Our Hopeful Home: How to Stage Your Home for Sale: Free Botanical Prints Download

Well, I guess it's finally time for me to 'fess up.

Over the next few months there will be some big changes coming my way,

namely, a M-O-V-E.

moving house Sometimes you need more than Monopoly to keep the family unit functioning.

Source

As in "we're moving."

As in "we're putting our house up for sale."

As in "Help!"

I haven't mentioned it here although I've known it for quite some time. Mainly because it's been a bit heartbreaking. It wasn't a planned move. It was a life-just-kind-of-happened-and-now-we-have-to-move move. Life is funny that way. One day it decides to throw you a curve ball and you find yourself in the position of having to keep the household running while your husband is working two and a half hours away in another state. You find yourself having to vet realtors (both here and in the new state) to find the best ones for your family's needs. You find yourself having to get the house ready for sale while continuing to homeschool your youngest child. And the list goes on.

But you know what?

At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what state we're in.
It doesn't even matter what house we're in.
All that matters is that we're together.

That's exactly what we told the kids as soon as we knew that moving was our new reality. It's been a while coming, as my husband has been living near his new job and coming home on the weekends for over a year now. But it's time to get this party started and get us all together under one roof again. And I hope you'll come along with us for the ride.

I must say that as a DIY home décor blogger I've been feeling a bit out of sorts throughout this whole process. The goal is to de-junk the house so that it is clean and uncluttered. But what if you're a thrift store junkie who loves picking up old things by the side of the road like me?

The "stager" {read: person who comes in and critiques your decorating style} has been here and has shared his expertise about how we should decorate the house if we want it to sell. I have to be honest and say that I was pretty pleased with myself when he basically said that I had already done an excellent job and that he had only minor suggestions. But then I got to thinking, wondering if he tells that to all his clients so that they won't be really mad at him when he ultimately suggests totally rearranging the living room {or family room, or den, etc.) somewhere down the line.

But either way, this will be our third big move as a married couple with children. And I can tell you that the decorating advice has not changed one bit from what they told us before our first move in 2000:

Less is more.

So.

We have not one, but two storage spaces.

In addition, our very spacious basement storage room is busting at the seams.

All this, even after I have culled, and sold, and thrown out and donated.

It's enough to drive you crazy. But life goes on.

Moving forward I'll be sharing little tidbits here and there about this whole moving process, but today I wanted to share some really beautiful, FREE botanical print downloads. I stumbled across them while frantically searching for free artwork to put in our upstairs hallway. Yes, I did this the day before the professional photographer was scheduled to arrive and take the listing photos of the house.

The frames used to be filled with our three children's school photos and original artwork. Why change them out? Because I was told to take down anything "with eyes." Translation: take down all your family photos. That, to me, is just plain sad. In a way I get it (let the new people picture themselves in the house, not you and your umpteen children). But on another level I think you should be able to leave your family photos on display. The same family photos that tell the story of a happy family, a happy life that's been cultivated in this very house.

Despite my personal preference, the stager won out, at least with regard to these particular family photos. And you know what? I'm actually loving the new look!

Aren't they fabulous? I admit I clearly need to restyle that old bookcase. It's had children's books in it since, well, since we've had kids! (Fourteen years.) But otherwise I'm thrilled with the outcome.

The frames were an inexpensive find many years ago, I think at Michael's. You can "pop" the acrylic out very easily and insert whatever you want inside it. They've done a great job holding Disney portraits (think: Nemo, Princesses, etc.) as well as the kids' school pictures and artwork over the years. But for now, I think these botanical prints look marvelous.

It's amazing what free artwork is out there for the taking. I found these beauties by googling "free botanical print download." The search results led me to The Crafty Nest Blog. Hop on over there to get the skinny on how to download this beautiful, four volume German book entitled Kohler's Medizinal-Pflanzen, published in 1887. According to The Crafty Nest, Botanicus.org scanned the nearly 300 drawings and made them available to download for free! Yay!

Note: I was unable to download individual pages, so I just downloaded the whole book and then went through it page by page, printing whatever caught my fancy. It was fun scrolling through and seeing all the incredible vintage drawings. I hope you have fun with it!

Once I've restyled the bookcase completely I will be sure to post an update.

Since moving will be the main focus of my life over the next couple of months, my blog posts will be a reflection of that. I'm so happy to be able to share the experience with you. I mean, it's always nicer when a friend comes along for the ride, wouldn't you agree?

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