Is your home decor giving you a backache

Those with aching backs might want to look at their home decor to help ease the pain. When decorating, most homeowners consider their personal style, color schemes and price range, but many don’t take time to consider products that can actually benefit their health.“

More than 80 percent of adults will suffer from back pain at some point in their lives, and treating back pain is often very time consuming and costly,” says Dr. Dave David.

A board-certified physician. “I encourage my patients to explore treatment options they can incorporate into their homes.” Some easy decor solutions that can help alleviate back pain include:

* Use reclining furniture. Seven in 10 doctors are likely to recommend sitting in a reclined position to help alleviate back pain, according to a survey of primary care physicians conducted by the L.C. Williams and Associates Research Group for La-Z-Boy. And, the American Chiropractic Association endorses La-Z-Boy reclining furniture for its back and lumbar support. Reclining offers total support, taking the strain away from the back in a way that sitting up straight or lying flat cannot.

* Get a good bed. The support provided by the bed and mattress at night are key to alleviating back pain. Ensure you have a good, firm mattress for proper support. If a new mattress is out of the question, use a memory foam topper. And for severe back pain, adjustable beds can make getting in and out of bed easier and less painful.

* Choose tables of traditional height. Stay away from the trendy bar-height tables that don’t allow you to anchor your feet. These can put added strain on your back while sitting and require extra effort to get in and out of the seated position.

* Find a deep tub. Soaking in a deep, warm tub is a great way to get a dose of the moist heat that is so often recommended for back pain. Whirlpool jets can also provide soothing relief for aching back muscles – just keep the setting low for gentle massaging action.

* Select carpet or decorative padded rugs. Hard floors can be beautiful, but many lack shock absorption beneath the feet. Selecting carpets or rugs can provide another measure of comfort for back pain. If hard floors are a necessity, consider a substance like cork, which is firm but flexible.

* Organize for little reaching. Store heavy items and those you use most often at arm-level to avoid the strain that comes from lifting or bending.

“There are many little things that sufferers of chronic back pain can do for relief at home, from sitting in a recliner to getting a firm mattress and taking a nightly soak in a deep tub,” says Dr. David.

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Interior Decorating on a Budget

Because we spend a lot of money when buying our dream home, we definitely want it to look the best enjoying compliments whenever any one visits. Home decoration is amongst one of the most important decisions of any person’s life and we tend to think that we must furnish the place with the most expensive items to make the home look good.

This is not true, which is just as well as not all of us are lucky enough to be rolling in money and there are some very good bargains to be had. Home decorating ideas can make a home look grand as long as colors and accessories are chosen with care and proper implementation of the cheap decorating ideas is extremely essential in order to make your home look stunning. When you enter a room, you want to be struck by the mood of the space.

The best and cheapest home decorating idea is to paint your walls with attractive colors taking in mind what impact you want to make. Do you want a peaceful tranquil feel or a cozy elegance, perhaps a lively bright room would suit. Whatever the decision, by choosing the correct shades you can make your rooms look bigger and brighter. Dark colors should be avoided unless you have extremely large rooms, as depending on textures and tones added, neutral shades can create either a formal, or a very casual room.

Adding pale sage green walls can help relieve stress and create a soothing atmosphere.Hanging a few carefully chosen wall pictures can add to the touch, improving the overall look of the room. Alternatively a new frame around an existing picture can make a difference and save money. Old wooden furniture can be painted to give it a new look, maybe putting a bit of stenciling here and there in a tasteful way. Also, buying furniture that can be used for duel purposes like a sofa bed, which doubles as a sofa and bed can save on money and space, making your room feel and look larger. Apart from the decoration, the way furniture is arranged can also have an effect on the look.

Large furniture should be placed against the longest wall in order to give the room a balanced look.Simply by altering the color of your trimmings can make an impact as you first enter the room. If the trim is painted in a darker color, it will give the room a more traditional feel yet if you go for a more monochromatic look, it will open the space and show off the furnishings, same as if you paint your ceilings white or a light color this will make the room appear taller, whilst a monochromatic ceiling will keep the room feeling cozy and intimate. All said and done the overall finish depends on your self and what mood you want to create.

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Cover-up

Wallpaper has become the new paint, adding style and creativity to homes and businesses alike. Wallpaper has enjoyed a resurgence in the decorating stakes during the past few years, replacing paint as the major wall covering in many contemporary and renovated homes.

Whereas once a feature wall was painted to add impact, home owners are now creating the same effect with a papered wall. Businesses, too, are using paper on their walls, and to great effect with the seemingly endless selection of patterns, textures and colours available.

Wallpaper has improved vastly in quality since it was first used more as a background than a foreground by the Chinese and then the French in the 19th century.

London's Victoria and Albert Museum's short history of wallpaper records the disappearance of many early examples because of their fragility, with history based largely on archived pieces, museum collections, surviving wallpaper in historic buildings, and those papers represented in pictorial records of interiors.

Throughout history, opinion has been divided about wallpaper, with some considering it attractive, clean and durable, whereas others felt it was a cheap imitation of wall coverings such as tapestry, velvet, chintz, silk drapery, linen, wood, masonry or a mural.

By the early 19th century, wallpaper had become commonplace and was the standard decoration in working-class homes, making it less fashionable in wealthier households.

Even today, it has its ups and downs in the interior decorating world, although it is now regarded as a durable fashion, being appreciated as an expensive and luxurious decoration in addition to being a make-do substitute, according to the museum. With the exception of sturdy embossed wall coverings such as Anaglypta, wallpaper is generally an ephemeral material.

Whereas furniture and textiles often survive, and pass from one generation to the next, wallpaper is frequently damaged, covered or removed altogether. It has generally been the easiest and, relatively speaking, the cheapest aspect of interior decoration to replace, and thus it is the least likely to survive. This is unfortunate, because wallpaper is the most eloquent embodiment of changing fashions, vivid evidence of an individual's taste, and the fundamental framework of any new scheme of decoration, according to the museum.

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Decorating a Green House

With so much emphasis nowadays on global climate change, reducing consumption and recycling, interior design can seem a bit daunting when trying to limit carbon footprints yet still achieve an aesthetically pleasing space.

However, with many improvements in the manufacturing of eco-friendly textiles, green design has become the wave of the future. When selecting environmentally friendly products for the home, keep in mind the four R’s of the environmental cycle; Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Replenish.

Reduce. When various home textiles are produced, for example bedding, bathroom linens and rugs, many of the processes include dying and bleaching of fabrics which can result in large amounts of energy consumption in addition to.

The production of many toxic gases. By selecting linens that are naturally dyed and fibers that are organically grown, such as organic cotton, wool, and hemp, reliance on processes that are detrimental to the health of our climate would be reduced. Luxury home linens manufacturer, Abyss & Habidecor, has developed a line of naturally dyed and organically grow fibers that are not only eco-friendly, but very fashion forward.

Reuse. Remember the saying, “One man’s junk is another man’s treasure?” Well, this couldn’t be more accurate and more environmentally friendly. Selecting slightly used home furnishings from local antique fairs is a great resource for finding hidden treasures and one-of-a-kind designs. Buying locally also reduces the distance an item has to travel, reducing the impact that travel has on the environment.

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A decoration that delights the eyes

A house looks imperfect and hurt the eyes until some furniture and fittings are not placed in all the rooms. Especially, a bedroom needs to be furnished very carefully and creatively. An elegant bedroom ensures a sound sleep and delightful dreams.

The bedroom furniture and fittings are bought taking into consideration all the factors like matching color, latest style, classy looks and price. Those who have a penchant for traditional and classic ambiance mostly opt for regency bedroom furniture which adds up the royalty factor.

Along with the appearance of household furniture, comfort level is also taken into account. Bedroom furniture and fittings such as beds, armoires, and nightstands are available in a wide variety of style, design, shape and size.

Those with a shoe string budget and those with a large budget can get satisfactory and desirable furniture on the websites itself. They can choose from the huge collection after comparing the prices. This is just a simple and effortless process of few clicks.

When it comes to color, one can go for white, cream, wooden and natural. The size of bed should be chosen according to the requirement. The most important thing is to buy the furnishings which matches with the color and structure of your bedroom. There are many websites which offer suitable deals on regency ivorybedroom furniture . Grobykitchensandbedrooms is where you can find innumerable designs, styles, colors which range from the most reasonable and simple to the most lavish and expensive. To avoid a stuck-up situation, one can just visit the website and check out the entire range to pick up the best one.

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Stainless Steel Home Decors In Trend

Think again if you think stainless steel is meant for only kitchenware, especially when you are in India. Steel has widened its ambit and found its place in area of the home décor products.

Today the high-quality variety of steel forays in to a variety of multi-utility and decorating products. Exquisite home décor items, office and bar accessories and designer furnitures made of stainless steel are giving bone china and porcelain products a run for their money.

Steel is decorating the living rooms of the houses like never before, in the forms of the stunning classy flower vases, lounge chairs, photo-frames, candle stands, magazine racks, etc. Several steel companies are putting in efforts to conceptualize and design an array of new steel products. These items are available in breathtaking designs and are very adept at gelling with the modern lifestyle.

“The important advantage of these home décor products is that they are unbreakable. We see European and Italian kitchens today and these products matches beautifully with it. One for its looks, durability and they make excellent gifts," says Ratna Singh, a customer.

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Revitalise your walls with wall décor stickers

The walls are exquisitely painted, not a spot of blemish and you have perhaps kept them spotless since you first had them painted. Well, congratulations, but it’s time to spruce those walls up with something new and fancy! And no, it’s not about re-painting so don’t fret; you can transform those walls by simply using wall decor stickers!

Just as the name suggests, wall décor stickers are stuck onto the wall and within minutes, the room is completely transformed! Each vinyl sticker contains individually cut out characters. They come in various shapes, sizes and colour to suit your taste.

Furthermore, this variety come in handy to suit the different rooms in the house, say for the children’s room, there are cartoon and animation stickers. Also, what better way to teach your toddler the alphabet or numbers than sticking them onto their bedroom walls?

For the sitting room, there are decorative stickers, fruit and vegetable stickers for the kitchen and a variety for the other rooms in the house. What’s more, these stickers are not only for homes but can be used in offices to create an elegant but subtle decoration to suit the work environment.

The primary advantage of wall décor stickers is that they allow you to personalise your home using your creativity. Even better, with all the style the stickers come with, there’s not much work needed to have them put up.
“Often, changing paint and wallpaper is tedious and expensive in the long run, but with vinyl stickers, one can change the appearance of their walls as often as they want with ease,” says Carolyne Owarwo Mulinde, director of Feed My Lamb Wall Graphics along Bukoto Street, Kamwokya.

At the mention of stickers on walls, one might fear them damaging paint when peeled off but Owarwo is quick to explain that the material which these stickers are made of is vinyl, so what does this imply? “These vinyl stickers do not peel off with the paint. Peeling them off will leave the wall as good as it was before.”

Besides not spoiling the paint when peeled off, below are a number of advantages the stickers have over paint and wallpaper.

Removable and reusable
Owarwo explains that unlike ordinary stickers, the life span of vinyl wall stickers does not end once peeled off the wall; they can be reused.
She is definitely not backing a product she is not acquainted with and confidently adds, “I have moved offices three times but the stickers I had in the first office are the same stickers I am using today.”

Also, you can change the stickers according to an event, say, if you have a party, you could use appropriate colourful stickers in your living room to suit the event and later peel them off and store them for the next event.

Easy to work with
What is easier than peeling and sticking? You can even have your children do their own rooms as they please. Wall stickers, unlike paint and wallpaper, do not require an assortment of tools to work with. You won’t need to hire workmanship to have your stickers up because you can do this yourself. Furthermore, these are not like paint that you may be forced to stand for a number of years simply because you will spend a fortune hiring painters to re-do it. You can peel décor stickers off even as soon as sticking them up, without any hassle.

Colour and design
Vinyl wall decor stickers present you with the opportunity to utilise colours that you would probably not have easily found in paint. What’s more, you can create designs that otherwise would have been expensive or difficult with paint.

Life-size
You can get stickers in any size you desire, say, if your child wants a life-size sticker of Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh or any other animation, you can have it stuck to their wall and create their dream bedroom.

Fade and water resistant
“A sticker will not lose colour because of water,” says Owarwo. They will stay as good as new due to the high quality inks that make them resistant to fading and water.

Fun and creativity
The flexibility of stickers spurs your creativity. You can stick these stickers in any arrangement you fancy! Let your creativity lead you to your very own unique and beautiful wall décor. You can have fun as a family when deciding which colours and stickers are best for each of the different rooms in your house.

Costs
Owarwo says the cost of a set of stickers depends on the size and design. “The more complicated or bigger the design, the more costly. A set goes for between Shs60,000 and Shs210,000 at Feed My Lamb Wall Graphics, Shoprite.” Joy Kiggundu, a sales lady at Aristoc Bookstore Kampala Road, says they have stickers for children’s bedrooms that cost from Shs2,500 to Shs3,500, although these are paper, not vinyl.

Owarwo regrettably says that Ugandans have not yet embraced the idea of using these stickers. “These stickers are more common in the west but Ugandans should try them out because of their efficiency.”
So, desiring to transform your walls without going through much hustle? Find the vinyl wall décor sticker designs that strike you most, let your creativity lead the way and customise your walls to do away with that bare appearance.

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Amazing Eclectic Style Decorating & Interior Design

Most people, when asked their decorating style say they are eclectic style, meaning they like a little bit of this, and a little bit of that. Eclectic style interior design is the way to go if you just can’t choose one style. This fabulous house is a great example eclectic style that encompasses a variety of periods and styles and is brought together through the use of color, texture, shape and finish.

Eclectic style is about mixing rather than matching, though all design elements should coordinate to achieve a look that is fresh and avant-garde. Eclectic style is the fingerprint of innovation and creativity. Borrowing from different sources and periods, eclectic style is a highly individualized style and is easily changed on a whim. Pictures from Light Locations.

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Home Decoration with Feng Shui in 2010

Feng Shui is the ancient Chinese art to decorate the home. This Chinese art is very useful for decorate your sweet home according to the flow of energy. In general term it means decorate and build your sweet homes according to special rules about the flow of energy, aimed at achieving peace with the environment. This ancient Chinese system uses the laws of both Astronomy and geography to help you to improve life by receiving positive energy.

The master of this art provides us the technical aspect to design and decorate our home. You definitely get the good effect on your life if your implements the Feng Shui Design in your sweet home. Based on the ancient knowledge and practices, Feng Shui is a spiritual way of life that helps you to combine the positive forces like wind and water of the universe.

Tips and Tricks of Home Decoration in New YearThe Principle of Feng ShuiFeng Shui is an art. It is no magic. Feng Shui is a collection of practical, time-tested solutions based on the fundamental properties of elements that are used to change the negative aspects of your life and bring the positive aspects of each element to your living environment and change your life for the better living.

How Feng Shui WorksFeng Shui has had a major impact on the lives of millions of people around the world you can also get its benefits by using the simple basic of Feng Shui like simply changing the interior of yoursweet home , changing the colors of your walls, changing the direction or position of your rooms and relocating the furniture in your room, you can enjoy the positive effects of Feng Shui.

Home Decoration in Xmas seasonBasic Points of Feng ShuiHere are the some key points of this old Chinese art -

* Open mind and spiritFeng Shui art requires an open mind, heart and spirit from you.

* Change Negative into PositiveFeng Shui releases negativity power from your house and life. It opens up a whole new space within you for positive thoughts, love, contentment and prosperity. Don’t let negativity enter when you practice Feng Shui.

* Control the power of Water and windFeng Shui art is depend on the use of the power of the wind and water. It tells us how to use and control the power of these two fundamental elements of earth.

* Understand the Feng ShuiUnderstand Feng Shui helps you to enhance your living space by changing one or more elements in the room. As you learn more about Feng Shui, you will begin to understand the significance of each and every practice that is related to Feng Shui. Feng Shui in Home for the year 2010.

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Dog mansions come with whole range of amenities

Tammy Kassis’ trio of 4-pound dogs have an 11-foot tall Victorian mansion with its own turret, vaulted ceiling and television. They enjoy heating and air conditioning to stay comfortable year-round.

Kassis, 47, figures she and her husband have spent well over $20,000 for the doghouse to match their Victorian mansion in Temecula, counting decoration and moving it a few miles away with the family.

“I would do it again in a heartbeat,” she said. “I live in it. I hang out in there with them. We have had camp-outs with my niece and nephew.”

Dog mansions can be extreme and expensive with amenities like plumbing, chandeliers, crown molding, closets, designer paint and wallpaper, patios, yards and fences. For hers, Kassis turned to Alan Mowrer, architect to some of the world’s most pampered dogs.

Mowrer owns La Petite Maison in Denver and works with partner and interior designer Michelle Pollak, who owns The Lollipop Tree in Charleston, S.C. The pair have probably made around 20 dog mansions in the past 10 years. They start around $5,000, with more expensive doghouses in the mid-$30,000 range.

Business was great until last year, Pollak said.

“Our clients were not directly affected but out of respect for their friends and colleagues who were, they postponed some purchases until 2010,” she said. “Everyone felt the effects of the economy. When your friends are affected by something that large, you don’t want to go throwing your money around.”

Still, some do. Last year, Paris Hilton posted several photos of the two-story pink mansion she designed and had built for her dogs. It is a mini version of her own mansion. Model Rachel Hunter got a house from Mowrer for her three dogs, a Doberman, a German shepherd and a Labrador retriever.

“It has a lot of wrought iron. It is Spanish style with turrets and a light in each tower. It looks great at night,” Mowrer said. “It has hardwood floors, wallpaper, wrought iron on the front doors. We replicated part of her house.”

For a client on the East Coast who owned a vineyard, Pollak and Mowrer hired an artisan to hand-paint each brick on her Lab’s doghouse to match corresponding bricks on her mansion. A Chihuahua in Long Beach got a miniature Spanish cathedral with white marble granite floors and stained glass windows.

But such amenities aren’t exactly recession-proof. Donald Gorbach founded a company called Doggie Mansions in West Palm Beach, Fla., in 2006, offering doghouses from $10,500 to $100,000. Gorbach is still selling real estate but as for the doghouses, “we just put everything on hold due to the economy,” he said by e-mail.

“We thought it was a bad time to promote $10,000 doghouses when people are losing their homes.”

After Hilton posted her photos, she was rebuked by some for the extravagance. Blogger Perez Hilton introduced the doghouse by saying: “We hope all unemployed, poverty stricken Americans turn a deaf ear, because this could be painful!!”

Cameron Sinclair, co-founder of the charity Architecture for Humanity, wrote on the Huffington Post Web site: “Having just returned from Haiti this story kept playing on my mind. It is not that she did it, it was that she was willing to do a photo spread for Life and Style magazine about it. Almost as if to say, ‘Sorry your home is getting foreclosed, but check this out!’”

Kassis knows that kind of criticism exists. Her answer:

“Life is about choices and everyone has their standards,” she said. “There is no right or wrong. I will do whatever it takes to make my animals safe and happy.”

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Western Decor Styles

You must have come across many southwestern rugs in American furnishing websites. You will be surprised to know that these are excellent materials to create a typical popular western, rustic and Native American feel to your Southwestern décor. Moreover, they are also very affordable and economical so much so that more and more western home decorators are eager to buy southwestern accent rugs online.

They are also used as western rugs or southwest area rugs on the floors in your western home décor, as also when you are decorating a log cabin with a typical rustic or western theme. These rugs give your home the required warmth and the rustic southwestern décor look.

There are many varieties of American Indian style rugs as also many southwestern rugs to choose from. There are so many beautiful varieties of rugs that you may not be able to decide which variety to buy for decorating your home in the typical country western décor style. These rugs carry a lot of history behind them and are also used as great works of art in many places.

Handmade area rugs, spirit rugs, Mexican Guadalupe rugs, Oaxaca Mexico rugs, Zapotec Indian rugs, Mohair and Navajo rugs are some of the varieties of rugs that are available online to choose from. Here it is pertinent to note that country western décor can be casual and cabin like or classy and formal. Western home decoration uses natural materials depicting nature and wildlife. Stone, wood and leather and even wild animal skins and antlers feature prominently among the items commonly used for country western decoration. The color schemes used for this type of décor mimic the outdoors with the use of warm red and yellow based colors. These are used as they evoke a sense of western sunset. Browns and grays are also commonly used in country western décor as colors for depicting a rustic setting.

Light fixtures are chosen keeping in mind their fit in the overall theme of design, for example for a more formal room one can use chandeliers of glass or metal. The size of the chandelier matters a lot as it is important to ascertain how the chandelier will hang. The light level in the chandeliers is very important for maintaining that typical western home décor as chandeliers are more or less decorative than functional. However they should offer some minimum light. Rustic light fixture chandeliers are apt for a typical western home décor style room.

A great chandelier will enhance the look of your western home décor style, thus giving your home decorating efforts a fillip. Thus you can see that you need not live in the Wild West to reproduce the ambience of the Wild West in your own home. This is now possible thanks to websites like cowboyquarters.com. These websites not only provide a ready catalogue for articles to be chosen but also provide ideas on the various style of western home decoration.

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