The Decorating Duchess: Cowabungalow ~ Some Just Beachy Ideas

Hi there! Boy, was it a long weekend at the beach. I went down Friday to help my mom and Stanley move into their new beach house. (So jealous!) It was three days of shopping, unpacking, painting, and arranging. All of the things that I love to do but I'm exhausted! I knew when we were picking out paint, tiles, bedding and so on that it would be cute but it is crazy cute if I do say so myself. :)

Unfortunately, we were moving into a house with no counter tops, no plumbing and no elevator with three stories of furniture. Huh? They wanted to be able to enjoy the house for a little while before it gets rented at the end of April so we were on a tight schedule. I have moved into dozens of model homes, parade homes and my own personal homes but I have never quite been in this situation. In the end, it was all worth it. I took some pictures but I want to go back down for new ones when everything else is complete. There are so many rooms, projects and ideas that I want to show you, so I think I'll have to split this up into several posts because I get overwhelmed easily. :) Here are some little projects and ideas that we were working on...

I took a surfboard that they had in the other house and painted it with the house name using stencils. The other side has hibiscus flowers....I'll have to remember to take a picture of this next time. See, I was overwhelmed!

When you come into the entry, there is a small nook with a bench. I made this hook wall for beach bags, towels, etc. as you come in. These are galvanized boat cleats that we purchased at West Marine.

This mirror originally hung horizontally with hooks across the top. Since it was too long for the entry nook, I moved 2 of the seahorse hooks to each side of the mirror and hung it vertically for a full length mirror in the bathroom. Sometimes you just have to redo a piece to make it work for you.

We moved this piece from the other house. I did not make this personally but I wanted to show you this because I thought it was a great simple idea. A bright color and some hot glued sea shells turned this generic medicine cabinet into a beautiful piece of art.They did not have a medicine cabinet in the bathroom, so I screwed the cabinet directly to the wall studs.

I love the idea of spelling out words for art. These simple letters came from Hobby Lobby. They are the same ones as the letters that spell out beach in one of the above photos.

Since Port A. is on the Gulf of Mexico and we were using bright blues and oranges, I thought it would be cute to make a table with an old Gulf sign in it. My mom and Stanley found someone that could do it and I think it turned out great. You have to have some whimsy, especially in a beach house, right?

My mom found this great pot and we were trying to think of something to fill it with. Bamboo was the obvious choice, then I thought of tiki torches. The sand works great to hold them in place.