It's the Most Crazy Time of the Year

This time of year is over the top for a designer. We want to get our clients' projects and homes ready for their guests and get togethers. In my own case, I even do holiday decorating for a few select clients. We love being able to weave our design aesthetic into interiors we have completed, always trying to keep things new and fresh. Here is one of the several trees we did this season. We wanted a bit of "Winter Wonderland" kind of feel, so we added blue and aqua and flocked greenery to the tree. It turned out very nicely.

This is one of two 12 foot trees we do each year as well. 

While all this holiday cheer was happening, we also have a nice master bath redesign/remodel project happening. We are taking it from brown and drab to clean and classic. 

This is a peek at the shower niches in herringbone marble set into white subway tile. It's a look that I love!

We are also adding paneled moldings on the walls and curved pediments at the sink and shower areas. We are also adding feet to the cabinets. We are doing this work in-house, which is a special thing that sets us apart. 

And excited is not the word about the Brizo polished nickel faucets and fixtures going in here. 

May I just say, I love this finish ridiculously much!

Meanwhile, with all this happening design-wise, I must admit I am a little challenged with my own holiday decorating at home. 

A look at one of my own trees, standing lit but bare of ornaments. As they say, the shoemaker's children have no shoes!

Oh well, I'll get it all done. I always do. 

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to all our friends, followers, and customers!  May 2012 be the best year ever!

Christmas with a Silver Lining

As I designed this display today for our shop window, it reminded me how much I love using silver, not only during the holidays, but throughout the year. 

I love doing simple, yet elegant displays like this design, using a silver container, garland, a few inexpensive silver ornaments, and a pretty candle.

Mercury glass is another favorite.  It is relatively inexpensive and looks gorgeous lit with candles.

Silver ornaments look beautiful among the green boughs on a Christmas tree. Paired with faux silver berries, it is stunning and classic.

This is another example of using a year-round silver container to hold shiny ornaments for a quick but classic decoration for a table or sideboard.

This is a table setting I did using red transferware, creamware, and silver baby cups from my collection. Using your collections in combination with ornaments or other holiday decor makes the design much more meaningful and personal.

 

Silver containers such as mint julep cups look so pretty containing amaryllis or paperwhites at Christmas time.  I also love the look of this green wreath against the silver-finish mirror.

This is just a beautiful idea using a silver tray, a crystal cloche, faux snow, some pretty ornaments, and pearls.  Easy but so elegant.

Remember to think outside the box with your holiday decorating and don't forget the silver!

Happy Halloween!!

Happy Halloween!!

Daydreaming of Summer....

With the holiday weekend upon us, it got me thinking about getting the house ready for all the family goings-on here at our humble home.  Ideas are plenty, but funds to make all those grand schemes come to life sometimes aren't so large.  But, that doesn't stop me from dreaming and planning, which is really a huge part of the fun anyway, don't you think?  So I compiled a few images from my stash to get you thinking and dreaming along with me about the summer season that spreads before us.

I love greenhouses and conservatories of all kinds and if money were no object I would definitely own one.  Some are really grand and would cost more than my house itself, but some are more in scale with what I think would go with an average-size house, like the one above.  In my fantasy, I would come out here to my garden house with my coffee every morning and tend to all my lovely plants and flowers.  In reality, I have a black thumb, so everything in there would probably be brown and dead.  Oh well, this is a fantasy, remember?

Summer here in the South usually involves using any event as an excuse to throw a hen party, I mean a baby shower or bridal shower, or some other soiree where we can bring out our pretty glasses and dishes, eat tiny little sandwiches, and celebrate friends and family.

I am lucky enough to live by the water so I always love images like this one showing great ways to get close and personal with the water in style.  Just love.

My house doesn't have a big porch, which really surprises me because I love them.  This porch just makes you want to bring a good design magazine and a glass of iced tea and relax.

Now that I am thinking about all this, I realize I don't have a porch swing either.  What was I thinking twenty years ago when we built this house.  I believe this post is bringing me to an epiphany that I need to remedy all these problems in my life before it's too late!

 Or you could always hit the road and go glamping (glamourous camping) in a decked out Airstream like this one.  Again, copious amounts of dollars involved, but still dreaming.

Before I come back to reality I will pretend this is my backyard where I stroll daily.

A nice big screened porch overlooking the water would be wonderful wouldn't it?

Last but not least, while we are thinking of this summer and the Memorial Day holiday, let's remember what it's really all about.

Happy Memorial Day!!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to You All!!!

May 2011 Be the Best Year Ever!!

A New Baby in 1985 and the Elusive Tree Ornament

In late November 1985 I became the proud new mother of my second child, a sweet baby boy.  Needless to say, Christmas shopping had already been done to the best of my hugely pregnant ability.  But the one thing I never managed to pick up that holiday season was the very important Hallmark Baby's First Christmas ornament for the family tree.  A couple of family friends sent gifts with little ornaments attached, but the main Hallmark ornament just never got purchased. Fast forward to 2010.  The aforementioned baby is now almost 25 years old and well on the road of his life.  But every year when I decorate my Christmas tree, complete with the Baby's First Christmas ornaments of his older sister, born in 1983, I feel just a little pang of regret that one little detail got overlooked that year.
Well, my internet surfing skills continue to improve little by little.  I now even can add Ebay to my repertoire of online shopping haunts.  And I can even proudly boast that I sometimes have some killer bidding skills when the item of my desire appears on my screen.
This afternoon I jumped on Ebay to look around and decided to search for that elusive baby ornament.  As if by divine intervention, there it was at the very top of the computer screen.  A vintage 1985 Hallmark Baby's First Christmas Carousel lighted ornament.  No box, but hey, no biggie to me.   NINE minutes left in the auction.  I think I hyperventilated a little.  I quickly logged in and the bidding war was on!  First bid, "you have been outbid, please try again".  Second bid,same bad news.  Next bid, "you are the highest bidder!".  Okay, now the gloves are off.  It has to be mine.  A young mother's regret has to be avenged.  One more click; the countdown begins.  One minute and counting down.  "You won this auction."  I felt victorious and silly all at the same time. 
But I'll tell you one thing, when I hang that little carousel on my tree this Christmas, I will revisit the joy I felt twenty five years ago rocking that baby boy in my arms.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day!

(I love this image, but don't have the source.  If you know, please let me know.)

The Week Between

How do you spend the week between Christmas and New Year's?  I try to take a little time off and just relax.  When my children were still at home it was a week to just be together without the hustle and bustle of shopping and holiday decorating.  Now that the nest is empty, my husband and I still try our best to put work on hold if possible and spend a little time around our own hearth.  We took out the gas logs a few years back and went back to a real wood-burning fireplace.  It's a fairly cold night in East Tennessee tonight with lows in the 20's.  So I will sit next to this fire with a stack of design books and magazines and dream about a new year and new designs.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Real or Faux Christmas Tree?

my tree Christmas 2008

I'm curious.  Do you have a real tree at your house for Christmas or a faux one?  I now do a fake tree after many years of only having a real tree because it enables me to put the decorations up earlier.  But I must admit nothing takes the place of that fresh-tree smell to put you in the spirit of the holidays.