Our Home’s Feature in Country Sampler Farmhouse Style Magazine

Our farmhouse was featured in the new Christmas issue of Country Sampler Farmhouse Style Magazine! I shared a sneak peek at the feature in my IG stories, but I wanted to get better photos of the feature to share with you here on the blog. I also wanted to give you a look “behind the scenes” of the article!

So that’s what this post is going to be about! I’ll take you all through the article sharing behind the scenes stories, links, and sources. And I’ll even share a few of the photos I took during and after the photoshoot too!

Our Feature in Country Sampler Farmhouse Style

The Kitchen

behind the scenes

When a magazine sends out a photographer to take photos of your home, they also send a stylist. It was fascinating to me to watch how they rearranged and changed things up in our farmhouse! They get to see it with fresh eyes, so they tweak and play with the decor you have, but in new ways you might not have thought to try. One of my favorite things they tweaked in our kitchen was the island.

The stylist came in from the porch mid-shoot and asked about an old wooden table leaf he found on our porch. The table leaf was a project piece, and honestly I had halfway forgotten about it! He arranged it down the center of the island, and added all my gingerbread decor on top of it, so that it functioned more like a tray. I never would have thought to bring that piece in, but I love how it turned out!

On the blog

• DIY Dried Orange Slice Garland
• DIY Gingerbread Man Ornaments / Faux Cookies
• Apothecary Drawer Pulls
• DIY Gun Rack Kitchen Storage

The Coffee Bar

behind the scenes

Behind the ticking stripe curtain is a little mini fridge that we use to keep water, soda’s, juice boxes for the kids, and coffee creamer! I didn’t want the glass door on the mini fridge to create a glare in the photos. So right before the photoshoot, I sewed this little curtain to hide the mini fridge. It was such a simple sewing project, I don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner!

On the blog

• DIY Cabinet Curtains
• Apothecary Drawer Pulls
• Winter Cocoa and Coffee Bar (A more neutral / natural look I did a different year!)

The Dining Room

behind the scenes

Speaking of projects… Before the photographers came, I spontaneously decided to paint our dining room table white. It’s a project that had been on my someday list for a while. And there’s nothing like having a photoshoot on your calendar to give you a little extra motivation for DIY’s and projects!

Also, I don’t know how other people get their Christmas trees to stay upright in a crock! Ours was propped up with a ton of cardboard and a beach towel. I made sure to not put any breakable ornaments on the tree just in case it toppled over. Luckily it didn’t but we’re gonna have to come up with something better for this year!

On the blog

• DIY Vintage Doily Table Runner
• My “Found” Vintage Glass Bottle Collection
• The White Paint Color I used on our Dining Room Table

The Living Room

Behind the scenes

We have had two different photographers out to the farmhouse, and the photos from those shoots have ended up in 3 different magazines. (Modern Farmhouse Style Magazine, Better Home’s & Gardens Farmhouse DIY Magazine, and now Country Sampler Farmhouse Style Magazine.) And for both of those photoshoots, our living room was the hardest room to photograph by far! It took way longer than any of the other rooms, and a lot more rearranging to get the photos just right.

On the blog

• DIY Fireplace & Antique Mantel
• Vintage Brass Candlesticks
• My Review of our Frame TV
• Where to Find the Best Free Art for your Frame TV

The Bedrooms

BEHIND the scenes

See the presents under the tree in our bedroom? Those presents were totally staged! I hadn’t finished my Christmas shopping before the photographers came… so to make this space look more complete, we wrapped some Amazon boxes and some shoe boxes and called it a day!

The flocked tree in our bedroom is one of my best Christmas decor finds, maybe ever! It’s a beautiful snowy looking tree and it comes pre-lit which I love. Though the best part about it is that it has memory wire branches, so there’s no fluffing! The tree comes in sections, and once you slide them into place, you just fold down the branches and it’s ready to decorate. Linking the best NO-FLUFF, flocked Christmas tree here.

On the blog

• DIY Wrapping Paper with a Vintage Quilt Pattern
• Red & White Quilts
• Guest Bedroom fit for Santa
• Vintage & Vintage-Style Metal Beds

The Porch & Exterior

Behind the scenes

It meant the world to me to see this photo of the old house in print! For those of you who don’t know much about our story, we re-built my grandparent’s home… an 1800’s farmhouse in North Carolina. Take a virtual tour of “the old house” to see more of the before photos and read more about the history of the home.

Our porch was decorated and styled on the day of the photoshoot. Even though it might have come together last minute, but this look is one of my favorite spaces featured in the whole article! The red and white quilt draped over the couch on our screened in porch is actually a hand-me-down piece that my great grandmother on my dad’s side quilted by hand. The wooden trunk is a piece from the old house, and one of these days I’m going to clean it up and use it as a coffee table inside our farmhouse. But it makes a great table for the porch in the meantime!

on the blog

• DIY Merry & Bright Scroll Sign
• Tour “the Old House” – before photos of the 1800’s farmhouse we re-built!

Thank you Country Sampler Farmhouse Style!

So many friends, both new and old, have messaged me to say congratulations and that you loved the article. I just wanted to say thank you!! You have no idea what your kindness has meant to me the past couple weeks!

I also want to say thank you to everyone who played a part in making one of my bucket list dreams come true! Thank you to Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, thank you to Elyse Major for putting our story into words in the most beautiful way, and thank you to Gridley & Graves for capturing our home in it’s best light!

2023: Behind the Scenes

Behind the scenes, 2023 was a really hard year for our family. It was a roller coaster of a year, with some amazing, unimaginable highs (like this feature in Country Sampler) and some impossibly difficult lows.

I’ve struggled quietly through it all, questioned a lot of things, including what the future looks like for White and Woodgrain. But in the hardest moments, the moments when things felt like they were falling apart… good things kept happening for White and Woodgrain. And I mean big things! Things like this magazine feature, which just happens to be our 4th magazine feature of 2023!

God Winks & Magazines

Most recently, during one of the hardest weeks of the year for our family, this issue of Country Sampler Farmhouse Style magazine showed up in our mailbox. I knew the magazine was coming. But it arrived much earlier than I expected. It came weeks earlier than expected, and the timing couldn’t have been better.

Things like this have happened time and time again this year, and at this point there’s no way to convince me that it’s all a coincidence. During some of my hardest moments and at the times when I’ve needed it the most, I keep getting these little “God-winks”. These little (or a really big) signs have been the encouragement I’ve needed to keep going and to keep sharing. It’s been validation that through it all, I’m still right where I’m supposed to be!

Before you go…

I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you to everyone who played a part in the article! Thank you for all the messages and the congratulations, and thank you for stopping by the blog today too!! It’s all meant so much more to me than you’ll ever know…

If you’re new to White and Woodgrain, I’d love to invite you to stick around and be a part of my email community. I share all the best stuff with my email list!

And if you want to see more of our Christmas decor from last year, head to this post for a Christmas tour of our home. In that post you’ll get to see tons of photos, and more views of the farmhouse that didn’t make it into the article! Thanks again for stopping by the blog today! Until next time…

Love, Brittany