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Sharing decorating ideas with friends, reading blogs or poring over your decorating magazines are great ways to get home design and decor ideas, but sometimes you need real inspiration. One of my favorite spring and fall events is our local parade of homes. I can’t wait to walk through these showplaces, admiring the lush decorating, fine details and better-than-last-year’s floorplans. What better way to get ideas first hand?

If you’re not familiar with the “Parade” idea, it is generally something like this — builders offer up their model homes to be part of a parade so that potential buyers and looky-loos walk through the homes. The builders only pick their best work for the parade and these homes are decorated to the nines. It is a perfect to way to experience the new trends in decorating and building. Many civic organizations do similar events with home or garden tours for fundraisers throughout the year. Those are also a great way to become inspired.

Here are a list of some parades and tours around the country. I’m sure your area has one, too. Have fun looking and regards!

Central Oklahoma: http://www.paradeofhomesok.com/

Central Pennsylvania: http://www.paparadeofhomes.com/Details.aspx

Dallas: http://www.paradeofhomesdallas.com/

Denver: http://www.paradeofhomesdenver.com/

Kansas City: http://www.kchba.org/shows/shows.shtml

Key West: http://www.oirf.org/events/tours.htm

Minnesota: http://www.paradeofhomes.org/parade-home/parade-home-search.aspx

Northern Virginia: http://www.vaparadeofhomes.com/about_parade.html

Orlando: http://www.paradeofhomesorlando.com/parade.cfm

West Texas: http://www.lubbocknewhomes.com/Parade08/

Welcome back readers, for the third and final installment of Feng Shui 101. Now that you’ve laid out your Ba-gua (feng shui floorplan) and have figured out which area of your life/space you want to work with, it’s time to start incorporating the feng shui elements.

Each area of the Ba-gua has an element to go with it. They are:
Water: career, life path
Earth: knowledge, health and relationships
Metal: creativity and children, helpful friends and guides
Wood: wealth and family

Each element also has coordinating colors. They are:
Water: blue, black
Earth: yellow, orange, apricot, pink, peach
Metal: lemon, gold, silver, white, magenta
Wood: green, turquoise
Fire: red, violet, lilac, lavender

To use the water element, you’ll want to incorporate both the elements and their colors into your space. For example, if you were focusing on the career space you would be using the water element. You could paint the room blue, using black as an accent. You could bring in blue and black throw pillows and blankets. The water element could be brought in by adding a small fountain, or a picture of a water scene. The possibilities are endless. For more ideas, http://video.about.com/fengshui/Color-and-Feng-Shui.htm offers some solid tips on how to use the feng shui colors and elements in your home.

And there you have it, an abbreviated look at feng shui. As I said before, there are many layers and levels to feng shui. If you are interested in learning more, check out the sites below. Happy decorating and regards!

http://fengshui.about.com/od/glossaryofterms/u/fengshui101.htm
http://shuitogo.com/fengshui/

Welcome back readers! Last time we discussed de-cluttering your space so you’ll have a clean slate on which to layout your Ba-gua, the feng shui energy map. It’s basically a simple floorplan that shows which areas in your home correspond to the areas of your life.

Most commonly you’ll see square Ba-guas. Circular Ba-guas are also popular, but look a bit more intimidating. Just think of them as a square with the corners cut off.

The Ba-gua can applied to any area, whether it be your entire home, a single room or even just your desktop. To begin, print or draw out a Ba-gua and align the bottom edge with the front door of your home (or room or desk). The front door will always fall in the 8,1 or 6 spaces. If there is more than entry, or you usually enter through the garage or side door, align the Ba-gua to the main entrance. Then mentally stretch the rest of the Ba-gua to fill your space, so you can see where the other areas fall. These sites: http://www.easy-feng-shui.com/feng_shui_bagua.html and http://www.fastfengshui.com/feng_shui_bagua.htm offer good tips on how to make a Ba-gua work in your home.

Once you’ve laid out your Ba-gua, you’re ready to decide which area of your space/life you want to improve. The sites above also give a detailed explanation of how the Ba-gua areas relate to your life. When you know what area you want to focus on, you can start adding feng shui elements to enhance your space’s energy (this is the fun part). We’ll cover this in part three of our feng shui tutorial. Regards!