plum, pomegranate and/or amethyst?

my husband came home from work today to find the front door painted purple. sometimes i feel bad for him having to live with my visions :)

office and christmas sneak peek

i have been busy moving my office downstairs this week, that is when i haven't been asleep in bed! my old office was in an extra bedroom upstairs, and the new space is in the front living room downstairs. i wasn't sure of the idea at first, but now i love the space. sunlight floods the room and i actually want to be more creative in this room - which is a struggle for me these days! it's not all finished, but i have added some photos as a sneak peak.

the huge yard sale lamp i blogged about a few weeks ago has received a new coat of white paint and some crystals and looks perfect on my glass ikea desk.

a few years ago, we built bookshelves which line one entire wall of the room, which i am very happy about since i have a lot of art supplies!

and here is my first order of creative business in the new space. i have a holiday show coming up at the end of november and i hope the shoppers love these christmas tree ornaments as much as i do. the old sheet music and metallic pipe cleaners create such a vintage look.

what in the world?

i make it a point not to put my kids on this blog, but this time, i couldn't resist. i pick my cute adorable munchkin #2 up from pre-k yesterday and they handed me an envelope full of photos. let me state for the record that these are photos we did NOT purchase and did NOT even know they were taking. in fact, we are kind of an oddity that we don't have professional photos of our kids taken. i prefer a candid journalistic style when it comes to photographs and am actually quite frightened by any posed ones i see, and rarely if ever buy school shots. that being said, seriously, what were these "professionals" thinking! munchkin #2 told me that the pants slipped on over the ones they were wearing. phew! for a second, i envisioned 20 little kids stripped down all waiting for their turn in these polyester pants. honestly, i can't stop laughing. this has got to be the funniest thing i have ever seen. from the grecian stand to the fake ivy to his bare feet it is a total train wreck.

but i have to admit that my little ones cuteness still shines through.

oh, and the best part, my husband tells me that when i was in london, they called him into the school to show him different shots they took and one pose had my son at a baby grand piano in this outfit. to quote rachel zoe, "i die"!

treasury and me

i was on the etsy homepage in a treasury yesterday and i didn't even know it! thankfully a very sweet etsy seller emailed me this screen grab. to anyone closely tied to etsy, you know what a big deal this is. to a non-etsian, let's just say that it is a huge validation that the work you create is well liked.
now i will get back to doing a little happy dance :)

newest project and obsession

i found this sewing machine table for $15 dollars at a yard sale recently. i absolutely love it's retro lines and i can't wait to get started in its rehab. lately i have been having the hardest time repainting furniture. not the actual painting part, but the fact that when i am finished, it doesn't seem to be very durable. this time, i think i am going to bite the bullet and have it professionally painted. i found a shop in town that will finish your piece with a custom colored lacquer. perfect! now the question is "how much is this luxury going to cost me?"

christmas stockings and treats

here is a sneak peek at some christmas stockings that i will be adding to my etsy shop shortly. the stockings are made up of chenille, candy cane inspired piping and vintage buttons all lovingly hand sewn by yours truly.

a little love and a flower sticker

i bought this table at a yard sale in the spring. i already have an old metal typewriter table, the kind where the sides fold up, that i painted red as a bed side table for my son's room. when i saw this table, i knew i had to have it as well, plus the $3 price tag didn't hurt. the coolest part is that you can pull up on the black handles and the table folds in half, very easily and it becomes really skinny. the top of the table did come with some rusty scratched parts, but i thought i could spray paint it and all would be good. upon closer inspection, i decided not to spray paint it because the entire piece is held together with grommets, not screws. because of the grommets, i wouldn't be able to take it apart to get a clean paint job.

instead, i ordered a lovely vinyl flower decal from this etsy store and positioned it so the decal covered as many of the scratches as it could. i also had some left over white vinyl mini circles that i placed around the top for more visual interest.

i love how it turned out, i am just bummed that i didn't take a close-up before photo!

fall and fairs

this weekend was the bi-annual cotton pickin' fair in gay, georgia, which meant i spent all day saturday going to yard sales along the fair route. i love heading out early in the morning with a packed lunch and a car full of blankets and tools because you never know what you will find and need to take apart to fit in your car! i found this amazing blue carnival glass lamp at a little sale off the beaten path - literally, my car is filthy from the gravel road. i know exactly how to update it and i can't wait to share photos of its transformation. we have been toying with the idea of moving my office to the first floor so i can be more available to the little munchkins in this house. i have been hesitant because i couldn't see the space in my head, but now, thanks to this lamp, i have the entire room planned out.

my biggest purchase of the day was an old 6ft by 4 foot metal shelving rack. i have been wanting to change my festival displays up a bit and this piece is perfect. it has 5 shelves, each progressively deeper as you reach the bottom. the shelves will showcase my shades perfectly while getting them off the table away from little sticky hands :) the best part is the thin metal strips that i can slide custom designed pricing tags and Linwood Avenue signage into. we finally figured out how to collapse the piece and get it into my trunk with only minor damage to my car (ooops). i am hoping that my plan to bungee it onto the top rack of my car on festival days will go more smoothly! now, the only question i have is what color i should paint it!!!

custom made and beautiful

i am loving this batch of aprons i recently finished for a custom order. they are from one of amy butler's fabric collections and the different patterns work together beautifully (as she always plans!).