Time for a Change

Well, the Style de Boheme store will be coming, but not as soon as I'd planned. I've decided to do some things around home before I launch the store. In fact, I think I may wait until fall to launch, as my very dear friend, Barbara will be coming to visit and I want to keep my time free. I also want to have the house looking spiffy when she gets here!

I've been putting ideas together for my decorating schemes, and came across a magazine that I LOVE! Flea Market Style is probably the best magazine I've come across in some time. I saw a mood board on page 40 of the current publication, and that was enough to get me moving. While I've seen a number of beautiful mood or inspiration boards, this is the first one I've seen in black and white. It is truly stunning! So...it was off to the Goodwill Store to buy a bulletin board that I could transform. This is my version. I painted the entire bulletin board white, and then to add a bit of dimension, I rubbed some gold paint into the recesses. Then the fun began! I displayed some of my favorite magazine clippings, a few old photos, some vintage lace, and a cherub head on the board. I think my favorite addition to the mood board was some jeweled push pins that I made.

I'd recently picked up a bargain desk and my favorite junque store, and the mood board was the perfect accessory to top it. This is where I'm planning to do most of my painting and paper projects. I can just look up for some great inspiration! As you can see, I've used various pieces of glassware and pottery in white and gold to hold many of my art supplies.

You can see in the photo below, that I've also found the perfect place for my decoupaged chair. It's another of my flea market redo's. I've covered it with vintage sheet music, old French love letters, and wallpaper scraps from the 1930's and 40's; with a few photos and magazine clippings added for good measure.

I have so many projects in my head right now I can hardly wait to move.  But for now, it's time for bed....

Until next time,

Musings

What a day! I've been prepping for tomorrow's photo-shoot most of the day. Gathering merchandise and props takes longer than you might imagine. I think I've found a printer who can handle doing art prints at a reasonable cost. I sent files today and am anxious to see the finished result, and I'm hoping to carry prints as well as originals in my soon-to-be store on Facebook.

The birdhouse shown here will be one of the items that I'll be adding to my inventory. I call it "Raven's Repose". It is decoupaged with gothic images reproduced from vintage sources. The hardware is vintage.

Time to start wrapping up for the evening. Tomorrow promises to be even busier than today! First, my favorite yard sale of the year, the Cedar Street yard sale in Belfast, Maine. Afterward back to my house to photograph merchandise for the Style de Bohême store! Until next time,

Maine Fiber Frolic

Last Saturday, a couple of my friends and I went to the Tenth Annual Maine Fiber Frolic in Windsor, Maine. It was quite an interesting experience. There were vendors of myriads of different types of wool and fiber, as well as the animals that produced that fiber. This was of particular interest to my friend, Pat Bunce(pictured left), creator of Whatsoever Things wearable art. I'll be featuring some of her beautiful bags and jackets in my upcoming online store! Pat purchased a large bag of alpaca fleece and some gorgeous hand-spun, hand dyed yarn. I can't wait to see what she does with it! There were lots of vendors present, and quite a variety of demonstrations....everything from carding wool, to spinning it, to weaving it....etc. It was very interesting to see all of the workmanship that went into the incredible yarns. The woman on the right is from Good Karma Farm, in Belfast, Maine, where alpacas are raised, and wool yarn is produced by hand. You can see some of the lovely yarns in the background. This is one of the many alpacas exibited at the event. They are lovely animals to look at, but not as warm and cuddly as an animal lover such as myself might hope for. Still, they were quite fascinating to watch. The animals were definitely my favorite attraction! This large ram was one of the friendliest animals. Maybe he realized that I'm an Aries! At any rate, he seemed to enjoy being petted. His wool was incredibly thick! I had to work my way down about 3 or 4 inches to find his skin to scratch behind his ears! My other favorites were the babies! I could have easily taken the little baby goat that Pat was holding home with me. He was as sweet and cuddly as a puppy! The little goats were just as playful as cuddly, though. It was a delight to see them jumping up in the air, and then chasing each other, and sometimes butting heads. Like their parents, the baby alpacas (above) did not care much for handling, but they were adorable to watch. These two appear to be sharing secrets. Well, I've got lots of work to do to get the store ready, and a very full weekend planned, so it's time to move on. I hope you enjoyed the pictures. Until next time...

My Front Porch

For my first blog post, I thought I'd share with you one of my very favorite places in the summertime....my front porch. Living here in Maine, spring and summer are always a welcome treat after the cold, gray of winter. Each year one of the things I most look forward to is decorating my porch, and every year, I try to do something a bit different. Feeling the budget crunch, I've tried to recycle, re-use, and "steal" from other parts of the house to come up with a new look. The photo at left shows some of last year's tag sale finds put to use: A wire header, a vintage cherub, and a pair of cherub wall hangings.

I always pull this iron table and pair of chairs onto the porch. This year, I decided to dress them in blue and white, and to carry the blue and white theme through out my porch and plantings. The tureen lid (right) and the wicker chair (below right) were borrowed from the house for this year's porch setting. The wild violets and pansies (below left) were a welcome return from last year.

This is the plant stand that sits on the left side of my porch.

The planter on the far left on the bottom shelf is one that I made last year from an old silver plated chafing dish.

Since this is the shady side of the porch, I planted some white impatiens along with one of my very favorite plants, dusty miller. I hope they do as well as last year's plantings did. The step stones in front of this flower bed are one of my favorite things....My father, his lovely wife, Louise, and I made them last year when they came up for a visit. In addition to being quite pretty (I think), they bring back some wonderful memories! Another of my favorite things is my pair of cherubs. I call them, 'my girls' and love to dress them up!

On the other end of the porch, I have one small window. I planted the window box with pretty white petunias and blue lobelia. I've also got some dusty miller planted at the back of the box, but so far, it's not tall enough to be seen. This table sits under the window. Aren't the pansies just beautiful?

This is an old child's chair that I picked up along side the road. I love how it is so naturally distressed! I planted a colader of petunias and used an old enamel-ware piece as a drip pan. I think this looks so cheerful! I love mixing refined and rustic elements together!

The last photo is of a friendly cat who stopped by to watch me work. I just love summertime!

Thanks for stopping by today. As this is my first post, I'm hoping my layouts will improve as I get used to using "Blogger". I hope you're having a wonderful summer, and I'd love to see what you're doing with your outdoor spaces. Until next time,