Things that make me smile while brushing my teeth.

Gah. I LOVE this small shopping idea! I am definitely going to join you on this challenge.  I've been trying to get my holiday shopping done early this year and have already made purchases at many a small online shop (here, here and here if you are interested!).  I also put this gorgeous planter and this snazzy kindle case on my Xmas wishlist. Whoo to the hoo.

So D, I wanted to fill you in on our new decor for the bathroom that we worked on over Thanksgiving. Some of it you've seen, some you haven't! Here are the pics:

We wanted to keep it simple and clean since the bathroom is small and very white. Oh yeah and as always, we were on a budget!  The bug/butterfly prints are from (shocker) Housing Works and we're $12/ea and came framed.  I painted the frames gray.  The green blowfish dish is also from Housing Works and a steal at $6.00. And my favorite, the last little framed photo, was 30 cents for the cost of printing the print that we placed in old frame. Total: $30.30!

For our readers: this pic is of Deweese and me from my wedding day.  Nick and I love all of the candids our photographer captured and decided that they needed to make an appearance in more highly traffic-ed areas of the apt (vs. a box in our closet and on a DVD in our desk). BAM! Twice daily brushing-teeth smiles now in action.

Love,

PS: It is really hard to photograph a teeny tiny NYC bathroom! Hope you get the idea of the space!

Shopping Small

Blythe,

What a lovely evening! The photos of August from La Buena Vida are sick. What a dreamy atmosphere and HAPPY BIRTHDAY NICKY! Thanks for the tip on the Eames documentary too, will have to add it to my queue! I can't wait to see all your apartment updates from this past weekend. Everything looked wonderful when Jeff and I stopped by for lunch on Friday.

Since Jeff and I were in the car most of the day Friday, I totally avoided all the Black Friday mania. I gotta say, I didn't miss it. I know I missed some mega sales, but I didn't miss the hysteria. And I wasn't even tempted by the 85 Cyber Monday! emails I received yesterday. SO unlike me, but it was just all so overwhelming! Maybe I'm losing my touch.

Admittedly, this ad made me think a little about the gifts I'd like to buy this season and I decided to challenge myself, and Jeff, to try to buy most of our Christmas gifts at local small businesses. No big box stores, no Amazon, nada. My goal is to stick strictly to local DC and Louisville shops and Etsy of course, the ultimate small business consortium. And if I do find something I want to purchase from a giant online retailer, I'll try to source it locally first.

What do you think? Is it doable?

For our DC readers, here's DCist's Local Holiday Shopping Guide: #1(Food) and #2 (Etsy). And don't forget two of my personal faves: Proper Topper and Good Wood.

And for our Louisville readers, stop by my two favorites: Louisville Stoneware and Scout!

Be sure to check out our Etsy faves from the past year on our Diggin' page for ideas!

Readers: What are some of your favorite small businesses for gifting?

xo,

Night Out in NYC

Hi Deweese!

How are you? It was such a treat to see you, if only for a few hours over pizza on your way home from Mass.! So, I have some major apartment projects in the works to share with you, but while they are still "in progress", I thought I'd tell you about a fun little date night that Nick and I had last weekend. As you know, it was Nick's 30th bday and so last Saturday night we went out just the two of us. It had been forever since we had a date night, and it was really nice.

First we went to dinner at August, which I read about on one of our favorite blogs, La Buena Vida. (you gotta check out the photos from that post...beautiful!). The food was delicious (best risotto I've ever had), and the atmosphere was even better. I definitely recommend this restaurant for a nice date or a place to have a special evening of any sort!

Then we walked over to IFC to see a new documentary called Eames: The Architect and Painter:

As you can see here and more so here, Nick and I have a couple of Eames replicas in our home.  Nick is definitely the bigger Eames fan in our little family, so this was the perfect film for us to see on his birthday weekend.  I learned in the film that the Eames motto was “the best for the least for the most”. I thought this was interesting considering what the price of an Eames piece has become.   I thought the film was great, but there was so much to explore with this couple and I felt they breezed through a lot of things that I would have liked to learn more about. Sigh. Maybe I'm just a nerd!


Love,

PS: This is so awesome. So Awesome.

Happy Deweese!

I Love Lamp

Hiya D and Meggie V!

Glad to hear that you are having fun in MA with the in-laws and our northern amigos.  I've been meaning to tell you that while I was with my in-laws last weekend, I scored these two beauties at my favorite Maryland thrift store:

Apparently it was 50% off lamps or something, so these came to a total of $18.00.

For the pair.

Oh la la!

However, Nick is not a fan of the lamps. I agree with my him to a certain extent, they are both in the danger zone of looking like they came within a package deal including two end tables and a couple of matching loveseats, eeeespecially the blue one. So we'll see. They need shades (maybe a DIY like this?) and a proper place in my apartment before their real judgement day. Stay tuned!

Love,

PS: The subject of this post is dedicated to this.

Meggie V!

Blythe,

That photo is too much. Too, too much.

Look who I found last night... wandering the streets of the South Shore....

Meggie V! Ok, she wasn't wandering, but we had a really fun girls night at this cute Mexican place called Salsas in Hingham. (This photo-of-the-day theme is turning into a Hingham, MA restaurant tour!)

xo,

The Original Hipster?

Hi Deweese,

We are all thinking of Uncle Joe! And are glad to hear that you are enjoying burgers made by Marky Mark.  Dude knows his region.  For old times sake, watch this.

 To keep with the trend of Nick's birthday, here is a photo of my husband, circa mid-1980s:

 

Ironic glasses, asymmetrical mop-top... was Nick the original hipster?

Love, 

PS: I've been waiting to post that picture for a long time. A very long time.

Wahlburgers

Jeff and I had a recent change of Thanksgiving plans. Unfortunately Jeff's Great Uncle Joe isn't doing too hot, so we decided to come up to Boston for Thanksgiving instead of Louisville. Jeff and I are working from his parents' dining room table today (which is really fun) and we decided to have lunch at Marky Mark's new burger joint which happens to be within walking distance from the dining room table. Lucky us! The burgers were delish!

And check out the cool light fixture!

Now if I just had some Old Bay popcorn for desert!

xo,

Old Bay Popcorn

Hi Everyone!

With the holiday weekend coming up, Deweese and I decided this is a Photo of the Day kinda week.  So here's mine!

Nick celebrated a BIG birthday this weekend. That's right, the grande tres-cero.  On Sunday we had a few friends over for to watch the Washington Redskins and some enjoy chili, beer and a special treat: homemade Old Bay Popcorn!  It was very tasty and brought a little bit o' Maryland to the par-tay.  It was the perfect fall Sunday.

xo, 

Phone-A-Friend: Paula's All Purpose Room

Now for the wildly anticipated 'All Purpose Room' installment of the Paula's Place: A Phone-A-Friend Mini-Series! 

Last week we wrote about Paula's bedroom and this week we're headed around the corner, so to speak, to Paula's All Purpose Room (APR).  Here's a reminder of what Miss P is lookin' for:

I would like to make the little den (with small leather sofa) an APR (All Purpose Room).. but, mostly for the lil one to play.. since we're always on the floor, I'm looking for floor pillows that are both kidsy, but sophisticated! Love this pattern. 

Here's the lil' den and Paula's fave fabric from OUR fave Marimekko.

Since neither of us have APRs, or kids for that matter, we trolled the interwebs (read: pinterest) for some inspiration. Below are a few pictures that piqued our interest because they are kid friendly, AND we feel like an adult could spend time in these rooms without wanting to poke their eyes out.

Who doesn't want to hang out with a giant slumbering teddy bear?

Paula mentioned in her email that she is looking for some great 'kidsy' floor pillows. Below are a few options that we think are kidsy AND sophisticated. You can chose a pattern you like, and then mix in coordinating solid colors in different shapes and sizes. Paula, you can also buy the Marimekko fabric you love and send it to this etsy retailer and have her make custom floor cushions. SUWHEET!

One, Two and Three

And for a more sophisticated option, we chose some fun graphic floor pillows that are on trend, but also great patterns and shapes for le kiddos. They acutally kinda remind of us our favorite Wee Gallery art cards.

One, Two and Three

And now a question for our readers: Are these stone/rock pillows the coolest or ugliest thing you've ever seen? We're stumped.

via

Now go out and buy some cute elastic-waist-band pants... Turkey Day is just around the corner!

xo,

China Cabinet Challenge 2011

Dear Deweese,

The cabinets look wonderful! I love them -- such an awesome built-in apartment feature you scored, girl.  As for painting the insides, DO IT. In fact, I've been wanting to do the exact same thing to my cabinet, too! For the exact same reason. So let's make this a lil' 75th and Sedgwick project, shall we?

In terms of yours, I love the coral idea AND the paper (I want to frame that paper).  Hmm, you've got such great stuff though, I wonder if a solid color will allow it all to shine a bit more?  I think the coral will be great because you've used it in some areas of your kitchen but not every wall.

I'm thinking navy for mine (psst: see pics of my cabinet here and here). Thoughts? The room where its located now has a few navy accents, but is otherwise pretty neutral. Since this cabinet is traveling with me when I leave, I'm thinking that it's gotta be a color that will work well with lots of spaces. Navy is a good choice, right? Its so classic, its almost a neutral.  Also, I think it will contrast nicely with my gold trimmed china.

I thought I'd share some inspiration shots I found on Pinterest:

Then again, this pattern looks great!

Love the green. We gotta go saturated.

I think these shelves are glass, but I bet I could achieve the same all-over color look by painting not just the back but the entire board. What do you plan on doing?

Some orange inspiration for you! Yours will be a bit pinker, though, right? 

Some inspiration for me. I love this greener version above, but I think I'm gonna go straight navy.

So, D, meet back here in a few weeks to show off our work?

Love,

China

Miss Blythe,

GAH, you gotta submit those photos to a contest or something, so beautiful. Maine is the only New England state I haven't visited and those photos make me want to drop everything and go today! Cait and Joe look like the happiest couple on the planet. Adore.

I recently did a lil' work on our so-called china cabinets and I wanted to send you pictures of the update. When we moved in 4 years ago, I kinda just stuffed a bunch of things in the cabinets (part of our eat-in kitchen) and never paid attention to them again. Then last year when we got married and received tons of beautiful gifts to display, I was too overwhelmed to figure out where to put anything.

So a couple of weekends ago, I got out some of our wedding gifts and reorganized the cabinets. Here's the result...

Lots of gorgeousness from Louisville Stoneware where my best friend Emily works. Plus the gold salad plates that my Mom bought me as a shower gift. I was obsessed with this pattern when we were registering for china, but it was WAY outta a price range I was comfortable with. Aren't they gorgeous? We ended up going with the more reasonably priced, and just as gorgeous Jaipur pattern from Macy's, which is still in boxes. (It's metallic in real life, the photo doesn't do it justice).

ANYWAY... I'm happy with the new china cabinet arrangement but I feel like it needs a little punch. What are your thoughts on me painting the inside of the cabinets the same coral color that is on the kitchen walls? OR, I could maybe get some great paper from Paper*Source and paper the backs of the cabinets? I want all the glass to "pop" instead of getting lost in all the white. See what I mean?

What do you think?

xo,

PS... If anyone is interested in learning more about Louisville Stoneware, just call the number on the website and ask for Emily. Tell her Deweese sent you!

PPS... I'm dying for these bookends.

My Brother's Wedding

Hi Deweese,

So good to see you, too! The trip to DC was so much fun. Ok, so Being Elmo is even further up the list now. Also, Nick and I are totally seeing the Muppets over Thanksgiving, too! So much feel-good fun.

In other feel-good news, I'd like to share with all of our readers that last weekend my brother got married! He and his wonderful wife invited a small group of loved ones to a ceremony and party in York, ME overlooking the Atlantic. Here is just a small sampling of photos taken by their wedding photographer, Nick!

 

It was such a memorable night. I felt so lucky to be a part of it! 

Love,