You’re stressing the fact that the pastor’s wife just saw your home. It’s aging and your decor is outdated and dull. You’re embarrassed to the core and pondering on what you can do about it. The trouble is that remodeling just isn’t in your budget right now. Don’t fret! There are many things you can do to give your home a voice, a unique voice that people will think about for all the right reasons long after they’re gone. In this piece, we offer you 25 inexpensive ways to add loving touches to your home — ideas, tips, and tricks to make your home sing, because simple things make all the difference.
Related: Floating Frames | How to Decorate Laundry Room | Inexpensive Ways to Put Heart and Soul Into Your Home | Simple Ways to Infuse Cozy Touches to Your Home | Tricks to Make Your Basement Luxurious
Display Personalized Art
One fun new trend is to buy a blank canvas and create your own art. You begin with a quality blank canvas. If you need to practice first, get a cheap canvas, and then, a prime quality canvas for the one you’ll hang, making sure it is acrylic-primed, or ready to be painted on. If you’ve already purchased one that isn’t, don’t worry.
Brush on this brand of gesso to prime your canvas for either water-based or oil-based acrylic paint. It will make it less absorbent and smoother, but it will still grab the paint as it is brushed over. This primer helps your canvas stay intact, and it makes your colors pop. Now you can paint on your canvas, or you can simply write, which is what many people do now, just a short quote or line after line to fill the entire canvas. You can also use paint pens, such as these various pens, including metallic colors.
Total — $43
Create Your Own Curtain Tiebacks
People notice your curtain tiebacks. There are many kinds that you can purchase, but you can make your own to perfectly match your decor. From making your own old-fashioned homemade tassel tiebacks (metallic pearl embroidery floss makes for a gorgeous look) to matching shears tied into floral designs, there are endless things you could do to create tiebacks they’ll talk about. Hobby Lobby and Michaels are full of items and ideas to wrap around your curtains and create your own look.
Total — $16 – $43
Display a Folding Screen
Folding screens can be gorgeous. Sometimes you can find one of those beautiful old folding screens at an antique shop or thrift store. New ones are also pretty. They can also create a private space or be used to make a room appear larger than it is.
Total — $140 – $152
Create an Interesting Bookcase
Source: Etsy
To create a bookcase similar to the one in the photo, get however many of these single cube bookcases you’ll need to hold all of your books and that many of these hangers. To help, the actual space inside each cube is roughly 11 inches (27.94 centimeters) high and deep, and 11.5 inches (29.21 centimeters) wide. Assemble the cubes. Next, attach the hangers to the top edge of the back, using either the shorter or longer side purposefully. Now, getting inspiration from the photo or drawing a sketch and then deciding what looks good to you, attach the wall mounts. All that’s left is to hang your cubes on the mounts and enjoy.
Total — $126
Transform Cabinets into Open Shelves
Take cabinet doors off by removing the screws. Wipe down cabinets with a solution, a 1:1 ratio of white vinegar and water with a drop or two of Simply Dawn dish soap to remove any grease and other particles. Dry well. Use wood filler to fill screw holes, wiping away and smoothing while still moist. Allow the filler to completely dry. Using an oil-based semi-gloss paint, paint the insides and outsides of your cabinets, not necessarily the same color. Use a color that contrasts with your wall color. It’s hard to mix an exact match to your old color, so pick a new color. Use the Paint Your Place app to upload a picture and visualize what your place would look like in a certain color. Consider whether you need to also paint your trim.
Total — $42
Use Self-designed Tiles
Source: Etsy
Re-tile a few pieces of your bathroom wall in style. Lay photos, magazine clippings, whatever, onto the tiles, then give them a coat of Modge Podge. Let it dry, then sand the top a little. Top by painting on a coat of polyurethane for gloss. Using multi-purpose ceramic tile adhesive, set new tiles. To remove adhesive if you get it on the front of the tile, don’t let it dry. Remove excess and residue with cotton cloths that are damp with warm water.
Total — $32
Contrast Dark and Light Colors
Use contrast to grab guests’ attention. Use a light-colored wall paint against dark pieces or a dark-colored wall paint against lighter pieces. You’ll need one gallon of paint for a small room and two gallons for an average-sized room. Use metallic finishing touches for a gorgeous room.
Total — $44
Add a Stainless Steel Backsplash
Source: Etsy
Stainless steel backsplashes not only add to the appeal of a room but also to the functionality, because cleanup is easy.
Total — $190
Create Unique Switchplates
Source: build.com
There are wallplates of all kinds. With unfinished wood plates, you and your kids can design them yourselves, or you may prefer a ready-to-paint design. Just buy paint markers.
Total — $29 – $44
Paint a Secondhand Desk and Chair
You can also get a wooden desk set or a separate desk and chair from Facebook Marketplace or an antique shop. Make them your own. Paint them any color you desire. You can also paint and stencil designs on them. Are there slats in the chair back? You can use it to store a throw, in case you get chilly while you work.
Total — $98
Conceive a Room Theme
From roosters in the kitchen to lighthouses in the family room, there are many themes to choose from, things to collect, a Paris theme, for instance. Themes can make a room unforgettable. Use clearance sales, Facebook Marketplace, and thrift stores to find bargains.
Total — $38
Refinish an Antique Table
You can find an antique table on Facebook Marketplace or at your local Goodwill. You’ll need 2 kinds of sandpaper: medium grit #120, for getting off the old varnish, and fine grit #220, for finishing. Use a tack cloth to remove all the dust. Next, it’s time to stain the wood. You can tell what color stain to buy by the color of the old stain. Make sure to use an oil-based stain. Oil-based stain thins and cleans up easily with a few mineral spirits. It penetrates deeper and more easily, and it delivers vivid, rich colors. If you want a glossy finish, let the stain dry out for about 4 days, then apply a water-based polyurethane coat.
Total — $78
Put Up a Pot and Pan Organizer Pegboard
Source: Wayfair
Pot and pan organizer pegboards will make lots of extra space in your cabinets, plus they come in various bright colors to match. Give your kitchen some kick.
Total — $87
Order Under-Cabinet Touch Lights
Brighten up your kitchen countertops or your bedroom and linen closets with wireless, battery-operated, under-cabinet touch lights. They are simple to put up, easy to use and add ambiance to your home. You can put them anywhere, like beside your bed, so a simple touch provides instant light when you need it.
Total — $25
Utilize Floating Shelves
Floating shelves come in an array of sizes, colors, and materials from unfinished wood that you can paint and decorate to metals of various kinds, and prices vary. They can serve as anything from a trinket holder to a bookshelf. You can match your furniture or your room’s trim or contrast against it.
Total — $5
Paint Flower Pots and Utilize Hanging Baskets
Plants give off oxygen into your home, plus they are a beautiful addition to a room. Add a hanging basket or two to your home, and paint your flower pots with flowers or abstract, colorful designs for a natural, earthy feel. You can even use stencils.
Total — $37 – $55
Change the Lighting Fixture Globes
You can use ambiance to completely change the atmosphere of your home. Whether it’s bath lighting, lamps, or chandeliers, change out your lighting fixtures to use unique and purposeful lighting to your advantage. Make your home a warm and inviting place that your guests will look forward to visiting.
Total — $24 – $141
Design Your Own Lampshade
Source: Etsy
Designing your own lampshade is fun and easy, and you can easily match your decor. The drum is the easiest type of lampshade to do, but others are doable. First, you’ll need a drum lampshade and some contact paper in a color that will make your room pop. Slowly unroll and attach the contact paper, circling the shade horizontally until it meets. Trim it so that it overlaps a little, but put them side that you cut off underneath the perfectly straight side, in case your cut is not perfect. Put some edging material around the edge of the bottom and the top with a lampshade glue kit.
Total — $37
Hang Coat Hooks and Key Hooks
Source: Etsy
You can buy all kinds of cool hook boards and hooks to hang coats, jewelry, keys — whatever. Organize, clean up, and add some pizzazz to your home with hooks.
Total — $10 – $90
Use Pops and Accents of Color
Use little shoots of the same color your walls are painted to let your decor be heard against contrasted (dark against light or light against dark) furniture. For example, if your walls are teal, paint only part of an end table or a desk in your room the same color as the wall paint to really make the color stand out. Use a couple of colorful throw pillows with only a little pop of that same color. Tiny hints of color can speak loudly. Then, use a couple of plain throw pillows highlighting a bright color in the print pillows.
Total — $123
Utilize String Lights
Warm-colored string lights bring romance to any room. There are gold hue, silvery-white, and iridescent hues…lovely!
Total — $11
Reupholster an Old Wooden Stool
Get an old antique wooden stool at a thrift store or antique shop. Use an old torn leather coat that you aren’t going to wear again or buy some faux leather material. Cut it in a circle large enough to cover the stool and fold under on all sides up to the leg bars. Use a heavy-duty staple gun to staple the material onto the underneath of the stool in the following manner.
Attach the first staple by pulling the material just up to the leg underneath and stapling. Next, pull the material until it’s snug 180 degrees directly across and attach the second staple. Then, smoothly and snugly, staple the cloth at a 90-degree angle from that one (halfway in between), and the other 180 degrees across from it. Continue this process until all of your material is smooth and taut.
Total — $54
Replace Knobs and Handles
Knobs and handles come in all shapes, sizes, and designs. Replace yours for an inexpensive kitchen or furniture facelift.
Total — $34
Make Inexpensive but Unique Frames
Source: Etsy
You can take wooden frames and make them unique by priming and painting them. You can embellish them with a hot glue gun and any of hundreds of items you can find at Hobby Lobby or Michaels. You can make your own frames with unfinished pieces of wood, primer, and paint from these places and a hot glue gun. Use 2 coats of spray primer, then, the spray paint. You can also embellish these to your liking.
Total — $14
Display New Curtain Rods and Hold Backs
New curtain rods and matching holdbacks can really catch guests’ attention and add a quaint touch to your home, and there are so many options nowadays. Do your room justice with this eye-catching transformation.
Total — $43 – 88
