Notes from the Nelsens: Guest Blogger Series- Looking for a Decorator? Look no further!

This week, Julie from The Smitten Mintons is sharing photos from some of her most recent decorating projects. As Julie mentions in her most, she was the brains behind our master bedroom makeover. She is so super talented and just the sweetest person you'll meet. If you're in the Atlanta area and looking for a decorator, she is your girl!

Hi y'all! I'm Julie, and I blog over at The Smitten Mintons. I also own a decorating business, Simply Beautiful! You may remember that I recently helped Heather and Matt decorate their bedroom! My husband and I spent the last three years living in Orange County, California and that's where I started my business. But this summer, we made the big move back home and just closed on our first house!

I have so many projects in mind for our new house, and at the same time, I'm also launching my business here in Atlanta! My future is filled with painting, organizing, and decorating, and I couldn't be more excited about that! One project I started on before we closed on our house was this hall tree. I've always dreamt of having a mudroom, and in every house that we went in, I would immediately look for a spot to create one. So when we walked into our (now) home, I was pretty pumped that there was the perfect place right by the door.

I immediately started my search for the perfect hall tree, but I quickly found that unless you got a custom-built hall tree, they were all pretty much 40" wide. The wall for our hall tree is 10 feet long so a 40" hall tree would just look silly and tiny on it! The only wider ones I could find were custom made, either on Etsy or locally, and those were running for about $1,500 - No thank you!

Enter Craigslist. By some kind of miracle, I somehow scored a custom built, solid wood hall tree, measuring 55" wide (perfect!) for $300. I was ecstatic, considering most 40" hall trees cost more than $300! It definitely needed some fresh paint and new hinges and hooks, and I was happy to give it the facelift it needed. One coat of Zinsser Smart Prime and two coats of Cabinet Coat later, as well as replacing the brass hardware with brushed nickel, and it's looking as good as new! (I would highly recommend both of those paints- Cabinet Coat is incredible at self-leveling to hide brush strokes.)

Before

And after!

Then came the fun part- styling!

If you are in the Atlanta area and are interested in my services, you can visit my website to see my project gallery, read reviews, and contact me via email! Here are a few pictures from some of my recent clients' homes.