Your BTSH Team: Jennifer Roth

Meet Jennifer Roth, BTSH’s Professional Home Stager! Jennifer and Shauna Lynn met through the local RESA chapter and found a connection right away. They often met outside of chapter meetings and quickly discovered they worked well together. So well, in fact, that Jennifer often helped out with BTSH vacant staging jobs. They ultimately decided that it made sense to combine their efforts, and Jennifer officially joined the BTSH team in May 2014.

Jennifer was one of the first certified Real Estate Staging Professionals (RESP). With a diploma in Interior Design from Sheridan College, she has been preparing homes for sale since 2011 and was named one of RESA’s Top 10 Rising Star Home Stagers in North America in 2013. Jennifer is also skilled in interior design and decorating, new home construction, real estate, and advertising and marketing. “I just love being able to take a room and transform it into something beautiful,” said Jennifer.

Prior to working at BTSH, Jennifer worked as a deal secretary with RE/MAX, where she processed offers on real estate transactions. She also worked at Peak Realty, where she acted as a personal assistant to a group of six realtors. “Everyone said I should be a realtor. I thought about it, and loved the industry, but wanted to use my creative side more,” said Jennifer. She credits a realtor with bringing home staging to her attention, and as a result, Jennifer started Home Selling Edge in 2011. She worked there until she merged with BTSH in 2014.

QUICK FACTS ABOUT JENNIFER
Favourite part of her job:
    Finding solutions to help sellers live in staged homes, and seeing the reactions of homeowners who see the transformation after a vacant stage.
Favourite TV show:
    House Hunters
    Love It or List It
Favourite stager:
    Karen Otto
    Red Barrinuevo
Favourite upcoming trend:
    Gold is coming back! Especially in fixtures. Furs are also becoming more popular again!

Jennifer loves contemporary designs like light fabrics, soft textures, clean lines, and metallics. She also appreciates all other design styles, and prides herself on being able to visualize different styles in all kinds of homes, whether it’s traditional, rustic, vintage, contemporary, or more!

Contact Beyond The Stage Homes today to find out how to get your property sold!

Phone: +1 (226) 240-0766
Email: info@btshomes.com
www.beyondthestagehomes.com 

Adorning Your Home for Thanksgiving and Halloween - BTSH Around The House Tip of the Week

Fall is a fun season to decorate for. The fall colours lend themselves to compliment most any palette, and carving pumpkins is fun at any age. Here are some tips to get you in the spirit of the festivities!

Thanksgiving
Start with fall harvest style décor. As a general rule in Canada, save the specific Halloween decorations until after Thanksgiving. This means that you can have pumpkins as a part of your décor, but save the carving of the pumpkin until after the carving of the turkey.

Think of the colours of the changing leaves when you think about decorating for this season. Burnt orange, browns, dark greens, burgundy, and sometimes even a little yellow. Also remember that the temperature outside is dropping, so you want to make the indoors as cozy as possible. Consider adding a throw and some decorative pillows to your living room in these fall colours. For an added touch, scented candles of apple cinnamon or orange spice give of cozy, warm scents.

Gourds are always a nice touch. These consist of a variety of decorative squash and mini pumpkins, in various sizes and colours. Have a display on the entry table at your front door, grouped on your mantel, or in a basket as a centrepiece on the dining table. Another centrepiece idea is a bowl of apples—take the family out apple picking, and put some of their best picks on display!

Great your guests with warm fall colours at the front door. Create a fall wreath from straw, corn husks, and artificial leaves or flowers. Bring it all together with a cloth ribbon. And just because the summer may be over, does not mean that you can’t still have fresh flowers displayed. Replace your potted plants on your porch with plants from the season, such as marigolds and mums.

Halloween
There are really no set rules for decorating for Halloween. This is the one time of year that I say let your wildest imagination take over, and don’t hold back! Halloween is my favourite time of year. I love the energy of the day, and the creativity of the costumes and decorating.

Naturally, no Halloween is complete without carving some pumpkins for display. If you don’t think you’re much of an artist, you can download stencils online, or buy at your local craft store. Be sure to use a good carving knife with a fine edge for details. Another idea is to paint the pumpkins. This looks especially great on white pumpkins, or Luminas.

As for the rest of the decorations, try to stick with a theme, whether it be ghosts and goblins, or witches and bats, be sure that your decorations compliment one another. If you’re hosting a Halloween party, dim the lights, replace a few lamp bulbs with some black lights for effect, play some spooky tunes, and be sure to have lots of treats to avoid any tricks.

Written by Shauna Lynn, Beyond The Stage Homes
www.beyondthestagehomes.com

Create Your Own Unique Centrepiece - BTSH Around The House Tip of the Week

Fun with paper mache!

I had a great idea for a centerpiece for my dining table that would serve a double purpose. I believe that every home should have at least one large serving bowl, but of course storing these can be a real chore. I thought if I could find one that would look great on the table as a centrepiece, I could fill it with something eye-catching to complete the look. I noticed that a lot of home stores had these funky, light-weight, textured balls, but not only were they expensive, I couldn’t seem to find any in the colours that I was looking for. So, when all else fails, DIY! Making these balls was a fun project, and gave me a lot of flexibility in terms of colour and sizes.

TOOLS YOU’LL NEED:

Styrofoam Balls (quantity and sizes are up to you)
Newspaper
Flour
Water
Mixing Bowl
Needles (same quantity as balls)
Thread
Coat Hanger
Spray Paint

Cut the newspaper into strips. Next, prepare the paper mache mixture in your mixing bowl, by combining 3 parts water with 1 part flour. Dip the newspaper in the mixture, and spread over the Styrofoam ball. Continue this until the ball is completely covered, and leave to dry (if you have a baking cooling rack, placing the balls on this will work well to ensure the ball dries evenly). Continue this for each ball. Be sure that all balls are completely dry before painting. I recommend leaving for a full 24 hours.

When it comes to painting the balls, you want to be sure that you get full, even paint coverage on each one. This is why we hang them from the coat hanger. Thread needles and tie at the base of the needle. Then hang on a few inches of thread, and tie to the coat hanger. Stick the needle through a Styrofoam ball. You want to be sure the balls are not touching each other, but you should be able to fit 3-4 on each coat hanger, depending on the size of the balls. Finally, spray each ball with the colour of your choice. Have some fun with this and use multiple colours! Be sure all balls on one coat hanger are the same colour though so you don’t need to worry about possible spatter. Hang the coat hanger on a hook or rod and leave to dry. Once the balls are dry, simply remove the needle, and arrange the balls in your bowl. The hole left by the needle will be so small you won’t notice it, but if you do, simply spray the area with a little more paint. These make a great accent piece for any dining table, and a great conversation piece as well when your guests ask you where you got them!

Written by Shauna Lynn, Beyond The Stage Homes
www.beyondthestagehomes.com