I learned a few years ago to not chase after happiness but to instead seek peace in my life, and that mindset has changed the way I decorate too. I just finished a refresh of a space in long need of one, the downstairs study which has felt very hodge podge for a long time.…
Today is the last day the holiday decorations stay up, then I’m packing them all away tomorrow. Just one more day to relax and look at the twinkle lights and ornaments before all the garlands and wreaths leave the house. I’m spending the day sipping tea while it rains all day outside. Later I’m making…
Mid December holiday greetings! Our daughter came home from college yesterday so now it’s a week of Christmas cheer for us, wrapping gifts and baking treats. My daughter loves to cook so I gladly handed the reins to her for making dinners this week. I finished a little bit more decorating, I moved our tree…
We’re in full preparations for hosting Thanksgiving and I’m off to buy the staples and pick up the turkey tomorrow. We took on two home improvement projects last week, having the gutters and eaves and shutters of our house painted before the rains come. We also retextured and repainted the study and I love the…
Several months ago I started making state shaped ornaments with raw clay at my ceramics studio for a local market where I’m selling art prints and ceramics in early December. Those ceramic ornaments were fired in a kiln, however I thought to myself perhaps I could recreate them with air dry clay for those who…
I’m in Florida this weekend checking up on our house and enjoying the sunshine before returning to California on Tuesday. Friday I went to the sand sculpting competition on Siesta Key beach, what fun to see so much creativity rising from the white sand of one of my most favorite places on earth. I posted…
Do you all recall the Halloween village I made back in September? Well…. surprise, I’ve reinvented it as a Christmas village. I hinted at the end of that post that this would be a great idea and sure enough, it was! This DIY Christmas village is easy to make and adds seasonal touch to any…
I had a crazy productive week. I staged a home for a design client which took several days of work, and also released new holiday art prints for the season, whew! I’ve started a few DIY holiday craft projects too, I’ll be sharing those throughout November. Next weekend I’m taking a quick trip to Florida…
It’s raining this weekend here in Northern California which is always a relief when wildfires are a concern. It takes the edge off to have a bit of moisture in the air, and also puts me in the mood to make fall soup and get cozy under a throw blanket. I don’t have any plans…
Whenever I consider a dark tone paint color, my eye always goes straight to the olive green or slate blue families. Rarely do I consider a dark red or deep burgundy as a color to layer on walls, but that’s a personal preference. I will admit that wine and burgundy tones do have an allure,…
I read that the average American household has 300,000 items in it. When I decided to take on the thirty day challenge of playing the Minimalism Game during the month of September, I was more than ready to purge my home of unnecessary objects because of the excessive amount of things I was holding on…
I’m in Paris this week staying in a very small but very chic Parisian apartment filled with light and plants in the Latin Quarter. I haven’t been back in seven years so it’s lovely to be here in the fall running around town with my girlfriends. Parisian design has mastered the timeless yet contemporary mix…
I leave for Paris tomorrow, I’m excited to be showing it off to a friend who has never been. After a few days we will be in the Netherlands exploring that country. I’ll be posting about in on Instagram stories if you want to see what those places look like in autumn. We’re starting on…
With so many horizontal and vertical planes and sharp angles in a home, an interior arch provides welcome contrast in design. The eye is naturally drawn to the curvaceous and expanded shape of them. Classically speaking, successful arch construction depends on a series of wedge shaped blocks precisely cut so that they press firmly against…