Last Minute Halloween Prep....

This will be our first Halloween in the new house. We were forewarned by our neighbors to buy lots of candy, since apparently our neighborhood is a trick-or-treating Mecca. People come from all the surrounding towns to hit our neighborhood due to the close proximity of houses and abundance of sidewalks. We have been slowly stocking up on candy, and while I still need to get some more, that is the least of my concerns. We have been in our house for 5 months now and there is one room that is still entirely empty, the future dining room. As luck would have it, this is the ONLY room that you can see from the front door. I freaked out that our neighbors were going to think we were crazy people with no furniture in their house handing candy out to their kids.

So I pulled together a make-shift dining room, using things we already had in other parts of the house. It works for now at least, although completely out of scale.

I put two large cracks in the plaster wall hanging frames. Awesome.

I also carved pumpkins Funkins. I was really not feeling the cleaning pumpkin guts thing, so I bought fake ones. I don’t think my mom was impressed. I’m not a scary face pumpkin kind of girl, so I just carved our address, (in size 666 font of course).

Happy Halloween!

Bespoke Silhouette Bangles....

Some people choose to engrave their wedding bands with their wedding date or names - but this is taking that to a whole new level!  At Cameo by RUX you can create a custom band with a using the profile of your loved one!
Can you see the profile of the faces? 

I'm pretty sure this is the coolest thing since sliced bread.
AND for those of us that already have our wedding rings, they have bespoke bangles!

Now I just need to figure out which anniversary is 'Resin' so I can convince the boy to buy me one!
Images from Cameo by RUX

Handwritten Notes....

I'm taking a page from one of my favorite bloggers (and people!) Meredith.  If you don't follow her over at &Unlimited you are missing out on fabulous photos, a cute dog named Orvis and fun words like 'micnic'.

Once a week she does "Magazine Mondays" ~ this is my version.

My new issue of Martha Stewart Living arrived this week and I was immediately drawn to the section entitled "Worth Doing Well - Thank You Notes".

 Stationery by 4th&Folded, Photo by &Unlimited

Thank-You notes are such a simple way to show gratitude, and in today's digital age I think they have become more meaningful than ever before.  As the article states "How often do you post emails on your fridge or place them in a keepsake box under your bed?"  I'll admit I'm guilty of not sending them nearly often enough.

The author, Abigail Libers, suggests a few quick tips to achieving the perfect thank-you ~

1. Timing - In today's age it is entirely appropriate to send a quick email first if the gift arrived in the mail letting the sender know it arrived safe.  You should always follow up with a handwritten note in a few days.
If you are anything like me, and sending notes promptly is not always the case, don't start the note with an apology, mention it as a PS.  Ex. 'PS. If I had a nickel for every time I thought to send this'

2. Start and End on positive notes, and avoid starting with 'Thank-You' as it shows a lack of imagination.  (I'm guilty of this one too!)  Be specific, include the occasion it was received for and details of how you plan on using the gift.  Its always nice to mention if someone has complimented you on the gift!

3. 'If it came in wrapping paper, you should write a note' - Margaret Shepherd.

My own personal tip, is to have stationery that you love on hand - its much easier to remember to send a note quickly if you don't have to go out searching for the perfect card!  On that note, I think I'm going to go design some -

7 things you may not know about me....

Kristin over at Bien Living graced me with this :

With this award, I am supposed to pass the award on to 5 other bloggers, and list 7 things that you may not know about me-

Tag You're It...
Bijou Lovely
Minted Life
Nodakademic
Life After Lobster
Moments Pass Slow

7 Things
1. If given the opportunity I will eat Nutella straight out of the jar, and it be gone in less than a week.

2. I have ‘practice – sketchbooks’ and real sketchbooks. I’m too nervous to write all my thoughts/ideas down in my ‘actual’ sketchbook. I think this is from years of reading ‘found lost sketchbooks’ type things from long-dead architects. What if I write a stupid note to myself and someone finds it 200 years from now. Perfectionist much?

3. I don’t have a Mac. I always get gasps about this one since I’m a ‘designer’ and all. 2 Reasons a) They didn’t make AutoCAD for Macs until very recently (like within the past few weeks). b) The boy is an engineer, he can fix/take apart/re-build a PC no-problem, but a Mac would be the equivalent of Chinese finger trap for him. I enjoy having my IT staff in-house.

4. When I lived in Italy I didn’t like wine. Tragic, I know, and I think about it every-single-day. Talk about a wasted opportunity. I still drank it of course, but I didn’t appreciate it like I would now. I love wine now.

5. It really bothers me when my toenails are shorter than the end of my toe. I don’t like seeing the nail stop short of where it wants to go, it is trying to protect the top of my toe (which I need because I’m consistently clumsy) and I’m going to let it do its job; much to the chagrin of my pedicurists.

6. I'm loose (and not in the sexual way).  I'm very flexible, especially in my arms/shoulders.  If my hands are handcuffed behind my back, my shoulders are flexible enough to allow me to rotate them around to the front of my body.  I should do a video of this - it's kind of gross.

7. I only wear my hair completely down maybe 30 days a year.  It's curly and unruly and I'm lazy.

Reason #7904 I love my husband....

On a recent trip to Home Depot, while perusing the moulding section, my husband casually suggested maybe we do black moulding instead of white.
I just about melted in his arms right there.

Images from Lonny

it is not me....

I have google alerts set up to monitor my name/business/etc. The spelling of my first name is not a common way of spelling it, so I don’t get too many un-related hits. There is, however, a plus size model – whose name is exactly the same as mine. Typically she’s a good girl and her photos are pretty. But apparently she’s down on her luck because I got a hit today which included my, her, our? name and a number of graphic keywords from mstrbate dot com (no I didn’t click on the link).


Just in case you were concerned, it is not me.

Do you share your name with anyone?

Happy *Early* Holidays....

I had a few spare minutes over the weekend (and by spare I mean, time acquired by procrastinating the finish any of the other projects I had already started), and decided to whip up a few potential Christmas card designs.  I'm trying to be really proactive about getting our cards out early this year, since I never got around to sending out 'We've Moved' cards and I want people to know our new address (because getting snail mail is my favorite thing ever).

Design [A] : Bow

Design [B] : Ribbon

I may still make some tweaks to the colors, or completely change it up....only time will tell.
I think we'll probably end up with Option [B] since the boy thinks Option [A] is a little sexist, but then again he wont see or sign them before they go out, and would likely never know.....


Which is your favorite?

Adore Home

I have to admit that I'm loving all the online magazines as of late. 
Have you seen this one yet? Adore Home
It's full of bright pops of color, classic lines and essentially, right up my alley.

image source

How do you feel about online magazines? 

Spray Painting Things White....

I think I’m over this spray-painting everything white trend. I swear I get at least one post/day in my google reader where someone is spraying an inanimate object white.

I’m not over spray painting things (far from it) – but there are so many pretty colors out there; why does everything have to be white?
Even if it looked pretty my husband would call it ‘clutter’, so maybe I’m just jealous?
Are you ON IT or OVER IT?

image

Weekend Update : October 1-2

Weekend Update!
Kitchen:
I picked up more white Ritva curtains at Ikea with a rod on Friday. I added some navy grosgrain to the sides and bottom of the curtains to match the roman shades I made for the windows on the other side of the house (same room). I need to get a sheer panel or some bamboo shades? to put behind the curtains.

You can also see the color I decided to paint the chairs – I love how it pops with the blue wall! Still haven’t repainted the table.

The island doors got more coats of paint and are almost done and ready to go back on the cabinet.

Master Bedroom :
We started installing faux-paneling in the bedroom, we got two walls done – 1 to go! This was more of a challenge than we anticipated since our walls are apparently anything but straight, I guess that’s the territory with an 90+ year old house. I’ll hopefully start painting sometime this week. The color above (which I realized I never posted about) is BM Kendall Gray. We still have to install the crown moulding.  All the moulding and area below the chair rail will be painted white. 

Random :
In between the thousand trips outside to cut the moulding we left the door open a few times…..and ended up with a squirrel in our house. He was sneaky and fast; we *think* he’s gone.

It was also chilly enough Sunday morning to warrant a fire in the fireplace (our first in the new house) and it was lovely!

How was your weekend?

The Big D-Word....

One of our friends recently announced that he and his wife are getting a divorce. They are our age 26-28ish but have been married for 6-8 years (don’t remember exactly when) and have 3 kids. We hung out with the two of them fairly recently and they seemed absolutely fine (and I know you can put on a show and pretend everything is fine, but she was sitting on his lap/arms around his neck, etc. – it really didn’t look like a show). We weren’t the only ones who were blindsided, apparently he (the husband) was as well.
Anyways, it got me thinking a few things


1. How can you be blindsided by divorce? I understand if the person is cheating, or leading some secret double life, but that is not the case in this situation. Did they not talk? And if not, wouldn’t you want to try and make an effort – at least for the sake of your three young kids to talk things out before leaving? Do you wake up and decided you do not love the person anymore or realize you do not like the life you created for yourself and decide you want out?  Don’t you think that the other person deserves to hear your concerns and try and fix things if they want (which he does) before you just decide it’s over? I honestly just don’t get it.

2. The second thing is that it’s making me feel really old. Are we really at that point where our friends are getting divorced?

I’ve been lucky to be surrounded by happily married couples growing up. My parents, grandparents and almost all my friends parents are still happily married. I do understand that some situations warrant separation, but also think that when you get married and have children you give up some* of your rights to your personal happiness, for the sake of your family.

What are your thoughts on divorce? 

*I really mean some, like not being able to go on vacation whenever you like, or choosing to get your child braces instead of those designer shoes you’ve been eyeing.