Milkglass was made for Easter!

Far more show than tell, I simply had to offer a peek at the pretty that's been hatching throughout my house this Easter. Simply put, milkglass was absolutely made for Easter time. The texture and the milky white looks so fresh and inviting next to the pastel colors of the season. So here are a few pics:

Beautiful On the Breakfast Table

 

This Fenton pedestal bowl is by far my absolute favorite piece in my collection. I can't think of a nicer nest for this charming swirl of moss and pastel colored Easter eggs.

Living room built-ins on a budget

I've had a design project rattling around in my brain for quite some time now. I'm slowly (very slowly) putting my living room/sitting room/room without a TV together and would really love to include the timeless elegance of built-ins into the décor. At the same time, I don't want to pay the high price for said timeless elegance, which is where my project comes in.


After spending a lot of time on sites like Ikeahacker.com and Ikeafans.com I've come to look at certain bits of Ikea furniture as raw materials, most notably, The Billy Bookcase. The basic Billy start out at a pretty low price and come in a few different colors and finishes, which makes them super versatile and budget-friendly at the same time. This would likely explain why the Billy bookcase turned into Built-ins project seems to be so popular. It also allows for some great personalization with some paint or wallpaper. I've even seen the standard matching shelves swapped out for glass shelves.


With my planned project, I'm thinking about adding some bead board wallpaper and molding to a few standard size Billys, along with some short doors to enclose the bottom shelves. Somewhere down the road, I'd also like to add some jadeite door pulls, to add a bit of antique chic. I have a few other ideas planned, but haven't come to a final conclusion. 



Here are a few Billy bookcase projects that I find inspiring:

 
This is a proper built-in, found at MagChunk http://www.magchunk.com/2009/11/12/more-built-in-bookcases/
 I'm loving the look of the entire room, really.

I can't remember where I found this picture. If anyone recognizes it, please let me know so that I can cite proper credit. I love that simplistic display choices.


 


And a great blog with lots of creative uses for bookcases, Billy included - http://www.simpleeffects.com/blog/?p=362




 

If you're considering a Billy built-ins project, Ikea has a great planner online.Give it a try!

http://www.ikea.com/ms/en_CA/rooms_ideas/planner_billy/index.html

 

Inspiration board makers revisited

After my initial post about an online inspiration board maker I'd found, I've decided to revisit the topic and expand. No longer in wedding planning mode, I now look at inspiration boards as a great way to plan a party theme, holiday decorating scheme or even to design a room Here are the different boards I've looked at, both online and offline:


Online Inspiration board makers


Polyvore

Great for putting outfits together, but that's primarily it. No home décor or party planning option available. You click and drag articles of clothing/accessories from a pre-populated library to create a fairly freeform board.

Modern hobnail gorgeousness

I know, I know, the pink party was days ago and I've yet to post an update. It's coming, I promise to regale you with tales of both Piny Party win and fail. However, in the meantime, I simply had to drop in to share an ab fab finding.

Look at this gorgeous blue hobnail tumbler from Anthropologie!

It's so bright, so beautiful, so bumpy!! I so love hobnail things. While this isn't a piece of antique milk glass, this is a wonderful, relatively inexpensive piece that would do wonderfully in a set, or on its own, filled with puffy white flowers. I'm telling you, had I seen this around this time last year, the centerpieces at my wedding would have looked a little bit better different.

Living room inspiration: Beachy, blue-greens and built-ins

So the living room/dining room redesign continues. After bathing the walls in a wonderfully serene blue-green I need some more inspiration for the next design phase. I haven't said much about this project, mainly because I'm still trying to get my thoughts together. Generally, I have a good idea of vibes and feels that I want in a room. But when I get down to execution, I'm all over the place. More about the LR/DR revamp in a few days.

Have mercy, I’m in love with a pillow!

As the pink party draws ever nearer, I've been on the lookout for a new pink tablecloth. Not just any tablecloth (of course), but the most divine, squee-worthy table cloth imaginable (at a reasonable price). In my searching I stumbled up a site called Tonic Living …and just about fainted dead out of my chair!

Tonic living specializes in retro fabrics, pillows, upholstery, outdoor fabrics etc, and even better (for me anyway), they're located right here in Toronto! Double, triple and even quadruple squee! They have the most fabtastic patterns reminiscent of prints popularized in the 50's, 60's and 70's. But wait, there's more. They also have organic fabrics!
So of course, I'm no longer visiting Tonic Living in search of tablecloth fabric, I'm shopping for my in progress living room redesign. I've totally fallen in love with this pillow:

This other pillow

And this fabric

Right now, somewhere our mother's are collectively gagging and wondering why the heck we want old lady pillows in our houses. It's funny how retro adoration seems to skip a generation.

Check out Tonic Living

Best Interior Paint EVER!

Like many a Domestinista, I absolutely LOVE decorating and redecorating, (and re redecorating) the rooms in my house. There's nothing like coming up with a brand new color palette, plotting the room organization and filling the space with fabulous bits of furni, tschotskes and other delightful bits.

However, and again like many diva-licious Domestinistas, I'm not so into the toil certain aspects of a redesign can require. Applying interior paint would of course be at the top of my list. I am so not a fan. But what pulls a new room design together more than splashing the walls with a new hue. So hottie hubby and I took ourselves down to the local HoPo , following some lengthy paint chip recon on my part –which he for some reason wanted no part of (who doesn't love staring at rack after rack of similarly colored paint chips?) and selected our interior paint.

Prior to painting, the interior paint in our living room and dining room was a hideous baby poop brown color that the previous homeowners probably got on special, as its hideousness had infected several other rooms as well.

We'd learned from a previous painting adventure that primer was a must have , particularly since I wanted my new interior paint to be a creamy blue green that was much lighter in color. I had also learned from the great kitchen paint of '09 that priming adds another layer of work and I hate it. It messes with my need for instance gratification.

Enter the most fabtastic interior paint ever! CIL Smart is interior paint and primer in one and I LOVE it! It's fantastic, and the only paint I'll ever use from now on. It's thicker than regular paint and apparently very scrubbable; although I can't comment on that aspect just yet.

CIL Smart interior paint helped us take our rooms from that horrible dark brown to a wonderful, creamy pale color in only two coats!

At the cash register, CIL Smart costs about $10 more than CIL's basic interior paint; however, in the end, I think it actually costs less overall. With primer build into the CIL Smart interior paint, you save money on a can or two of primer. You also don't have to buy a second paint tray or tray liner. You don't have to use a second brush/roller or waste water on cleaning a brush/roller before reusing it for your paint. You spend less time painting, which equals less time with the lights on in that room, which equals lower utility cost (ok, I may be reaching there). Lol.

The biggest savings is in effort and time spent painting, which I happen to think is the most important.

So, if you're planning to purchase some interior paint sometime in the near future, maybe give CIL Smart a try. It's very worth it!

http://www.cil.ca/products/brands/cil-smart3.html

Globally Concious Home Decor

With so many eyes on Africa this summer, now is the perfect time to introduce you to one of my favorite new home decor and gift giving finds online. The site is called Aid to Artisans and they help create business opportunities for global artisans living in 3rd world countries. Artisans are provided assistance with product development, business training and given access to the world market. One of those markets happens to be Aid to Artisans own online store.

I have been positively salivating over the gorgeous handmade delights in ATA's online store. Right now (with the option to change my mind, of course) I'm pretty sure that these exquisite Carved Wood Sugar Bowls from Mozambique are my absolute favorite!

Although this beautiful Mexican Ceramic Pot is running a very close second...

...closely followed by this super cute set of Cimberre Wood Bowls.

Have a look at the rest of Aid to Artisan's online store