Home Sweet Home or By The Sea?

Home Sweet Home or By The Sea? I'll take them both! Maybe someday my home sweet home will be by the sea. I'm a bit fond of Myrtle Beach. The sweet houses, top, are the 11 luscious receipts from Jeri Aaron's House Row Swap http://artfulgathering.typepad.com. I made my artist's dozen to send while in Myrtle Beach, in fact, on vacation in April and blogged about them here http://lillysoflondonish.blogspot.com/2008/04/thinking-about-home.html.

I had almost forgotten about them when my package arrived from Jeri. I received great houses, from (top row, L-R) Virginia Madison, Jan Love, Sue Day, Kim Newberg (a fellow shabby sister), Susie Cazier and Anita Edmonds. In the bottom row (L-R) are Gloria H?, Gwynn Thoma, Susan Tidwell, Liane Ceglar and Gerdie Fisher. Many recipients are talking about adding hinges to make a folding screen-type display or mantle piece. Sounds like a great idea to me. I can't bear to put these away and not display them. For more eye candy and more houses, Jeri's blog is really a treat. Visit her older posts, too!

The 'By the Sea' page is a 4 x 4 I made tonight for the Chubbyville group all original page swap, hosted by Debbie Metti. I will mail this one off and get a different one in return. I am keeping all my monthly original receipts and other random 4 x 4's, and I will bind them into a book at the end of the year. My "Song of the Sea" page has a removable tag that can be used as a book mark. I attached the copper starfish charm and seashell with silk cord, after drilling a hole in the shell (and burning up a drill bit). Who knew seashells were so hard? I guess that explains how they survive for thousands of years. See you by the sea........

Little Pieces of Me

Pictured above and below are a few shots from around my house that I was inspired to share after seeing fellow blogger Kari Ramstrom of MN http://artsymama@blogspot.com/ published in the November issue of Romantic Country. How exciting for her!

Call me weird, but I like to keep my table set so I can enjoy my dishes, table linens and candles and rearranging them with the seasons. Since my kitchen is mustard and cranberry, this setting works about half the year. Then I like to go all white in the late winter/spring, and I also like to break out the silver and gold and maroon for the holidays.

The bowl of potpourri in the living room was an unfinished paper or bamboo bowl from TJ Maxx that I painted brown and turquoise. The word stones and glass pebbles came from Pottery Barn in a silver bowl/candle holder thingy I got on after-holiday clearance at Bath and Body Works for something like $2. Gotta love a sale!

The shells and bottles of sand go with my nautical/neutral bathroom and the little Halloween tableaus with grinning vintage ghouls and Peanuts are just temporary kitchen decor.

Of House and Home: Living In Color

Never one to miss an opportunity to get two birds with one stone (not really, would never hurt a flea, and BTW: what is it with me and birds lately?), I decided to do my ZNE Book Club http://www.znebookclub.info/ third week assignment to blog about "Home" and my ebay CaaT group, Complementary Art And Things Blog Cafe assignment on "Color" together.
Although we have only lived in this house two years out of more than 20, this is the first one that truly feels like home. Before that, I would often think of my childhood home as "home." But, this one - this one grabs me, gets me, and satisfies, for the most part, everyone under the roof. It is like living in the country, while still living in a subdivision.
Although it is an older neighborhood and older home by today's yuppie standards, it is so SOLID. I just love that. I feel safe, secure. It is is quiet. If you don't want to enjoy a storm, crickets, a train, whatever, you don't have to. But, if you do, we have two patios and a deck, although modest, they are outside with beautiful views. We have had deer at our front window (yes, looking in) and bunnies coming on to our patio, not to mention the neighbor's two golden retrievers, Grace and Ellie, who were used to handouts from the previous neighbors. Apparently those folks thought throwing bones in the yard was a good idea. (We spent weeks on cleanup and rehab).
Although there are some older features like non-buried power lines, the inside is thoroughly modern, Millie, and the 32' foot long kitchen is a dream, and was the selling feature (as the green and gold shag carpets were not). We are lucky enough to have a living room, family room and finished basement great room, so everyone has a place to go. The 4th bedroom in the finished basement is perfect for adult daughter, Pookie. (OT- I love the blog Pookie and Fig just for name's sake http://pookieandfig.blogspot.com/).
Another funky older feature is that the first owners had a chimney, mantle and wood stove in what was formerly the kitchen or family room, and is now the laundry room. Not too many people get a stone chimney and mantle in their laundry room (see pix). It is the perfect place for my Americana, basket and primitive collections in red, white and blue, of course. I do love color, and my son's bedroom is also r/w/b, although mostly because that is what it was before and this house came with a bedroom with red carpet - the ONLY carpet we kept. Lucky him.
Most of my walls are all off white, also old-school but so much the better for decorating. However, the kitchen does have two cranberry and two faded mustard walls, which I love.
Most everything else is a muted mix, earthy tones of tans, sages, browns, faded blues. I love my ocean bathroom and the brown bathroom. The main bedroom is robin's egg blue with some bright salmon paisley from Land's End, which somehow works great. My office has touches of lavender and is where I keep a lot of my whimsy stuff.
Although all my other country cutie crap has been relegated to garage sales, I just couldn't part with some of these red, white and blue items. I especially love my prim Americana angel I've had so long I don't know where I got her, and I am proud of my cross stitch sampler, a county fair blue ribbon winner. Also love the r/w/b fabric crow on an antique doorknob base.