My Favorite Room....Ms. Toody Goo Shoes

 Hello Savvy readers! I'm Amy, also known as Ms. Toody Goo Shoes.  I've been doing cartwheels ever since Kim asked me to feature my favorite room on her blog!

Savvy Southern Style is one of the very first blogs I started to follow, and I've been smitten with Kim's impeccable design sense ever since. 

It didn't take me long to decide which room to feature today. Without question, it had to be the Family Room! It's our TV-watching, family-meeting, game-playing, football-cheering, company's-coming, ring-in-the-new year, put-your-feet-up-and-relax room. 

 

Now, to be honest, in these photos, the room doesn't look as, ahem, "lived in" as it usually does. In fact, when my son came home from school the day I was taking the pictures, he said, "Where did everything go? Are we MOVING?"  I told him not to worry -- I'd mess it up again as soon as I was done taking pictures. True story.   

Not only is this room well-loved because it's where "Family Happens," it's also one of the more recent rooms in my house to be re-decorated, so it best reflects my current sense of style...

...which, by the way, seems to change every 10 minutes...or, pretty much every time I look at someone else's favorite room. Although many types of decor appeal to me, my home is furnished in the traditional style. My goal for this room was to give it a modern traditional feel.

When we found this house 11 years ago, I was immediately attracted to the open floor plan, which is perfect for entertaining. The Kitchen is adjacent to the Family Room so the two rooms really feel like a Great Room. Oh yes, it's "great" alright, except when I am doing the dishes while Mr. Goo Shoes is trying to watch TV. I am signing up for silent dish-washing classes very soon ;)

The Family Room got a makeover about four years ago. Here's the way it looked before we updated it. 

The Family Room - Before

This is how it looks now...

The furniture layout was a little tricky to determine. It is a very long room, so we decided to treat it almost as if it were two separate spaces -- the TV area...

 ...and the game table/bar area. 

There is only one full wall in this room, which made it a no-brainer as for where to put the TV. There weren't a lot of options for seating, so we decided on two love seats facing each other. 

That left us ample room for a passageway, and bar stools at the kitchen's pass-through area.

Other than painting and refinishing the floors, we haven't done any major renovations to this room. The columns were here from the original owners, and I think that their presence makes the whole area look a lot more grand. 

We replaced every piece of furniture in this room, except for the coffee table, thinking it was temporary until we found something else, but I actually like how the glass table helps to keep the space feeling a little lighter. The beige metal base is a good compliment to the wood, and although the glass top is pretty scratched up, I have no plans to replace it. The top is always covered with my photo-books, which I make for any and every occasion.

The simple couches are taken up a notch with the addition of the nail heads, and are covered in a durable chenille. Yes, we have even spilled orange children's Motrin on one of them, and it came right out. 

On the other side of the room, we have our game table, which is often the scene of some very heated Monopoly games, most of which, sadly, I lose.

Put a table cloth on it, and the game table becomes extra seating when entertaining.

Between the media unit, sofa table and game table, there was already a fair amount of brown wood furniture in the room, so we brought in some black painted pieces to balance it out.  I chose a distressed black finish for the game table chairs. My absolute favorite thing is the animal print on the seat covers.

The bar was purchased from Pottery Barn, and ties together nicely with the black chair frames.

I love mixing inexpensive items with treasures. The silver tray and mercury glass decanters are from Home Goods; the burgundy glass decanter and glasses were a gift to my parents for their wedding; the brass goblet was used at our wedding when we shared a traditional sip of wine; the silver goblet was a given to me when I was a teenager.

The tall vase is from Home Goods, and is changed out seasonally. Right now, it is holding my winter stems and berries. 

I am still working on adding more accessories to this room. Maybe Kim would like to come over and help me? 

The menorah is a truly special memento from our trip to Israel last year.

The little clock and animal print urn are local finds; the tray they are sitting on is from our trip to Amsterdam.

The silver lighter was another gift given to my parents for their wedding.

Well, I had a great time showing you around my Family Room. Now I need to go and mess things up again, so my son can stop worrying that we're moving.

Thank you so much for inviting me, Kim!

Thanks Amy for letting us tour your favorite room. We have a faux animal throw almost just like the one you show above. My hubby wraps up in that thing every night.

Alright y'all I sure hope you will take the time to go over to Amy's and tour some more of her home and say hello.

Miss any past favorite room posts? You can see them all right here.

Y'all have a super weekend!