Room Service
A busy family gets a brand new room at a great price
After spending their first 16 years of marriage in a tiny starter home, Jaimie and John LaMarca moved recently to a larger house—a two-story colonial, in Glen Head, New York—that was originally built in 1913. "Back in the seventies," says Jaimie, "the house was expanded to include a new garage, a guest room and a guest bath, plus the extra large room we now call the family room."
With two daughters, Emily, 12, and Nicole, 16, the LaMarcas thought it was great to have a 15,520-foot family room where everyone could gather. The problem was that they didn't really know what to do with the space. "It had an ugly stained carpet and vertical blinds, which didn't go with the character of the house at all," Jaimie recalls. "I put a couple of old chairs, the TV and the dog's bed in there, but it was never a comfortable place for us to hang out."
After letting the space languish for more than a year, Jaimie knew it was time to make it a room the family would actually use and enjoy. But she wanted to furnish it affordably, so she enlisted family and friends to help her create the space she desired. After removing the ratty carpeting, which the LaMarcas had planned to replace, Jaimie explains, "we found red oak flooring that we immediately refinished." Finally, she was ready to decorate.
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