This is such a cool idea! Do you have some silverware that’s looking a little old and boring? Maybe you’d like to finesse your flatware and get another set to remain un-finessed. Well, Apartment Therapy has an idea for you: spray paint your silverware!

You can do all sorts of funky colors or stick with a simple palette. And as Apartment Therapy reminds us, only do the handles — not the part of the utensil your mouth touches.

What do you think of this idea?

Image courtesy  of Apartment Therapy.

Everyone has certain beliefs about decorating that they’ve heard over and over again and internalized as the truth. Sometimes though, it is good to look at things you thought weren’t the “right” way to decorate.

House Beautiful shared quite a few well-kept decorating secrets. Here are a few of our favorites. Make sure to check out the rest of the post here!

• Don’t be afraid of the dark: A dark paint color can add depth to a small room and make it feel bigger. Not to mention, dark walls can often be quite cozy.
• Wallpaper isn’t just for walls: House Beautiful suggests wallpapering sliding closet doors to give them a new look. Don’t forget about the inside of your closets too! A pop of wallpaper that can be seen as the door opens adds a lot of visual interest.
• Speaking of closets…there isn’t anything worse than feeling around in a dark closet for your clothing. Put a light in there and stretch beyond the usual bare bulb on a string.
• Go green: With plants, that is! A nice, large plant in a room adds a sense of the outdoors.

Everyone has their own personal style, but let’s face it — some people just have a knack for decorating. To give the rest of us an idea of things to avoid, House Beautiful (via MSN Real Estate) has some tips. Here are a few of our favorites. Check out the rest at MSN!

• Overzealous Decorative Painting: Color is great, but be judicious. Remember that you’re not living in a beautiful photograph — this is actually your home. Once the newness of that apple green accent wall wears off, will you really want to look at it every day?
• Furniture Pushed Up Against the Walls: Do you really want to strain to converse with someone who is sitting on a chair huddled against the wall on the other side of the room? MLuxe recommends creating conversation spaces instead.
• A Single Light Source: Unless your room is incredibly small, you’ll need more than one lamp. A single overhead light can be harsh. For activities like reading, you’ll want to have smaller, concentrated lights.

Via HousingZone.com, a leading news website for home-building and remodeling professionals, we learned of the Sherwin-Williams Colormix 2012 forecast, which presents a range of 40 colors the company’s “color experts” foresee being popular, trendy or just downright cool in the year ahead.

So what do we learn from this new Colormix forecast? “The 40 hues highlighted in colormix 2012 stay close to home with earth-inspired, color family groupings: Reds, Blues, Greens and Neutrals.” More specifically, Sherwin William’s Jackie Jordan says:

Colors that are analogous, or adjacent on the color wheel, are a dominant trend. We discover a fresh array of combinations within color families ― be it fiery reds, watery blues, grassy greens or organic neutrals. … Just hone in on a color you love and the ideal, natural complement will be right nearby.

See the colors in all their glory here. Anything you see inspire you?

The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Gardeners
The Daily Green
“Gardening for the first time? You can’t go wrong with these time-tested techniques.”

Making tax time a little more bearable
Design*Sponge
Maybe these tips will help you be more efficient next year: “Confession: this year I’ve become a total tax failure. It’s April 12, and I still haven’t filed. I’m only halfway through my receipts and feel like I need to psych myself up. In an attempt to rally, I rounded up just a few things that would make tax time a little more bearable.”

The Worst Paint Colors for a Home Exterior
Charles and Hudson
“We’ve all seen them. Maybe you’re out for a leisurely stroll, or a relaxing drive. You decide to check out some of the nearby neighborhoods. And then, without warning … you encounter one of THOSE houses. You know what we’re talking about–a home painted with a color so garish, so horrible, that you can’t help but admire the homeowner even as you laugh and question his or her mental reasoning skills.”

5 Examples of Bigger Being Better (In Small Spaces)
Apartment Therapy
“Bigger is better for many circumstances in life. Take umbrellas for example or how about bank accounts or a theoretical big heart? When it comes to small spaces it’s easy to scale back on size, but we’re here to reassure you that these 5 things arealways better bigger when it comes to home decor!”

Renovating your home can be one of the great joys of home ownership. You get to put your own personal stamp on the space, but what happens when you want to sell? DIY Life lists five projects that are most likely not going to be worth your time and money. Here they are, along with our thoughts.

• Too Much Taste: DIY wisely points out that even if you think brightly colored walls look stylish and unique (no argument there!), other people might not think so. Should others’ opinion matter? Probably not…unless you want them to buy your home. If you plan on staying put a long time, you might as well paint your bathroom orange. Painting can be a pain, but it’s a fairly cheap and easy fix. If you think you will be selling soon, do yourself a favor and go with beige.
• Budget-Friendly Fixtures: We think that you should buy the highest-quality items that your budget will allow. After all, you can’t change out your flooring the same way you would some cheap throw pillows. Again, we think this decision will have a lot to do with how long you will be in the house. Cheap fixtures might be fine for a few years but bother you after 10 years.
• Big Ticket Items: DIY Life mentions a pool as a prime example. In that case, we say it depends on the climate. In a northern environment like Minnesota, where Marvin is located, pools are rare and might not add to resale value. In a place like Arizona or Florida? Buyers might welcome the chance to take a dip. But any big ticket home item must be weighed by the enjoyment you will derive from it vs. how much of its value you can recoup. Maybe your future buyers won’t be impressed by that expensive steam shower you put in the master bath.
• Reinvention of Space: Our opinion is that this depends how easily you can swap things out. Let’s say you use your third bedroom as a crafting room. When it comes to selling, buyers probably want to envision it as a bedroom, but that’s a fairly quick fix to stage. More permanent room re-dos, like turning that bedroom into a bathroom (to give DIY Life’s example) might not be so wise.
• Unfinished or Poorly Done DIY Work: If you’re handy, do it yourself. If you’re not, or don’t have the time to finish what you started, PLEASE just hire someone to get it done. You’ll thank yourself for it later.

What other home renovations do you think are an unwise use of time, space and money?

Image courtesy of freefotouk on Flickr

Looking for a way to jazz up your kitchen without doing a whole remodel? How about replacing your countertops? Calfinder had a post about some great new countertops out there and we fell in love! They look like works of art and are  a true focal point in any kitchen. We especially love this ThinkGlass countertop in Turquoise Ice–it’s cool, modern and lovely.

Check out Calfinder to see the rest and start dreaming of your own kitchen art!

Image courtesy of Calfinder.

Color: It’s one of our favorites ways to change up a room. It can make a dramatic difference, it’s fairly inexpensive, and with just a little elbow grease, you can get a whole new look.

But this made us think. When we choose to paint, is our color palette dictated by the season? In these warm, sunny months, perhaps people are choosing clean whites, sky blues and cool pale greens. In winter, perhaps there’s a rush towards cream, royal blue and mallard green.

Of course, this only takes into account people’s decision-making process at the time of painting. Unless you have a lot of time on your hands and truly love to paint your walls, that eggplant wall won’t suddenly turn into lavender every summer. The most important thing with choosing color is to make sure that you love it and that it fits the room–in whatever season.

Calfinder has some photos of bright, bold colors that manage to look season-less. Here’s one for your enjoyment and please check out their post for more paint inspiration!

Photo courtesy of Calfinder

Apartment Therapy recently featured some self watering planters — perfect for those of us with irregular schedules or who can’t quite remember that all living things need water! Now, they’re not completely maintenance free — you will have to put water in every so often. But once the water is in, you can sit back and watch your plants grow.

There are quite a few options out there, but our favorite is the Grobal Self-Watering Planter designed by Karim Rashid (see some of his work for the myMarvin project here). The Grobal comes in enough colors to satisfy any decorating scheme and features Rashid’s signature curvy lines. With something as easy as this, there’s no excuse not to try growing something this summer!

Photo courtesy of A + R

We recently talked about some (supposedly) passé decorating trends. According to The Nest, there are seven big mistakes you can make when decorating–even if you avoid the aforementioned trends. In no order of importance, they are:

1. The unanchored rug–nothing on top of it? Then why is it there? We’ll make exceptions for small rugs used by doorways to avoid tracking dirt in.

2. Really big furniture. If it takes up most of the room, it will look ridiculous.

3. Bad paint. It can’t be said enough–test your paint in various lights and sleep on your decision. Maybe in the morning that tangerine accent wall in the living room will seem less kicky.

4. Too much of everything. The article evokes the old Coco Chanel adage that says that before a woman leaves the house, she should take one thing off (e.g. a piece of jewelry or a scarf). The same is true for homes. If course you want it to look lived in and not empty, but too much stuff=clutter. Fast.

5. Decorating from a single era. Yes, you want your furniture to fit your home. And you don’t have to go completely crazy, but don’t be afraid to put a piece of African art in your Cape Cod, a Ligne Roset chair in your Victorian or a piece of chintz in your modern house. After all, you don’t live in a museum.

6. A BIG TV. Look, we all like the idea of a home theater. but consider your room’s proportions. Also look at the pattern of use. For a basement rec room, a very large TV might be just the thing. For a living room used for multiple purposes, such as gathering after dinner and entertaining guests, don’t let your television become the focal point.

7. Bad lighting. It’s unflattering and causes eyestrain.

Of course, this is all opinion, and in the end you should do what you are comfortable with. But the thread that runs through all these “donts” is a lack of consideration for living and for human interaction. Clutter, TV, distracting walls and bad lighting will detract from the warm human element that home should bring to mind.

What are your decorating donts?

Image courtesy of Chris Campbell on Flickr.