A little Birdie told me...

... that our chandelier is a fabulous place to sit on. So I let him. And a couple of his friends, too. We like living close to nature.









Other "Springification" projects of this past week include:




Paper Streamer Flowers



Pillowcases





And a side table painted in "Pesto" and accessorized with the most amazing flower-knob from Anthropologie

Change of Mind

Remember that grey and white striped rug in the entry way? Yeah. Wasn't feeling it anymore. Way too dark and boring. I wanted something bright and sunny that brings the spring into my house. So I flipped it over and painted the back. I love how it totally changes the mood of the entire room.
Side note: You know you've been taking way too may trips to Home Depot when the guys in the paint department start to treat you like family.

California Cruisin'

In between egg hunts, Easter brunches, barbecues and eating way too much candy, we snuck out and took a long bike ride along the beach. It was perfect.

Room for Creativity

Reason #207 of about one million why I love this house: My own space.











Most of the things in this room like the desk and the shelves I already had before we moved. Even the various picture frames, which I have been collecting for quite a while. The only items missing were a rug and some antique-looking chairs. The latter I found at the thrift store last week. One was bright orange, the other one neon green with purple zebra fabric. I'm pretty sure the lady at the store thought I was crazy for buying them, but with some fresh paint and a new cushion they now look great. As for the rug, I decided to do the painting-thing again. This time I made two different stencils to transfer the outlines and used a normal paintbrush to paint on the pattern.

Madly in Love

Words can not describe how much in love I am with our new digs. In fact, I don't think I want to move out of this house ever again.


View from the stairs into the entry/formal living room.
Pretty much everything you see in this picture is either from Craigslist (white towers, chairs, the play table you see a bit on the right), from the thrift store (foot stool) or right out of the trash (yes, the ornate mirror was something my dad pulled out of the trash when he was here visiting us two years ago)
Of course all of these things needed some serious updating (sanding, painting, reupholstering) but I love how they turned out and that they're just one of a kind.


Thats what the chairs looked like when we got them. They're from South Africa and hand carved. We bought them from a nice old man for 25 dollars each. The seating had to be completely re-done which took way longer than we anticipated. As for the wood, I decided to sand and use a chemical stripper as well, since the previous finish was so glossy that I was afraid no paint would stick to it. I honestly don't know if it made a difference, though. They still chip pretty easily.



One of the last things I did before we moved, was to give our old, stained, beige IKEA-rug a fresh new finish. A couple of coats of white latex paint, some grey stripes and you couldn't believe it was the same rug, that had been laying underneath our dining table for years.

More pics of the house to follow.

Anthro-Style

I've been eyeing these for a while now but just couldn't bring myself to shell out 100 bucks for the whole set. Then last week while digging through a box of craft stuff I discovered some old Fimo-clay and wondered if there was a way of making something like that myself. After shaping I baked the flowers for about 20min and then painted them with some acrylic paint. The vases I got for super cheap (about $2 each) but they were just clear glass, so they needed a coat of paint as well. I opted for good old spray paint, which worked pretty well. Finally I used a bit of hot glue to attach the finished flowers and voila: Flower vases - done.

New Season

Time to wear some butterflies.