The Magic of a Cozy Corner

When thinking of home, sterile and pristine do not come to mind. In fact, I’m looking for the magic of a cozy corner in just about every room. Read along for how to create a cozy home.

1. Start with a Purpose

Think of your own home. What is your purpose? What is your motivation for decorating your home? For me, I want to build a home that welcomes each family member daily to a cozy, hospitable space. When my family enters our home, my desire is for them to feel at peace.

2. The Three Essentials: Lighting, Texture, and Layers

For my first ever home, I learned the beauty of a neutral palate. However, as the years and houses have come and gone, I am learning there is more to great design than a neutral paint color. Lighting, texture, and layers are three simple ways to create a cozy home.

As I have shared before here, there are three types of lighting for every space: ambient, task, and ascent. Your lighting can not only brighten up a space but give it a signature style as well. We recently added in art lights to our dining room and I cannot express how impactful that design choice has been. Guests have shared how elevated the room looks now.

3. Add Personal Touches

What are your own likes? Hobbies? Incorporating a balanced amount of personal touches can make your home your own space. For me, I like to add prints of places we have been: Wales, New Orleans, etc.

Instead of having personal photos throughout the home, we placed a gallery wall ascending our staircase. This design choice allows us to enjoy our personal photos while keeping the home aesthetically pleasing.

4. Don’t Forget Function

Think of each nook and corner of your home. What do you use it for? What do you need it for? If you reside in a large home, do you need to fill the void? If you are like us and find yourself in a smaller home, you often need each space to pull double duty: coziness and functionality.

We changed the eye level bookshelves in our living room to low level bookshelves with a bench seat on top. Our armoire in the living room serves as extra storage and extra pantry space as well as the home for our microwave.

5. A Cozy Corner in Every Room

Over time, you can look around your home and find a cozy corner in every room. Think throw pillows, blankets, storage baskets, or ottomans. Soft lighting that invites one to sit a spell and read a good book. Enjoy creating spaces you and your family will love!

What makes travel so grand? Is it the new location? A different culture? Or just the possibility of getting away from the day to day stress. Read on to discover how to travel on a budget.

Tip #1: Create a budget.

When planning a trip, sit down with yourself or your significant other and determine how much money can be spent on your trip. Give yourself some time to consider: transportation, hotels, clothing, food, etc. Be sure to include how many people are traveling with you. You might learn what a ticket cost for one person but then you will need to multiply that cost by how many are in your travel party.

As I will state later in the post, research will be a big help to your planning. I found this article during my recent research for our upcoming trip to Greece. I love that the author gave a variety of budget levels for traveling to Greece. Once you have created your budget number, now it’s time to list out all your wants.

I love to travel! You can find other tips and advice I have given on a previous post, here.

Tip #2: List your wants.

While considering your travel budget, make a list of all your top wants in a trip. What is the most important to you? Great food or a great hotel? Which would you prefer to do more of: lounge in your hotel or be out and about with the locals? Write your travel priorities in 1, 2, 3 format and allocate the most funds to your top priority.

For me, I want my family to have as many experiences as they can while on a trip. As far as money goes, I am willing to eat cheaper or reserve a standard hotel room if it means we can rent a sailboat and tour an island or if we can take an old fashioned train ride up the mountainside. For others, having a grandeose suite is the hilight of their trip. Only you can determine which part of a trip is the most important to you and therefore, deserves the greatest allotment of your budget.

After you have listed your wants, now begins the research. Research allows you to match your wants with your budget.

Tip #3: Research, research, research.

With the world wide web at our fingertips, you have ample oportunities to research any travel destination. Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube, and blogs offer a plethera of ideas for where to stay, what to do, and what to eat. Depend on the real life experiences bloggers or friends and family share with you regarding your desired travel destination. Please do not rely on only one person’s review. Spend time reading or viewing several reviews of a restaurant, resort, or travel experience.

Once you have completed your research, create a travel ititnerary that list where you will go each day, where you will eat, and where you will stay. An itinerary can help reduce impulse spending and keeps your entire travel crew on track. For our trip to Wales, I used Rough Guides travel guide to Wales. Here is one for Greece. (As an Amazon Associate, I may earn commission off any viable links. This is at no extra cost to you.) My travel guide book gave me an abundance of information and really was beneficial during my trip and I needed a quick reference to an area or a recommendation for food.

With careful study of reviews, I have utilized the following sites for hotels and overnight stays: Airbnb, VRBO, and Booking.com Google can offer great reviews on restaurants and experiences. Yelp is also another review site for restaurants; however, blog reviews of restaurants for overseas trips might be most beneficial.

For more tips on how to travel on a budget, check out this link.