This week for our Summer Spotlight is the ever so talented Liz from Love Grows Wild. I have known about her blog for awhile now and I’m always amazed at her projects. From decorating a room to giving a chair a makeover. Her pictures are always beautiful and her posts are so easy to read.
I’m so glad I got to know a little more about her and some behind the scenes stuff too! Hope you enjoy!!
The Summer Spotlight is a collaborative effort to showcase great ideas from a different talented blogger each Friday throughout the summer months. Follow my co-hosts and I online to see the great ideas we share year-round:
Amanda of Dwelling in Happiness
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Carrie of Kenarry: Ideas for the Home
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Courtney of Crafts By Courtney
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Ashley of 3 Little Greenwoods
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Kristi of Making It In the Mountains
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Katie of View from the Fridge
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This week Kristi from Making it in the Mountains will be introducing you to Liz, from Love Grows Wild, so grab yourself a cup of coffee and enjoy as she shows you why you need to know this fab blog!
From the first moment I laid eyes on this gorgeous mint desk, I’ve been head over heels in love with Love Grows Wild!
And then, when I began looking around her incredible Project Gallery, I couldn’t help but pin literally every. single. thing!
Like this gorgeous Painted Chair.
This rustic Farmhouse Table and matching Benches.
And I’ll definitely be trying this Board & Batten Tutorial.
I instantly fell in love with her beautiful farmhouse living room, her lovely dining area (complete with DIY farmhouse table), her sweet front porch and her dreamy home office (which I’d been waiting ages to see)!
I just adore her simple, farmhouse style full of neutral colours and all sorts of rustic charm! Tell me this beautiful Antique Ladder Shelf doesn’t have you swooning!
As if all of these gorgeous photos weren’t enough to make me fall in love, reading the story of how she came to live in her lovely farmhouse with her beautiful family melted my heart. I honestly felt as if we were visiting over a cup of coffee (not weird, right?)!
Now, I’m absolutely dying to share a bit more about her story with a few Q & A’s with the super sweet gal behind the blog, Liz:
One. I’ve always dreamed of living out in the country – the views, the solitude – there’s just something so enticing about the quiet simplicity of it all. What are some of your favorite things about the farm girl life?
I moved out to the country when I met my husband, and at first it really freaked me out. No gas station within 15 minutes, no grocery store within 45 minutes, and decent restaurants and shopping were almost an hour drive away. Yikes! But slowly I started to see all the wonderful parts of country life… the open space, the quiet. We are crop farmers, which is a very hard, but very rewarding career. When it’s planting or harvest season, my job (other than running a blog!) is to run meals out to the tractor and make sure they have everything they need. Our two boys love being involved with the farm too, riding with their dad on the tractor and checking the crops as they grow. To me, that is the best part about living on a farm… it’s all about family, working together, teaching hard work and respect to our boys, and being there for each other. I couldn’t think of a better way to raise a family!
Two. You’ve been so hard at work on your living room and dining area (LOVED the video tour!), can you give us a hint about what else you might have planned for these spaces?
Of course! Our living room/dining room makeover was a really special project for me because it was the first time I designed a space EXACTLY the way I dreamed it could be. In the past, I would put “band-aids” (as I like to call them) on the problems in our house, like buying new pillows for the couch when it was really the wall color that I hated. We gave this space a complete makeover with a new furniture arrangement, board and batten walls, our signature farmhouse style, and whole bunch of rustic furniture that we built by hand! A large coffee table, a farmhouse-style dining table, benches for the table… we built them all together as a family. We still have a few final touches to add in this space such as curtains for the large window in our dining room (and maybe even a DIY wood cornice box!) and a small bench under the window.
Three. You’ve worked on your office, living room and dining room – what room would you most like to transform next?
Our master bedroom! Our poor bedroom has been neglected ever since we moved into this house 3 years ago, and it’s time to whip it into shape. Here’s a confession for you… we never could decide on what bed to buy (or how to get it up our steep, narrow staircase), so we’ve been sleeping on a mattress on the floor for the last 3 years! How did I let it go this long?? I want our bedroom to be a cozy, inviting retreat with vintage touches and a bit of romance. I see white planked walls, an antique-style bed, and lots of reclaimed wood!
Four. I find myself pinning each and every project you share! What are some of your very favorites?
My style has changed a lot over the last couple years, and when I was going through a more modern, colorful phase, I refinished a mid-century mod desk that was handed down from my grandmother in a gorgeous mint color with bright gold hardware. It’s still a huge reader favorite! But I always go back to my rustic farmhouse roots, and these are a few of my very favorite projects from over the years: DIY Farmhouse Table, DIY Photo Clipboards, Rustic Industrial Chalkboard, Feed Sack Pillow Cover, Front Porch Makeover.
Five. How do you manage to balance being a wife, mommy to two beautiful boys and blogger?
It’s not easy! I tend to get really focused on one thing and have a hard time keeping everything else in balance. I’ll knock a ton of projects out for the blog, but then I look around the house and realize we have nothing to eat in the fridge, dirty dishes stacked up the ceiling, and piles of laundry for days. I’m totally guilty of this! The easiest way I find to keep balance in my life is to make a schedule and STICK to it. It’s hard when you work from home, but when the boys are in school, my work day starts when they get on the school bus and ends when they get home. We usually have homework and sports practices to run to all evening, plus dinner and chores around the house to do. By having set work hours, I’m able to turn off the computer and walk away when my family needs me, and I actually find that I get a lot more accomplished during my “work day”!
Now, tell me you aren’t dying to see more! You can follow along with Liz as she continues to transform that gorgeous farmhouse!
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If you enjoyed this feature, you may want to check out the other bloggers we’ve featured in the Summer Spotlight. You can also visit our Summer Spotlight Pinterest board to view all the great ideas we’ve shared in this series.
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Love, Courtney
