Tim’s son in law introduced us to a refreshing new drink, its called the Imperial Fizz. He had it at PF Chang’s. When he first told us about the drink, I was skeptical – mango rum (kinda eww to my mind), orange juice, lemon and Kirin beer?
Imperial Fizz Cocktail
And yet, it works! Here’s the recipe, let me know if you try it and like it!
…a lamp that I love, but sadly don’t have room for any longer.
Vintage Hand Painted Lamp I'm selling on Craigslist
The ad says I’m redecorating, and that’s no lie, as we all know, I’m almost always redecorating. I recently took a hard look at the living room and realized its crammed with all sorts of stuff. I wish I could say “artfully overstuffed” but to my eye, its a small living room and it looks crammed full of ‘stuff’. Stuff that I’ve loved, but its time to reduce the clutter. (And as part of the decluttering, this lamp has no where to live, including not a space inch in storage!) Hopefully my decluttering efforts will help fund some other purchases for other sadly neglected rooms.
Close up of the hand painted brown parrot tulips
Lamp info:
Cream background with hand painted brown Parrot tulips. Very hefty and substantial – must see to appreciate! Slight crackle effect enhances patina. No visible cracks or defects. Rewired in 2006.
Are you interested? Contact me: designgumbo [at] gmail [dot] com or via the Craigslist ad.
is fabulous! With few exceptions, I loved the picks and then spent the last hour downloading her selections from iTunes…Check it out:
Fall 2011 Playlist from House of Fifty
The June malaise seems to be gone and I am once again interested in sprucing up our nest. In addition to creating the kitchen valance (which, by the way, was half created and then languished for well over 4 months before completion…) I was inspired to whip out the sewing machine to create a lumbar pillow for the new modern sofas I bought for the living room. I made it from the remaining valance fabric.
Ironic story: I had not used the sewing machine in the 2 years since I purchased it, and I could not recall where I had stashed it. After looking for it high and low I resigned myself to hand sew the whole thing, until Tim came home and said, “Oh, I know where that is located…” and about 15 minutes later, the pillow was completed.
A shot of color and pattern for the sofa
Tim was once a Korean translator in the Air Force in a time long ago, and a world far, far away (the 1980’s to be exact) and he brought home from his Korean travels a pretty writing desk. Since 2006, that pretty little writing desk has been collecting dust in our bedroom hallway. Pretty, but not very useful. Hoping to get a more inspiring look for our entryway, I placed it on the library table that serves as the living sofa console, and key drop spot. Not sure if I like it there, but am enjoying the bromeliad, coral and green paper mache Haitian bird. What do you think? Does it work there? Too much?
Korean writing desk, bromeliad, green bird and coral
And finally, my newest acquisition, my Red Ear Turtle shell. I’ve seen the turtle shell decorating trend for several years now, and have been mostly priced out of the market. Case in point: In the current issue of Lonny Magazine about “Guy Friendly Guide to Decorating”, and which showed 3 turtles (of similar size to mine) by the artist Eduardo Garza. Sourcing them at his website, I about fell off my Cole Haans – are you ready for this? They ranged in price from $895 – $1495!!! Mine is not quite so dearly priced – I paid $45 (including shipping and handling) on eBay. For the base, I simply placed it a top a brass candlestick from my mother.
Red ear turtle shell
I’m looking for two more, one specifically: a Diamondback Terrapin, since Tim and I both graduated from University of Maryland, and that’s our mascot. That one will most likely be a long time coming as they are endangered. If you happen to run across one in good shape, and reasonably priced, let me know!
I once read a quote about Paris apartments and decorating. it went something like this:
“Decorating your home is a lifelong journey. As soon as you believe you are finished, completely finished decorating it, then you die.” – Author Unknown
Keeping that in mind, I’m not going to die any time soon, as there’s always something else that need to be done. I think I’ve shed the malaise that haunted me in June, as we’ve done a lot more work in the backyard, although sometimes doesn’t look like it. But that’s another post.
Our large casement window in the kitchen has been missing some sort of fabric to soften its ‘squariness’, and tie the room to the rest of the house. I knew what I wanted to do for the actual treatment, it was finding the fabric that I could live with that was the problem.
Our kitchen before, with our dear departed Abby, circa 2006
Finally, I found some orange ikat fabric at Ballard Designs (now on sale from $25/yard to $14.99/yard). A tutorial by Effortless Style gave me the inspiration to try my hand at creating my own “box pleat” valance. And here’s the happy outcome. Please excuse the lack of color correction on these images. No matter what I did, I could not get the color edit in Photoshop to do what I wanted.
Window with newly created valance
Here’s the valance from another perspective and time of day. This and the 18/10 flatware sets clearance were two things I have managed lately and am very happy with both:
Valance viewed from another perspective
A while back I teased about my backyard clean up campaign, and even shared with you what the backyard “terrace” looked like before we cleaned it it. Now, here’s shot of what the backyard originally looked like when we bought the house in August of 2006. Note the “crap” on the terrace is not ours, but the previous owners. They had not removed all their flotsam and jetsam at the time of the photo.
The backyard before it was really ours… festooned with previous owners ‘crap’ on the back terrace.
Coming soon, what we did this weekend to make it look a bit nicer…
Hey Y'all, I'm Carollynn and this blog is about creating my personal design gumbo.
You'll find a little bit of this, and a little bit of that as I make my way through interior design ideas, yummy recipes, stories about my two Grrr Girls and the flotsam and jetsam stuff that makes up a life.
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