by Fiona Rossiter on April 24, 2013
- Find Your Inspiration ~ It is important to gather inspiration before you begin any makeover project. I like to draw up a mood board and have a fairly clear idea of what I would like the space to look like. A good place to start is to review a selection of Interior or Home Magazines, to help you create a mood board or use Pinterest, which is a virtual pin board, to gather images. It is helpful to decide on a colour scheme that you like, which I find helps inspire the creative process. You can also use everyday items in your own home such as pots, coffee cups, tea towels or soft furnishings, to help you formulate design ideas.
- Determine Your Priorities ~ Decide which aspects of the makeover are most important to you, whether it be design or functionality or a bit of both. Have your priorities clearly outlined before you begin the makeover. Our recent kitchen renovation was prompted by the new cooker and hood we had bought, so although design is important to me functionality and good quality equipment is a high priority.The room you are making over will largely determine what your priorities are. Never rush a makeover project, especially if is a place you spend a great deal of time.
- Enjoy the Process ~ Have a bit of fun with your design choices, add some colour to the space. Make the space inspirational and unique, a place you can enjoy spending time in. If you keep the basics fairly neutral then you can add colour in your cabinets, wall colour or soft furnishings. It is a great idea to have a feature wall, which you can create buy either painting it a completely different colour to the rest of the room or bring in a different texture by using wall paper or art work. A great website to find colour inspiration is DesignSeeds, where you will find stunning color palettes to help create your unique space.
- Up-cycle ~ Try to re-purpose items in the space you are renovating where possible! We reused some of our original kitchen cabinets in our scullery, after doing our kitchen makeover. Other ways to up-cycle is to give a coffee table a new lease on life by having it antiquing rather than replacing it! Either have it done professionally or have a bit of fun and do it yourself. See this post on one of my favourite blogs, a beautiful mess, on “how to make a lace patterned coffee table”.
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by Fiona Rossiter on April 23, 2013
I have always thought of myself as more of a modern city gal but over the past few years, I feel that my taste has definitely been swayed. I am finding myself drawn to more of a country-style, especially as far as interiors go. You may remember my mini kitchen-makeover and my choice of country-style cabinets and wood counter tops – definitely not modern or city inspired!
As I mentioned to my hubby yesterday, I would love nothing more than a large farmhouse kitchen – loads of space for all the “big” personalities in our family to explore their culinary skills! Not too rustic though, it would have to be that perfect mix of country and chic. The funny thing is both my hubby and I were raised in the suburbs but we both have a longing to live in the country! This being one of the main reasons we moved to Noordhoek, which is essentially half way there! Truth be told we would love nothing more than a small holding somewhere and open space around us. I know that our girls are super keen on having horses so this would be the ideal situation 
Well who knows perhaps one day when we are all grown up this dream will become reality! For now I though I would share these gorgeous images of my idea of typical Farmhouse Country Living.
Image source: Country Living
by Fiona Rossiter on February 28, 2013
By now most of you must have heard about Washi Tape – well if not ~
Washi Tape is a printed Japanese washi paper tape. It is self-adhesive and comes in rolls like regular sticky tape. They are often partially transparent in places which allows the colour of the material underneath to show through. These beautiful tapes can be used for many different purposes from craft projects, scrapbooking, and decor items to creative packaging. ~via washitape.co.za
Now that you know what Washi Tape is, the next question is what can you do with it? Well as you may know I love Consol Glass Jars and when hosting a party recently I decided to create my own outdoor lighting! I used a few Consol Mason Jars I sourced locally and my Washi Tape collection.
All you will need, to re-create this type of lighting, are empty Mason Jars and a few rolls of Washi Tape and a bit of creative flare – it could not be more simple! It is as easy as selecting Washi Tape and candles that will suit your decor or theme and set to work.
My colour scheme was red, blue and white to match my newly renovated kitchen – I used a pretty red and turquoise tape, from Typo, to adorn my jars and used candles to compliment the tape, in berry red and white/cream .
This is a great, low-cost but effective way to create usual and fun lighting, which you can use indoors or out. The other great aspect is that you can very easily remove the Washi Tape from the jars to create a new effect or use the jars for another purpose. It also gets the creative juices flowing!
For other fun and interesting ways to use this tape see my Washi Tape Board on Pinterest and creative ways to use glass jars see my “Its Good in Glass” Board. If you have any fun ideas for lighting please share the below or on our Facebook Page.
There are quite a few suppliers of Washi Tape but I thought I would share a few of the ones I know of with you:
Online Stockists:
Japanese Washi
PaperPeony
Rumours of Ribbons
Washi Tape
Cape Town Stores:
Smitten Home and Life ~ 53 Constantia Rd., Cape Town, Tel: 021 762 9687
Typo Cavendish Square ~ Store Number: F67, Tel: 0216710957
by Fiona Rossiter on February 20, 2013
A few weeks back I asked readers, via Facebook and Twitter, which room in their home they would like to renovate first. The general consensus was that the first room to receive a little makeover magic would be their kitchens! I agree 100 percent, for me the kitchen is the centre of the home – essentially “the heart of the home” and a place, where you will spend a great deal of your time, especially as a mom! A kitchen needs to be both aesthetically pleasing and functional.
My kitchen is like my “art studio”, it is where I create my master pieces! 
It must be a space that it pleasing to my soul because lets face it sometimes even I, do not feel all that inspired to “paint”.
We recently had the opportunity to do a mini makeover on half of our kitchen. It sounds strange to only do half but I have had my eye on a gorgeous Smeg gas/electric range, which I was treated to as an early Christmas pressie! A new stove or cooker is definitely at the top of my list of priorities when comes to renovating my kitchen. Our original oven was much smaller and in order to fit the new one in we had to create more space, which required having to move kitchen cabinets. Instead of refurbing the original cabinets we had, we decided to have new free-standing units made.
I decided to use this makeover opportunity to inject a bit of colour into my kitchen, which had an otherwise neutral colour scheme. Colour is very important to me in interior decorating but I am quite conservative in the base colour that goes into a room. I do however like to be bold with my colour choice of accessories and soft furnishings and introduce colour into a room in that way.
It is important to gather inspiration before you begin any renovation project, draw up a mood board and have a fairly clear idea of what you would like the space to look like. I used Pinterest, a virtual pinboard to gather images, which you can see above, to find colour schemes I liked and inspire my creative process. You can also use everyday items such as pots, coffee cups even tea towels, such as the these items below from my own kitchen, to help you formulate design ideas.
It is impossible to be 100% certain of the outcome and you will probably change your mind on certain things along the way but you at least need a starting point.
We decided to not only include colour in our kitchen accessories and appliances but also in the cabinetry. A brave decision but I love it! The only problem now is that the renovation bug has bitten – what will be next I wonder?
by Fiona Rossiter on February 13, 2013
I love the amazing local products that I am encountering across this beautiful land of ours! A very recent find were these beautiful candles by “With Love Products”
With Love Products are hand crafted with organic and natural materials carefully chosen to uplift and enhance your environment. As you can see in the photo’s I took, the packaging is gorgeous, capturing the essence of LOVE!
Products are shipped locally and internationally and they offer a secure online ordering system, but the best part is that a portion of each product sold goes to assist a child in need. So you can shop with joy knowing that your purchase improves the lives of many special children.
With Love Candles are made with raw Beeswax, which is sourced direct from Beekeepers. The Beeswax is heated to filter out natural organic material like vegetation etc. but it is not bleached or diluted with normal wax. Beeswax releases natural Negative Ions into the air, which remove unnatural chemicals and harmful elements. Beeswax has a rich fragrance and the Essential Oils are used subtly enhance this fragrance. One of the main features, is that our Beeswax Candles burn for much longer than normal Candles.
With Love Products have very kindly offered all Super Mom readers 10% off their first purchase in February 2013. All you need to do is add the Voucher “With Love 10″ on checkout, when you make a purchase. If you would like to view their whole range of products and place an order pop over to their website here.
I am Fiona, a Capetonian with a passion for all things beautiful and creative. Inspired Living, is a melting pot of things that inspire me from beauty to fashion & photography. I love to cook & family is super important to me! I hope you stay a while & please do come back! Thank you for visiting my blog! Please follow me on Facebook & Twitter to keep up to date with future posts... 
