Our house is pretty standard ’50s ranch house, but a few decades ago the owners built an addition onto the master bedroom. And now it is ginormous. It was one of the things I loved about the house the first time I walked through it. I was envisioning a sitting area or a little office space and a luxurious bed stacked high with pillows and, you know, luxury.
The reality has been somewhat different.
The only thing sitting in the “sitting area” most of the time is laundry. Although sometimes the cats sit in there, too, when the sun is at the right angle. The luxurious bed is luxurious compared to, say, a cot, but the mattress has been getting increasingly sad and saggy and I usually can’t find any king-size pillowcases to go on the king-size pillows so — shocking confessions ahead! — they either go without or wear a standard-size case.
Things are turning around, though. Last week we replaced our 10-year-old Sam’s Club mattress, and I’m working on turning the bed into more Westin than Super 8. It’s been a slow process, because have you seen how much pillow shams cost? Roughly a billion dollars a piece. So I’ve been waiting for things to go on sale. Things like the Vintage Floral Quilt I paid $30 for at Land’s End (clearance + friends & family sale + Shop Your Way points FTW!) or the Restoration Hardware pillow shams that were on clearance for $5 a piece.
Now that the foundation of fanciness is coming together, I’m on the lookout for decorative pillows to put in front of the utilitarian pillows. Here are a few I like. (But probably won’t buy, because $95 for a pillow is crazypants.)
I still want to put together a sitting area of some sort, but my budget is still standing in the way of my dreams. Chairs are expensive, you guys. Everything is expensive.
Anyway, do you like any of those pillows? Do you have a secret cheap-beautiful-pillow store you could share with me? Are you Emily Henderson taking pity on me and wanting to come over and design my room?
(Call me, Emily. You can use all the creepy porcelain phrenology heads and hot pink you’d like.)
Do you have Tuesday Morning where you live?
Yes! I went there last weekend, but there weren’t any great sham deals. (What a dopey sentence to write.)
Ooh I LOVE the Blue Sky pillow, but that’s because that’s Our Song. How about making the pillows, or swapping services of some sort with someone who could make them for you? Vintage hand towels from a flea market can make really cute pillows, or some print fabric. You could easily have unique pillows for less than $20.
I may end up going that route, although if I try to sew them myself they’ll end up looking like well-loved dishrags.