via pierstaylor
Home sick and I'm spending most of the day making a dent in the couch and pinning every possible thing on pinterest. I spied this renovated farm and decided I would like to be teleported to this time and place. The Bertoia chairs and poppies are especially amazing.
It seems I'm not ready to give up on Christmas decorations just yet. Isn't this pink tree from Making it Lovely just beautiful?
I spent time catching up on blogs this morning while I drank my morning coffee and spied Making it Lovely's pink Christmas tree. She linked to Treetopia. I've seen this site before, but choked on the prices. The happy news is that they are having a crazy sale on Christmas trees that ends today. They have trees in every color -- it's amazing!
Christmas is winding down and soon my living room will be a lot less sparkly. Just how long is too long to leave my decorations in place?
"Goodbye Honeysuckle Yellow, hello Tangerine Tango, or you may prefer to call it 17-1463, announced as Pantone’s color of the year for 2012."
Orange is one of my favorite colors so this makes me very happy!
Minneapolis finally has a CB2. The store is located in Uptown, near Design With Reach and Roam, helping make the neighborhood more of a home design destination.
My sister and I attended the preview party on Friday night and left with giant wishlists. We also enjoyed the free flowing beverages, food (aside to Molly - SWEDISH MEATBALL?!?) and the many splendored facial hair styles sported by Minneapolis' scenesters.
It was fun to check out the goods we had previously only been able to see in catalogs. Like this pork chop receptacle, also known as the shop red chest. People are so strange.
The party was crowded -- mostly in a good way, but I was more than a little paranoid about shaking my booty to the music and knocking over a glassware display. Molly solved this by finding a daybed to recline on.
We didn't buy anything that night because my eyes were bigger than the storage capacity of my sister's wee car, but I'll be back.
I used to buy a ridiculous amount of makeup. It was especially silly because I don't exactly pile on the product. When I bought my house it became more important to buy a gallon of paint than a tube of lipstick so I kicked the habit. However, my interest was recently rekindled when I saw a video about Birchbox on YouTube. For $10, you get a box of samples delivered to your door each month. I whipped out my credit card and this box of goodies arrived today.
Here's what my October 2011 Birchbox contained:
All of this is definitely valued at more than $10, but none of it seemed like a real score. I totally wish the false eyelashes it appears some people got in their haul were in my box. I kind of worry that they look at a person's age bracket and make assumptions about the sort of products you might like. Maybe November's box will be a bit more exciting.
Wouldn't it be fun if someone translated this concept to home decor? I'd love to get wee sample pots of paint and other fun things. Someone should make this happen!
I spend a lot of time thinking about publishing on mobile phones and tablets and have downloaded and played with many apps that shovel print content to the tablet format. Most magazine to digital apps haven't been that thrilling. Zinio was one that didn't excite me all that much. I mean, who really prefers swiping a smudgy iPad screen to flipping through glossy pages?
That boredom turned around when I noticed they also sell subscriptions to non-US magazines. I used to occasionally treat myself to UK-based Living Etc but at $10 or so an issue it was a rare pleasure. And at $100+ for a print subscription it just wasn't going to happen. On Zinio I can subscribe for 32 bucks and change! There's no long wait for the printed mag to fly over the Atlantic to your home, and, you don't have to buy into the Apple hype machine and get an iPad -- you can read publications on zinio's apps for iOS, Android and your desktop.
Here are a couple pages from my favorite story in the August 2011 issue. They are from a lovely townhouse in London. I will eternally be a favorite of the combination of old architecture and white walls with modern decor. Sure I'd prefer to rip these pages out of a magazine and pin them to an inspiration board, but I'm no purist -- a screenshot and pinterest will do.
Yeah, this sounds like an ad, but it isn't. I just love the magazines this app gives me access to and wanted to share it.
Life is getting back to normal now that my big project at work is live. I took some time off last week to relax, paint my office and, of course, watch the royal wedding. By the time the big day rolled around I was suffering from a near fatal case of royal fever. My sister and a good friend came over at around 4 AM and we donned our fascinators to watch the big event. British flags and bunting were hard to come by (should've ordered ahead from Party Pieces, I guess), so this mug of flowers was the only themed decoration present.* Too bad I couldn't find yellow posies to match the Her Majesty's dress.
*OK, we may have also taken turns wearing a replica of a certain bauble. All in good fun!
It was just a week or so ago that the snow was melting and it was warm enough where some [crazy] people were wearing shorts. Now this. Another 13 inches. I hope I can get my front door open so I can get to work this morning.
Buried treasure or sign of shopping addiction?
When I was clearing out the room that will eventually become my home office and studio I found a pair of shiny shoes I bought on sale at anthropologie. I totally forgot about these lovelies.
This isn't a DESIGN blog. It's a chronicle of my adventures in fixing up and decorating my first home -- a circa 1953 rambler.
