I know I said I'd be back yesterday with a real post but I'm pretty backed up right now with work & trying to figure out the childcare situation, so I need a little break.  We toured a couple of daycare/ preschools  yesterday and I'm feeling pretty good about 1 so we'll see how it goes.  For now I'll just leave you with an image I got from one of my favorite reads, Head Over Heels.    It's perfect for the beginning of Fall and I cannot get over that velvet.  So sumptuous & beautifully aged!!  (I'm not sure I've actually used "sumptuous" in a sentence before but could think of no other word!)

xoxo,

lauren

Taking the Plunge

We're off today to check out a part-time daycare/ preschool for our little guys.  I'm sort of mixed about it, but mostly excited.  It will be 3 days a week and my mom will be watching them on a 4th day.   I'm attempting tp take the 5th day off so we'll see how it goes.  Christian's three years old and is dying for "friends" and loves classes and that sort of thing so I think it'll be great for him.  I worry a little bit about Justin (8 months) but I'm sure he'll be okay too.

We're really hoping that with almost full-time daycare, that we'll be able to get a bit more of a separation of work & home.  I hope my expectations aren't too high but I really feel right now that "something's gotta give."  If anyone has any insight out there about all of this, I'd love to hear your thoughts. 

I'll be back today later with a real post!!

 

Seasonal Change

With Labor Day fast approaching, the kids back in school, and our first home football game (which they won!) it can only mean the seasonal change is right around the corner.  The days are getting shorter and the nights are crisp and cool so my decor has got to change.  I have had this wreath on the door all summer.

But, as much as I love the beach, I wanted to give the front door a little more of a harvest feel.  

This wreath was super easy to make.  I just took two different colored sunflower picks and took a sunflower off of the grouping of sunflowers with pliers.  I took the two different colored sunflowers and wove them into the top of a 12-inch grapevine wreath.  It looked a little bare so, I had picked up two sunflower picks at Joann Fabrics (these picks had leaves, berries, and wheat on them) and I stuck one of those on each side of the sunflowers and that gave it the look I wanted.  I was trying to go for simplicity with a touch of color. I love the seasonal changes and will always have a lot of that in this blog.

I will remind you of my CSN $45 gift certificate giveaway.  Click here to enter. 

 I will also remind you to enter any giveaways you might be hosting to Atticmag's giveaway link up for their Giveaway Friday. Click here to enter.  They are also hosting a backsplash giveaway if you need a new backsplash!

 I will link to these parties:

Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch 

Just Something I Whipped Up at The Girl Creative

Making the World Cuter at making the World Cuter

Market Yourself Monday at Sumo's Sweet Stuff

Show Off Your Cottage Monday at The House in the Roses

Make It For Monday at Cottage Instincts

Toot Your Horn Tuesday at Silly Little Sparrow

Get Your Craft on Tuesdays  at Today's Creative Blog

Show and Tell Wednesday at Blue Cricket Design

Whatever Goes Wednesday at Someday Crafts

Transformation Thursday  at The Shabby Chic Cottage

Corolla & "my" Beach House

We're finishing up our week here in Corolla, North Carolina and I DO NOT WANT TO LEAVE.  I love this place.  we've been coming here for summer vacations ever since I was a kid and I even spent a summer working here with one of my best friends, Alissa, at the local sports bar, Sundogs.   

Here's a picture of Sundogs and its appearance is deceiving.  It's so much fun!!!  (If you ever come here, it's in the front of the Food Lion Shopping Center and gets going late night.  There's a huge tiki bar inside.)

During the 4 months that I worked at Sundogs (a college summer) I made some amazing friends who we get to come back & see every year...

It was a late night...  Nat Hall (on my left) & Jerry Cooper (on my right) used to bartend at Sundogs and play music all over the Outer Banks.  (Jerry's since moved & is now living with his wife in SC)...  I worked there 8 years ago and I've never looked at Corolla the same since.  It was interesting to get the "local" perspective after vacationing there for so long.  Honestly, I'd recommend having kids work at least a summer at their vacation spot because you really just do get a whole different flavor for it.  You respect it in a different way.  You see all that goes on behind the scenes and you appreciate it more.  (And, you always having friends to come back to!)

...The only types of pics Dave & I usually get together are the hand-holding the camera kind:

So, as I was saying, I do not want to leave this place:

Here's our beach house this year:

I'm not going to show you the inside BUT I'll show you what I wish it was:

Check out the lower level entry:

{Image via House of Turquoise)

And the dining area:

{Image via Head over Heels}

And the living room- oh my goodness!!!

{Design by SR Gambrel}

And "my" bathroom:

I LOVE this hammock which sits on the deck:  (really)

The bunk room:

{image unknown}

And my bedroom:

{Design by SR Gambrel}

Here's the walk up to the beach:  (Now back to reality ;)

Christian's having the best time.  He & my grandmother built this fortress:

Dave & my little sister Morgan (13 years old) enjoying the surf:

And Justin relaxing in his stroller:

I could literally dedicate an entire post to my son's thighs.  I CANNOT get over them.  They are so insanely squeezable and kissable and...  I'm going to spare you but it's hard for me to stop ;)

So anyway, have an amazing weekend and we will be enjoying the rest of ours right here:

Thyme-Sauteed Pork Chops with Apple Slices

The greatest thing about having herbs in your garden is actually finding a way to use them.  This recipe caught my eye years ago when I first started growing herbs and I make it every year when thyme is full in the garden.  The recipe source is Martha Stewart's Quick Cook 1983.  

Ingredients:

1/2 cup flour 

salt and pepper to taste

8 extra-thin (1/2-inch thick) loin pork chops

4 tablespoons of butter

4 Tablespoons of olive oil

16 sprigs fresh thyme, or 2 tablespoons dried thyme

2 Apples (Martha suggests Granny Smith or McIntosh) peeled, cut in 1/4-inch slices

  (I used 4 apples and I will use any variety I have on hand.  These apples were Jonagold,  they are fantastic cooked like this.)

1. Combine the flour with salt and pepper.  Lightly dredge the pork chops in the flour.
2. Heat half the butter and oil in a large skillet.  Saute' half the chops for 5 minutes on each side.  While the chops are cooking, put some of the thyme under each chop so the herb will stick to the meat.  Remove the chops and keep warm.

Here is a picture of my pork chops.  I brown them on one side and before I turn them over I will put the thyme under the chop.  

 Here the thyme is under the chop.  This prevents the flour coating from sticking and it gives the chop a great flavor.

3.  Add remaining oil and butter to the skillet and cook the rest of the chops the same way.      Remove them and keep warm.

4.  Using the same skillet, saute' the apples for 2-4 minutes, or until soft but not mushy.    

     Arrange the chops and apples on a serving dish.

Serves: 4-6

 I will link this to Foodie Friday at Designs by Gollum.

Go and visit all to sample all of the great recipes.

Do you need new dinnerware?  Enter to win $45 CSN Gift Certificate!  Click here to enter now!

CSN $45 Gift Certificate Giveaway!

Do you need a new dinnerware ?  How about Corelle?  I use Corelle Country Cottage as my everyday dishes and I wouldn't want anything else.  

Raising three boys, I can vouch for the fact that this dinnerware doesn't break with rough handling.  So, if you need some new dinnerware you are in luck!  I have been contacted by CSN to give one lucky reader a $45 gift certificate to get something wonderful from one of their 200 plus online retail sites.  They have a lot of online merchandise to choose from, some of my favorites are:

http://www.cookware.com/

http://www.dinnerplates.com/
http://www.csnbaby.com/ 
http://www.tailgatingpartysupply.com/ 

You can click on http://www.csnstores.com/  to see how many ways you could spend that gift certificate.  The endless choices of merchandise are amazing. 

To Enter for the $45 CSN gift certificate:

• Just leave a comment saying you would like to win. ( 1 entry) This is mandatory to win.  Always leave your email or make sure it is visible in your profile.

For extra entries after you have done the mandatory entry above:

•  Follow publicly with Google friend connect or let me know if you already are! (2 entries) 
• Post on your website about this giveaway; linking back to this site and let me know that you did.  And, be sure to grab my picture to help advertise it. (2 more entries)

This giveaway is open to US and Canada residents and will end on Sunday, September 5, 2010 at midnight.  Winner will be announced on this blog Monday, September 6, 2010.   I will email the winner.   Feel free to leave your entries in separate comments or all together.  I will add up all the entries and use random.org to draw a winner.  Prizes will be sent directly from CSN to the winner. 

Good luck!  I am so excited to offer you this opportunity!
If the winner doesn't respond after 7 days a new winner will be chosen.

*I did not receive a product or any form of compensation for writing this post.
This giveaway is now closed. 

Sunflower Country Breakfast

As of lately, I have been intrigued by color. I think the seasons inspire me a lot, as does nature in general.  So, the fall colors just keep popping up everywhere.  This little breakfast table is out by the garden.  The riot of color in the flowers playing as the backdrop to my breakfast.  

My centerpiece is some sunflowers in an urn with a pumpkin.  I wrapped some honeysuckle vine around the urn to look like fall foliage.  As much as I try to use Mary Carol Garrity's ( owner of Nell Hill's) tricks for tablescaping, I just can't bring myself to put as much on a table as she does.  I do love her style though.  I might just need a bigger table!

Sunflower plates by Maxcera the pattern is Terra Cotta Sunflower.

Matching mugs for your coffee.

 A little flower on the inside rim of the mug.

Here comes fall!  By the time it finally cools off here, fall has turned rapidly into winter.  So, I like to drag fall out a little.  Once the kids get into school summer seems over.

Thanks for joining me for a little breakfast table by the garden.

I will link to:

 Centerpiece Wednesdays at The Style Sisters

 Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch 

Show and Tell Friday at My Romantic Home
Vignette Fridays  at Color Outside the Lines

 

Decorative Memories in our Core

I often think about patterns from my childhood... Fabrics, tile, wallpapers, even linoleum patterns.  Many of them have really stayed with me over the years and I remember them fairly clearly.  For the ones that are no longer around... I wish I could just have a piece...  A yard or a square foot to look at and remember perfectly. 

The sofa in the photo below was upholstered in a beautiful chinoiserie floral in orangey-pinks, cream and green and was in my grandparents' living room in Honolulu many years ago.  I've seen the photo below of my grandfather & me over the years (and I'm not sure at what point I started consciously thinking of the fabric) but it's just sort of always been one of those fabrics filed away in my mind that I think of every so often and love. 

{My "Geedaddy" & me}

Below is another photo of me in my muumuu on the beloved sofa fabric.

My mom and I moved in with my grandparents to McLean, Virginia (just outside of Washington, DC) when I was 4 years old.  My grandmother has an amazing sense of style and we lived with them for 6 years before moving only a few minutes away. 

{My grandmother whom I called "Beautiful Grandmother" (she told me that was her name ;) and me...  Again, the blue & white Hawaiian print that I'm wearing...  that's one of those fabrics that's so ingrained in my memory that it just feels good to look at.  If I ever had a little girl and found an outfit just like that one, I'd be in Heaven.}

When I find things that remind me of pieces  my grandmother's had over the years, I often buy them on the spot.  They just give me this good feeling. It's almost that feeling you get when you first wake up and you can't quite remember a dream but then you do and it just feels so good.  Does that make sense?

{I bought this Chinoiserie ginger jar flea market lamp the second I saw it because it reminded me of my grandmother's lamps}

It's what it would be like if you could actually grasp a cloud.  (I remember being little and scraping the inside out of an oreo and just holding the white part...  It was strangely satisfying in that same weird way.)  It's the intangibles in life.  And when you finally have them clear in your memory or physically in your hands, its's so oddly satisfying.  I feel this way about prints...

Another one is this vintage blue peacock flower fabric on my Grandma Maestranzi's (my Grandmother on my dad's side) dining room chairs in Antioch, Illinois:

Lucky for me she was a little old Italian grandma who protected everything under oh-so-chic PLASTIC.  It's still perfectly preserved to this day.  (Thanks Grandma!!) 

I'll never forget the cloud wallpaper in my nursery or the pale green vine fabric on my first big girl bed - a canopy bed- at my dad's house.    I remember picking it out at the store. (My parents divorced when I was really young and so I had a bedroom at my mom's and a bedroom at my dad's.)

My mom had this vintage butterfly quilt in cream and earthtones...  I wonder if it's still around?  My Aunt Josephine had these beautiful japanese gardens with stone pagodas that I'll never forget...  My grandmother has a beautiful blue and gold floral throw blanket made by my great grandmother (I think?)...  Terrible linoleum in the kitchen (not picked out by her I don't think) that I used to love & stare at...  It was fun finding shapes in the linoleum and I'd always show people the "two dinosaurs" I'd found throughout the pattern. It's since been replaced and looks so good, but I can't help but miss that pattern.  

...Anyway, I could go on & on (and seriously it's so satisfying recounting the patterns) but I guess what I'm getting at is that these patterns are so ingrained in my mind.  These choices made by my grandmothers & my mom and the people who decorated & accessorized the homes I spent time in really did affect me.  Even at that age, I recogized beautiful & interesting things.  (Some of them were even plastic flowers so I'm not saying they're necessarily beautiful today...  but to me they are.)   I loved looking at them.  The same goes for a lot of the artwork and accessories around the house- things my grandparents had picked up on their extensive travels, knickknacks and china my Grandma Maestranzi collected...  I remember going from tabletop to tabletop in both houses playing with the accessories... 

 

I was an only child for 15 years (my little sister, Morgan, was born 15 years after me when my mom married my stepdad, Tom) so I guess before that, I spent a lot of time alone, exploring the houses, observing everything in them.  To this day I like looking through my grandmother's linen closet at her sheet sets and still get a twinge of excitement when I see the vintage leafy green printed futon being pulled down from the garage.  (This happened when my closest cousins came to visit us and - just like a memory-inducing smell- the sight of that futon still gives me a childish excitement.)

Even as I write, I'm struck by the flood of memories & feeling that seeing or remembering patterns and objects from my past elicits in me.  I am so happy when Christian asks to be lifted up to see something on a shelf- like the little froggy limoge box that sits on our bookshelves.  He gets to hold it and play with it for a little bit before we put it back, just like I used to be allowed to do. 

What we put in our homes today affects our  not only our present, but is also the backdrop for our future memories. If you have kids around noticing the things, you just might be helping to develop their taste, style.  The fabrics and patterns from my past are so ingrained in my memory that I know they've influence my design aesthetic.  As I work on fabrics for the my upcoming fabric line, I'm amazed by how many of my ideas spring directly from the patterns of my past.

To some people, picking the fabric for a throw pillow may be as easy as running to Target and choosing a color that works with their rug...  to me, it's way more than that...  (although the pillow could be from Target! ;)  It has to elicit an emotional response from me or my client.  A fabric I choose is typically somehow tied to the past, memories or a feeling -although I (or they) might not even know it at first...   Designing a home's a big deal to me and those little choices are all a part of the equation.  Your thoughts??