the sweetest, little DIY ornaments you ever did see

i heart christmas! 

we usually wait to decorate until after miss nia's birthday, to be sure it doesn't get lost in the holiday shuffle. so now that we're in double digit december, all is clear. our tree is bought, up + decorated.

each year we give the kids a new ornament for the tree, which is a tradition i really love, especially after last year when my mom gave me a box of all of my childhood ornaments; so sweet + special.

this year i found these gorgeous boiled wool ornaments from the sweetest little shop in washington CT. the yellow toadstool nia picked out herself, amidst the pink and purple ones. and mr.fox is for cai made by roost (another amazing site that i love + frequent :) 

  

but i still wanted to find a little trinket for the tree for stuart. after some serious instagram inspiration from laura short, i whipped up these little angels in lieu of a store bought ornament. 

i made them using heavy pre-glittered paper for the wings. the weight really worked nicely to glue everything to and will hold up. you can find the paper, in a bunch of different shades, at any craft store. 

the little paper hats are cut from fun origami paper, that i doubled and reinforced with heavy paper behind them so they could stand up straight and take the weight of the glue and pom pom. 

 ta-da! how adorable, right!? i love them so much, i plan on hanging them up somewhere to stay all year round. 

rosemary gin fizz

we just had our 4th annual friendsgiving. it was sensational + exceptionally delicious.

we each prepare 2 or 3 dishes with the challenge of trying to top last years. amongst the white truffle oil smashed red potatoes, pancetta sautéed brussel sprouts with maple glaze, roasted beet salad and sage + garlic stuffed turkey, we made a signature cocktail for the evening; rosemary infused gin fizz.



the recipe was a combination of a few that sounded easy and sweet, but after reading this recipe, i based mine off of that.



rosemary gin fizz

2 C. rosemary infused simple syrup (1 c. sugar + 1c. water + handful rosemary sprigs, brought to boil until sugar dissolves. remove sprigs)

2 1/4 C. gin

2/3 C. freshly squeezed lemon juice

2 C. club soda

1 bottle Prosecco 

mix in large pitcher or punch bowl and add fresh sprigs of rosemary to each glass. (we added a splash of prosecco to our finished cocktails to add a bit more *sparkling* )

i have some sweet and flavorful cardamom + clover simple syrup from williams sonoma and am curious to try that with the gin + prosecco too. i'll keep you posted once i try it. perhaps this weekend : )

birthday wishes

                            

i just celebrated my 31st birthday with great friends and delicious food. i never have really felt myself getting older or feared being in my 30's , however, i just went for a 4 1/2 mile run yesterday and my body afterwards was screaming at me to stretch. it never did that when i was 25. 

i'm back!

well, needless to say i'm seriously slacking and totally fell behind on this sweet, little blog. lots of things to update you on; our perfect little prince Cai, the house slowly coming along, current cravings, recent delicious recipes and couches we're pining for...

coming right up!

here is the main reason for my delay...

design update: dining room

our dining room is probably my favorite room in the house so far. maybe it's because it's the only one nearest completion.

i think it reflects our style really well. it has amazing natural light spilling in all day long. there is the amazing original character and modern light fixture that work together so well. and perhaps my favorite bargain/design/piece is our barn door conversion farm table. 

but this room has gone through quite the transition and is still in progress...

here are a few before pictures...

stuart deserves an award for his patience on this room. it was originally a dar maroon color and took over 6 coats of paint. 6 coats!

i love love love this cabinet. we took the curtain out and just have a few glassware pieces in there, but ideally it will just display wine + liquor. 

before we did the barn door table, we had our old, solid teak table, which was our awesome focal piece in our apartments but now looks so tiny in our new house

and here in the (almost) final product

close up of the really beautiful barn door table

and these really perfect + modern hairpin legs i found on etsy. 

for now, this room is just about done. i still have visions of doing the dipped chairs and having a bench along one side of the table. i would also LOVE upholstered french provincial chairs for the heads of the table. and i'm always on the hunt for a gorgeous hutch or cabinet to make a bar station along the back wall. 

holy hiatus!

so sorry for the lack of updates. there's been so much happening here in suburbia and feverishly trying to get the house ready for spring time visitors and the baby (due any day now!)

first up: dinning room update. stay tuned!

white crush

loving these white looks

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headboards + sweet dreams

remember how i was just telling you we are totally overwhelmed with headboard /wall ideas for our bedroom?

well, just this week i stumbled upon this AMAZING site. ariele seems just awesome and her work has such a great feel. i would love to own a piece (specificially; a headboard. obvi)

here are some of her designs...

fireflies

kind of obsessed with this song right now + thought i would share

fireflies

beds & headboards

we LOVE our new bedroom. just love it!

we (finally) upgraded from a full size bed to a queen and it's been amazing sleep since. we bought this bed from west elm. we wanted something simple, clean and easy to adapt to whatever we decided on the "feel" of the room. it's perfect!

we shortly after decided we need some sort of headboard. while i would be head-over-heels for something fun like this rattan headboard

or something more luxurious and pretty like this gorgeous upholstered headboard, there is no way i could convince stuart to go for it.

so we've moved on to thinking of maybe reclaimed wood plank paneling the wall behind our bed in a gorgeous grey or faded color reclaimed wood. but then there comes a thousand questions to decide on...

vertical or horizontal? (we're thinking horizontal)

what color wood? grey? white wash? sun faded lavender is our ideal, but how long will it take us to find that and stay within our budget?

is it socially ok to go to a strangers house and ask them if we can pick apart their deteriorating barn or shed on their property? (probably not)

do we do the whole wall? or just 3/4ish to mimic wainscoting feeling?

here are some of our inspiration photos from pinterest

DIY hibiscus dyed curtains

we are so lucky to have gorgeous bay windows in our bedroom. but as of now they are only covered by hideous, old, dirty and cheap plastic blinds that came with the house. we've been searching for awesome curtains, but don't want to break the bank, especially as i have a tendency to change my mind on design ideas pretty quickly.

we think we want our overall look to be light, airy and a little pop of blues or violet colors on the ends to accent.

we were searching around bed, bath + beyond and we spotted these. i just loved the subtle texture. so we bought 8; 2 panels for each window, so they are still soft + light but thick enough to give us privacy.

HOWEVER, i scooped up all 8 of the ivory color. no white. so as we are putting them up and thinking they look gorgeous, the more that we put up, the worse it looks against our white trim. ugh.

so i've been toying with the idea to bleach them white (they don't even exist in white. i've checked everywhere!) but then what's the point of spending all that money to still have to fix them. annoying.

now i'm thinking maybe i'll experiment with one and dye it a very faint color. i'm loving this shade of pink + idea and the fact that it's natural. 

otherwise, i think i might just try good ol' rit dye and go for a shade of lilac. right now, i'm liking shade 600, 116 and 563. i'll keep you posted on the progress of the curtains.

say yes to the dress

well, i'm tickled pink to find our 'say yes to the dress' episode on youtube. we had SO MUCH FUN that day!

...and now back to reality.

stay cozy!

it's chilly today. we have big plans of grocery shopping, a few chores (maye sneaking in a much needed manicure) and then staying cuddled up on our new, big couch.

stay cozy!

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nursery inspiration

big + exciting news: we're expecting baby #2 in the springtime!

so, along with the my usual OCD and organizing plus the typical organizing you do when you move and are trying to settle into a new house, are now both being trumped by a severe case of nesting. hand in hand with nesting is planning for the new nursery. i have a zillion ideas leftover from nia's room or new things i've seen out + about. 

we don't know if we are having a boy or a girl, so we're thinking grey paint, white crib and i plan on refinishing one of the awesome dressers we just scored in either a mint or lavender color and the room having lots of warm wood tomes. 

here are some of my favorite looks from pinterest...