Currently/ No Place Like Home

Isn't it funny how good your bed feels after a time away?  Even if you have been staying in wonderful places?

After 6 days in New York, I was VERY happy to find my way home yesterday.

This is what our room looks like currently.  With all the switches that happen around here, I'm not sure you are current.  :)

Still thinking about adding white curtain panels, but mostly, this room is done and makes me happy every time I look at it.

Back to real content tomorrow.....

Merching the Fall Catalogs: Crazy, crazy bedrooms

My girls' room 2.0 is turning out just a little sweeter or more proper than I maybe initially intended.  These here boards feel like a rebellion to that: really letting my freak flag fly.

Sources here

Sources here

If I was just a little more freewheeling, a little less uptight, a teensy bit cooler than I actually am, maybe my house would look like this.

Shoot.  Now I feel bad about myself.

But I want in to these bedrooms.

For living rooms using the fall catalog merch, check it here.  Dining room here.

Merching the Fall Catalogs: Dining Rooms

One of the fun things about putting together vignettes that are pure fantasy is the opportunity to experiment a little.  For years, I wanted to be a window dresser at ABC Carpet and Home, and this feels a little like that, lite.  In these dining rooms, I pulled benches up to the table, repurposed dressers as buffets, and generally pushed it just a bit with the mix.

Source here

I'm loving this dining room.  It isn't "me" exactly, but man do I love all of these elements.  I decided to try on some West Elm faux-wood wallpaper for size, mixed three different kinds of seating at the parsons table, and used a campaign chest as a buffet.  Loving the rope chandelier and the mid century bar cart.  It all feels on-trend without going overboard trendy. 

Sources here

And this here is the kind of dining room I always thinking I'm going to do, but never actually do.  Love the mash up of pseudo-Gustavian (bench), updated Chinoiserie (mint chairs), beach (bead chandelier and rattan mirror), coastal (striped dhurrie and galvanized metal table), and regency-lite (dresser and gold garden seat.)  I think I would pull the daybed up to the table and finish it off with six of the minty chairs.  Oh, and gold curtains?  Where have you been all my life?

The first one reminds me a little of the work I did at the local restaurant Cheeky Monkey (which I still need to share properly).  I would love the first one in a second home, and the second one in my first home.

What about you: any favorites?

Merching the fall catalogs: Living Rooms

Last spring, I created some design boards as a way to share (and play around with) my favorite new pieces in the big box catalogs.  It was such a great way to tune in to the new stuff, I thought I would do it again.

Only, when you click on "new" on most of the store websites, the first gazillion items that come up are Christmas decorations!!! Ugh, so much for getting a jump on fall.

Is it super nerdy that I spent the last two nights making design boards for no one?  Tell you what: it was lots of fun.

First up, a couple of living rooms.

Sources, here

Sources, here

I have to say, Serena and Lily and West Elm have such fabulous art collections now, it was easy to really complete these spaces.  I am way too lazy to list out all the sources, but if you click through to my olioboards, you can then click through to any specific item.  

Stores I perused included:

West Elm

Pottery Barn

PBTeen

Crate and Barrel

World Market

Wisteria

Ballard Design

Schoolhouse Electric

Serena and Lily

Anthropologie

and some random etsy bits here and there.

Every time I do this, it makes me want to start all over.  Even though I LOVE all the pieces I have collected over time, and the many stories they have to tell.  

come back tomorrow for bedrooms and Friday for dining rooms, or vice versa.

I could live in either of these rooms.  This is making me want a colorful couch!

Letting it be

Yesterday's post maybe seemed a little random.

This is going to make it more random at first, but bear with me.

I am refinishing my first piece of furniture.  The little desk in the girls' room was inherited from my mother (or my Aunt or their cousin--there are three of these and who knows which is which?  I have one and my brother has one and the third?  Well, again, who knows?)

The finish is old and brown and heavy, and I have been planning to strip it and use a liming wax to give it a sort of grayed-out look, a bit like the sunburst mirror above it.  (Once again a "free" mirror sparks a major change and a ton of labor!)  Seizing the fine weather before winter descends, I started the task this weekend.  It is not going well--full story in another post--but here's the thing:  Under the brown paint, the dresser is pine, and I immediately knew that the piece should be waxed, not limed.

I actually love waxed pine, especially when the knobs are pine, too (on my little desk, they are.)

Aubrey and Lindsey's Little House Blog, here

Meet Me in Philadelphia

(Ashley JUST revealed her den, and it is worth a peek, here.)

You see where this is going?

As in yesterday's advice to choose a frame for the picture, not the room, I believe it is best, likewise, to choose a finish for the piece, not the space.

Of course, a little waxed pine dresser does not work all that well in the girls' room, putting me in a bit of a quandry.

Of course, rules are also made to be broken.  So tell me: do you finish a piece for the piece or for the room?

P.S.  Guess what I got today?  ANOTHER ELEPHANT HAMPER!  Can you believe it?  Two!  The girls want to keep them both and name them Babaar and Celeste.  Both came from my lovely aunts, (neither of whom was the original owner of the little desk in this post), and one of whom suggested I make "please buy this for me" a regular feature.  Tempting....tempting!

How to frame a work of art

This was one of my first real lessons in decorating:

I was in my early twenties and had picked up a pair of original watercolor fashion illustrations, and I was having them framed.  I took them to a place on Union Street in Park Slope Brooklyn, where the man took them out of their cardboard sleeve gently, as if they were significant works.  He used small felt sandbags to hold down the corners while we talked.

I started to tell him about my decor, and how I wanted to frame them to go with, well, with whatever my fancy was at the time.  (This?  Maybe this.)

Oh no, he said.  You have to frame a picture for the picture, not for the room it will hang in.

He selected frames I never would have imagined, frames that suit the era evoked in the paintings as well as the color and the texture of the watercolor.

Not only are the frames just right, but they have worked in each of my subsequent homes because they are not trying to "go" with the decor.

There are exceptions, of course, but this rule always works.

Yes!

Look what came in the mail!

Now, what else can I put on my (apparently very effective) blog wishlist?

Just kidding.

The girls LOVE it.  It's a little bigger than I expected and a tiny bit tight for the space, but when I suggested using it for myself they looked at me aghast.  It has already "eaten" many clothes, and they are debating names.  (I could also send it back for the medium size, but it would lose some of its fun, I think.)

I was impressed that the hamper comes with a liner/bag that velcroes to the inside top for easy removal, and the thing is really well made.

Hooray!