the other day i discovered an entire shelf of books on design at the local library.  hello!  the books i brought home were published within the past two years, so m was reassured that i wouldn't be pulling inspiration from the 80s for our home.  i spent the day rifling through 

now i have a new obsession... one that is less costly than magazine subscriptions and abundant with amazing ideas for making a house into a home!
 

latest addition

recently we made a lovely addition to our very monotone living room.

it all began with love-at-first sight

and a $50 cabinet

 

it needed a little love and some color

so m and i picked a color we both love: teal

the sanding and painting began

  but after the first coat i thought it looked a little too commercial and 

lost some of its integrity as an old piece of furniture

so i began to distress it

but even then didn't get the exact effect i wanted

so i found some gunstock wood stain and rubbed it allllll over the paint

-that worked out well! 

it gave the teal a more muted, dirty tinge that keeps it looking old

despite being updated.

 i kept the inside back neutral to help the lattice design pop

(*pop!*)

 my favorite part lies just on the other side of this drawer:

(with its lovely original pulls)

 

ta-da!

some pretty paper+mod podge= one fancy fun drawer

the cabinet brings a nice vibrancy to our living room
but i still am trying to figure out just what to put inside it...

any suggestions?

here it is next to our (one) pretty window

 

and how i hope it will look someday
(assuming m will let me put a purple pillow in here!)

 if i had the money and my husband let me, 

i might have a living room that looks like this.

  

it may seem cluttered to you,

and m would say the same.

but i've been keen on bohemian style for a while, 

and this sort of eclectic mix of patterns and colors really appeals to me...

i think somewhere deep inside me is a gypsy trying to break free.

do over....

when i was imagining up ideas for our extra (guest) bedroom, 

i had something like this in mind for the green-wall effect:

with a bohemian touch of...

ooooooh, so pretty.... i L.O.V.E!

         

aren't those staggered bookshelves interesting?  i could totally rock those somewhere in the house.

so.  back to the guest bedroom.

m & i are thinking the color we picked isn't really working.  

i, for one, am not convinced it is achieving the rustic, boho effect i so crave.

so maybe sometime in the not-too-distant future we'll give it another go?

i'm also thinking a lovely curtain-headboard would suit the space well.

what do you think?

 

and i, of course, still fantasize about making a bohemian quilt for the bed...

1   2   3   4   5

difference of opinion

(link)

these beautiful linens could someday be our bedding.

today i bought an oversized table cloth of the same pattern from world market, 

and i'm thinking it could be a good candidate for a bedspread.  

m doesn't think so.

he thinks it looks like a gaudy 1970's mess.

but to me, it has the same affect as the pattern in the bedroom picture we both liked:

which is why i bought it.

what do you think?

it's just a good idea.

don't get excited folks; it's not that time for us.... yet.  but peeking at one of my favorite blogs, i came across this picture of a baby's nursery i just had to share:

(link)

i love the wall of ledges for books, and i love the hodge-podge color scheme.

not to mention the stripes on the ceiling... yes, please!!

color theory

 m and i have been trying to agree on a color for our bedroom walls.  remember this?

i had a plan, but i just couldn't get m on board with it.  

so, perhaps green?  said i. no more green, says m.

yellow?  no.

how about taupe?  that's like a gray but with a little more warmth, says i. 

nope.  

my brain operates on color and sound.  in other words, i spend 99 % of my life contemplating beauty in space and sound.  

so i have a habit of always wanting color... everywhere.

but today i had an epiphany.

walls don't have to be the source of color.

so we have decided to go with white. 
i never thought i'd agree to white walls...

but it can be done right.
not that i will necessarily do it right, but i'll certainly try.

here's where i'm pulling my inspiration from:

 these rooms are all from various magazines i've torn apart to save snip-its of things i just love.
pottery barn, crate and barrel, and world market really know how to do color, but i'll probably end up trying to replicate something to save money. 
updates will be sure to follow!

in the mood

 for some mood boarding?

i know i am.

a la guest room

oh no, olio

today i discovered something that is sure to become my new obsession.

olioboard allows you to create your own mood board so you can be, like, a real interior designer(ish!)

so i tried it out with some of the thoughts i have for the guest room.

i especially love the peacock pillow because birds are pretty and it has both of the colors i'd love to see together in that room: deep teal and chartreuse. 

because the walls are dark, i think white bedding or a simple stripe would be best on the bed, and i'd love to get a cast iron headboard for a nice vintage-y look.

i love the pillows pictured above, they capture the bohemian whimsy i love and still remind me of those good ol' crayola bold markers.  

plum-diddly-um

there are so many many pretty things in the world! 

lately i've enjoyed looking for all of those pretty things online. 

you might know that purple is my favorite color?

plum, to be exact.

if you were at our wedding, you may remember lots of pretty purple.

yes, i love purple.  

would you ever paint your walls purple?

these people did, and i think it looks....

you guessed it, pretty.

 

from

 from

from

 from

 from

of course, it's always a nice color to wear as well.  

hm... can i think of someplace to wear this vera wang dress?

from

yahoo!

today we bought the first (two) pieces of furniture for our new home!

they're waiting for us to bring home, and i can't wait!

they have a nice honey hue, but i may recover them along with the couch at some point.

i just love the color scheme the folks over at young house love created for this mood board:

and i think it would look g-r-e-a-t! in our living room.  we have the chocolate colored floors, the straw colored walls, blue green in the kitchen and the bedroom, and i think the yellow/orange would really brighten the room up!

today while we were out at the used furniture store, berry hill home, i saw these cute wood paintings that i thought would be fun in our teal guest room: 

 that might be a fun project!

for the summer, of course. 

inspired

i keep looking at our guest room.  m picked the color, and it's sooo beautiful!  i knew i married the right guy.  :)  it reminds me of the markers i loved so much when i was a kid.

 

now all i can think about is how awesome a bohemian-ish patchy quilt would look on that bed.  now, when something that seems awesome pops into my head, i just can't get it out.  it literally consumes me. so i went ahead and made this little sample from images of different fabrics on fabric.com just so you could see what i'm thinking.

m would probably say it's too colorful, to which i would say,

"bah!"

there's no day like a snow day

to get things accomplished!  luckily i had two snow days in a row, and m and accomplished quite a bit.

i made this hat... it's the first thing i've knit for myself, and the color just makes me happy every time i look at it!  

 and speaking of turquoise, m and i painted the guest room a rockin' teal:

i made these lacey curtains from fabric i got on clearance for $1!

they look nice and airy.

i've got the kitchen painted the new blue, and it looks ssssooo much nicer

i can't wait to get the cabinets finished and put a counter top in there; it will be a great space!

 and i began making some curtains for our bedroom out of this

beautiful damask fabric

we plan to paint the walls grey

the windows in here bother me a bit because they are not centered on the wall 

(previous owners added a deeper closet that takes up part of the wall)

 but i think if we do the curtains properly, you won't be able to tell... what do you think?

 quite a lot of work for a couple of days, no?