Sleep in Style: How To Personalize Your Bedroom

Whether you just got a new place or need to remodel your childhood bedroom into a more sophisticated space, it can be hard to decide which direction to go. If you’re eccentric and have many hobbies, you might find it difficult to focus on one theme. Maybe you love warm colors but don’t want bright yellows and oranges to keep you up at night. Keep this guide for how to personalize your bedroom nearby for all your remodeling projects.

Decide Your Room’s Theme

Before you begin arranging your bedroom, you may want to consider a theme. Having a theme in mind will guide you when considering what bedroom furniture to choose and how to decorate your room. If you follow a fandom, collect pieces from a historic period, or enjoy any other hobby, you could include it in your theme.

Let your theme guide you when picking paint colors or wallpaper. While it’s best to keep bedroom furniture to a minimum, your theme can guide you toward decorative pillows, ottomans, and lamps you can mix and match. Even if you don’t have a major theme in mind, choosing cool colors—such as shades of blue, green, and purple—are ideal for bedrooms due to their soothing effects.

Pro Tip: When you have two themes you want to showcase, use the 80/20 rule! Eighty percent of your room should follow your main theme while 20 percent of the room should be modeled after your secondary theme.

Hang Art in Your Bedroom

You can display your personality in any room with a favorite piece of artwork. Display your sophisticated and serious side with functional wall décor such as calendars, clocks, and mirrors that are available in a plethora of designs. Bedrooms are a great place to display personal and meaningful items, such as family photos. Art and other framed images should be hung at eye level—also known as gallery view—to make the ceiling seem higher and your room look bigger. Hanging smaller pieces of art on your bedroom walls will exaggerate the size of the walls.

Pro Tip: Decorative mirrors can add space to a room! You can provide the illusion of double windows by hanging a mirror across from one.

Lay a Rug in Your Room

A simple way to personalize your bedroom is with a rug. Rugs instantly transform any space and are especially good for small rooms. They add texture, pattern, and color—and can protect your feet from a cold floor in the morning if you don’t already have carpet.

Make Your Bedroom Smell Good

When considering how to personalize your bedroom, you may want to consider all the senses. An often-overlooked sense is smell. Add a candle, plant, or potpourri to your room with your favorite scent. Rose, lavender, and vanilla are popular scents soothing for nighttime. Be aware of what scents you have, though, to ensure they don’t clash and result in something unpleasant.

You can personalize your bedroom in multiple ways. Whether you add some new decorations to freshen up the place or refurnish your room with all new furniture, paint, and flooring, let your bedroom represent you.

5 Electrical Safety Tips Every Homeowner Needs To Know

As a homeowner, it's essential to understand that there are several safety concerns relating to your home's electrical system and appliances. Your electrical system is present in almost every space of your home. There are five electrical safety tips every homeowner needs to know.

1. Protection for kids. Take note of any unused outlets in your home. If ignored, they can cause serious harm to children. You can prevent an electrical shock by using plastic inserts to cover the outlets, which will also save energy by cutting down on drafts. You should also hide cords and keep all dangerous electrical devices are out of reach of children.

2. Fuses. If a fuse in your home blows, it is essential to turn off any appliance that is on the same circuit as the blown fuse. A fuse often blows when there is a power surge or a disruption in the electrical flow. You can protect your valuables by using a surge protector. Just make sure you get the right surge protector for your needs and don't overload it. Furthermore, when you replace the fuse itself, replace it with one with the same rating to avoid any problems.

3. Overload. As mentioned, putting too much strain on an outlet is one of the most dangerous things a homeowner can do. Doing so has caused thousands of fires in American homes. If you notice flickering lights or discolored wall outlets, that may be a sign that you have an overloaded outlet in your home. Reduce the use of all multi-line converters and plug major appliances directly into the wall.

4. Extension cords. There are a few tips for extension cords that you likely have around the house. Always pull the plug itself, not the cord. Removing the plug will prevent fraying and stress on the end of the cord itself. Also, keep extension cords out of wet or damp areas. A situation like that is a recipe for disaster.

5. Fire. If you have to face an electrical fire, it is essential to remember one thing: never try to put it out with water. You run the risk of electrocution and harming yourself even more. Make sure you have a household fire extinguisher with an A-B-C rating. This substance is safe for electrical fires.

Just like any other part of your home, it is essential to pay attention to your electrical system. We hope these five electrical safety tips every homeowner needs to know will help you understand your home’s electrical system a little better and keep you and your family safe for years to come.

The Psychology Behind Staging a House and Selling

When you are selling a home, you might be wondering if it’s worth staging a house or not. Well, according to Forbes, the average staged home sold for 17% more than a non-staged home. The study also cited that staged homes sold 87% faster than non-staged homes. So, it’s worth putting in the time to organize and stage your property before selling it. Here at House to Home Organizing, we can help you stage at a lower cost than a realtor might charge for staging. 

To correctly organize and stage your house, understand what prospective buyers will want and need by understanding the psychology behind staging and selling. Keep the tips and tactics below in mind when staging your home.

1. How to Use Colors

In larger rooms, you want to use warm colors. These warm colors will make people subconsciously think of sunlight and heat. Warm colors are shades of red, orange, and yellow. They should be used in living spaces such as the dining room, living room, and foyer.

Cooler colors such as blue, green, and purple can create a sense of calmness and can be soothing. Just make sure you use lighter shades of cool colors. Also, cool colors give a room more depth and should be used in smaller rooms to help expand them. 

2. Organize in Threes

Use the rule of three when organizing and planning the layout of a room. When staging a house, you should arrange items in three because three is the lowest number to begin a pattern. Human brains like patterns and prospective buyers will tend to gaze longer at items in three compared to even or symmetrical groupings. 

For example, in the living room, you can group the couch, rug, and coffee table as a trio. While in the dining room, you ought to showcase the dining room table, chairs, and overhead light.

You should also consider textures when it comes to the rule of three. For instance, a room can have wood-accented side tables, a blanket with a soft texture, and a metal chandelier or table to giving off a sleek finish.

3. Organize to Minimize 

Millennials make up the largest generational group of buyers (25%). Millennials, and other generational groups to an extent, want minimalism. They would rather spend money on experiences than physical things or objects. Millennials also understand they are paying much more per square footage than previous generations did so they’re looking for smaller homes.

To help appease millennials and others, you should organize to minimize when staging a house. One way minimize is to remove your personal belongings from the household. Prospective buyers want to visualize themselves living in the house, not imagining someone else doing their daily habits like brushing their teeth or making the bed. 

For more tips on staging a house, checkout RentSpree’s visual below:

Safe Indoor Plants

Considering nearly 70 percent of American households have a pet, it’s fair to assume many homeowners are also pet owners. This means when it comes to putting the finishing touches on our homes we have to keep our pups, cats, and other pets top of mind. This can include everything from flooring that can withstand scratching, cabinet hardware that can take the gnawing, and even the indoor plants we keep —  after all, we’ve long turned to greenery to spruce up our space, but how often are we really considering whether it’s pet-safe?

With March marking Pet Poison Prevention Month — and with plants among the top 10 most reported pet toxins, according to the ASPCA — the time is now to reconsider how to help our plants and pets live in harmony. Consider this your gut check that, as homeowners, we needn’t subject our pets to toxins to create a feel-good oasis. We just need to opt for pet-safe plant alternatives. 
To help, Honest Paws curated an ultimate guide to pet-friendly plants and compiled some of them into the infographic here. Scroll through the pet-friendly finishing touches, as well as the health benefits of incorporating both pets and plants into your abode.