trendy and kind of modern and never exactly perfect for this house. But, it was neutral and not offensive, and I wasn’t sure what else I would choose. But an entryway is such an important moment. When you first walk into the house, I wanted it to be really special. 

Thanks to Sandberg Wallpa...

Finally, the right size rug for the dining room!

This dining room was the first room I called "finished" when we moved in almost 7 years ago, and because dining rooms have pretty basic ingredients, it hasn’t really changed all that much. I’ve definitely improved it though, several times. But the thing I was never able to get right was the rug. This room is about 12' x 12', which means a standard 8'x10' rug looks… OK? But definitely not high-end or really comfortable.

Thanks to Rugs USA for partnering with me on this post.

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Cutest patterned Roman shades, and outside mounting them

I’ve installed many Roman shades in my house, but only just now did I install any outside mount. Inside mount is typically the ideal, because then it doesn’t block any of the trim around your windows. But on some windows, there isn’t a deep enough trim, or maybe you don’t have trim and you want to make the window look taller. Or in my case, I didn’t want to block any of the light that I didn’t have to, and when you install inside mount, you automatically block the top 6+ inches of the window whe...