Creativity Unleashed - Decorating with Plates - by Guest Writer Amanda

I always have a hard time deciding where or what to hang in my house for decoration. It doesn't help the situation that I move quite a bit and so I find myself always stick with this dilemma. Searching for a new idea for the space above my headboard, I found inspiration from my friend Shannon's blog Bless Our Nest. She showed a before and after pics of her bedroom wall displaying white plates. 

So I began my mission and hunt for the perfect plates. I decided to follow her lead and go with all white so it will always match the walls in our bedroom. I never realized how many types of white plates are out there- round, square, oval, big, little, off-white, beige, bright-white, colored rims, floral, geometric, brand new, slightly used, really worn, etc. After about two months of scavenging through antique stores, flea markets and thrift stores, I had a decent size collection of off-white varied sized plates with some type of raised design/pattern around the edges. The plates were all great bargains ranging from 25 cents to $5 (this was for the platter). My husband thought I was crazy for having stacks of plates on the bedroom floor and my cat kept searching for food on them :) 

The next step was the layout which I was fortunate to have my sister visiting to assist. I normally would have put them in a straight row but she showed me how it's more interesting with a slight curve. I cleaned the plates with baby wipes (which is great at removing sticker residue) and traced them on brown paper sacks. I numbered the backs with masking tape and numbered the cut-outs so I would know the exact placement of each one. I found the white plate hangers from an antique store which were less than a super store. 

Ta da, I'm finally finished and overall I'm very pleased with this project. I really enjoy antiquing and hunting for bargains, but it's even better when you're digging for that perfect object. Now what...maybe I'll try a black/white patterned plates for the bathroom.