china shepherdess

Ladies Night

Tonight's the first chance I'm getting to host a get together with friends other than my family. My last place wasn't really suitable for entertaining and one of the reasons I'm excited about the house is the opportunity to pay back my friends for the many dinner parties I've been invited to. I'll be at work all day today, so the meal won't be anything fancy, but the company will be good and it will be fun to show off my new place. And, oh yes, there will be karaoke!

Simply tourist.

I saw this wallpaper on Retro Renovation today and was smitten. It would be the perfect thing for, don't laugh, my bedroom closet. The furniture in the room is all modern, as in nowadays purchases from CB2 and Ikea. However, I'm going to be hanging my collection of mostly kitsch vintage Paris prints and paintings (including a fun paint-by-number) gallery style on one of the walls. If I put this wallpaper in the closet it would be a nice complement to that collection and would also hide the minor the cracks in the plaster walls. Definitely an extravagant way around that problem, but a closet wouldn't require much paper, and tax return time is coming soon. Now to find someone in "the trade" so I can found out how much it would really cost me. 

P.S. Here's a link to the NY Tiimes article mentioned in Retro Renovation's post: DESIGN REVIEW; When Artwork Has a Sticky Back

Yes. Yes. No.

The chair is staying. The rug is staying*. The pillow? Um, no. It's already on its way back to Urban Outfitters. I'm not sure what I was thinking with that purchase. It's like somebody upchucked Kraft Macaroni & Cheese onto 1970's bathroom wallpaper. And not in a good way.

All this is crammed into the corner because the rest of my bedroom floor space is filled up with parts to the Ikea wardrobe I need to finish putting together. The noisy background interfering with my pretty pink walls is because I clearly shouldn't rely on program mode while using my new camera in low light conditions.

Just a wee post to celebrate my two month homeownerversary! I sometimes beat myself up because I don't feel like I've accomplished much. Then I remember that I've only owned the place for two months and I just moved in the weekend before Christmas. 

*The rug may end up in the tv watchin'/karaoke singin'/guest room instead.

Skol, Vikings!

I'm guessing I'm the only person you know who has Danish Modern (candy?) dishes featuring Vikings on the attack. Even my home accessories are cheering for the Minnesota Vikings today.

Rock 'em, sock 'em, FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!

Now I can be like one of those annoying people on TV

My first home delivered copy of the Sunday New York Times (imagine me saying it aloud in the same pretentious way they do in their television commercials) was delivered today after I filled out their online form wondering where the heck it was. I feel like a grown up now.

Change of plans.

I was sitting in my dining nook tonight and had an epiphany that the country kitchen oak cupboards that I can't replace right now read as orange in the evening light and really, do I want more of that? So I've changed my mind and I'm thinking I'll flip flop the colors around and do aqua as my wall color with orange and green as my accents. I think the aqua will look really fresh and will help balance the warmth of my cupboards and better complement the lovely grey I chose for my living room. I have the perfect green lamp for over my dining table, but I'll need to pick up a few orange accents. I guess I have a good excuse to start collecting Le Creuset in their traditional (and my favorite) shade of flame orange.

I'm picking up paint samples tomorrow. Wish me luck!

want

This Vivienne Westwood pillow from The Rug Company would be perfect for my bedroom, but at $635 it just ain't happening.

It's Spring somewhere.

I saw these forsythia branches and thought they'd be perfect for my flowers of the week. This shot was snapped the morning after I bought them and after following directions, I've since forced a few more blossoms out of them. Even better, last week's flowers are still going strong, so my meh kitchen has some nice touches of color.

Once again, you can see the still partially papered walls in the background. I'm taking Friday off and I'm hoping to complete the heinous task of stripping the old wallpaper so that on Saturday I can play with paint samples.

Fear of wallpaper?

I enjoyed this post from StarTribune.com's Homegirls blog: Fear of Wallpaper.

I love a lot of wallpaper designs, but I'll admit that I'm totally afraid of it. My boyfriend already talked me out of wallpapering one of my ceilings. Will I conquer that fear and paper an accent wall or a closet? We'll see...

phony baloney

You may have noticed there hasn't been a big reveal of my bedroom. The excuse is that it is still very much a work in progress. Realistically it will be that way for quite some time. One big thing it's missing is a chair of some sort. I have found many that are quite appealing. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Room & Board's Norton in Gunmetal.
• Room & Board's Norton in Spice Leather.
• CB2's Parlour Chair.
• And, the biggest dream of them all, an Eames lounge chair and ottoman in ivory  leather.

None of them are really in the budget right now. I mean I have a whole house I need to fix up.

So luckily, one of the blogs I read pointed out a bunch of "designer-inspired" chairs they found on Overstock. I've wanted a real Eames rocking chair since pretty much forever, but just haven't had the cash and/or area rugs to make the commitment. I spied the white knock-off Eames-ish rocker on Overstock and decided it would go quite nicely with the white, streamlined thing I have going on in the bedroom and would cost basically the same as a dinner or two out.

Honestly, I do feel a teensy bit guilty about it, but the cost is the difference between having a chair or not. There's also the whole controversy about how the authorized reproductions are made of plastic (as is my knock-off) and the vintage ones were made of fiberglass. I'll let other people sort that out. Maybe someday I'll get a real one, but in the meantime, I think the knock-off will work well in my pink, but not too pretty bedroom.