Ever wonder how come all the folks featured in shelter magazines get to live in such perfect, pristine interiors — when your place is such a wreck? Well, maybe they’re not really so different from you.
Cote de Texas’s Joni Webb, this month’s Houston House & Home magazine cover girl (well, actually — her dogs are on the cover; she’s on page 50) gives a picture of what really goes on behind the scenes:
I had exactly one week to get my home “photo ready.” I was totally overwhelmed by this news, but my family was ecstatic and promised to help me clean it up, which I knew would be a lie (it was.) . . .
The list of rooms that couldn’t be photographed was growing: my office is such a disaster even I hate to go in there, my daughter’s room is a typical teenage mess, the kitchen, with it’s outdated appliances, has new pewter hardware clashing with the brass plumbing fixtures which are awaiting their turn to be replaced. This same problem affected all the bathrooms. My decorating crises didn’t leave too many rooms “photo ready”so I had to get the rest of my house in tip top shape and fast. Like most people whom I sure don’t have “photo ready” rooms, my house is filled with the clutter of everyday life: piles and piles of unopened junk mail, back issues of unread magazines stashed everywhere, an overcrowded garage — not that they would want to photograph my garage, but after the grease-stained headboard cover story, who knew? In other words, my to-do list was very, very long, so long that I dreamed of calling the magazine to cancel. My suddenly publicity hungry husband threatened me with divorce if I did. And so, I proceeded on to d-day.
After the jump, what to do with junk mail and electrical cords: A Houston design blogger reveals how to make your home ready for its close-up . . . in a jiffy. Plus: more pics from the shoot!
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