Driven By Décor: Favorite Posts of 2012

Hi everyone - how were your holidays? The end of 2012 has been good to us - we've spent the last week eating way too many sweets, sleeping in late, doing dance battles with Just Dance 4 (in which I get my butt kicked by my oldest daughter no matter how many times we play), playing Five Crowns & Sorry, and getting some much needed R & R. Of course, we also had our Christmas gift exchange - this year we tried something different and limited the amount spent on each adult to under $5 per gift. It was fun to see what everyone came up with - some gifts were handmade like the shell box that my daughter made for my sister, some were practical like my new cheese grater, and the best ones were joke gifts linked back to funny past family events like the Burger King hat and rutabaga that my dad received or the plunger and toilet paper that were gifted to my brother-in-law (as you can imagine, there are some great stories behind these...). I hope that your holidays have been filled with the same laughter and time with family as ours.

As we get close to ringing in the new year, I thought it'd be fun to do an end of the year post with my most popular posts of 2012 (you can view each post by clicking on the highlighted links). By far and away the most popular post was on 20 Rule of Thumb Measurements for Decorating Your Home. If you've ever wondered how high you should hang a picture on the wall or what size light fixture is appropriate for your space or if you've needed help with hanging drapery panels, this post is for you.

There's also a recent follow-up post with 10 More Rule of Thumb Measurements for Decorating Your Home that is helpful for selecting and hanging ceiling fans and choosing appropriately sized dining room chairs and tables.

Those of you who like to garden enjoyed the post on Galvanized Metal Tubs, Buckets, & Pails as Planters. Not only do galvanized containers have a great look, but they are rust resistant and very reasonably priced, making them a fantastic choice for planters.

Our fireplace/bookcase remodel was my biggest project of 2012 and a popular post. We started out with major ugly:

and after painting the bookcases, adding a new gas fireplace and installing stone veneer over the brick, lining the backs of the bookcases with burlap,

and recently restyling the shelves, it's made a world of difference in the appearance of our family room:

Another favorite project from 2012 was creating three Restoration Hardware-like rustic bulletin boards to go on an awkward wall in our kitchen. Creating these bulletin boards has gone a long way in helping me to stay organized and keeping track of coupons and other little things that tend to get lost in the paperwork on my desk. For 2013, I'm thinking about changing up the fabric covering the bulletin boards to create more contrast with my kitchen wall color.

Since we went out of town for Christmas this year, I didn't put up a ton of decorations but I do like to decorate our combination dining/living room since it houses our Christmas tree and is one of the two rooms that are most visible when you enter our home. In addition to decorating the table, I created star anise wreaths to tie to the back of each dining chair and LOVE how their fragrance has filled the downstairs of our home!

Another popular post was one with four great baby shower games & activities, including creating a pack of late night diapers for the new mom:

With Facebook changing the size for cover photos to a long, horizontal image, making a collage photo with several pictures is a great way to go. After creating one for Driven by Décor's FB page using Picmonkey, I posted a tutorial on how to create a photo collage for the cover photo of your own Facebook page. Picmonkey recently started charging a fee for certain photo editing services, but you can still create a Facebook collage for free on their site.

Finally, readers liked the idea of using nautical rope and vintage ladders in decorating. My posts on creative ways to use nautical rope in your home's décor,